Jan 4th – Still Hungover?

Well just like i expected…I wouldnt be able to workout for a few days. NYE absolutely killed me. Im still off. I think this is the worst ive ever been hungover. i tell people that partying is like being an athlete. if you dont train for it a hard event will beat you up pretty good. When i first started racing, hangovers were easy and racing was hard. Now after all of these years of being a dedicated athlete again, racing is easy and hangovers are hard.

20mins easy on the rollers in the morning

At night I did some strength work. Front box squats
5 x 3
95/135/185/225/235/245/265/275lbs (1 rep PR)

New Years Eve

Tonight is gonna be insane. Gotta get the workout done in the morning cuz its likely that i wont be able to workout again for a few days after tonights madness

5mins x 2, 5mins rest
288/281watts

1min x 5, 1 min rest
369/370/352/361/374watts

December 30th – Trainer

I didnt sleep as well as i would have liked. I didnt have much for this workout today. i broke my tabata sprints in half in order to make sure i was hitting some decent power numbers. After seeing the results i’m considering taking up this approach and programming more sets of tabatas into a workout together. i just wanted to stay above approx 425watts. i achieved that. I will try 4 sets of 4 at 425min watts in the future

10min ramp up. last 5 mins at 270watts

tabata
475/490/471/477watts
2:30 rest
478/443/429/416watts

December 29th – pistols

I was cooked afterwork today so i stayed home and did some pistols while watching television
5 sets of 3 each leg, no bounce out of the bottom

December 27 – Crossfit

1k row 4:09 (worked on form, strong pulls)

Split Jerks
95/135/185/205/225/235f

December 26th

Trainer session
5min x 2 with 5min rest
300/272watts

1min x 5 with 1min rest
300/300/296/321/334watts

Christmas Day Tabata Squats

I couldnt find a Crossfit box open today so I opted for a quick bout of Tabata squats in my parents family room. I didnt have any luck trying to convince them to join me.

tabata squats
18/16/16/16/16/16/16/18

Friday December 24th – DT

Strength
5×3 front box squat
135/185/225/245/265

Metcon
DT
Five rounds for time of:
155 pound Deadlift, 12 reps
155 pound Hang power clean, 9 reps
155 pound Push jerk, 6 reps

scaled to 95lbs 4:50

GHD situps
30 reps

Thursday December 23rd – Recovery

I was feeling pretty beat today. I’ve been getting good hours of sleep but not feeling like I’m rested. I did a 2k row at 7:34 then just played around with some skills around the gym.

Wednesday December 22nd – Pistols

I didnt have time to train so I did 5×5 pistols each leg and some mobility stuff before work

Tuesday December 21st – single leg drills and tabatas

6 x 15 seconds each, single leg drills

tabatas. these killed me. i went with a larger gear than usual. i wanted to stay in my typical ranges above 400. the first couple my goal was to be over 500 watts. i was pretty close. i was deep in the hurt box on the last 4 rounds. i could barely turn the pedals on the last two

519/501/477/451/417/418/352/282
avg 427

Friday December 17th – Explosive Strength

I did ass to ankles back squats with a pause at the bottom. Explode through the movement with a minimum 12″ jump at the top. Surprising how much these gassed me. My intent was to work on hip flexibility with the depth and pause. All the while working on explosive speed strength with the rate of movement and jump at the top.

5×8 w/ 65lbs

Thursday December 16th – Tabata sprints

418/455/420/422/410/397/410/399
avg 416watts

Wednesday December 15th – Front Squats and GHDs

2 reps each of front box squat
185/225/230/230/235/245

2×25 ghd situps and back extensions

Tuesday December 14th – Tabata Sprints

Gotta get some time on the trainer…

single leg drills
1 min each leg then 3 times 30sec each leg

tabata
663/580/514/461/415/406/397/394
avg 479

Saturday December 12th – Daily Double

I had to teach classes today at Crossfit. So i decided to split up a strength workout in the morning before classes and a metcon in the afternoon afterwards.

900am
1×20 each ghd and back ext
5 reps each leg
Bulgarian split squat with kettlebells in each hand
8/12/16/24/24/24kg

200pm
12min amrap
15 kb swings 24kg
15 6′ broad jumps
30 double unders
I have no idea how many rounds I completed. I was focused on trying to get my double unders in order. They were by far my limiter in this workout. You can not hide on this one. The loads are manageable in weights and quantities that youre almost forced to do each bit unbroken. Trying to manage your breathing is key here

Thursday December 9th – Hotel WOD

@ the Avia Hotel in Houston

I wanted to move my body around and feel normal again. All this travel was beating me up. I wanted to work on speed strength. So squat jumps was the medicine…

5×3
50lb dumbell each hand squat jumps
25lb dumbell each hand thrusters

In between each of the 5 sets i toyed with various mobility movements and a total of 2 sets of 30 ghds on a body ball.

Wednesday December 8th – The Prowler bwaah, hah, haaaaaaaaa

@ Crossfit Woodlands in Houston
3 rounds (not for time)
50m prowler 200lbs
Run 400m
Prowler
Row 400m
Prowler
Airdyne 25cal

What a kickass workout. This was my first time using a prowler. That thing is gruesome. I wish that I could do this one weekly. I killed the prowler during the first round each of the first 3 times i got to it. Then I got to the airdyne and thought that i was going to die. I really swore that i was going to just fall out. I was dizzy and my lungs were ready to jump out of my throat. I came close to calling a DNF. I was droning in slow motion on the airdyne saying to myself,” I’m a cyclist. I’m supposed to be good at this shit”. By the middle of the 2nd round my body started to wake up and my CNS stopped freaking out. I finished strongly in the end.

Monday December 6th – Tabatas

@ Crossfit Southside in Jacksonville
Tabatas of
Pistols
Strict pullups
Lateral jumps
Clapping pushups
4/3/20/5 (lowest reps of each)

This was an interesting selection of movements for Tabatas. I hated the pullups the worst. There is no stretch reflex to help you when youre fatigued trying to do strict pullups.

Thursday December 2nd – Back at it…Front Box Squats

Today I did Front Box Squats. First day back at CF since last week. Today felt good. I did some mobility work than hit it. I did sets of 2 reps with 135/185/205/225/245/245/245/225/225/225lbs

Wednesday December 1st – Still Recovering

Today was my last day of recovery. I still had a very slight soreness in my upper glutes. Looking back through my training log, I’ve had a good month of training through November. Im happy that I made the decision to have a light recovery week. Today I had my own GTL minus the tanning part, for all you Jersey Shore viewers. I put in a load of laundry and did 3 sets of 15 kettlebell swings (25lbs, light), kettlebell thrusters, situps, and pushups followed by 15 minutes of spinning on the rollers. I took a break to put in another load of laundry. Then spent the next 30mins on the rollers. Took a break to put the clothes in the dryer. Then spent another 15 mins doing some high cadence intervals on the rollers. My prescription for these was to ride to the verse of a song at a high gear then shift to a lower gear and ride the chorus at around 130rpm. Fun workout. I’m jonesin to get back to it. For the next month I’ll be trying to focus on strength work on the legs and adding a little more intervals on the trainer.

Friday November 26th – 30min spin

I was still trashed from the last two days. I chose to ride the rollers for a half hour to get some blood flowing. I followed with some foam rolling. My legs are blasted from yesterdays team wod.

Thursday November 25th – Thanksgiving Team WOD

I went to Crossfit 908, near my parents place. They had a great workout planned. I walked in to see Matt one of my CrossfitNYC mates. We were teammates.

Teams of 2 . As one person begins to lunge around the building the other person does a farmers carry around the building until they complete 1 full lap and meet up with their teammate. Once the two meet, they switch roles. The person who was lunging takes the weight, begins the farmers carry, and the other person begins lunging. This process is repeated until each team has made it around the building twice. At that point the team will enter the building and complete a total of 50 burpees.

Farmers Carry (2 35lb dumbbells)
Lunge
50 Burpees
16:40

This was fun. My glutes and quads were absolutely wrecked afterwards.

Wednesday November 24th – Jackie

Jackie
1000 meter row
45 pound Thruster, 50 reps
30 pull-ups
10:17 This was pretty much the same as last time. I was just 2 seconds slower. Last time i did this was around a year ago. I suffered. This is a tough wod. Today i did it with a sprained ankle. Adrenaline had me going during the wod but my ankle was throbbing when i was done.

Monday November 22nd – Push Press

I wanted to train but nothing on the bike. I had two good weekend rides and want to rest off the bike. The Crossfit WOD was the solution. Today was triples of Push Presses. My weights were 135/155/165/175/185/195lbs. No complaints considering I havent done much work on presses. Its 10lbs off my PR from a year ago.

Sunday November 21st – 3.5 hours

I wanted to get in between 3-4 hours today. I ended up at 3 and a half. This was due to me joining a group ride on the way back home. I wanted to peg the ride at approx 220 watts for the duration. Soon after leaving Nyack I got swarmed by like 20 guys. Testosterone and male ego, made me jump in. So the last 45 mins of my ride was spent at 282 watts, with lots of attacks and accelerations. I hurt good. It was super fun.

3:26 at 233 watts normalized

Saturday November 20th – 2 hours

I went out for a ride for a minimum of 2 hours. Saturdays are quick because I rush back to get ready to teach CF classes at 12.
I spent 2:12 at 225 watts normalized. Felt great. I notice that I feel so much better on my weekend rides if I have a couple of short mid week trainer rides.

Thursday November 18th – Daily Double

Morning
30mins on the trainer
170watts average, just spinning the legs…

Evening
10min AMRAP
5 reps of 135 lb push press
10 pullups

I completed 8 rounds and 5 pullups. I scaled the push press down to 115 at Round 3. The rx weight was too much on my wrists

Wednesday November 17th – Pistols

Well I was supposed to be back this evening to make it to Crossfit. Unfortunately the weather didnt cooperate. It was too windy so my flight from Montreal was delayed a few hours. It was too late to go to CF so I just got creative while doing some computer work. I lowered my desk chair all the way down and did “chair pistols”. I used the chair like a box in a box squat. I did 5 sets of 5 pistols per leg. Slow tempo with minimal stretch reflex.

Tuesday November 16th – 30mins on the trainer

I spent 30mins on the trainer before work. Nothing crazy, 170 watts, 93 rpm avg. I didnt measure heart rate or anything. I just wanted to get some time spinning the legs…

Friday November 12th – Nancy

“Nancy”
5 rounds for time of:
400 meter run
95 pound Overhead squat, 15 reps

Poor attempt…My calves are still a mess despite the mass of work that i’ve been putting into them. (As i type this, I have a lacrosse ball jambed into my left calf:) I blazed the first run. Hit the first set of overhead squat unbroken, scaled to 85lbs. On the 2nd run my calves were locking up. I scaled the 2nd set of squats down to 75lbs. I went to the end of my 3rd round and called it a DNF. My right calf was shot