Made it!

Woooo I woke up on a Thursday morning to go workout! Typically Thursday is a rest day for me because it was OLY Class day and 5 am was not an option. But starting last week Thursdays became available for regular workouts and of course the first go round I slept in! Not today, Jack!

Eat to Perform
So far I’ve also been a champ on eating to perform! At least getting 90-95% on target. Probably a lil closer but I don’t want to do the math. I have also just started getting used to drinking my coffee black so now I’m considering going bulletproof by adding the butter and the MCT oil. I’m not well versed in what it’s all about yet but once I get it all researched I’ll share some more. If you already do this and have seen some positive OR negative things, PLEASE PLEASE let me know. I think it will help me hit my FAT intake target much better. I finally restocked on coconut flakes as well and if I would remember to pack them in my lunch I’d probably be better off!

The eating test is ON starting NOW. From NOW till Wednesday next week we will be NON-STOP all over the place with little to no time to cook, eat, breathe, etc. So I gotta be crafty with the food and not let LIFE get in the way. And even more than life getting in the way, I need my slacker side of my brain to co-operate with the disciplined side of my brain and take care of business! If anyone wants to just cook for me and deliver for the next 6 days, it’d be greatly appreciated!

Today’s WOD
Skill/Strength: Free Handstand Holds and/or Pistol work
Pistols are a super weakness for me and I should work on them but my IT band has been on the mend. Hopefully with the cleaner eating I will clear that up. I opted for Free Handstands. Once upon a time I could hold handstands, not forever, but for a long time. Oh to be young or to have just stuck with it! I can still easily get upside down but we use the wall regularly and that has become my safety net. It’s nice to work on Handstands today because I don’t typically do this on my free time. I managed to get a few seconds of freestanding, which I guess is better than NO seconds. Just one more thing to add to my list of mini goals!

4/11/13 WOD

MetCon: 4 rounds of 4 Back Squats (225lbs, 135lbs), 10 One Arm KB Snatch (1.5pood/1pood), and 16 lunges
As I was warming up to 135 lbs I was thinking this is heavy! And it felt heavy. It’s about 82% of my 1RM. Coach was confident I could do the weight for all the rounds and I really wanted the RX so I did it. But I wasn’t sure about the 1 POOD Snatch. I know I can do it but not sure if I can do all the reps in good time. I still don’t have the best timing when it comes to KB Snatch and I still got bruises on my forearms from the workout but I do feel I did better overall. There’s not much to say about the Lunges except they smoke you just in time for the Back Squats! And boy was I smoked. I spent too much time contemplating if my legs were ready for the Squats. I did the first and last round of Squats UnBroken but I racked the weight and split up the reps for the 2nd and 3rd rounds. I knew I wasn’t moving fast but at the same time I wasn’t really stopping except for the moments right before the squats. It was a slow but good butt whoopin! Hahah. SLOW, a sub 10 minute workout! I guess SLOW isn’t the best word, but a heavy squat for me takes some time to focus. Time: 9:35.

Giveaway
Also I have a little Facebook bribery/giveaway going on. Head on over to my FB page, LIKE me and share me with your friends. Tell you friends to like me and comment telling me who sent them over. When and IF I get to 200 likes…. BIG IF I know, then I will select a lucky fan and their referral person to each win a pair of my handy dandy AWESOME socks. You know you want ’em!

So go right now, click right HERE and like me. Then share idrankthecfkoolaid with all the people! Have a great THURSDAY, the weekend is in sight! And you know the drill – BE AWESOME!

Move, Move, Movin’ Along

It’s only day 3 of my magnified view of my eating habits as a result of coming across EAT TO PERFORM. So far so good for the most part. I did realize this morning that I was calculating my pork belly all wrong therefore I didn’t hit the recommended fat intake I needed for the past two days. Granted I was probably closer to those levels than I have been in the past. So it’s not a wash or a screw up. I did see my error, fixed it and now moving on. I now know for today that I need to get about 30-40 more grams of FAT in me. Woooo! It’s not hard but it’s not easy either. I do, however, feel confident I will plan this out just fine.

After 2 full days of clean eating and being dialed into this new macronutrient perspective I really have zero cravings for snacks. I’ve been here done that before but it still shocks me how simple it is! No cravings. No bloated feelings. Etc.! It’s crazy that I’m insane enough to stop eating clean. Yet I fall off the grid frequently! Now if I can just stick with it. My true test will be this weekend when we will be gone for a good part of the weekend for baseball. I’m gonna have to step up my own game plan!

Also on a small side note, I’ve been using this site www.nutridiary.com to log my macronutrients. I really haven’t delved into the site as a whole but it shows you a daily analysis of your Carbs, Fats, and Proteins after you’ve entered your foods. If the food you eat is not in their system, there is an option to save your own foods. It’s not the most eye appealing but it’s FREE and so far helps me keep track without having to carry around a notebook. So just that little aspect of the site is helping me out ALOT. I’m sure it offers more but I seriously don’t have time to figure that shit out!

One more note: FRESH HOT OUT OVEN EGGPLANT = AWESOMENESS
but NEXT DAY MICROWAVED is just okay

BOOM BOX
This feel good feeling from eating better even helps move me along to show up for the Boom Box even when I REALLY REALLY don’t want to show up! For instance, this morning = cold and running. My idea of sleeping in sounds so much better.

Skill/Strength: 10 minute Double Under / TRIPLE UNDER work, 3 x 5 Pendlay Rows As Heavy As Possible
If you have DUs down, it’s time to work on Triple Unders. I haven’t checked the CrossFit Main Site but I have read amongst the social media networks that TU’s have shown up so it’s only natural it’s something we should learn. And guess what??!!?? I got ONE! Woooo. I was oh so close 789797 times but I finally busted one out. Now how I get more than one or even string them together is another task.

Pendlay Rows are getting easier as we do them more often. They truly were awkward when they were introduced to us a few months ago but now I feel I’m getting better. 3 x 5 AHAP was 85lbs for me. Not bad and I think next time I will go up in weight.

MetCon: 15 minutes of – 2 minutes MAX Double Unders, 1 mile run, MAX DU’s with left over time.
Well it’s cold outside and drizzly/rainy and miserable. And I don’t like running. AND I’m a horrible runner with NO aspirations to be a better runner. But that wasn’t even the worst part. The worst part is a tiny little muscle in the sides of my upper arm fatigued super fast and I was struggling stringing together DUs. UGH. I got 95 in 2 minutes before I headed out the door for the 1 mile run. For a lot of you out there 1 mile is easy. Once upon a time it was much easier for me but not currently with my chunky butt recovering food addict self.

With cold wind and rain blowing in your face, one would think I would run faster to hurry up and get inside but there isn’t a FAST button on me. So there I went … slow and slower. More of a trot actually. It took me well over TOO LONG to finish the run. Got back with less than a minute to get DUs in. I was only able to get 32 in for a total rep count of 127. Sigh. But I did get a TRIPLE UNDER so who cares about running!

It’s HUMP DAY, hope y’all have a good one! Go on now …. BE AWESOME!

My hands hurt :/

Just recently my hands have been really sore. Not just sore on my callouses from hanging on the bar but sore in my palms, sore in my grip, etc. After talking with coach he suggested getting a rubber band and wrap it around my fingers and work with opening and closing my hand. I’m gonna give that a try for the rest of the week and see if it helps out. I know with time the pain will go away eventually but I’m hoping this helps work out the little muscles in my hand.

In other news, I did pretty well hitting my Eat To Perform targets and I had a sense of relief that I can do this. I CAN eat all this dang food and all the fat pretty easily. What was hard to eat was my Post Workout Meal this morning as it’s about double of what I’m used to eating and lately I have slipped off the PWO Meal anyways. They do suggest Sweet Potato Recovery powder from Simply Pure Nutrients that I may look into because I don’t know that I can always shove that much food down or that I even have the time too regularly. Just add water and I can drink some of those carbs! If anyone has tried it, let me know what you think about it.

Food Front
So with all this eating and adding FAT I finally got in the kitchen to get ahead at least a day so I wasn’t stressing out about what to eat. I also finally bit the bullet and purchased a digital scale. I’ve had an old fashion cheapo one and I never felt like it was accurate but I wasn’t really ever concerned about getting exact breakdowns of my food. With the digital I can easily track grams, ounces, ml which helps me a lot in trying to get an accurate count of my Carbs, Proteins and Fats.

So I cooked up chicken and beef, measured and portioned it all out. I also quick boiled some aparagus, broiled some eggplant, baked more sweet potato and got some kale prepped for salad. I’m also going to share with you how I cooked up my eggplant and a couple of chicken strips. I didn’t originally plan on this so I don’t have pictures of the food in the making. But if I wait to do that properly I may never post about it.

Broiled Eggplant
Super simple to cook and a vegetable I’ve only cooked once. For some reason I’m not drawn to eggplant so I rarely buy it and if I do buy it, it sits in the fridge till it’s bad. So this time when I saw two perfectly purple eggplants and bought them, I was determined to cook them up. And I’m not in the moment of life where I can take time to experiment a whole lot. Turns out this veggie is really easy to cook. Found this on NomNom Paleo. http://nomnompaleo.com/post/4739682522/broiled-zucchini-or-eggplant. She used Zucchini and Globe Eggplant. I’m not quite sure what GLOBE eggplants are but I just bought your typical eggplant that’s purple and odd shaped. I’m not as food savvy as MRS. NOM NOM but I can figure some things out on my own, haha.

Easy Breezy Eggplant

Really easy! I promise. Preheat oven to BROIL. Grab a cookie sheet. Line it with foil. Drizzle oil on to cookie sheet. Add salt and pepper to your oil. Cut your eggplant into even slices. Place on oil coated cookie sheet THEN flip eggplant so you can get oil and seasoning on both sides. Broil for 8 -10 minutes, flip halfway through. Once you remove the eggplant from oven you can add a little vinegar or lemon OR BOTH and you have scrumptious eggplant. We even tried coconut aminos and that was wonderful too! I’m hoping it holds up after sitting in the fridge all night.

Fried Chicken Strips
If you have ever fried anything you should be pretty capable to concoct something and season it to your likings. If you’re not a cook or scared of stepping out of step by step instructions, let me tell you, it’s easy to just do whatever. And that’s what I did with some chicken strips that I had.

I took the chicken strips and rubbed chili powder, garlic powder, salt, pepper and lemon pepper all over (use your favorite seasonings). I then took some egg white and put in one dish. And set up another dish with coconut flour, pepper and salt. I made sure the flour and seasonings were mixed well. Take your seasoned chicken, dip and coat it in the egg whites, then dip and coat in your coconut flour. I went ahead and took coated strip and double coated it. While I was prepping everything I had a pan heating up at Medium Heat with 2TBS Coconut Oil. By the time I was done coating my chicken strips the oil was hot enough. Place the chicken in the pan and let cook a couple of minutes (no touching) then flip after 2-3 minutes and let cook through on other side for 2-3 minutes. Really tasty fresh, not as tasty microwaved next day. But a quick and simple protein with some “cheat meal” flare.

Not the prettiest shot. I’m no photographer but it tasted yummy!

So now that I have my kitchen in work mode, I’m hoping I can just keep things rolling along! But now it’s time for the BOOM Box Recap. It’s short and sweet today.

Skill/Strength: 5, 5, 5+ @ 65%, 75% and 85% of 1RM Push PressLast week we found our 1RM Push Press and sadly even though I felt like I could have got more weight up, I only got 95lbs. So using that I was going for 60lbs, 70lbs and 80lbs. My warm up sets and my first round weren’t hard but everything was hurting in an achey kind of way. Finally at 70lbs it felt much better. Got to 80lbs and busted out 10 reps! I went for 11 and failed. Now my arms were really dead! It felt good though to get those 10 reps.

4/9/13 WOD

MetCon: 3X – 3 min AMRAP of 5 Burpees and 5 Knees to Elbows, 1 minute rest
3 rounds of that. UGH. It might not be so bad if I was good at KTE. But I am not. I did start off strong in regards to getting my knees up but by the end it was just get knees as high as possible. I dropped after each rep of KTE because my hands were on fire! Burpees are burpees. You just gotta do them. I ended up with a total of 9 rounds + 1 for all the rounds. So that’s averaging 3 rounds per round! Makes sense right?

It’s TUESDAY folks. And I’m already ready for Friday! That’s a problem 😀 Ah well, I’ll just have to chug on through. Hope y’all have a great day and of course BE AWESOME!

Goal Setting

I’m typically not a goal setter. I never have been. I just go with the flow. As much as I would like to get better in EVERYTHING, I just don’t really follow through on attaining my wants. I think mostly because I turn into a lazy thing and let my “goals” slip away. And we all know I’m not some 20 something that can just learn and execute movements overnight. Oh how I wish I was 10 years younger and starting out. But I am not Now that the open is over, I am going to try and focus on GOALS! Things like a sub 10 minute Karen, Pull Ups, HSPU, etc. I know it’s all possible I just gotta put in the homework. Over time with Coach’s programming at CrossFit Boom I have made progress in many things. I’ve come a long way. But I don’t feel I’ve met my POTENTIAL. Wait, I know I haven’t! And I know I can’t just “get” by with only showing up and not working on my weaknesses when I get a chance. I’m not going to try and kill myself but I know a little more mobility work each day will be helpful. Hanging on the pull up bar a little everyday will be SUPER helpful. So many little things that I need to focus on. And that’s my FIRST GOAL for now. Do HOMEWORK and hopefully take it to the next level.

Today is just day 1 of new focus so I haven’t done much of anything yet. But hopefully this evening I can dedicate some time to all those little things. I have started to follow EAT TO PERFORM’s guideline to eating. I typically feel I eat enough. Eating Paleo for the most part kind of makes it all come together. But as laziness sets in, so does poor eating. Even if it’s Paleo, it can still be poor. You can still miss out on everything you need. You can get by, manage and still be healthy but after reading through ETP posts, I feel that trying out their guidelines and following them for a bit won’t hurt. I think my downfall is not getting enough fat in, not because I’m scared of fat though. It’s just I don’t eat enough of it. So I’m focusing on the FAT and getting a good dose of healthy animal fat and healthy plant fat. And of course managing my carbs and proteins as well. They outline a female that is close to my weight and they have her ideally eating 200g of carbs. HOLY SNIKES! That’s a lot! Sweet potatoes and carb heavy squashes here I come. I want to PERFORM and I thinking giving this a shot will be worth it. I will have to journal my food intake for a little bit until I get used to breaking it down. But hopefully that’s a short lived task and I’ll get the hang of it pretty quickly.

4/6/13 Community WOD
Free Community Workouts are back Jack! Woooo. I enjoy them because a lot of times they are Team WODs and alot of times we do fun stuff, but even when they are not it’s still a good time because you get to workout with people from different class times. This time around it was a doozy of a 20 minute AMRAP.

4/6/13 WOD

20 minutes of 20 KB Swings (1.5POOD/1POOD), 20 HR Push Ups and 20 GTOH with 45lb/35lb plate
We worked in teams of 2 and it was up to us how we would split up each round. My partner and I decided we would go 10 and 10 until we were too spent for that and figure it out from there. We started off strong and made it through several rounds of sets of 10, then fatigue set it and we started doing sets of 5 reps. We went straight through pretty solid and ended up just shy of 10 rounds! 5 reps AWAY! GRRR!

Ground to Overhead with Plate

4/8/13 WOD
I actually got some decent sleep last night and felt good about waking up. Too bad it was only my brain that was awake cause my body wasn’t feeling it!

Skill/Strength: 5, 5, 5+ Back Squat @ 65%, 75% and 85% of our 1 RM
Well my back and hips are pretty tight from all of those KB Swings and GTOH with the plate. And although 65% and 75% felt good, 85% got me. Last week I went 6 reps, today 2, womp womp! Hopefully next week will be better, especially if I’m owning that mobility goal homework.

MetCon: 4 Rounds, 1 min on 30 sec off of Diamond Push Ups and Power Cleans 135/95lb Max Reps
Doesn’t sound too bad till it’s time to go! Holy heckola Diamond Push Ups are no joke. And that 30 second break goes FAST! We alternated between the Push Up and Cleans. So 1 minute of Push Ups, 30 second rest, 1 minute of Cleans, 30 second rest X 4. I didn’t go with the 95lb RX weight because Coach wanted us to go quickly. And I probably could do 1 round at 95lbs quick-like but not sure about 4 rounds with Diamond Push Ups as well.

commando_fitness_diamond_push_up_18kl7po-18kl7qg

Diamond Push Ups

I can’t remember each round breakdown but I stayed fairly consistent something along the lines of 20, 24, 21 and 17 for the Push Ups and 14, 14, 10, 13 for the Cleans. It was for a total of 133 reps. I’m a slacker and forgot to take a picture of the board! Hopefully the next time higher rep Cleans are involved I will go for the RX weight. I was pretty spent. My hands, forearms, and shoulders are done!

It’s a new week with new focus. I’m hoping the BUSY of our lives doesn’t drag me down at least not as much as it has been doing. I gotta work around it and fight for the things I need to do for me! Happy Monday y’all and you know the drill … BE AWESOME!

Thankful and Blessed

Hey everybody… I just wanted to thank all of you again for checking out my posts regularly. This is my part of the little world to vent, rant, rave, be silly etc. Even if I had zero readers I’d probably still blog away. I just want to re-iterate that I share my days, my ups and downs, my silly world with you so you know LIFE is a journey. Life can be hard, but it can be SUPER and rewarding as well. In the end, this blog is for fun, entertainment (sometimes), and a creative outlet. So thanks for putting up with me willingly 🙂

Yesterday we had a little bit of crazy enter our world. One of my kids lost complete feeling in his legs for a few hours and had all of us, including Dr.’s scratching our heads. All is well now as far as we can tell but it’s those moments in life where you sit back and evaluate. We should be thankful and appreciative daily but on a day to day basis sometimes it’s hard to see the forest through the trees. (Cliche I know, but you get me right?) And of course when I’m rambling here it’s mostly towards a specific love/hate relationship I have with CrossFit and clean eating. Like I’ve said, idrankthecfkoolaid.com is meant to share my experiences on my fitness journey. You get tidbits of the rest of my life but only tidbits. After some reflection and prayer, I know and have always known that I am truly THANKFUL and BLESSED. My life is GREAT. I don’t think I say that enough. It’s not perfect by any means, HELLOOO, I have 3 boys (13, 11 and 10). It can be a little insane. We have a lot of irons in the fire but we are good. God has truly blessed me.

I just wanted to share that and put that out into the open but I still gotta recap my BOOM BOX morning where I forget all of those happy warm feelings! Especially when it’s 30° outside! And this morning I felt OLD. Not old like on my death bed old but worn out and heavy feeling. My bones felt heavy. I wasn’t feeling bushy tailed and wide eyed at all. I’m sure it was the mental stress of yesterday, the cold of this morning and the fact that I just might make all 5 days this week instead of sleeping in, feeling crappy or whatever. Ernie actually encouraged me to go this morning. So I had to roll out of bed and go.

Skill/Strength: 5 RM Deadlift

SOOOOOO being all sleepy and old feeling I forgot we had a 3RM day last week, so I was just going until I could go no more or until time ran out! After some good warm ups I was ready to jump up in weight and like I’ve been saying over and over, DEADLIFTS finally feel good to me. I used to dread them but now it’s like wow, I can lift this. My hamstrings aren’t wound up tighter than a (fill in the blank because I’m at a loss for something funny). I worked up to 185 and knocked those out. Coach said was that HARD. I was like NO but it’s not EASY either. So he goes it was easy. Do one more set and add weight. So I went up to 195lbs and besides losing grip, I felt good at this weight. Again not HARD but not easy. Just somewhere in the middle. I don’t do the math to find out what my 1 RM should be but it should be something amazing! Yay for Deadlifts!

3/6/13 WOD

MetCon: 3 rounds of a 3 minute AMRAP of 5 Shoulder to Overhead (155lbs/95lbs), 10 Burpees, 15 Toes to Bar, rest 1 minute.
Hhhmmmmm. Did I tell you all I felt heavy and old? Ya, 95lbs, hhmmm. I can get 95 overhead. My max right now is 105lbs. And then someone asks if we are cleaning the weight each round and the answer is YES. Duh, why would I hope for anything else. So my max clean is 105lbs too. Hmmm. I warm up thinking I’ll just go to 85lbs. Seriously I was ready to take a step back. Then I remembered how I fought through those damn Kettle Bell Thrusters on Saturday and told myself to do the 95lbs. Just suck it up and do it. You are already going to not do TTB as prescribed, you might as well do the weight RX! 3-2-1 GO. I cleaned the bar fine. I felt good. But HOLY SHEESH this is heavy going over head! I went slow. I dropped the bar after the 4th rep. HELLO you only have to do 5. Then I struggled cleaning the bar again. I got mental really quickly. Finally got it overhead and moved to Burpees. These are never any fun but got through them and I didn’t even try to do TTB, just went straight to Knees to Elbows. I didn’t even complete one round in the 3 minutes. How defeating. After our minute rest it was time for the second round of 3 minutes. I got a little more amped and aggressive with the bar and knocked out the STOH like it was easy or something. See what MENTAL does to you? Got to burpees. A little slower than last time. 95lbs is still heavy for me. I was tired. And then fought for those 15 KTE! Made it through one round. Yay! I pretty much went through the 3rd round the same as the 2nd. I finished even faster but wasn’t able to clean the bar fast enough to get it overhead before time was up. Score: 86 reps. Not super or outstanding but I put in the work and I was beat!

13.1 is released today for the CrossFit Open and foodwise I’m not ready. Way to go Steph. Way to screw up Whole30 when it counts the most. It is what it is and I just gotta focus on eating clean over the next 5 weeks and just pray and hope to see improvement. I’m sharing a link about being a sugar addict. I typically share all 21-Day Sugar Detox and Whole30 type information. But found this to be another source/voice to add to my arsenal of information. This might be the words that you needed to read to kick the sugar, grains and dairy habit. http://www.beingprimal.com/could-you-actually-be-addicted-to-foods. Check it out. (Disclaimer, the only thing I don’t agree with is the beans in the detox salad) Kick that crap to the curb and carry on! Or just pretend you are doing all the right things and your health is in tip top shape. I know it’s gibberish to hear that GRAINS, something that is the basis of the FOOD PYRAMID and that has been bashed in our heads FOREVER are bad for you! But they are. It’s hard to believe that SUGAR is that bad for you. Even worse those NO CALORIE CHEMICAL SUGARS are gasp… BAD for you!

Come on now. You know deep down all that processed food going in your body is not good for you. Or wait maybe you don’t. It’s becoming clearer everyday, from news shows, to reality tv shows that the GENERAL PUBLIC has no idea how BAD processed food can be for you. If it comes in a box don’t eat it. If it comes out of a window don’t eat it. If it has more than ingredients you can not pronounce or clearly define DO NOT EAT IT. I can’t force you to eat real food or make you believe me. You have to do your own research. You have to do your own self experimentation. I’m telling you that I physically have seen and felt the difference and I know others that have as well. Giving it a try isn’t going to kill you. At least I don’t think it will! Just try to eat better folks! Please!

Alright enough for today. It’s HUMP day! Take that one step for a better, healthier life – It will make you more AWESOME!

I want a MAKEOVER!

Yes I watched the Biggest Loser last night and I was wishing someone would come and scoop me up and take me out for a fresh look! Sure I could make a day for myself but how much more fun would it be for me to just show up and BAM! I’m made over! I wish I could get a mental makeover too. Something that would help me Quit SUGAR completely because right now the “little” cheats are sabotaging me! I was good on the Whole30, as a matter of fact I was GREAT! But now I sit here in guilt and bloatedness! Someone just slap me. Ok, just kidding don’t slap me for real. Just become my personal chef so all of my meals are cooked daily. Thanks!

Skill/Strength: Pistols (AKA one legged squat OR really frustrating dumb movement)
Damn you LEFT IT BAND. It pains me to even do modified pistols on my left leg and puts a little fear in me that my leg isn’t going to support me at all. This morning I worked on that a little bit by starting out at the bottom of the pistol resting on a medicine ball and working on the UP part. That in itself is hard for me on my left leg. Right leg not a problem as far as technical goes just need to build up the balance, strength, skill to execute a Pistol properly. Not my favorite movement!

3/5/13 WOD

MetCon: 10 minute AMRAP of 30 Double Unders, 15 Jumping Back Squats
Jumping Back say WHAAAT?!? Haven’t done this one before. Thankfully it was with the bar only!

This was hard for me to gauge in regards to how many rounds I would finish. Watching the guy above do 51 in 60 seconds after I was smoked just doing 15 makes me realize I need to reevaluate this movement! I wonder how I would have performed if I had watched the video before the workout! I also tend to shut down on DUs when a clock starts! Who knows what I’m in for! But this morning I busted DUs out quickly and was onto the Back Squats really fast. I finished those pretty quick as well and thought I got this. One round complete in less than a minute! Hahaha, it’s true, but that second round of DUs SUCKED! By the end of round 2 my hips were on fire! Then came the “I think I might pee my pants doing DU’s” part.

Thankfully I did not but I sure was worried for a minute. I was super fatigued in round 5 and probably rested too much during the Squats but I got to round 6 and finally did another set of UNBROKEN DUs. Then dragged ass on those Squats again. With 11 seconds left I whipped out 14 DUs going into round 7. Then ran to the bathroom! Score: 6 rounds, 14 DUs

Another day down. Still trying to keep up that positive attitude at the box but it is hard. One little negative thought can ruin it all. If I catch myself, I try to reword the thoughts in my head for something better. If I say something bad outloud then I try and turn it around to be more optimistic. As long as I keep showing up and trying, right?

That’s it for my Tuesday report. I’m thinking I may slow the posts down to a couple a week and try to be more “content” aware instead of rambling along daily. Let me know your thoughts faithful readers. And with that take your AWESOME to new places today!

Beat Up and it’s only Monday!

I feel like I got hit by a truck when in reality I was just beat up by some kettle bells on Saturday. My whole body is in a world of hurt and I still showed up this morning to the BOOM box. Although had KBs been on the agenda, I would have slept in for sure!

Saturday 3/2/13 WOD

3/2/13 WOD

Skill/Strength: Front Squats 1 x 5 @ 70%, 1 x 5 @ 75%, 1 x 3 @ 80%, 1 x3 @85% and 3 x 2 @ 90% of 1RM with 1-2 minutes rest between sets.
For me that was going to be 95lbs, 100lbs, 110lbs, 115lbs and 120lbs. Overall besides not keeping my chest up on a few reps I felt good at this weight. Hoping for a PR in the near future. It’s been a while since we tested so I HOPE I can get a little more weight on the bar.

MetCon: 9 Kettle bell Thrusters (24/16kg), 9 Knees to Elbow, 400m run, 18 KB Thrusters, 18 KTE, 400 m run, 9 KB Thrusters, 9 KTEWe warmed up with light weight but 1 POOD Kettle Bells in each hand? for RX??!!?? Uh holy wow, that’s gonna suck. I tried cleaning on KB then reaching down to clean the other KB and that was a repeated fail. Coach went over how we should clean both KBs up in one go and low and behold that helped a bit. Having 35lb kettle bells in each hand pretty much sucked. And now we were supposed to do thrusters with them. OOOOEEEEEEE. I struggled with the first 9, so I knew 18 was going to suck. I made it through the first 9 KB Thrusters and KTE alright. But when it came to the 18 I was slooooooowwwwwwww. It took me forever to finish those 18. I’m pretty sure some of the guys completed the whole WOD before I finished my 18. Those KBs were heavy and defeating. Besides some wall balls getting in my head last year this was the first time in a long time that I seriously did NOT want to finish the workout. On my last set of 9 TEARS welled up in my eyes. I was done. I didn’t want to clean the KBs cause it freaking hurt. I was just standing there staring into space. My forearms were swelling up and the whole side of my arms (deltoids??) were turning red. So not only was I just physically beat up, I was mentally beat up. And the baby tear I had got on Thursday turned into a full blown rip. I finally did finish. Literally 1 rep, rest, 1 rep, rest until I finished. Time: 22:48

OUCHY

Monday 3/4/13 WOD
I was still feeling the aftershock of Saturday’s workout. I did zero physical activity the rest of the weekend. So even though I’m still sore, I wasn’t feeling too bad. It would have been nice to sleep in but it’s the first week of the CrossFit Games Open and I can’t be slacking now!

Skill/Strength: Overhead Squats 3 x 3 @ 90% of 3RM
I was still sleeping this morning even after warm up and mobility work because I tried to jump up 30lbs from a lightweight warmup. Thankfully I realized I was putting on too much weight for my next warm up set before I tried moving that bar! All I was thinking was to get my 3RM which 2 weeks ago was 85lbs. I should have worked up to 75lbs and do 3 sets of 3. But did sleepy head do that? No she did 3 x 3 at 85lbs. Ooops, But I did it!

3/4/13 WOD

MetCon: 3 rounds of 20 Pull Ups, 30 HR Push Ups, 40 Sit Ups, 50 Air Squats. Time cap of 20 minutes.
Instead of doing strict Pull Ups with the green and blue bands, I did Kipping Pull Ups with the green band only. Although Pull Ups slowed me down, I got through the first round in less than 6 minutes. Three rounds is feasible. But the second round of Pull Ups got me. I was struggling. I knew I had to bust through the other movements to even come close to finishing in the 20 minute cap. Once I got to round 3, I knew it would next to impossible to finish and boy was I right. I only got through 13 Pull Ups before time was up. My forearms were smoked. My hand was hurting. And I was pissed I couldn’t push through. Score: 2 rounds 13 Pull Ups.

Although it doesn’t sound like I’ve had a good time, I was really glad I FINISHED the WOD on Saturday at the RX weight. I didn’t take a step down and I didn’t quit. And I may have wanted to complete the workout this morning but I did use only the green band vs. doubling up on bands. So if I have to take a few steps back to take a huge leap later on down the road then it’s worth it right?

I hope everyone is having a better Monday than me! It’s going to be in the 80s toady! It should be beautiful! Enjoy your day wherever you are and as always BE AWESOME!

Don’t forget to like my new blog Facebook and share me with your friends. Also know that I have AWESOME socks for sale. Let me know if you would like a pair. $13 a pair.

Finding Motivation

Yes, I am the worst sometimes at finding the bright side of things. I find myself losing the motivation and inspiration in ME more often than not. My heart and happiness goes out to everyone else who is working hard, making changes and showing progress; yet I can be my own worst enemy. We all can and I think for the most part we know that but sometimes we let ourselves get carried away. Or should I say, I LET Myself get carried away.

Clearly I am able to stay focused but I’m having a hard time staying focused CONSISTENTLY! Am I the only one on this roller coaster? What do y’all do to just focus on the good, the awesome?

Don’t get me wrong, I still show up to do work everyday, I still TRY to eat clean regularly. I consider myself a success in many things but there are days, where I just struggle. And I feel I struggle too much over many things. I don’t know how to let it go. For example, I know I could probably Snatch more weight than I actually can, but I SCARED! And with the fear comes no results. Same with the internal motivation. I’m still gonna show up but pushing myself sometimes falls flat. How do I clear all the junk in my head??!!?? If you got suggestions, solutions, etc… I’m listening!

2/22/13 BOOM BOX Morning!
I am SORE! My legs are still fried from Wednesdays Wall Balls! But that’s not the point is it? What was in store for us today?

Skill/Strength: 3RM Deadlift
Yup, gotta work hard to manage a PR in the future. I felt pretty confident I could have PR’d my 1RM in today’s work but we were running out of time and we had a MetCon that looked like we needed some extra time. Deadlifts still feeling good. Thank goodness, my hamstrings aren’t dead. Just my quads and inner thighs. Worked my way up to 195lbs and did 3 reps just fine and dandy. My grip strength was not super great but I held on. Now I’m really looking forward to a PR!

2/22/13 WOD

MetCon: 50 DU, 30 GTOH (65lbs), 40 DU, 20 GTOH, 30 DU, 10 GTOH, 20 DU
How’s that for insanity? I didn’t even warm up any DUs and didn’t realize that until it was time to go. I was more concerned in trying to AMP myself up and warm up for all those Ground to Overheads! I know 65lbs is something I can do without completely dying but 60 reps! EEEK I don’t know! I was doing alright and then my should started hurting on the way down. A pinching feeling that was not feeling good at all. If I dropped the bar I seemed to be OK, but that really slowed me down. I actually was stringing together DUs pretty well. My second round I almost did UnBroken! But I got too excited thinking I got these and screwed up! Time: 11:10

Whew! Another week down!! Spring is on the way, I love it! Time Change is on the way, even better! Baseball is here! Woohooo! Have a great weekend y’all! Be Awesome!

Home Stretch

It’s so close – Day 27 of the WHOLE30 and you know what? This train isn’t stopping! I still wish I had a chef to alleviate some of the burden that goes into it all but I’m not holding my breath on that one. The big challenge will be Birthday Cupcakes at my son’s birthday party this weekend! I think I’ll be fine since at this moment that doesn’t even sound good. But who knows by then. I should be fine.

Whole30 Days 24-27
The weekends have become easier to manage. In the past I either skipped meals or lived on fruit and junk of some form but I’m managing well with 3 meals a day. It helped that I made chili this weekend. Yesterday was the first day I felt a nap was in order, I think I was just spent from my CrossFit workout the day before but who knows. My hormones are still changing so it’s been all sorts of chaos on my mental state. I wish that would go away ASAP!

Went to PF Changs for my baby boy’s birthday. Risky I know. I googled it of course and partakers of Whole30 suggested the Gluten Free, Steamed Salmon and Ginger. So that’s what I ordered, no sauces on anything. Of course the server looked at me funny and said well the Chicken Lettuce Wraps you ordered weren’t special, I said I know, those are for them, not me 😦 OH how I LOVE the lettuce wraps. They would have been fine if they weren’t cooked in a sauce that has rice wine and sugar

I patiently waited for my food as it was the last to come out. Took a few bites and it was delicious! Flavorful and I’m not a huge fan of salmon. All the veggies were steamed as well. I busted out my bottle of Coconut Aminos, YES I DID! and splashed some on my foods. I probably would have been fine without but it was good anyways. Not too bad, even watched the family all get dessert. Although I wish I could had a sample, I powered through. Got home, started prepping my Chili for dinner and I had to rush, RUN to the bathroom. Not sure if there was something in that Salmon or if it was just fish itself but I fear it wasn’t Whole30 compliant. I won’t ever know though and I’m not quitting or starting over based on that. I felt fine the rest of the day.

As you can see or NOT see, I haven’t been taking any GOOD pics of my meals but I’ll share my Chili Pic with you. It’s not impressive but the actual food was good.

Not the best pic, Chili with sweet potato, avocado on top. YUM!

1/28/13 Lunch – Chili, Spinach Salad, Broccoli, Kiwi

Chili Ingredients:
2lbs grassfed ground beef (chili cut, Burgandy Beef has a less ground beef just for chili, good stuff)
2 cans tomato sauce
2 cans diced tomatoes
1/2 cup chicken broth
1 onion
1 garlic glove
1 sweet potato (cubed)
1 TBS cooking fat
Spices: cumin, salt, pepper, chili powder, cayenne, red chili flakes, cinnamon ( I have no measurement as I just pour to my liking. I like heavy on the spice.

Saute onions and garlic in cooking fat, ghee for me, until onions start getting soft. Add ground beef. Add spices. Cook through. All the while I have the tomato sauce, diced tomatoes and sweet potato warming up in my crockpot. You could do this all on stove as well. Once the ground beef is browned, dump into crockpot. Cook on high for 1-2 hours, check sweet potatoes. If they are soft, then you are good to go, If not let cook on low for another hour.

I would have added red, green and yellow peppers if I had them but I didn’t. It’s chili, add what you want. Turned out great! And sweet due to those sweet potatoes! Good stuff.

1/26/13 WOD
I was very sore walking into the BOOM Box Saturday morning. REALLY sore. My shoulders were dead, my hamstrings were dead and what was on the board: deadlifts and burpees!

Skill/Strength: 3 x 5 Deadlift @ 75% of 1RM
It’s been a LONG time since I’ve deadlifted. I think the last time is when I PR’d. And that was a while back now. So getting back to this lift was awkward but nice to do. 150lbs is my weight and overall I felt good. Had some small items to work on but didn’t lose all technique, thank goodness.

1/26/13 WOD

MetCon: 12.1! For those of you who don’t know, that was WOD 1 for the CrossFit Games Open last year. 7 minutes of Burpees! Oh the hell! We looked up our reps from last year and I got 74. Coach went around asking what our goals were for this time around and I said 75! Seriously. I’d be good with that. 3-2-1 GO! I was determined not to burn out too fast like I did last year. So I just went with the goal of “DON’T STOP”. Coaches were yelling out time left but it wasn’t really registering. I just thought this is the longest 7 minutes ever. I finally hit 75 reps and thought well shit I gotta keep going. Then I just said go and went H.A.M till I got to 90.

Then I thought I was going to die but there was still 2 minutes left. I just kept going up and down, making all kinds of mad noises. Final: 112! WOOOOOO! I don’t know where that came from but I was all sorts of Happy. Made my day indeed! After I stopped rolling on the ground like a flailing weirdo, I sat up and said Whole30! Strict clean eating!

1/28/13 WOD
Still dead from the Burpees. My shoulders are TOAST! Today was nice and HUMID. 62° and HUMID! We aren’t used to this right now. So much better than FREEZING! I fear February will bring us SUPER COLD though. We need it to kill the buggies but I don’t like it!

Skill/Strength: 3 x 3 Back Squat @ 90% of 1RM
Yup that got heavy fast. My shoulder mobility sucked so bad holding on to the bar. UGH! My hips were dead too. I worked on my hip mobility after my first set and Coach noticed a big difference. I could feel it and knew then that I should have done both sides, but my right side is the painful side. Ah well. Got through the lifts ok. I’m not feeling explosive on the way back up. Hopefully that’s just a side effect of being smoked!

1/28/13 WOD

MetCon: 100 Double Unders, 75 HR Push Ups, 50 TTB, 25 Pull Ups. You have 5 minutes to complete each movement. If you finish early in your 5 minutes of one movement, you get to rest! Record time finished.
So we have 5 minutes to do 100 DUs, 5 minutes to do the Push Ups and so forth. A timed chipper I guess is best to describe it. I was already scare of DUs just because my shoulders are so tight, sore, etc. Shoulders go fast when they are already useless to you. Then PUSH UPS next. Not good! I finished DU’s in a little over 2 minutes, I can’t recall specific times but I know it was 2 something. It was a good rest till HR Push UPs. I struggled but managed to finish in a little over 4 minutes. Enough time to get handguards on for TTB, errr Knees to Elbow for me. I found my kip and got 10 in a row. Went back for another 10, then hit a wall. Only getting 5 at a time, then only 3, then 2. Finished under 4 minutes on this one though! Only 25 Pull Ups but it’s still alot in my book. Did 5, 5, 3, 2, 1, 2 and 1’d and 2’d it till the end. Finished in 4:20 I think, not sure, Final time (added up): 14:25.

There you have it folks. My weekend wrap up! Hope you all had an enjoyable weekend. It’s a whole new week. Make that change you are thinking about, stop thinking about it! And be Awesome all the while!

See Food, Eat Food, REPEAT

$@!$##%&*^$@#@! I can’t stop eating. Let me rephrase, I CAN’T STOP EATING CRAP! I’m in a downward spiral of bad eating. I definitely don’t need a scale to tell me how much I’ve gained. My bloated self in my ever shrinking clothes tell me daily and yet daily I stuff my face with badness. Just a little less than 2 years ago I kicked that shit in the face and now here I am eating for what? Not my health. Just eating! Is that what happens? A relapse. Back to my old self. I can’t let it go on anymore that’s for damn sure! And OH how quick the weight comes back. It sure doesn’t want to shed off that fast. It takes weeks…months even to meet the tiniest weight loss goals. But start stuffing your face and all the pounds jump right back on and get comfortable. I can’t continue to regress and be the old me. I gotta nip this in the bud and move on. Come on folks. I need some motivation. I’ve lost it!

At least I’m still showing up to put work in at the box but I know it’s not enough. Last week was a struggle and a mental beatdown. This week is a little discombobulated due to Christmas! Which by the way was good. How was y’alls? I hope you got to hang with your loved ones and enjoy life. I ate a lot, but you KNOW this already! Back to putting in work though right? Well we had a nifty little Christmas Eve WOD – 12 Days of BOOM! And we could choose to partner up or go solo. Hehe, I’m not about to do anything of the sort on my own so I partnered up. I failed to take a picture but here was the workout:

1 HSPU
2 Pull-ups
3 Over The Box jumps 24/20”
4 OHS 95/65
5 Burpees
6 Push Press 95/65#
7 Jumping Airsquats
8 Knees to Elbows
9 Wall-Balls
10 KBS 1.5/1
11 HRPU
12 Front Squats 95/65#

Kind of like the song , 12 days of Christmas, we did 1 HSPU, then 1 HSPU and 2 Pull Ups then 1 HSPU, 2 Pull Ups, 3 Over the Box Jumps, then 1, 2, 3 and 4 OHS. Rinse and repeat and add up to 12. My partner probably did more of the work but I really tried to do my part. All the gross foods draggin me down! We came in 3rd I believe at 22:01. Not too bad. The only upside to bad eating is that I feel I have to push harder to prove bad eating doesn’t slow me down. We all know it does but I can pretend right?!?

After Christmas Eve, we had a 2 day hiatus from the BOOM BOX. Arrived this morning to a chill BOX temperature of 37°. Really warm and welcoming! Every joint, muscle, and tendon was froze in my body. It doesn’t take long to warm up but 20° weather isn’t fun at all. Where’s my summer heat? I need you!

Skill/Strength: Pull Up work, Muscle Up Work
The bar was cold and working on kipping sucked. I tried using a pair of the kids football gloves to help keep my hands from freezing. They just made my skin hurt. It was a lose/lose situation. I typically think I do OKAY with the kipping but today I just didn’t have much in me. The extra LBS and the coldness was in my head. I was just glad for it to be over. Although it wasn’t going to get much better for the rest of the hour.

12/27/12 WOD

MetCon: 5 minutes AMRAP of 200m run, 15 Toes To Bar, rest 2 minutes 5 minutes AMRAP of 200m run, 15 HR Push Ups
Come on Coach you know it’s cold outside! My face was burning from the cold! It doesn’t make me run faster because it’s cold outside. I really did try to get in and out but holy geesh when my insides are freezing from all the cold air, I just couldn’t go fast. My TTB ended up being Knees to Elbows, kind of, sort of. I made it through 1 round and 1 run. It was ugly. The second round was a LITTLE BETTER as I can do PUSH UPS with a little more ease than anything hanging from the bar. I only said I did a little better. It was so hard to breathe after the first run. My nose is running and impairing my breathing. I made it through two full rounds, went out for a 3rd run but didn’t make it back in time so it doesn’t count. Sad Sad Sad.

That’s it for today y’all. It’s cold, I’m a mess and I need food help! I apologize for the depressing post. Last week was looking up by Friday and now it’s all blah all over again. There’s a big ol defrosted free range chicken waiting at home to be cooked. The good food is there, I’ve just been choosing to ignore it. Gotta put my blinders back and get to work! I’m scared to jump on the SUGAR DETOX but I have to do it. I will DO IT. And I will be AWESOME at it! Have an amazing day and let your awesome shine!

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