So Saturday’s workout was tough- insanely tough. We had teams of two grind out 100 pullups, 200 pushups, 300 situps and 400 squats. Sounds hard enough, but it gets harder. Only one team member can work to accumulate counted reps. The team member that is not accumulating reps must be swinging a kettlebell. If the kettlebell stops swinging, the reps incurred during that time do not count. Each team member has a kettlebell. Both of the team’s kettlebells can not be touching the ground at the same time. This means that in order to switch from swinger to rep accumulator, swinger must hold the kettlebell until original rep accumulator picks up their kettlebell. We actually had to add a penalty for breaking this rule: 10 burpees for each member every time the rule is broken. I wanted to make it 20 burpees for each infraction, but a couple teams would be performing 100-160 burpees after the already 35-59 minute workout. Most teams genuinely forgot the rule and righted their wrong after one reminder. They only had to do 10 burpees.

Our crazy workout forced teams to strategize. For instance to get the best time, team members would agree to do 20 reps each and then switch. The strategy was a bit of a balancing act: too many reps per person would waste time by resting; too few would waste time in transition from accumulator to swinger.

Communication was extremely important. If an accumulator continued to perform reps while a swinger was resting, the reps did not count toward the total and had to be redone. If an accumulator was resting while the swinger continued in motion, more valuable energy was wasted. All but one of our 10 teams was co-ed, which made communication interesting. Quite a few teams got creative by resting the kettlebell on their foot while the accumulator was resting between reps.

The madness was a great prep for the affiliate cup. Not only did team members have to rely on each other to complete the WOD, they had to follow the rules. If this were an actual competition WOD, teams would get disqualified for disregarding requirements. If they did have a burpee penalty, they would probably add the time it takes to complete the burpees to the overall time to do the WOD. That is something I would change if I had to do it over again. Otherwise, finishing times would mean nothing. Rule breakers would finish faster and get no penalty in the overall competition. They would only suffer for a few minutes after the WOD while they completed burpees.

Saturday’s workout was long and grinding- a complete gut check. The intensity was gone after only a few minutes of starting. This was definitely not high-intensity Fran. As trainers we would do you a disservice if we did not throw a long one at you once in a while. A quote from Greg Glassman, founder of CF, has stuck with me since I fell in love with CF: we fail at the margins of our experience. Remember the 12 days of Christmas? That WOD was crazy long, but you did it. You got through it. This weekend you suffered and endured and finished. All of you were nothing short of amazing. Go back and read Slaughter’s post on Pain. What was harder about Saturday: the mental or the physical? Which pain was worse? Does anyone else find it amusing that a CF coach, named Slaughter, wrote a post on pain?

We even had two visitors this weekend that endured the suffering. They were so excited about CF after the workout; and said they loved it. Both did an outstanding job and pushed through pain until the end.

I am so impressed with every one of your efforts. You put heart into your WOD – hell, it took heart to finish the damn thing. You guys rock!

WOD 2/1/2010

Front Squat 1RM

AMRAP 15
400M Run
12 Deadlifts
12 Knees to Elbows

Optional:
Clean & Jerk 1-1-1-1-1
Snatch 1-1-1-1-1
Toes to Bar 10 unbroken x 3

In the course of conversations in the gym, you may have heard trainers or other members talking about taking fish oil capsules. While CrossFit does not typically recommend much in the way of supplements, a good fish oil source would be the exception. The list of benefits are simply too numerous to overlook. There is a great Paleo site called Nikkisblogspot which had an article about fish oil I’d highly encourage you to read. It lists the following benefits of fish oil:

• enhances heart health by maintaining elasticity of cardio tissue
• helps the heart beat in a strong and healthy way
• ensures efficient heart function so that this key organ will last longer
• increases lean body mass
• increases metabolism by up to 400Kcal/day
• reduced inflammation within muscle and connective tissue
• improves fat burning
• important for cell membrane structure and essential for proper brain function
• improves insulin efficiency
• prevents excessive muscle breakdown
• increases brain health
• improves nervous system function
• contains antioxidants and their benefits

The pharmaceutical community has decided to cash in on this and released a new “drug” called Lovaza. As Robb Wolf points out, it is nothing more than a prescription fish oil!

Now the questions you may have are: where do I get some of this stuff and how much should I use? Robb Wolf has suggested taking a dosage of 1/2g of EPA/DHA per 10 lbs of bodyweight. For example, at my current weight of 170 I would need to take enough to equal 7.5g of EPA/DHA. Keep in mind however, that you will need to check the label to see how much actual EPA/DHA you are getting per capsule.

One of the best brands of fish oil is Kirkland, available at Costco. They sell a bottle of 400 capsules at 300mg of EPA/DHA per capsule, for just under $10. That works out to a total of 120g of EPA/DHA per bottle which equates to a cost of approximately 8 cents per gram of EPA/DHA. I compared this to the Kirkland concentrated version (each capsule is a little over 600mg of EPA/DHA each) and the price jumped to 13 cents per gram. Lastly, I looked at GNC’s triple-concentrated version (900mg per capsule) and the price worked out to 11 cents per gram.

So why would you ever consider the more expensive versions? Going back to my calculated dosage of 7.5g of EPA/DHA daily, that works out to 25 capsules if I buy the standard Kirkland fish oil. If I were taking the GNC triple-concentrated, it would only be a little more than 8 capsules. Moral of the story–if you prefer to take fewer capsules, you might want to pay a little more for the concentrated versions.

By all means, if any of you have come across a better value on fish oil please share and post to comments!

WOD – 7.9.09

Overhead Squats 7×2

Four rounds for time of:

• 10 Push Press
• 15 Good Mornings
• 25 Sit Ups

Use the same bar for both Push Press and Good Mornings. Post times and loads to comments.

Today was a busy day at CFSB.  At 8:00 AM we kicked off the day with John and Sean putting up strong times on the first of the Last Chance Qualifier workouts (10, 9, 8 … 155 C&J, C2B Pullups, 1.5 KBS).  9 AM we did our normal Saturday workout and had a great turn out to do a team workout.  11 AM to the beach for our Monthly beach workout and despite the cool temps and dreary skies we still had a fantastic time.  The back to the gym to cheer John and Sean on as they continued there workouts in an attempt to qualify for the Games in July.

Great work to all of the athletes today!

Team Workout
1 Minute at Each Station
4 Rounds

Rope Climb
Wall Ball
Front Squats

One Team member does Kettlebell Swings while the other does the activity

Count the Kettlebell Swings

While not a proven fact, real world experience indicates that Crossfit “Cures” hangovers. I put this to the test this weekend in Las Vegas, after a long Friday night of the normal Las Vegas debauchery. 9:00 AM sharp to Crossfit Las Vegas for a workout. Zack and Joe at Crossfit Las Vegas were great hosts. 50% of the class were Crossfitter’s who had traveled in for the Memorial Day weekend. Saturday was supposed to be a day for new folks to come in and try Crossfit out so they put a scalable workout on the board.

WOD
3 Rounds
400M run
25 Wallball
20 Sit-ups

Luke, owner of Crossfit Scottsdale convinced a few of us to sub 10 Sit-ups and 10 Strict (no Kipping) KTE’s. As always like in our gym there was great comraderie and folks were cheering each other on even all of us outsiders. No Stopwatch Whores in this group as Zach and Joe reminded everyone of form and the people cheering were encouraging form over time.

In the end showed up to breakfast with the rest of the party feeling energetic and alive which is more than can be said for everyone else sporting a hangover.

So on Monday make sure you make it to the 10:00 class and work that hangover out, I can almost guarantee you will feel better than if you chose not to show up!

WOD – 5.23.09

5 rounds for time:

• 5 Squat Cleans (135/95#)
• 15 Pushups

Cash Out: 20 Tire Flips

Blatantly plagiarized from CrossFit Laguna Beach and CrossFit 603.

Congrats to the Viquez Family (Al, Michelle, Eman and Diego) for completing the EIF Revlon 5K Run/Walk for Women Los Angeles last weekend!

What activities do you do outside the gym? Post your hobbies to comments.

Quite a few of you do some fun stuff:

• Allyson paddles outrigger canoes competitively
• Angel and John M. play hockey
• Ruth and Marcus rock climb
• Forrest plays volleyball
• Lutrell swims
• Ryan H., Ryan W., Al, and Michelle play softball
• Michael plays golf
• Chip cycles
• Tori plays guitar
• Matt recently did a triathlon
• Simon plays rugby
• Sean N. and Stephen play soccer
• Chris and Emery do MMA
• Avelyne runs
• Eric is training for a marathon

Send us pictures of you playing your sport, coaching, volunteering, competing, performing, traveling etc. We would love to post them on the website!

WOD – 5.12.09

Max Front Squats

• 1-1-1-1-1-1-1
• 1 x 15-20

Cash Out: 7 sprints to pylon

We’re always scouring the internet searching for more info to share with you all. Recently, a few of us exchanged Google Reader feeds to get an inside look at each other’s reading material. As a matter of fact, yesterday’s WOD was a result of that exchange. It’s a great way to subscribe to a site’s RSS feed and every time you login, all of your favorite sites are there ready to read in one convenient window. If you’re interested in checking out our RSS feeds, email me and I’ll shoot you over a list. To get you started, Takefit.com lists some of their favorite sites that also feature some our favorite places on the web as well. What are some of your favorite sites? Post them to comments – they don’t have to be Fitness and Nutrition related.

WOD – 4.22.09

Snatch
5 X 3

After the WOD is over, you’re usually done, right? You’re spent, left gasping for air and you just want to lay down. However, it’s better to do a “cash out” or “finisher.” Work on a skill like Avelyne is doing above. This skill work following a WOD will carry over into other movements resulting in an increase in your overall work capacity. We’re going to start doing this a lot more in our classes so get ready for some extra fun.

Saturday Morning Workout – 3.28.09

“Practice Makes Perfect”

10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 reps

Back Squat
Front Squat
Overhead Squat
Shoulder Press
Push Press
Push Jerk
Deadlift
Sumo Deadlift High Pull
Clean

The entire workout is performed with a a 45 pound bar for women and a 75 pound bar for men.

Next week, March 28, we will be offering our monthly FREE workout on 9th street in Hermosa Beach. We’ll be doing what we do on the sand beginning at 11am. Tell your friends and family. It’ll be the perfect opportunity for someone to get their first intro to CrossFit.

There will still be a 9am class at the gym as well.

Saturday Morning Workout – 3.21.09

21 kb swings
21 sumo deadlift high pull
400 m run
15 kb swings
15 sdhp
400 m run
9 kb swings
9 sdhp
400 m run

Saturday Morning Workout

2 minutes of work at the following stations for a cumulative score of reps:

Tire Flips

Deadlifts

Row (for calories)

Push Press

Overhead Plate Walk 100 meters

Saturday Morning Workout – 3.07.09

“My Pet Rock”
In teams of two:
200 m waiter walk (35#)
100 wallball
80 pullups
50 overhead squats (45# bar)
30 pushups

Partner holds two 35# KBs while the other works.