Dan's lose the 'blob' journal

[Chunky_Dan]

Hey guys, after some great advice in the beginners section I've decided to start up a journal.

My main goal is to increase my fitness and as a byproduct lose a few lbs into the bargain as I'm definitely a tiny bit more rotund than I'd like to be!

It's been suggested that crossfit fits in really well with my goals and after a tryout session on the 16/4/07 I've decided that i really like the crossfit method. It's not nice to me and it's not pretty, however I've got to admit that the fault is mine not crossfits and the programme is what I need to be doing, as one of your sigs goes... 'pain is weakness leaving the body'

So I am going to focus my workout mainly around crossfits WOD I have access to a full gym so I should be able to do most of the routines with a healthy dose of pain and a fair bit of advice from you guys.

I do plan on supplementing my crossfit training with some more traditional training routines, for example I plan on doing some weight work on 3 days a week, the weight work will be separated from WOD by at least 8 hours. I'm also going to be doing additional cardio on 3 days a week, this may be performed directly after WOD depending on time constraints.

For weights I am planning to be building up to olympic lifts but as I need to learn these lifts I will initially be performing mainly heavy compound lifts, obviously with regards to my lifting I'll have to be sensible to make sure i'm not doing too much too soon.

I'll be sharing all my successes and failures with you guys over the next few months and I feel it'll be an interesting journey (for me at least -you guys will be bored stiff!)

I hope you'll give me as much advice as possible, I'm an absolute beginner at crossfit and any routines or anything you could suggest to me would be very greatfully received. The same goes for my overall training regime, if I'm doing something wrong please tell me so I can make changes. I don't want my ego hindering my progress.

Speak to you all soon.

16/4/07
'Cindy'
5 pullups
10 pushups
15 squats
complete as many rounds as possible within 20 minutes

managed 13 rounds, but the last couple were me clearly cheating so I'm going to say 11 clean rounds. All I'm going to say is 'ouch' I felt very alive after this workout, only problem I had is for the first 15mins I wasn't entirely sure I wanted to be.

17/4/07
Bench 3x6
Dips 2x6
Shoulder press 2x6

8 hours later
Crossfit warm up (ok warm up - seriously that's a warm up?? blimey!)
I then skipped for 10 minutes in 2 min intervals with 30 secs rest.

tomorrow my new regime begins properly so any advice would be appreciated.

Cheers, Dan

[gymgirl]

HI, Dan!

I'm so glad you decided to start an online journal here, and hooray for another crossfitter!

I agree Crossfit sounds like the perfect program to help you meet your goals. You mentioned you are wanting to learn the olympic lifts. I'd suggest looking on the main page of the crossfit site and checking out the video's posted under the WOD's. The ones from Coach Mike Burgener are hands down priceless. There are also some great demo's on the main page too.

I really look forward to following your workouts.

[Chunky_Dan]

Not a great day today, after training non stop since saturday i had a few aches and pains, still went through my routine but if i feel rough tomorrow I'll probably treat is as a rest day and just walk a couple of miles.

18/04/07
CFWU

3 rounds for time
500m rowing machine
21 75lb hang snatches.


/edit forgot to mention i subbed 50lb hang snatches as I've never done the movement properly before.

I knocked my stopwatch halfway through but I'd say this took me somewhere over 14-15mins

rowing splits were 1:57, 2:14, 2:32
felt exhausted on the snatches, come rep 12-14 each time I was gone and had to compose myself to carry on.

i then ran treadmill for about 12 minutes alternating every 2 mins between 8 and 6mph.

no pain no gain but I'm going to listen to my body tomorrow with regards to a rest day.

any feedback is as always welcome.

[gymgirl]

fantastic job Dan! you did excellent on today's WOD. Those hang power snatches are very tough, you were smart to go a bit lighter if you didn't feel 100% comfortable with the movement.

soon you'll be known at your gym as the guy who does weird stuff...then the weird looks will follow.

Anyway, great job today and remember: It dosen't have to be fun, to be fun.

[minime]

hey dan, welcome! Wow for a newbie to crossfit you sure are doing great! 11 round cindy on your first go is quite a feat! great job on everything so far. Oh and 1:57 is a great 500m time :

[tim_mcf]

Nice work, keep it up!

[Chunky_Dan]

ok, todays been a rest day. walked a few miles but thats it, on the upside my shins are feeling a lot better, I've got a work friends' leaving do tomorrow night so it's an early morning crossfit for me tomorrow as I'm in work all day, depending on if the new wod is uploaded I may be performing...

'michael'
3 rounds for time...
run 800m
50 Back extensions
50 situps

man i hate running and i just can't run fast at all so expect a pretty lame time. If i have any energy left in me whatsoever I may add a little weight work afterwards though as it'll have to be very brief in duration and will be straight after my WOD it probably won't be much, it's been a few days since I've done legs so I might hit a few squats, just a 3x5 routine probably.

Won't get a chance to post my time tomorrow due to this leaving party so will post when back from work on saturday along with saturdays workout.

have a great day/evening depending on your timezone and I'll speak to you all soon.

[gymgirl]

Originally Posted by Chunky_Dan

'michael'
3 rounds for time...
run 800m
50 Back extensions
50 situps

I may add a little weight work afterwards though as it'll have to be very brief in duration and will be straight after my WOD it probably won't be much, it's been a few days since I've done legs so I might hit a few squats, just a 3x5 routine probably.
.

LOL, that was exactly my plan for today. do michael then do my 5x5 weights afterwards....let me just tell you the weights didn't happen. I even rested for 15 min and only made it through 2 of my 5 weight sets and I hadn't even gotten to my working weight!

Anyway, you'll do great on Michael, when you feel like you want to give up just push through! Glad you hear your shins are feeling better and have fun at your friends party.

[Chunky_Dan]

Sorry for no Update, bit of a wild night, but moderated my alcohol intake and made sure i took on plenty of water, lack of sleep wasn't good though.

Did a scaled version of Michael with 35 situps and 35 back extensions 19:37
I was pretty cool with the su and be but the running absolutely killed me!

Did nothing at all on saturday due to tiredness and today i went in and went on the rower for 20 mins to work my way back in.

Tomorrow I'll be doing 2 WODS to catch up

Lynne
5 rounds for max reps
Bodyweight Bench
Bodyweight Pullups



Overhead Squats
7 sets for max load
3 Overhead squats.

I'll do Lynne in the morning then the squats in the evening overall should make for a very good full body workout for me!

I'll catch up by doing the same split of 2 Wod on tuesday before reverting to normal.

[Chunky_Dan]

heh, well pretty exhausted now, did Lynne with splits of:

Bench Pullups
13 18
8 13
9 11
6 9
4 7

Bench I had to use a lower weight than body as i can only do 2 reps at bodyweight so dropped it from 100k to 80k. Pretty obvious from this that my stamina and ability to recuperate are pretty poor at the moment, they'l improve with work though. I was trying to take no real rest between rounds but typically i'd say there was about 1 min rest.

With regards the overhead squats the real thing i noticed was my lack of balance, I'm unsure if i did them correctly so i'll be reading up on them but the real limit to the weight i could carry was trying not to tilt forwards or backwards, as such i just did all 7 rounds with 120lb. I allowed myself 30 secs rest between rounds.

Cardio I did a 1k race on rower in morning with 500m split/30 sec rest
Evening session involved a 1mile run.

pretty spent to be fair. Bit worried about the workout I'm doing tomorrow morning as there is no way i can do anything like 50 pullups. I'll figure something out though I'm sure.

[.V.]

Bah, another crossfitter.


Just kidding. Looks like a good thing, gives great results. Not something I'm terribly familiar with, but do respect the workouts.

Congratulations for having the spine to jump into something so demanding.

[tim_mcf]

Nice work! Your pullup strength is pretty impressive, and 20K isn't much below your bodyweight.

Regarding the pullups, just go for it and see what you can do. Try learning how to kip, that helps:

http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/eva-on-kipping.wmv

Or you can do jumping pullups with slow negatives, or whatever. If you keep going, you will eventually bang out 50 reps, it just may be slower than you would like. Judging from your numbers, I bet you get there faster than me.

Although maybe not...for ultra-high rep pullup workouts like that one, I often use an Iron Woody band for assistance:

Iron Woody Fitness Bands and Equipment

Loop it around the bar, step into it with one foot, and off I go. Brings my puny 7 or 8 reps up to 20 at a time or so, and I'm able to maintain the blistering pace required by a metcon WOD. Without the band I get fatigued so fast that I have to rest, thereby losing the metabolic hit you get from going all-out.

So that's an option. Jumping pullups is an option too. Remember that this workout is designed to target your metabolism, not your arms as such; it's a metcon workout which uses pullups, not a pullup workout. Jumping pullups mean that you're doing the same amount of work - your chin goes over the bar 50 times - you're just using your legs as well as your arms. Not cheating. You do what you have to to get the metabolic effect.

[Chunky_Dan]

Thanks for advice tim and cheers for the welcome all.

Ok today was a bit of a failure for me, I didn't do the pullup one as I only managed to get to gym in the morning so I did the current WOD

Linda.
1 1/2x bodyweight deads
1x bodyweight bench (-20kg for me)
3/4 bodyweight clean (140lb for me)
sets of 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1

heh, I flunked at sets of 4 here, just couldn't move the weights when i got down to reps of 4, I was absolutely gone. To be honest I went through doing my 10 deads 10 bench 10 cleans then my 9 deads 9 bench 9 cleans and by that point i was sweating and wondering how on earth i was going to be carrying on.

Still it's all about improvement and my muscular endurance will get far better with time, In other weight lifting schemes I've always stuck to low volume so moving into something where I'm asking my body to do do 50+ reps of an exercise is a big jump i suppose.

I also hit the CFWU and 10 minutes running.

I'll do at least 1 WOD tomorrow but Thursday I'm setting aside specifically for some Squats, nice regular 5x5 heavy weight squatting. It'll be a relief to be doing exercises I actually know!

[gymgirl]

Hey Fantastic job Dan!

I don't know if you read the comments today under Linda on the CF website, but EVERYONE struggles with that workout. It is very impressive for someone who has not been doing this sort of training to make it as far as you did.

also your Lynne performace was fantastic as well. You are a pull-up machine!

Keep up the great work!

Oh and I know that exact feeling you are describing, when you go through rounds 10, 9 then you think how on earth am I going to finish this?!?

anyway great job!

[tim_mcf]

Good work on Linda. The first time I tried that one, I only got to the 6's, and ran out of time (it was about an hour and a half at that point). Actually, my entire goal for 2007 is just to be able to do that workout, AT ALL (as rx'ed). Usually I subtract a certain % from my bodyweight on all exercises. Tomorrow I think I'm doing it at minus 25%, if I remember right. She's a hard one.