The one thing that got me out of bed this morning? Knowing that we're starting a new four-week cycle at
CrossFit Palo Alto. Plus, after everyone in the gym did a crapload of rowing on Friday, I kind of figured the erg wouldn't be playing a major part in today's metcon. See? I'm using my noggin even at 4 in the morning.
Strength Skill:
- Kettlebell Snatches (5-5-5-5-5 per side)
It still amazes me how much I can perspire while doing just a few brief sets of kettlebell work, and with plenty of rest in-between to boot. Still, I'm pleased to report that I'm no longer terrible at kettlebell snatches. "Not bruising my forearms" used to be my primary marker of success with KB snatches, but today, I actually got to focus on cleaning up my form.
As usual for the first week in a cycle, I kept it relatively light, but I managed to work my way up to 24 kilograms. Already
drenched dewy with sweat, I would've been happy to pack it in for the day, but there was the little matter of the metcon.
Metcon:
3 rounds for time of:
- 20 lateral tuck-jumps over a parallette
- 15 handstand push-ups
- 400-meter run
This looked fun (except for the running, which never looks fun). The tuck-jumps reminded me of stuff I used to do in my garage back when I was bouncing around to P90X and Insanity DVDs -- and just like the good ol' days, my jumping was less than graceful.
Having just finished a cycle of HSPUs, the handstand push-ups flew by pretty quickly -- especially now that I've discovered the one-legged kip. For the past couple of years, I've been doing strict handstand push-ups, and finding that once I ran out of gas, I was done. With the extra little oomph provided by a single-legged kip, though, I felt like I could keep cranking out HSPUs for a good, long while. I was thisclose to finishing all the handstand push-ups unbroken, but right before my forty-fifth (and final) rep, I fell away from the wall. D'oh!
Let's not talk about the running. Suffice it to say, I remain sluglike on the running path.
Result: 9:12 as RXed.
