Team Bay Ridge CrossFit at CFSBK
- Happy birthday, Frank H.!
- Coach David’s article about programming deadlifts is blowing up the interwebs. Like Inside the Affiliate on Facebook so you don’t miss any future articles!
Got Plans on Saturday? Come to CFSBK’s Art Show!
CFSBK’s first Art Show (and maybe the first ever at a CrossFit gym?) is THIS Saturday, November 22, from 7:30-10:30pm. Free entry and alcohol.
Matthew Reid, a local Brooklyn artist, will be live painting a mural from 8-10pm. Follow him on Instagram to see more of his stuff, and look through his website to see some of his past collaborations.
Most importantly, come check out art from fellow talented CFSBKers. Below are all the artists whose work will be on display:
Elyse Barton
Camille Cruz
Asta Fivgas
Katie Harper
Jenna Jerman
Alona Katz
Tim Mauseth
Kevin McDonald
Laura McElherne
David Osorio
Cait Vogt
Keith Walter
Brian “Baz” Zimbler
If you have any questions, email Kate at Katharine [at] CrossFitSouthBrooklyn.com.
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There Was No First Human It’s Okay To Be Smart
The Unhealthy Competition Bug: Is Your Gym Infected? Breaking Muscle
Wednesday's Programming
Turkish Get Up
Fitness: 3-3-3-3-3
Performance: 1-1-1-1-1
Work up to either a heavy triple or single, depending on your experience with the movement.
Post loads to comments.
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Tabata Russian Kettlebell Swings
Go medium heavy and focus on perfect form.
then,
Inverse Tabata L-Sit
Post loads to comments.
Yesterday's Olympic Lifting class. Well, the clean and jerk went well. Jerk in particular felt very solid. Keeping my hands around the bar in the catch definitely helping my staility at the bottom, get my elbows higher and stand up the weight with less difficulty. I worked up to 145 and had more room to run, but our heavy day is Wednesday so did not push it.
Snatch was another story. I kept missing my first warmup weight which was frustrating/ridiculous. I was experimenting with my balance during the first and second pull by actively screwing my feet into the floor – trying to establish a more solid base before the third pull. Frank noticed, asked me what I was thinking about and told me just to pick up the bar and lift. "What does Ilya think about when he walks up to the bar – NOTHING." Visualize the lift first, think about what I want to do and set up and just execute. Well, I hit my next five lifts + a PR double. This is a tough sport for a head case like me.
Went for a PR single and missed four times in a row. Always the same issue, got the bar overhead in a good position but landed with my weight on my toes and hips too far forward so my feet/ankles collapsed and I could not stand it up. Need to get my weight back more in the landing/overhead squat position (i.e., get my butt back). Surprisingly, this is what every CFSBK coach has been saying to me for 3-1/2 years. Hmm . . . . .
Per Frank, on Wednesday I am going to work on some Power Snatches + OHS squat to try and fix my positioning. The pulls during the PR attempts where good and I got the bar plenty high, which is encouraging. Hopefully I can correct this issue so I can make some nice jumps over the next few weeks.
Small 6am class with Jess and McDowell. The rope jumping went well and definitely made clear what issues I need to work on. I managed to string 18 together at first, and had a couple of runs of 10 or so, and a few more of around 5. My main issue is just pure timing. I Always do better when I take some time to think about the timing beforehand with some jump-tap-tap, "look at me, I'm a seal!" drills. I also (as McDowell pointed out) need to breathe and not get super tense in my shoulders while doing double-unders. Some things to work on…
The nose and toes handstand holds were fine, though on the last couple of rounds I could feel my core softening and my hollow position breaking down a bit. The v-ups … happened. The dumbbell step ups are what I'm going to feel for the rest of the day. Literal pains in the ass, but it should be fine as long as I remember to stand up every fifteen minutes or so.
TGUs! Love these! Worked up to 45 on the right side, failed that weight on the left though. (my last successful attempt was at 40 on the left) I think I might have had it, since I got all the way to standing — lost my balance on the way down. Then I switched to barbells, first 15 and then 22. This was much easier than the first time I tried TGUs with a barbell, although "much easier" does not equal "easy."
82 swings with the 24kg KB, then L-sit with my legs a little further out than a tuck the whole time. 10-second holds, I can do. I feel like it's a mobility issue, not a strength issue, on these. How the hell do I get my legs straight? 😛
6am post from NorCal Crossfit in San Jose
Unfortunately Jason wasn't there but the gym was still super cool. GIANT space, with a whole section in the back devoted to Brazilian jujitsu and another section for boxing.
Today's workout had three sections:
1. Partner warmup of ring dips, wall balls, and running.
2. Work up to a heavy 3 of thrusters
I worked up to 205 before I failed the third one and it got pretty heavy (and ugly).
3. Metcon was a couplet:
21-15-9 of thrusters at 135#
9-7-5 of MU's
I got 13:04, breaking up the thrusters 7/7/7, 5/5/5, 3/3/3, and the MU's 5/4, 4/3, 5. It felt a little fran-like without the frantic pace (no way to do that on the heavy thrusters).
Great vibe overall at the gym. I love their drop-in fee: "Bring a starbucks gift card for the coaches if you come more than 3x in a week as a drop-in."
6am with Jess and McD… McLady Fox?
Jump rope practice went just fine. Double unders are pretty dialed in for me at this point, so after about 3 minutes of working on controlling rope speed (i.e. doing doubles as slow and relaxed as possible), I decided to get some triple under practice. By then last two minutes I was consistently hitting a sequence of single-single-double-double-triple, but could not for the life of me do anything organized after the triple. The rope was still spinning but I couldn't get back in sync with it. Should be fun to practice this at OG in the future and see if I can get to the point of sprinkling triples into bigger sets of doubles… I see lots of jump rope welts in my future.
NFT WOD was deceivingly tiring. I did shoulder taps instead of a nose & toes hold at Jess's suggestion. They were super awkward at first and I thought I'd fall on my head, but then I started to get the hang of shifting my weight. V-ups were v-ups, but the step ups with dumbbells wore me out. I used 50lb dumbbells, and was struggling on the last two reps for each leg. Probably just the right weight.
Make-up from yesterday:
Worked on some oly lifting…gotta at least improve my snatch a little bit before the Hoboken comp!
Snatch: worked up to 88 again. I'm actually getting low on 93 (a new development), but the bar is too far in front of me and I'm not locking out.
C&J: Kept these pretty light, worked up to 133, then a couple more at 123. Feeling very sore, and not very spry.
I'm kind of dragging my feet on back off week because I haven't worked out for several weeks, but I gotta say, it's kind of lonely working out BESIDE a class instead of in it.
11am lifting session
Was dreading this as I'm still significantly sore from Saturday
Squat
245×3
280×3
310×3
Not too bad, although the 310 was slower than it should have been
Deadlift
240x10x5
T&G Power Cleans
165×3
185×3
200×3
Had some trouble organizing the hook grip on the way back to my hips but was able to do it without catching it on my thighs first. Feet went wider than ideal on the third rep at 200.
Make-up post from yesterday's 7:30 pm w. DO and Ro:
Jump rope practice went okay. My goal going in was to consistently link more than 7 or 8 at a time. Whenever I cross this threshold, I can often link up to 30 together, but it's not predictable when that will happen for me. However, I just couldn't settle on the right-sized rope for yesterday's workout (my usual one was taken), so I had to use a slightly longer jump rope. After I finished pouting silently to myself, I realized it was good wrist control practice learning how to whip that longer rope around twice in a controlled manner. I managed to do 30 unbroken in 2 separate sets with the longer jump rope, but I also had a number of sets where I couldn't link more than a few together. Sometime to continue working on…
Handstand practice was fun. I have to work on better body awareness to really know when I'm completely vertical and not slightly tipped in either direction, but I'm not sure how to improve this. V-ups were in tucked position to get to "V", then slowly extending legs and coming down in the full extended position. DB step-ups with 20# DBs.
I've had some scheduling changes this week, so I'm looking forward to seeing some familiar faces in the evening classes before getting back into the 6 am routine next week!
Yesterday 4.30pm with Arturo and Noah.
I've been having some trouble with my DUs lately, not that they were ever really dialed In or anything, and I had almost lost hope and really wasn't enjoying hitting mysef repeatedly with the cable, so I had given up on practicing them for a week or so. Noah gave me some great advice- because my arms tend to go out a little bit more the more DUs I string together, he told me to go back to singles after five or as I feel my arms going out, and keep it going that way until I have this under control. Simple, yet extremely effective, as I have a tendency to just get frustrated and give up, but if I don't actually stop, I can 'catch' the rhythm again and get many more DUs with my arms in the correct place, just by breaking them up with singles. Thanks Noah! I feel like this is going to help a lot.
Pull-ups
10 x 2 ( 1/2 pull-ups, 1/2 chin-ups)
CRASH-Bs 2 x 16'/5' 16SPM
1. 2.15.1/500M 16SPM 3551M
2. 2.17.7/500M 16SPM 3485M
Today- Oly Cycle.
Snatch complex- 53 x 5 x 3, 58 x 5, 63 x 3 x 2.
Clean & Jerk complex. 83 x 2 x 5.
More great advice from Frank. Lots to work on but feeling pretty confident that I know what my main issues are, which is the first step to improvement.
Pull-ups
2 x 3- pull-up grip.
CRASH-Bs 2 x 16'/5' 16SPM
1. 2.14.8/500M 16SPM 3559M
2. 2.16.7/500M 16SPM 3511M
Slow and steady.
Re: article about the "Competition Bug" aka clickiness…
I'm happy the type of environment he speaks of does not exist at SBK. We do have one lifter who follows his own programming and he is a competitive on the national level, and happens to be one of the most approachable and talkative athletes at the gym. Our Comp Team athletes train alongside our brand new newbies except for one class that meets once a week, where they can all throw down together in a more adrenaline fueled environment that would probably scare/turn off newer members. As we've grown from 30 members to exponentially more, there will naturally be groups that relate to each other more and become friends, but I see this as almost entirely a product of convenience and the amount of classes that we now offer. If you regularly train at 6am, you probably don't really know the people who train at 5:30pm and therefore won't regularly hang with them. That said, at any event we throw I'm consistently warmed and impressed by people's willingness to go outside of their regular circle and get to know something about someone else.
Y'all rock 🙂
im gonna say competition stuff: if it wasn't for the subway series, i wouldn't have met a lot of the AM people! well now i know them via front desk but STILL!
Did yesterday's workout at 6:30 with Whit. Was such a fun workout!
Learning how to isolate the individual parts of a DU, using a shorter rope, and focusing on the wrist helped me so much! I actually got a couple DUs here and there during practice. It was so fun to have 10 minutes of just practice– practicing on my own won't seem so intimidating now.
The WOD was also fun. Love all things handstands, and the step ups were a fun, new exercise. Used 20# dumbbells which made it really challenging, especially to keep my knees out on the step up.
800m run (because it was freaking cold and I was late)
DROMS
Death by Push Press @65#
Completed 12th round, 11 into the 13th minute (unbroken up to last round)
Lots of shoulder mashing w lax ball, then feet and calves
More warm ups, DROMS, then
50 air squats
550m row
50 sit ups
Fun Turkish get-up session w Jess
DB: 25, 30, 35, 40
BB: 33, 43 — first time w barbell, failed first try at 43, got it on 2nd attempt
Tabata Russian KB 20kg
12-12-11-12-12-11-12-12
Inverse Tabata L-sit
First 4 legs straight, left shoulder position compromised so switched to alternating leg out. This always bothers my shoulders
Felt really good after this work out, and yesterday actually. Back off week is exactly what I need right now.