March 29: Ups and downs

I've been going through a couple of ups and downs lately, mostly downs. We moved in December and lost track of our healthy eating habits: more restaurant visits, eating when hungry, take-away... and unfortunately I also became ill on-and-off (probably related to some food issues and the unhealthy eating). I had an airway infection, the flu, airway infection 2 and airway infection 3.

All this led to gaining almost 7 kg (15 lbs) and no more working out.  This had to change so we decided to enroll ourselves in a supervised nutrition program: No nonsense nutrition program. We had to keep a log for 5 days (3 week, 2 weekend) and based on that log in combination with current weight, fat percentage and goals we received our individual program.

The program consists out of 12 weeks. The first four weeks you get a strict balanced program you have to follow and the following weeks you learn to take your own eating habits into control.

Let's hope that all these downs will turn into a lot of ups. :)

New Year's Resolutions

My CrossFit New Year's Resolutions are:

- first strict pull-up (deadline April, 1)
- first strict push-up (no knees)
- first ring dip
- better core strength to do gymnastics!
- body weight back squat and front squat
- 100 kgs deadlift (now 97,..)

Biggest goals:

- limit my inhaler use during running and wall ball shots!
- finish the intermediate level!

DAY 6: McGhee

I'm officially halfway the challenge! We started the strength part with sumo deadlifts but since a week or two they have been hurting the inside of my hip joint and this happened again today, so I switched from sumo deadlifts to deadlifts. I managed to repeat my 1RM from September (215 lbs) and that is really awesome after six days of daily training.

McGhee went great, I really love long workouts. Instead of jumping on a wooden box, I jumped on a softer box and this was the first time after my box jump injury that I did box jumps in a workout.

I finished with 15 rounds and 3 push-ups! 

DAY 5: filthy fifty

I slept only 6 hours last night and I could definitely feel it in my muscles. We did 4 x 20 front squats with 50% of our 1 RM and they were very difficult. My 1 RM is actually 135 and I could barely manage the front squats with 65.

Since it was a full house, I had to start the workout with the knees to elbows (knee raises) and it took me too long. My hands just couldn't hold on to the bar and I kept falling off. I took me over 7 minutes to complete the first fifty. Afterwards I tried to pick up the pace and that went well but I couldn't make up for lost time. I finished doing 43 jumping pull-ups and still had to do the kettle bell swings and the walking lunges. Maybe next time...

(I found this picture somewhere online but I forgot where..)

DAY 4: Isabel - 3 min rest - Grace

When I started to warm-up I felt immediately tired. Not as much my mind as my body. I could tell that I did Murph the day before but I gave my best effort nonetheless. 

We did 5x3 sets of power snatch (with 70 lbs) and 5x3 of clean&jerk (with 75 lbs) in the strength part of the workout. Afterwards we did Isabel and Grace with 3 minutes rest in between. I started the workout with 70 but lowered the weight to 65 after 15 clean&jerks because I couldn't hold my back muscles stable enough. I finished in 16:35. 

DAY 3: Murph

Today was murph-time. I was still sore from fight gone bad and seven when I started with the murph. The running actually went quite well but then the problems started. If I have a muscle ache, normally, it goes away after a couple of movements in a WOD, but today it didn't... I really struggled with the ring rows and the push-ups. The squats went really good and the running afterwards went as good as it can be after 300 squats.

Nonetheless it took me one minute more than when I did Murph in June, from 58:28 to 59:38, but I finished underneath the hour mark so that is good.

DAY 2: team SEVEN

Yesterday we did a team seven. First time I did this WOD and it was intense! My team mate and I finished in 48 min 31 seconds. I did almost all the thrusters and all the deadlifts and she did almost all the kettle bell swings and wall climbs. I can do wall climbs but they take so long....

Happy with the results and the upcoming muscle soreness. Luckily today is a rest day.

Murph tomorrow....