Dan getting above the net. It must be the sweet CFSB boardies
Last weekend was the first volleyball tournament that I’ve played in almost two years. I had a big reality check as I felt like all my shots were off, passes were not in the right spots and sets were less than satisfactory. After a year of not playing, it was obvious that I have some work to do. My partner, Mark Bell, played great but I couldn’t carry my weight on the team. We played again on Sunday morning for about 4 hours as well. Looking back on it, about 8 hours of competitive doubles volleyball might have been a little much since I just started getting on the sand 2 months ago.
I started doing CrossFit a few years ago because I wanted a conditioning program to supplement playing beach volleyball. Today I love both equally, but realize that I have to choose my battles wisely. As I write this on a lazy Sunday night, I can barely walk because my legs are so sore and crampy. My knees and hips are achy and my ego is bruised. Big thanks to one of our soon to be newest graduate of PT school, Missy, for helping me release my spasming hips (or as Wes likes to call it, “booty lock”) and for stretching my cramping hamstrings. That definitely reminded me of the importance of stretching and myofascial release. Sucks getting old.
The moral of the story is that CrossFit kept the majority of my conditioning up. There is no substitute for having sand legs and the only way to get them is by running and jumping in the sand. Where CrossFit helped me is that after a year of not being in the sand, I didn’t really loose a step or any explosiveness in my jump. Now the sand definitely made things harder, but I recovered a lot faster because that’s what CrossFit trains you to do. Unfortunately all of my skills have gone to shit, but that comes back with practice. If you are using CrossFit as a supplement to a sport (which I highly recommend), then you should see a pretty dramatic improvement once your body adjusts to the intensity of training. Hopefully, I’ll be able to walk tomorrow to come and open up the gym.
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Workout of the Day 8/30/2010
A. Power Clean 2-2-2-2
B. 12-9-6-3-6-9-12
Cluster (clean to a thruster) 95/65
Pull-Up
100M Sprint
Compare to 4/20/2010
I can totally relate to “sand legs”. But it works the other direction too, you know…a normal CF workout that might make others sore isn’t so bad if you’ve been running doubles for 3 hours a day consistently.
I wonder what the upper-body equivalent to sand legs is? Rings? Some activity that when you do it, the next day you’re sore in places you didn’t even know existed….
PS: This http://www.flickr.com/photos/crossfitsb/4930252398/ needs to be a blog front page pic, please and thank you.
You are right Jeremy…
although i wouldnt want to run to poke fun at Ryan too much… have you seen him at night, he could kill me: http://filmistruth.com/images/b-kurgg1.jpg