Crossfit

***This giveaway is now closed! Find out who won here!***

I stole away from work on Saturday for a little BBQ at CrossFit United. It was to celebrate the culmination of the Whole 30 Challenge as well as send the students off as we begin summer break. While I’ll definitely miss them, I’m happy to have a little peace and quiet. A few pics from the day:

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How CrossFit does buffets, with boxes!

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We made an awesome Quinoa salad we adapted from Pinterest. So good!

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Paleo cookies and bars. The cookies were right out of the oven, to die for!

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And the BBQ pork, beef and turkey…

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Laura and Boone. Isn’t he the cutest kid ever!?

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Sake

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Lee catching some sun…

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Charlie and Nate

Earlier that day a few of the girls and I had gotten on the topic of fitness inspiration. While it seems there is no shortage of places to find it these days, as it turns out, we all revealed that we look to specific people to stay committed to our goals and motivated to push ourselves in workouts. Each one of our idols was different, from Christmas Abbott to Andrea Ager.

I absolutely love Jenny Labaw. Not only has she managed to overcome the challenges of epilepsy to become the 6th fittest woman in the world, she completed all of the 2013 CrossFit Open WODs with a broken foot. Badass!

And Now a Giveaway!

So with fitness motivation in mind, I wanted to offer you guys an amazing giveaway! Through my ambassadorship with Verizon, I’m giving away one UP by Jawbone! ($129.99 value)

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{image via Verizon}

What is UP? UP is small, flexible and strong to accommodate an active lifestyle and help people reach their goals for a healthy lifestyle. Some of the features of device include:

  • Designed to be worn 24/7; up to 10 days of battery life
  • Tracks sleep and activity using advanced sensor technology
  • Log what you eat and drink, and track nutritional info
  • Get personalized insights that help you set and achieve your goals
  • Set a Smart alarm to help you wake up feeling refreshed
  • Set Idle Alerts to remind you to move and stay active

I am so jealous of you guys! So, ready to win an UP system? Here’s what you need to do:

Before midnight CST on Friday, May 17, answer the following question in the comments below:
“How has technology helped you reach your health and fitness goals? Or if it hasn’t, who is your fitness idol?” Also be sure to confirm your comment with the Rafflecopter giveaway widget below!

I will randomly choose one winner from the comments to win an UP by Jawbone and I’ll announce the winner Friday morning. Good luck!

Side note: You might come across other UP wristband giveaways around the blogosphere this week. Verizon requests that you only win on one blog.

Disclosure: I am participating in the Verizon Health and Fitness Voices program and have been provided with the Motorola Razr HD and six months of service in exchange for my honest review and opinions about the product.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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In the absence of personal photos from the gym last week, I thought I’d link a great video I came across last week. If you’re unfamiliar with Barbell Shrugged, it’s a great video/podcast for not only CrossFitters, but athletes or the fitness-enthused altogether. Lots of great info and tips, and in this case, some ways to adjust the Paleo/Primal diet for active lifestyles.

For those who are training heavily or looking to increase load or overall training volume, some have found a strict Paleo diet is difficult to maintain without feeling like you’re eating all the time or just not getting enough. We’ve fallen in this category and have adapted our diet as necessary to include rice, oatmeal and some homemade sourdough bread just to feel satisfied and energetic enough for our volume. While it’s definitely not a reason not to engage a clean eating or Paleo/Primal lifestyle, realistically we’ve found it difficult to do without some accommodation.

I’m currently in LA for AdobeMax, so posting is a bit slow as I try to write entries for what I’ve been doing here, and just taking in the sheer amount of information to be found everywhere. I packed my conference scheduler with everything they’d allow me, so literally back to back sessions from 8:00-5:00 every day.

That being said, last week was a great week for programming and I am still really enjoying the OPT programming. I’m feeling stronger, and definitely more sore than I have in a long time. I can’t wait to see how I feel at the 6-week mark, and as we head into the summer and into a few competitions in the fall.

Neil’s hamstring is still sore, but as you can see below, he really didn’t let that stop him from doing whatever he could in the gym. Lots of upper body, with some light lower-body work. He messaged me today and said he managed a 145 lb squat and that he was only feeling a little sore, so I think he’s on the mend.

I’m excited to get home this week because we’re having another Friday Night Lights as well as a BBQ on Saturday. It’s crazy just how much I miss everyone!

Monday

Jessica

A1. Press; 12-15×5; rest 30 seconds (65 lb)
A2. Weighted chin up clusters @50×1 (1 set of as many as possible to tax), then 5×5; rest 15 seconds/rest 3 min

B1. Bench press 3×5; rest 10 seconds (75 lbs)
B2. Incline dumbell bench press 3×10; rest 10 seconds (2 20lb weights)
B3. Static headstand hold; amsap (as many seconds as possible) unbroken x3; rest 3 min (30 seconds each time)

C. Bent over supinated grip barbell rows @41×2 or 6-8×4; rest 2 min

Neil

Strength:
3×5 Squat – Air squats due to pulled hamstring
3×5 Strict Press @ 120lbs

WOD: 21-15-9
Horizontal ring pulls
Hand-release push ups

Tuesday

Jessica

A1. Front squat 3×5; rest 10 seconds (115 lb)
A2. Back squat; 3×10; rest 10 seconds (115 lb)
A3. Barbell walking lunges 3×24; rest 3 min (45 lb)
+
On the min for 20 min:
Odd- 30 seconds max double unders
Even- 30 seconds max goblet squats 1.5 pood (55 lb – managed 12 per round)

Neil

Rest Day

Wednesday

Neil

WOD: 3 Rounds Each For Time

250m Row
10 Roll-Outs
10 Abmat sit ups
10 Wood Choppers

Thursday

Jessica

A. HSPU eccentrics; accumulate 30 perfect reps with as slow of a tempo as possible (full range of motion)
+
7 TnG push jerk (75 lb)
Row sprint 20 seconds @100%
rest 3 min
x3
+
7 unbroken chest-to-bar chin ups (amrap if this above pr)
Row sprint 20 seconds @100%
rest 3 min
x3
+
Row sprint 30 seconds @100%
rest 3 min
x3

Neil

Strength:
3×5 Squat – Air squats due to pulled hamstring
3×5 Strict Press @ 120lbs

WOD: 21-15-9
20 inch box jump
Ring dip

Friday & Saturday

Travel days, no scheduled workouts

Have you had to adjust your diet to accommodate your fitness goals?

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It's crazy how motivating this little flower is... #vzwvoices #fit

Well, as you can see below, Neil had a rough week. After doing back squats (the athletes are in a strength cycle and building new PR numbers every week with certain movements), he pulled a hamstring doing a cycle of sprints. He’s doing better, but is on limited movement workouts until his hamstring heals. Our trainers have been great in helping him treat it, and he’s been more mobile than both he and I thought he’d be at this point. It’s a level 2 muscle pull, so it definitely could have been worse, and for that we’re pretty thankful.

I’m a week into my new programming and really enjoying it for the most part. I managed two PR’s last week in both my bench press (95 lb) and front squat (165 lb), and the workouts are definitely putting my strength endurance to the test. I’ve had to adapt several of the workouts to accommodate some concerns about my shoulders (high-rep snatches) and equipment we don’t have at the gym (Airdyne), but I think my adaptions maintained the intent of difficulty.

I will say that I’m definitely missing the social aspect working out with the rest of the class, especially Neil. This programming has returned me to solo workouts, and it’s kind of bumming me out. What I love about CrossFit is collectively slugging out workouts with other people, and with the exception of one day this past week, I’ve been completely alone. My trainer has indicated that the programming will merge more in the future, so I’m looking forward to that.

Monday

Neil

Strength:
3×5 Squat (Add 5lbs to Last Week) – 190 lbs
3×5 Press (Add 2.5lbs to Last Week) – 115 lbs

WOD: 5 Rounds
100m Sprint (11-12 seconds)
- Must not deviate +/- 2 Seconds From Original Time. Penalty is 30 Evil Wheels.

Jessica

Strength:
A. Build to 1 RM incline bench press (95 lbs – 25 lb PR)
B. Amrap ring dips in 5 minutes (begin the 5 min with 1 amrap unbroken set and record score) – Got to 27

WOD: 10 rounds for time:
10 toes to bar
10 hand release push ups
Finish: 10:40


Tuesday

Neil

Warm-up: Relay + Med ball

Strength: 5RM DL (Following the Last Few Weeks, Try to Add 5lbs To Your Working Sets) – 255 lbs

WOD: 10 Rounds For Time
7 Wood Choppers (Left and Right)
5 T2B
Finish: 8:19

Jessica

Warm-up: Relay + Med ball

Row 3 min for max cals/miles
Rest 10 min
x3
No pacing, all out efforts

Finish: Finished between 640 and 680m for all three rows. Cut the rest time to 5 minutes instead of 10.


Thursday

Neil

Warm-up:
Relay warm-up

WOD:
5×3 back squat – 195 lb
Sprints – pulled hamstring, could not continue workout

Jessica

Warm-up: PVC + relay

Strength:
PR’d my front squat today — 165 lbs! Second PR this week.
Establish 1RM Front Squat: It’s been forever since I established a 1 rep max front squat. My old PR (that I remember) was 125. I PR’d with a new max of 165 lb. I think the 175 is close, just need to tighten up a bit more on my form.

WOD:
Snatches:
25 at 45 lb
25 at 75 lb


Friday

Neil

Warm-up: Relay with oly tech

WOD: 12-9-6-3
Push Press (did strict press at 95 lb)
Ring dips

Jessica

Crazy amount of snatches in this workout, but I can definitely feel myself getting stronger and closer to my goal of an 85lb!
Warm-up: PVC and 25 snatches with a 45 lb bar.

WOD:

A. Power snatch; 3, 2, 1, 3, 2, 1; rest 3 min (at 65 lbs)
+
Airdyne 30 seconds @85%
Airdyne 30 seconds @50%
x6

The workout originally slated for 20 rounds, but time and concern for my shoulders made it 6 rounds for me. There was no prescribed weight accompanying this workout, so I chose 65 lb.


Sunday

Jessica

30 minute recovery run – covered about 3 miles with the dogs in a run/walk.

Do you prefer to workout solo, or with other people?

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Week in Pictures

April 27, 2013
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We’ve had a pretty good week so far, but are thrilled the weekend has arrived again. My camera was acting funny, affecting my posts this week, but I think I have it figured out, save for a few images in this post. Fingers crossed! Lost of yard work this week — well, whatever we could [...]

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Weekly Workout Recap (4/15-4/21)

April 23, 2013
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I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a weekly workout recap for a while, and some changes to my programming in the past week have finally convinced me it would be something fun and worthwhile to document. For the past few months, I’ve been doing extra strength work aside from my 4-5 WOD’s a [...]

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Friday Link-up

April 20, 2013
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Another week comes to a close! I am home this weekend, and so excited to bum around and get some work done, especially around the yard. Maybe some baking too. And napping. In the mean time, here are some things I’ve come across this week! Above is the workout we did today. Super tough! A [...]

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Weekend in Chicago Part 2 (Verizon Health and Fitness Voices)

April 14, 2013
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Just tuning in? Check out our first day in Chicago I woke up bright and early Monday morning and got ready while Neil enjoyed some extra sleep. I met the other girls downstairs and our guide Brenda took across the street to Marketing Werks for orientation. Being from a little midwest town, being on the [...]

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