I took my friends Jim and Beth up to Snoqualmie Central for their first day on skis and I think they’re hooked. They found a beginner lesson package deal. 3 days of lessons, tickets and rental and if you complete the three you have the option of a cheap season and rental pass. All of this for less than what I paid for my season pass. So with an easy drive up. (rock star parking!) and living through the rental line, they were off in there lesson.
Interlude:
While Jim and Beth are in there lesson I went up to check out Tripple 60 and Silverfir chairs. Lots of snow, reasonably steep, and some trees. Very tasty.
When I met up with them after their lesson I was greeted with these big ear to ear smiles. (game, set and match!) Even after all these years seeing somebody get that “switched on” smile is a thrill. The rest of the day was spent trying out their new skilllzzz on the beginner lift and trying to estimate the amount of work they can safely cut while the snow is flying.
Congrats Jim and Beth. Welcome (though your wallet probably won’t thank me 
). You can now look forward to the weather turning cold and snow flying.
Workout tonight was a combo of a dumbbell complex and jump ups
Step 1:
With 35lbs dumbbell do a pushup, left arm raise to chest, right arm raise to chest, jump up squat hang clean, split jerk. Do 25 repetitions of this.
Step 2:
To a target just out of reach jump up and touch 100 times.
Repeat Step 1 and 2 three times.
It’s about 27 minutes of work – painful grinding work.
Sometimes you just have to admit you’re struggling. So I’m just going to come out and say it: my back squat is epically, egregiously, enormously stalled. For months I’ve been poking at 140Kg. As in back down to 132, take another linear run at it, start dropping the bar, form all over the place, and me frustrated enough to fall down and start chewing at the gym mats. It’s my hamstrings and my middle. A big soft chewy hole in the middle. The very center of what should be my get up and go. So hears how it goes down: bar is heavy so step one , I stay really upright and quad it – ok that’s rep 1 – I then go : “ok fix the hip drive” – so rep 2 – the moment I start to bounce out of the bottom my middle caves in, by erectors round and my hips tucks like a constipated cat straining beyond dignity to make his litter box deposit. So Michael takes pity on me. “Rack pulls”, “enough squats for you, need to get your back strong”. So set the rack bars to just below my knee, set up like a dead lift with very little shin angle, and “TIGHT!” back, chest up, and rock hard abs pull it up the leg. Holy crap. It kills my hams and erectors. I knew that I was cheating around that but this is evidence, immediate feedback as to exactly what is weak. So good, mission accomplished, I have a new path forward. Rack pulls and good mornings twice a week. Until my back is strong enough to be legally a lethal weapon. I’ll take my humble pie with a big dollap of whip cream and a cherry on tip please!
With the efficency of a New Soviet Man in the Utopian light of the Workers Paradise I’ve finally posted the pictures from Mark Rippetoe’s trip to Seattle (and more importantly CrossfitEastside) for a Barbell certification from early this summer. After the cert. was over and all the Ripp-isms (not to be confused with Rippism) had been dispensed to paying customers we got down to some serious business. We went to Brouwer’s. Brouwer’s is a great cafe down in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle that specializes in Belgian and local micro brews. You can find fantastic stuff there. On our field trip I took some pictures, most significantly of Rip and Stef with Rip’s hero, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, whose statue promanatly overlooks Fremont (Let your freak flag fly! It’s more a nod to revolution in general mostly, Fremont residents are lefty but like driving their Volvos).
Gallery images are here.
The weather down here in SD is a little cooler today and there’s a little haze on the coast so it seemed like a good day to just take it easy. I’ve been haning out around the rental reading and walking down to the beach. I also was able to fit in a nap. Needed the rest day too. Some how I managed to wasteapate my quads. Back at it tomorrow.
Stone brewery on a wonderful sunny day.
Spent the afternoon today in Escondido at the Stone Brewery. Drank many beers, a bunch from Stone, and a bunch of other local stuff. I think the best find was Stones Cali Belgique IPA. Hoppy, Belgian yeast, very yummy. I wish I could remember all we had but it was a beautiful day in their garden and the sun was shining and, well, I was over taken by events. After the session I went nuts in the gift shop and bought tee shirts and even a bike jersey.
While I’ve been in Cali it’s been a little catch as catch can for workouts but I’ve been able to get two in (within 24 hours of each other). On Friday the 24th I got over to crossfit socal for a workout.
Three rounds of:
25 double squat wallball shots – this was a really weird movement in which you squat immediatly after throwing the ball, bottom out, and be back up to catch the ball which you then squat and throw agian. (repeat until desired results)
15 100Kg deadlift
My time was 11:06 – I was late to the workout (turns out there is no more 6:30 workout) so I tagged on at the end of the 5:30. There were a few times in the 6 minute range, then a big gap, then it started up again in the 11′s. Not sure what everybody was deadlifting but I’m guessing the time differences yet again a delta between the unbroken and the broken.
Second workout was solo the next morning. I was feeling that I needed to catch up and move some blood. After I got the cobwebs out of my head I ran down to the lifeguard shack below La Jolla village and back to the rental, took about 20 plus minutes and felt good I figure it was about 5K. Then I did 100 pushups, 50 situps, and 50 squats. (the last two in the original plan were for 100 but I bonked – it just hurt to much)
This solo stuff is good but really can’t compare to gym time. I love vacation but I do miss Eastside.
(was a picture of the Schindler place)
While I’m in La Jolla I’ve been staying in one of the units of Schindlers Pueblo Ribera development. Pretty cool example of California modern design. Lots of wood and concrete.
I’m listening to the crashing of the surf on the beach here in La Jolla. Something about that really feels like vacation. I’m off work for a week for some R & R – though I’m having some trouble unplugging the email – in the San Diego area. The plan is to read, get tan, maybe catch some waves, check out some of the local crossfit gyms, drink more beer than I can zone, and generally try and get some sanity back. Been a nutty couple of weeks, late with a project, got reorg’ed, planning for this trip, distracted by the election, and watching the market with the same sick fascination that you watch reality TV. Bleh, as we say in Windows land, time for a reboot.
Mike and Carrie were out of town last week and Friday (9-12) night was the first class back. And I for one can feel their return in my traps as surely as gravity. It’d been kind of a mellow week for me. With the 3 on 1 off I’m trying I’d managed to miss one of the big workout nights. (missed Karen) I mentioned to Mike that It’d been kind of light for me and with the casualness of a dynamite fisherman he dropped a workout on me that, to keep the metaphor going, had me stunned, belly up, and gasping.
5 rounds of:
- 15 70Kg hang power cleans
- 15 box jumps (52″ box)
Time came in at ~ 17:30 (I was too hypoxic to remember and it didn’t get written down)
Today (Sunday) it feels like my shoulders are up around my ears.
Welcome back guys, we’ve missed you.
