PETER GETS FIT

Bad about posting, as I have been for a while, but training has been ticking upwards as I’ve been starting to incorporate more and more CFSBK training WODs into my workouts. Not a ton, more like 2 a week, and I haven’t been training very thoroughly much more beyond that, so this period has felt more like a very slow shake-the-dust-off for things like the big lifts, etc. 

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN, THAT’S GOOD:

Deadlifted 355, failed on 375. Could have had 365 but skipped it.

Bunch of handstand push-ups.

A cool TGU workout.

A bunch of other cool metcons that aren’t worth reporting on.

RESULT: Getting a bit of a baseline again, maybe.

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN, THAT’S BAD:

Diet has been loose, and I look/feel it.

I haven’t been foam-rolling consistently, and I feel it. I feel stiff and rickety in general. Need to get on my mobility game.

I did an All-Clean workout the other day, and on a fail at I believe 175lbs, the bar caught my right wrist as I bailed and I think it’s sprained. It’s sore, not overly so, but enough to definitely limit certain kinds of training in the immediate future. I don’t really see myself doing push-ups or handstands on it, or overhead pressing, this week at least. And I’m not sure about gripping/pulling. Might be a week for conditioning/squatting (blergh.) At least it’s not broken. I think.

Today is a programmed REST DAY for CFSBK, and I’m following their programming. But since I do No Rest Days, I’m going to do some active recovery to tend to what I’m sure will be sore hammies from yesterday, and get a little conditioning since yesterday wasn’t much of that.

FOR CONDITIONING:

45 Minute Spin Class

Hazardous Mutation was a big success. I loved following it, and I shared it with a friend who, to my delight, had some awesome gains with it. Now that it’s the Fall (which has always felt like the beginning of the year for me), I’m ready to switch things up a bit and work on my baseline fitness again. I don’t want to overthink things, so I’m just going to follow the CFSBK programming and do it on my own. I picked a great week to start, as apparently they are doing 1RM tests (HA). Big lifts, no conditioning? And I’ve been away from the gym for a while? Sounds like a PGF workout to me. Actually, it’s probably not a bad idea for me to re-establish my maxes and see where my strength is at, since things have likely gone to shit over the summer.

FOR WEIGHT:

1RM Strict Overhead Press

RESULT: I ground out an UGLY 135lbs, about 15lbs short of my PR weight and, more importantly, I was extending my back like a joke. Not proud of it. I got a bunch of other reps in around 125lbs and lower. Good to know where I’m at.

FOR WEIGHT:

1RM Deadlift

Would you believe it if I told you that my streak of doing something every day remains unbroken? While this summer was a tornado of travel, life stuff, and very little working out, I have kept the PGF match lit even when most days it was just a nominal gesture, like stretching my wrists out in bed before I fell asleep or touching my toes. A workout? Hell no. A reminder that even in the face of an training “ebb” I’m still in the game? For sure. And that is kind of the point of No Rest Days. It’s not to train well, necessarily, it’s just to keep this on my forehead.

Hazardous Mutation continues to be every bit the the thrash-metal gorefest/surprisingly well-balanced program I was hoping it would be. Here are some highlights from the past nine days of training:

MUTATIONS:

L-Sit PR of 40 seconds, which I am proud of. (PR!)

10-11 rep Pull-up sets.

35 rep Push-up sets.

Some lackluster rowing.

Some incline benching which is stupid.

105lb x Press sets.

A complete loss of my hamstring flexibility (BOO)

A gain of some of my shoulder flexibility (OOB)

Front squatting! Oh, how I missed thee, oh how heavy 185lbs feels for some shameful reason, oh how sore you make my quads.

RESULT: I mutate, therefore I am. Most importantly, I have taken to wearing this shirt around the gym because I am, just, a gift.

Okay, Mutants, I’ve thrown myself into HAZARDOUS MUTATION, my homebrewed back-to-basics program that provides equal amounts of exposure to the big lifts, high volume pull-ups and push-ups, and Richmond, Virginia-based thrash legends Municipal Waste. It’s not too late to hop on board and subject yourself to this and let me know what you think. It doesn’t look like much but if you crank on it, it starts to hurt. Trust me.

Reporting in from the front lines of Mutation a few days in:

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN:

My best 1000M row thus far was today at 4:07 Min, but I haven’t been really pushing it on these. I’ve been sub-4 in the past and I think I can easily get there if I seek the pain cave a bit more. A few of my Mutation workouts this week happened late at night post-Indian/Mexican food and margaritas/beer, because I’m an intense and colorful individual, but no my cardio wasn’t exactly serious.

My lifting numbers are nothing to speak of--if not downright embarrassing by prior standards--but I’m fine with it. Heavy, heavy. heavy ends up being pretty counter productive to gymnastics, so I’m happy to keep things light and fast. I deadlifted 275lbs, benched around 155lbs+, and pressed 95lbs. 

I did 50cals on the Airdyne in 6:06Min.

Push-ups and Pull-ups, woof, gotta love high-volume but it starts to hurt. I’m doing about 30 push-ups at a clip on bars (currently my max is around 32 but I’m not really grinding) and my pull-ups are around 9-10. Trying to focus on beautiful, fully-extended pull-ups and not worrying so much about the numbers.

L-sit came in at 28 seconds the other day. Diet has not been strict and I feel it on those things.

Only thing of note: I have been having shoulder pain when doing toes-to-bar. Can’t explain it, just feels clicky and tight and very, very, not like a good idea. So nixed those until I can figure it out. I do feel like it has to do with Frequinox not having a straight pull-up bar so I’m doing it in some wonkier shoulder positions, but still. Advice welcome!

I’ve been hunting around for programming to start, but, as it has so many times in the past, it dawned on me that I’d prefer to just write my own!

Without further ado, I present to you all METHODS OF MADNESS 2: HAZARDOUS MUTATION.

It has been a while since I wrote my last training protocol, METHODS OF MADNESS, which attempted to blend weightlifting, powerlifting, and gymnastics all together and was appropriately named after Obsession’s 1987 album.

HAZARDOUS MUTATION is different in a few ways. Most importantly, its namesake, and gorgeous artwork, is taken with great respect from Municipal Waste’s second album of the same name, which should be listened to on repeat throughout the entire training protocol for optimum results.

WHAT WENT DOWN:

2x6 Pull-ups

Lots of Foam Rolling

Some Cable Rowing Stuff

Some Landmine Rowing Stuff

Some 60lb Dumbbell Rowing Stuff

1000M Row

...that I’ve been training all this time? Because I have been! I’ve been a shitty poster, but not for lack of training or lack of interest--in fact, #norestdays remains intact. Have there been plenty--plenty--of days when I kept it alive via a handful of push-ups or even just some wrist mobility in bed before I fell asleep? You bet. But that was the point of the whole thing. To keep PGF going every day (minus sick days, crazy travel days, or intentional big travel vacations) of the year, and we’ve made it to May successfully.

Actually, the real reason I fell so behind on posting is just because I haven’t had much very interesting going on training-wise that I felt compelled to keep detailed track of. I’m still feeling the need to start a more organized program now that my overall fitness is approaching a workable baseline, and I’m getting a sense of where my body is at. When I’m doing a strength cycle, I love logging every rep and set, when I’m just hitting the gym a lot and messing around, I don’t feel as intensely about journaling everything. Nevertheless, I’ve learned a LOT in these past couple of months of training. See below!

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN:

A lot of traditional “pumping iron”, aka bodybuilding-esque things: bicep work, free-weight type stuff. Lots of fun.

Tons of ab wheel. Love me some ab wheel.

Continuing to drill my handstand. I’m not as disciplined/focused as I need to be, I keep just “doing a bunch” even if I try and do it with my new techniques in mind. I’ve definitely learned that I need to keep my head down and in. Looking almost a foot BEHIND your hands (i.e. in front of them, chin down) helps.

Airdyne! I’ve been doing a bunch of airdyne workouts. I like a 21-15-9 for calories, with 1:1 rest-to-work periods. Great metcon.

Lots of hamstring mobility.

WHAT’S NOT BEEN GOING DOWN:

The big lifts: squatting, deadlifting, clean/jerk/snatch. Outside of a handful of squat sessions and maybe some deadlifts, I’ve all but stayed away from these.

Running

“WODs”

HOW MY BODY HAS REACTED:

In the absence of squatting and deadlifting, I am able to make significant progress on my hamstring flexibility. For whatever reason, I really struggle to pursue both of those things at once. 

Without consistent squatting/deadlifting, my leg strength has majorly atrophied.

Without more athletic “WODs” I feel significantly less athletic/agile/fast. 

My pull-ups have greatly increased. I can do about 10 now, unbroken.

Crossfit seemed to do a lot for my overall flexibility. Without the snatch and similar overhead work, I feel much tighter and have intermittent tightness/pain in my pec/pec minor.

Bodybuilding has been fun! I’ve definitely gotten better at pull-ups due to biceps work.

WHAT’S NEXT:

I still feel very in need of programming. I haven’t dedicated any time to looking around online for a program to follow outside of the gymnastics program I had looked into earlier, and I’m not that interested in the traditional barbell programs since I’m liking staying away from the big lifts and working more on my mobility and such. But overall, while I’m loving having Equinox around the corner and how much training that has resulted in, I have noticed the impact that the absence of Crossfit programming has had on my total athletic ability: not having someone force-feed me WODs, strength-work, and mobility-inducing barbell stuff (i.e. overhead squatting) has definitely knocked me down a few beast points.

Day Four.

3 ROUNDS NOT FOR TIME:

1 Minute of Right Leg Split Stretching

1 Minute of Left Leg Split Stretching

So, I’m focusing on gymnastics for the foreseeable, since it’s what I like more than anything and unless I knuckle down and focus I’m not gonna get anywhere. To start things off, I’m gonna try out the gymnastics programming from here, and follow along to the best of my ability. I accidentally did the wrong workout for day one, these two days were sort of the first three workouts combined, I kinda fucked it up. I’ll hit my stride starting tomorrow in terms of following the programming to the letter. Day Four coming up tomorrow.

Day One:

4 ROUNDS NOT FOR TIME:

Max Belly-to-Wall Handstand

Max L-Sit

30 Seconds in the Bottom of a Squat

RESULT: Completed. This was harder than it should have been on the day.

Day Two:

FOR MOBILITY:

5 x Bridges

5 x 20-second hang at the bottom of a dip

Shoulder Dislocates

Wrist Mobility

Pancake stretching

RESULT: Completed. Focused on trying to do PERFECT bridge work, not sloppy ones where you just crank it from the middle of your back. Went well, especially in the latter sets. Hanging at the bottom of the dip was pretty brutal, unexpectedly so, but in a good way. I think I’m pretty sore from rings. I know that the crux of this training is going to be flexibility.

10 MINUTE AMRAP:

20 Hollow Rocks

20 Superman (arch) Rocks

10 Box Jumps (substituted for Broad Jumps)

Whoa! A bit to catch up on here. Just going to get it all down on e-paper:

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN:

A lot of gymnastics training. I’ve decided (for the umpteenth time) to make this my focus for the foreseeable future. Why? Because I like it, I’m psyched to, and I want to! I’m not going to stress if my “all-around” fitness slips a little bit--i.e. if my barbell lifts fall behind a little, or if I struggle to get consistent about cardio though I’m going to try to--and I’m going to focus on what I’m into and have at it.

I PR’ed my L-Sit (PR!) at 34 seconds, twice. Where did this come from? Not quite sure. But I’m into it.

I took a week “off” on the beach where my daily “workout” was lugging a beach chair around and catching up on my vitamin D. Totally counts!

I did a couple other workouts at Equinox that were pretty unremarkable.

A yoga class.

One Billion Handstands.

I finally brought my rings to Equinox and set them up and did an all-rings workout that was AWESOME. So excited to be able to do this. Will make gymnastics training way easier.

Did some research into programming for gymnastics I can get into. More on that tomorrow.

Not the longest workout, but a good one!

WHAT WENT DOWN:

Le Foam Roll

1000M Row

A lot of Dips

A lot of Pull-ups

I know, I know, but I’ve been slammed with work! These were light training days, anyway.

WHAT WENT DOWN:

Uh, I kind of can’t remember?

A good day of handstand training

My dips are back! I knocked out like a dozen and felt great. Thank Painangel.

A really long middle-split static-stretching session that was awesome

Jefferson Curls

Random accessory lifting/bicep curls/tricep stuff/whatever

Toes to bar stuff

Pull-ups

Sort of front lever stuff

Some rowing

Some running

Oops! Got behind on posting again. Need to stop doing that. Catching up quickly because I’m busy!

WHAT’S BEEN GOING DOWN:

Lots of running with guided runs via the Nike Run Club App. Loving these. Running with Mo was awesome and hard.

Some deadlifting.

Some benching.

Some squatting.

Pull-ups.

Handstand Practice.

Lots of Handstand Practice.

Lots of Wrist Mobility.

A couple light days where I stretched a little at home.

The end.

Not much here. Both of these days my gym plans got (unforgivably) sandbagged by work so I just stretched for a second at home. Not only was it a bummer, but I feel substantially WORSE in every way, mentally, when I don’t get to the gym. For real. Important data.

WHAT WENT DOWN:

Just enough to keep the streak alive.

With an evening work call on the books, today was a #NoRestDays-style rest day. Did some push-ups, stretched my hammies.

WHAT WENT DOWN:

Did some push-ups

Stretched my hammies