Holly

Last week marked the half way point in the Koda 20-rep squat challenge. Even though Alex, my typical back-squatting partner, was AWOL I managed to pull through the 20 reps at a current PR of 315. I have to admit that the 20 reps at 315 felt better than 3 weeks ago at 285. Hopefully I will see similar results this evening with 325.
I have been VERY proud of all of the Koda athletes. They have been tackling this 20-rep squats series like Ray Lewis in a junior high football game. Each set for every person has been a struggle worthy of praise but there was one set of 20 last week that I cannot stop thinking about. Even as I am writing this post I am getting pumped up thinking about it.
In order to protect the innocent I will call the client in this story “Holly”. Holly is 27 year old business woman with little athletic background and hates to run. She has been CrossFitting for a couple years now but does not consider herself a competitor by any means. She is very social and uses CrossFit as a way to hang out with her friends while throwing in some physical activity. It is easy to get a smile out of Holly but getting her to push past her comfort zone has been much more challenging.
I was lucky enough to be teaching our 6pm class last week for the 3rd attempt at our 20 rep squat max. Jared has affectionately nick-named this class “ChickFit” because there is a very large majority of girls that attend this class on a regular basis and Holly is a ChickFit regular.
After warming up the class I released them to start prepping the bars and their legs for last week’s attempt. I warned them a few times that this was going to be a battle and that they needed to get themselves mentally prepared. I do not remember what weight Holly was using that day but I it is not important. When she took the bar off of the rack I could tell that she was under a load that she was not accustomed to. Although her form was near perfect, the first 6 of her 20 rep were the slowest of the day. From watching many others attempt this feat; I did not believe that Holly was going to make it past 12 reps. Typically, people are able to make it between 8-10 reps before they need to break up the set and even then not everyone makes it to 20. Holly broke at 4 and was doing single reps afterwards. It felt like it took her 2 minutes to get from 6 to 15 reps and each one was a struggle. By the time she had gotten to 15 the whole gym was cheering her on. Students from the other class were poking their heads through the door to see what all the commotion was about and I was yelling everything I could think of that would give her the encouragement she needed to keep going. She painfully muscled through the last 5 reps with the class on the edge of their metaphorical seats. Each one was a near failure and the last one took a solid 7 seconds for her to stand from the bottom of the squat. She finished the set of 20 and bailed the weight off of her back while the class cheered and congratulated her. It was one of the proudest moments I have had at Koda.
I think that this demonstrates the power of the CrossFit community and gym family. I can say with 99.9% certainty that Holly would not have ever squatted that much weight 20 times if she was not a member of a CrossFit gym. I love seeing the team environment created by social fitness and I feel bad for anyone who has not experienced it.
Along with encouraging our own gym family we need to make sure that we get out and participate in community challenges whether they be associated with CrossFit or not. I think it is our fundamental duty to promote health and fitness within our local community. Not only does it inspire others but it also allows us to break the monotony of our regular training schedules. And there events do not have to be competitions either. There are loads of 5k runs and fundraising events available. SIGN UP!

Plateaus

Last week I wrote about my revelation dealing with my 2nd pull and how I hypothesized that I would be able to improve my snatch by focusing on power snatch. I was hoping that taking out the 3rd pull (fully under the bar) would eliminate some of the complexity and allow me to focus on setting up a good position with the 1st pull and violently exploding in the triple extension on the 2nd pull.

I am proud to announce that the result was monstrous. I was doing one
of “Outlaw’s” strength sessions that included a 7 min EMOM of 2
snatches at 85% followed by 1 rep at 95%. I know that when Rudy calls
for “Snatch” he means full snatch but I modified mine to 1 power snatch to work pulls 1 and 2 then 1 full snatch to put all 3 pulls together. With my current 1RM at an estimated 205, I did the EMOM at 175lbs. I felt fast and explosive all the way through the 7th set. Then I loaded the bar up with 195 and went into my 1 rep at 95%. The
movement was effortless and I caught the bar higher than I ever have with that weight. I want to mention here that this is the weight that cost me $1000 and a 2nd place podium finish in the Asian Regional’s. After crushing 195 I knew that I could not stop there. I quickly added 5lbs plates and hit 205 with as ease, then 210, then 215.
Filled with excitement, I loaded up 220. It went plenty high but I left the weight out in front, causing me to miss the rep. I thought back to what Steve Miller told me about lat activation throughout the first 2 pulls and shot up a successful rep with less than 15 seconds of rest from my missed attempt. At this point I knew there was only I thing to do. I had to hit 225.

For those of you who do not know me well, I snatched 225 over two
years ago at the 2010 regional WOD #1. My form on that day was
abysmal at best but the adrenaline took over and I was able to get the
weight. Unfortunately, I have not been close since even though my
strength numbers have gone up and my fitness has greatly improved.
The only way I can describe my progress in the snatch over these 2
years is “overwhelming disappointment”. I had not only stalled, but against all of my best efforts, gone backwards.

I hit 225 again, for the second time in my life. With only 7 days of power snatch focused work I was able to find my sticking point. I know some people reading this will think that the solution should have been obvious. But the truth is that solutions are never obvious until you know that they are solutions. I was trying all kinds of things that kept getting more and more complicated. But the real answer was for me to keep it simple.

I am writing this hoping that it will inspire others to “keep it simple” when they hit their own plateaus, whether that be performance specific or dealing with body composition. Take a week and try something simple. If you are struggling with pull-ups do 10 negatives every day for a week. If can’t get your diet in line, try cutting
sugar, or bread, or diary for a solid 7 days. If your performance is stalling, try running a couple miles every morning for a week or doing the RX’d programming at your gym. I will not guarantee that you will be successful on your first attempt, but you will be 1 step closer to finding your solution. The important thing is that you go hard! And don’t forget to measure results at the beginning and the end.
-Brice

20 rep squats, Weddings, and Power Snatches

I have to be honest; these last 2 weeks of training have not been a fruitful as previous weeks. I attribute this mainly to taking Thursday through Sunday off of the last two weekends. One weekend off was for my sister’s wedding and the other was for a lake outing with several other fun-loving Oklahomans. Both of these events were a blast and something I would exchange for training 10 times out of 10. I think a lot of people (me being one of them) get too swallowed up by their programming and will not deviate under any circumstances. I am EXTREMELY hyper-active with an addictive personality to boot. It is especially important that I take a step back from the constant grind at the gym and live life.

Tip of the Day: Make sure you are having fun.

The one shining moment of the last couple weeks was Monday’s 20-rep squat sequence. We started a 6 week cycle at Koda where we will be doing one set of 20 reps each week. We are starting at 70% of our 1 rep max back squat and increasing weight each week (assuming that we get all 20 reps). Last week I was able to get 295 with a lot of encouragement from fellow athletes. I know this is not “Drew Hymer status” but I am glad I was able to start the cycle off with a win. I am looking forward to battling 305 tomorrow.

Another big plus is that I am starting to feel the Oklahoma weather cooling down a little. I am extremely nervous writing this because I do not want to jinx every OKC crossfitter (except for CFComplete… they have A/C) but the last couple weeks of training have been unbearable. We should have taken stats at Koda and sent them in for the “Most Sweat Produced in 4000 sq ft” category of the Guinness World Records.

HSPUs are still progressing at a very steady rate. I feel stronger with every EMOM that I do and am trying to keep myself from attempting Diane for another couple weeks.

Again, my excitement centers around the Olympic lifting movements. Last week I was doing one of the Outlaw strength WODs that included power snatch. I noticed that my power snatch was pretty weak compared to my full snatch which led me to believe that I was not properly executing the 2nd pull. I know this does not seem like a huge revelation but I had been focusing almost exclusively on the 3rd pull. I did power snatches for the next several workouts and was able to add 20lbs to my power snatch “max” in no time. I plan to keep heavy-ish power snatches in my oly warm-up from here on.

-Brice

P.S. We are hosting Steve Miller for an Olympic Lifting Seminar at Koda on OCT 6th. Click the link below for details. There are only 30 spots available. https://kodacrossfit.zenplanner.com/zenplanner/portal/event.cfm?CALENDARTYPE=Event&SKIP=false&eventId=AAFD0C74-6F2B-4B60-BEE8-6CBF73342F16&FRAME=false