Tag: Handstand

Front Squats with OLY Shoes

I didn’t sleep very well last night. Was actually up, rolling around in bed at 5:20 and thought about going to the 5:45am class. That didn’t happen though so I went to the 9am. My lower abs have a weird soreness that I can’t really explain. I’m pretty sure it’s from over an hour of back tuck progressions and attempts.

Strength

Front Squats 5×5

It’s been a long time since I front squatted heavy. My 1RM is 215# and it was set way back in May. Since the number was so old I figure I must have improved quite a bit, which made me go higher than I should have in my last set. I’ll know for next weeks sets of 3 though. Here are my warm-up and working sets:

  • 7 @ 45#
  • 7 @ 95#
  • 5 @ 135#
  • 5 @ 155#
  • 5 @ 175#
  • 5 @ 195#
  • 2 @ 215#

I probably could have fought for the 3rd rep on the last set, but I gave in too easily and bailed on the weight. I knew it wasn’t going to a 4th or 5th rep, that’s for sure. Next week I’ll hit that 215# for 3 reps easily. This was the first time wearing Olympic lifting shoes and they felt good with the squats.

Accessory

4 rounds

  • 12 Weighted Step-ups (18″)
  • 30s Rest
  • 45s Plank
  • 30s Rest

For the first 2 sets I held 45# DBs and then used 53# KBs for the last 2 sets.

WOD #1

In 10:00…

  • 21-15-9
    • Thrusters (75#)
    • Burpees
  • AMRAP: 150m Run

This was sort of a new format. The 21-15-9 portion was like a buy-in for the runs. I did all of the burpees unbroken, as well as rounds of 21 and 9 thrusters. In the round of 15 I broke it down into sets of 8 and 7. I finished that first part in about 6:05 and then got through 5 runs with about 10 seconds left on the clock.

Finisher

Wall Facing Hand Stands

Yesterday at Gym Jesters they showed us a way to walk up the wall while facing it. The goal is to get your face, chest, hips, and feet all touching the wall. This works on the hollow body position, which is the foundation of most gymnastics movements. I could really tell a difference in how this felt compared to kicking up the a handstand hold and not facing the wall.

WOD #2

After mowing the lawn I was in the mood for another workout. With the Every Second Counts competition coming up in less than 3 weeks it’s time to start working on the movements in the WODs. One of them is a 95# “Grace” so I want to work on heavier stuff.

10:00 EMOTM

  • 3 Clean & Jerks (135#)

This felt good. I getting them done in about 25 seconds each round. I’m unable to cycle them, so it wastes quite a bit of time when I have to drop the bar from overhead and get it steady again before doing the next rep. In the final minute I did 6 reps instead of 3 and finished with a few seconds to spare. Total of 33 Clean and Jerks in 10 minutes.

Hold that Finish

Other than my lower back I’m feeling good. Went to the 5:30pm class today and with all the rain we got last night it was really humid out.

Warm-up

5 rounds

  • 15s Jumping Jacks
  • 15s Air Squats
  • 15s Mountain Climbers
  • 15s Jump Squats

WOD

20-19-18…3-2-1

  • Burpees
  • Russian KBS (53#)

Wow, this one will kill you. I did all of my reps unbroken for both movements and only rested during transitions. I think we had 16 people in class so it was a scramble for KBs. I ended up with a 53#, which was just fine by me. It allowed me to keep a high intensity and maximize my power output. I finished in 25:51 with an ocean of sweat under me.

Finisher

5 rounds

  • 30s Bottom Squat Hold
  • 30s Handstand
  • 30s Plank

This looks rather easy, but it definitely was not, especially being so sweaty. When I went up for my 3rd handstand, the mat started to go flying and I nearly ended up on my head. My arms were even shaving in the 3rd round of plank. Great way to finish of the workout.

On Vacation!

I’m officially on vacation and not back to work until the 16th. Woohoo! I’ve been looking forward to this for a couple of months.

My lower back and legs are pretty sore from doing 135 reps of 155# deadlifts yesterday.

Warm-up

5 rounds (10 min cap)

  • 5 Vertical Jumps
  • 5 Air Squats
  • 5 Broad Jumps

I absolutely loved the jumps in this warm-up, but didn’t understand the need for squats when we had 250 con deck. For the vertical jumps I switched between reaching with my right and left hand and touched the 10 foot wall ball mark each time. I took the broad jumps nice and slow and jumped over one width of plywood plus one width of horse mat on each jump. We had plenty of time to finish so I wanted to make the most of each jump. Did I mention how much I loved the jumps?! 🙂

WOD

5 rounds

  • 50 Air squats
  • Rest as long as it took to complete the reps

5 rounds

  • 10 Strict Pull-ups
  • Rest 2x as long as it took to complete the reps

10 rounds

  • 100m Sprint (50m down and back)
  • Rest 1m

This was a long one. I finished in 36:20.

During the last 2 rounds of pull-ups I had to use the red band, which is almost no help at all, so they were still a struggle. Having to keep track of the time it takes to do a round and then do math on top of that, while you’re fatigued, is no joke. I understand the point is to give everyone appropriate rest times based on their work time, but I’d rather see set rest periods in a WOD. I was so gassed after this workout that when I filled up my water bottle, I went to take a drink without putting the top back on and dumped half of it down the front of me and all over the floor. Smooth!

Finisher

3 rounds

  • 20 tuck jumps
  • 30s Handstand Hold

I was able to get in one round before Cari cut us off for the end of class. Going upside down at the end of such a grueling workout probably wasn’t the best idea, so I’m not too mad about missing out on 2 more rounds.

Tomorrow morning I head up north to Long Lake for 10 days of relaxation with my family. I’m taking workout equipment with me and I have WODs already planned out since I’ll have an endless supply of free time.

Back at Survival Fitness

I was absolutely exhausted last night when I got home. Went to bed at 10pm for a solid 10.5 hours of sleep! First day back at Survival Fitness this morning and it felt great. It was a pretty big class from what I remember the size being a few months ago. I’m excited that SF will be moving to a much bigger space soon.

Warm-up

  • 300m Power skipping while with OH PVC
  • 30 Air Squats
  • 20 PVC Pass thrus
  • 30 OH Squats

The power skipping was pretty taxing, especially having to hold the PVC overhead. I hadn’t done anything like that before.

Skill

5 rounds

  • 30s Handstand
  • 30s Deep squat hold

This was really easy considering I’ve been doing scaled handstand push-ups. I could feel it in my wrists a bit though.

WOD

  • 1 Mile run
  • 100 box jumps
  • MAX HR push-ups
  • 100 sit-ups
  • MAX pull-ups
  • 100 KBS
  • 1 Mile run

There are over 20 people from SF doing the Tough Mudder next weekend, so this WOD was designed to prepare them. It was a good test for me as well since I have the duathlon coming up in two weeks. I ran the first mile in about 6:40. The last time I did a mile test was November 20, 2011 in 7:47, so I was thrilled with my progress. I used a 24 inch box for the jumps without a problem. It’s just that 100 is a lot to knock out in a row. For maximum HR push-ups I was able to get 26 unbroken. I split sit-ups into sets of 50-25-25. I went with strict dead hang pull-ups, since the bars aren’t high enough for me to do kipping, and set a new PR with 7. The worst part of this workout was doing 100 KBS. I used a 53# KB and broke them into sets of 10 for most of the way. The last mile took me about 8:20 for a total time of 39:19. Along with another guy, we were the only people to finish under the 40:00 goal. He smoked me pretty good on both runs, but since I did fewer push-ups and pull-ups I was able to get a head start on the last run.

Deadlift Week

My upper body is a sore this morning from the snatching we did yesterday. I was awake about an hour earlier than normal thinking about some work stuff got out of bed and accomplished a few things before I headed in to the box.

Warm-up

  • 500m Row
  • 2 Rounds
    • 10 PVC Shoulder Pass-thrus
    • 10 PVC Pull-throughs (laying on ground, pull legs through and extend again)
    • 10 NPU Burpees
    • 30s Wall Handstand

We usually have the option to run or row in the warm-up so I’ve been switching it up to rowing lately since I had always done the run. I stayed in the handstand closer to 40s because I could use the strength there.

Strength

3 Sets

  • 8-10 Weighted Push-ups, 2-0-X-1 tempo
  • 60s Rest
  • 15 KBS
  • 60s Rest

First time doing weighted push-ups for me. I started off with a 35# plate on my back and did 10 reps, then 45# for 10 reps, and finally 55# for 9 reps. For the KBS I used 53#, 53#, and 62#.

WOD

15m AMRAP

  • 9 Deadlifts
  • 12 HR Push-ups
  • 15 Box Jumps

Must be deadlift week or something. The Rx was 185# and I wanted to go with it, so I did. We all knew HR push-ups were going to be a bitch since we had already killed those muscles. I used a 24in box for box jumps. For the WOD I completed 7 rounds plus 9 deadlifts.

I was trying to keep good form throughout, but could feel it slipping away as I got further and further along. 8 sets of 9 is a lot of deadlifting 185# pounds. In fact that’s moving 13,320 pounds over the 15 minutes. I sure hope the first Open WOD doesn’t have any deadlifts, because I’m doing it tomorrow morning. I guess I’ll find out tonight when they announce the workout.