Real Talk: On Rest Days I Rest

Let’s Be Cereal

You always hear of friends at the box going for some intense cardio sessions on “rest days” from CrossFit. Either they go for a long-ass run/bike ride outside or join some globo gym for their cardio fix. However, if your own programming or box’s programming is spot-on, you really shouldn’t need that extra cardio.

Maybe a day or two for some light cardio sessions, but there’s no sense in tiring your body out. The best programming out there has a reason behind each WOD. Yeah, I actually used to think CrossFit workouts were really random, as I only followed the main site 3 years ago. Then once a buddy of mine became the head coach at his nearby box, I learned I was completely wrong.

At the same time, I learned that extensive cardio on top of your CrossFitting can be detrimental, depending upon your goals. Want to gain muscle or get shredded? Either way, you’ll need muscle, and too much cardio will hinder you in that respect, unless you’re eating enough. Want to lose weight and don’t care too much about body composition/muscle? Then eat enough and enjoy yourself with the cardio.

Once again, I’m no expert lol. Just mentioning some things I’ve learned from other coaches and my own personal experience.

Coach Knows Best

On our box’s blog (I might reveal it in the coming months ha…), the owner encourages us to post every day of our WOD results and some feedback. One time, there was a trend of people commenting about their “after parties” post-WOD. Some people did skill work, which is fine, while others would do something like a 1 or 2 mile run.

Coach was just like, “Are you guys crazy?” He explained that doing that often could result in overtraining, slowing down any strength and muscle-building. His programming is designed in such a way that for the everyday athlete, the WOD’s 3-5 times a week are all you need.

Maybe you’re not pushing yourselves hard enough? I mean, after a good WOD, myself and others are usually feeling like this:

If you aren’t seeing gradual results, something’s wrong. It’s most likely with your nutrition. Or maybe you might have some kind of health complication preventing you from reaching your goals. Get some tests through your doctor. Ask your coach for more info on this kind of stuff.

Cardio And My Return On Investment

I like saying it, so I’ll say it again…let’s be cereal. Cardio has a low ROI (return on investment). Why? You have to spend a lot of time on top of your normal CrossFitting to get it done. And to maintain your weight, you can’t stop doing cardio. It sucks, and does’t help when you’re someone like me who hates running.

Of course, your alternative, which actually has a better ROI, is to stick with your typical CrossFit programming and just get your nutrition fixed up. Sure, you’ll spend more time preparing meals, but that’ll most likely be less time than the extra few hours a week you’d spend doing cardio. And you know what? The CrossFit WOD’s will burn calories while you’re resting.

Back when I was at my lowest weight, around 145# going into my freshman year of college, I was always wondering why I didn’t have a 6 pack. I thought I ate “well”, and I did at least an hour of cardio after my strength training (typical bodybuilding shit). While I was really happy with how clothes fit, I still had some fat in the gut area.

Knowing what I know now, it’s because I didn’t have enough muscle on me. It made sense since my lifts were weak back then aside from Smith machine back squats (yeah…Smith machine…pathetic I know haha), and I barely ate enough protein. I barely ate in general. And to think some days

Rest Is Good

So for most people out there, rest on your rest days. Your body needs to recover from the punishment CrossFit delivers. Rest is really the only way you’ll improve, whether if you want to lose fat or improve your performance.

I Wish I CrossFitted When I Was 15

15-Year-Old Karissa Rempel Is Going To Regionals

Have you heard of Karissa Rempel’s story? Check it out on the Games site here.

How crazy is that? Huge props to her! And her dad Dave is going to the Canada West Regionals as well on their affiliate’s team.

Man, if I knew about CrossFit when I was 15, I’d be a beast at whatever sport I did. Then again, I stopped playing team sports going into high school. So…

Are These Kids Too Young?

While I’m sure Karissa has all the right training and guidance to ensure her safety during these workouts, I’ve always wondered if you’re too young to train around that age. Yeah, there are kids programs out there which involve some of the basics of CrossFit, but I was shocked to find out that a 15-year-old was Rx’ing stuff and going to the Regionals.

At first I thought minors weren’t allowed to compete, but I found this old blog post for the 2011 Games that says minors can as long as they request the proper forms and have them signed and submitted by a legal parent or guardian.

I was just wondering about this whole age thing because I remember of kids in high school being told by their coaches not to do any weight training until a certain age. At that time in your life, your body’s still growing so you don’t want to mess any of that up, right? Once again, I’m not an expert. Just working off of the things I heard back then haha.

Regardless…

Huge props to Karissa and Dave Rempel for making it to the Regionals! I’d love to make it one day and I’m sure a lot of you readers would like to as well. You guys are an inspiration and make me want to get over my hate of running right NOW.

2013 CrossFit Games Opens…I’m coming for you 😛

Running Sucks

I’m glad I was able to slip in this post on my blog before the day ended 🙂

I Was Never A Runner

All asthma stuff aside, I can easily say I was never a runner. Running’s not fun. Whether you’re on a treadmill where you’re working your ass off to head nowhere at all or even if you’re running around the neighborhood, it still sucks. That’s just me.

Then again, even Rich Froning, Jr., the World’s Fittest Man, isn’t a fan of running either.

Luckily, for CrossFit workouts, running is just a small portion of the bigger pie. Phew. Regardless, any sort of running past 200 meters (yeah…) is the death of me. Take today’s WOD for example.

Alright, so the original WOD was this:

25 minutes on the clock
1 mile run “buy-in”
AMRAP of:
7 shoulder to OH 135#/95#
9 pull-ups
12 sit-ups
Then 30 double unders every 3 rounds

However, we had to change things up a bit for my noon class because a seminar was going on at the same time inside the box. The WOD was done outside so we got to enjoy some awesome weather.

Since we didn’t have music to blast, I luckily brought my iPhone and ARCTIC Bluetooth headset so I could listen to some Pandora. This was the first time I actually used this headset for running, as I generally use it when riding my exercise bike in the basement. It’s really just a shitty Walmart bike with an Outback magnetic bicycle trainer. Sound quality’s pretty decent on the run and it stays in place for me. My only gripe is the button for enabling Bluetooth jiggles around a bit during jarring parts of the run.

Aside from that I love this pair. I’m an audiophile to an extent, so I’ve burned through $100+ earbuds that were ruined by sweat or had their wires melted by the heat. When it comes to running, I just stick to cheap headphones that sound better than those lame iPhone/iPod earbuds. If my sweat ruins them, who cares? I’ll just spend around $25 again lol.

I digress…yeah, I love technology, but I’ll save that for another post or better yet, another blog haha.

The owner of my box came up with 2 modifications of this WOD: one for people who worked out yesterday and another for those who didn’t. Why two mods? Coach didn’t want to wear down our legs after the squat cleans, burpees, and high box jumps from yesterday.

Here’s what I did for today:

25 minute AMRAP:
800m run
3 times:
7 shoulder to OH (did 115#)
12 sit-ups

Score: (this is a bit much…) 2 full rounds + 800m run + 1 round of the cluster + 7 shoulder to OH + 10 sit-ups

Damn You Running

I’m gonna say it again. Running sucks.

If it weren’t for the running portion of this, I definitely would have had 3 rounds at the very least. I was short 21 reps of 3 rounds. Sure, ab movements like sit-ups, toes-to-bar, and knees-to-elbows kill me, but I was crushing the shoulder to overhead, almost Fight Gone Bad-like push presses unbroken. I should done them Rx’d. At least I know now. My legs, my strongpoint, help me out a lot with push presses and jerks.

I guess I’ll just have to keep pushing forward. Get better at running. If I don’t do anything about it, running only going to hold me back. I love joking about running all the time. Hating on it. Saying it’s not for me. Blaming my asthma. All this bullshit.

Rather than all this negative talk, I’m going to take action and stop the hate. CrossFit was rough for me at first, but eventually it got to the point where I could actually keep up with the majority of the class. So why can’t I gradually progress to the point where running can just seem normal to me?

Commentary On 2012 Regionals Commentary

Wait, What Commentary?

If you haven’t watched it already, here’s the CrossFit Games Update on the Regionals by Caity Matter Henniger, Rory McKernan, and Pat Sherwood:

Yes, it’s 30 minutes long. Yes, I watched the whole damn video. Yes, I’m that obsessed with CrossFit. Chances are, if you’re reading this, you probably are too 😛

So Why Commentary On Their Commentary?

I always find these Games Updates rather amusing. There’s a SportCenter-like feel to it, especially with the flashy menus and cheesy music, but they don’t take themselves so seriously and they know it. There’s that gritty feel to it that’s very much of the CrossFit culture. It’s just raw, despite the production values.

Let’s Get Started

Diane

Okay, the first thing they were really talking about was the WOD Diane for Individual Event 1. I’ve never done Diane before, nor would I be able to Rx it. 225# deads are around that threshold where a high number of reps would possibly fuck up my back. And handstand push-ups? Before my trip, I was able to do 1 legit HSPU! Now I weigh a bit more, just getting inverted is a hassle…

Everyone was saying that deads are pretty straightforward for the people who’ve made it to Regionals, so the HSPU’s will definitely be a bottleneck. That’s skill right there and some efficiency management.

“Efficiency management”? Well, it’s just something that came to mind. Not sure if there’s a legit term for it. Basically, in the case of this WOD, do you do strict HSPU’s or do you kip? Strict HSPU’s are obviously faster, but you need to take into consideration your abilities and how long you can maintain your shoulder strength for the duration of this WOD. Oh, you’re a beast at handstand push-ups and know you can plow through each one strict? Then by all means do that. You’ll have a speed advantage. However, for some, kipping through the whole WOD could serve beneficial. Starting off strict might gas the athlete out. Switching to the kip later on would help, but that initial wearing down from the strict HSPU’s would bring down his or her overall time for Diane.

That’s why it’s all about knowing your abilities.

8:11 – “HOLY SHIT!”

At 8:11 in the video, Rory starts talking about Individual Event 2, which is row a 2K, 50 pistols, and 30 hang cleans (225#/135#). Once done spitting that out, all Rory could say was, “HOLY SHIT!”

Then Pat nonchalantly responds, “Yes, thank you…” and continues on with his thing.

In this next screen, look at that smile on Rory’s face lolz. He knew that Pat had the perfect reaction to his “Holy Shit” and you know for sure Pat just enjoyed saying “Holy Shit” for the cameras. Better yet, Caity’s trying so hard not to crack up. She had a small laugh, but I could definitely see her blowing up in laughter. I would’ve done the same.

It’s subtle scenes like these that keep me coming back to these Update shows.

9:43 – “Balls To The Wall”

At 9:43, Caity talks about strategy for Event 2. Should you go…

Sure, there are obvious reasons why I find her saying “balls to the wall” so amusing. But, for those of us who watched the 2010 CrossFit Games online, some of us will never forget this gem of commentary during the final heat of Event 2 “Hell-in”. From what I remember, the female announcer was talking about pacing for the current workout and drops the phrase “ball to the wall”.

Her co-anchor didn’t seem too happy about the phrase, so he apologize to the audience at home for the language, since kids might be watching. Well, he should’ve said something about people constantly saying “shit” in the earlier portions of the stream haha. Oh the pre-ESPN2 days 🙂 #nostalgia

Edit: I found the video! Check out my post on the whole scene.

15:03 – Can I Get In On This?

Coming back from the commercials at 15:03, you see the trio having such a fun convo. Can I get in on this? For real. I think it would be so much fun just to shoot the shit about the CrossFit Games with these guys and gals. At least for all the Updates I’ve watched, every guest host seems to have been a good time.

21:42 – Why Chivalry Is Dead

Team Event 4 involves a “human rack” where a pair of men or women will have to hold the other sex’s barbell during a set of 50 pull-ups. ROUGHHHH.

When you think you can go for a break from the pull-ups and some squat variation, you need to lift up that weight onto your shoulders for your partners. Okay, for the men, that’s bad enough. For the women? It sucks cause they have to carry a much heavier weight on their shoulders. Ladies go first, huh? Yeah, workouts like this show why chivalry died a long time ago. You can thank Dave Castro for that 😛

It’s okay though, Rory says this workout provides “equal opportunity” lololol:

So I Think You Get It By Now

I don’t watch these Updates for technicalities or to learn stuff about CrossFit. Yeah, you might pick up on a few workout tips or random trivia info every once in a while. True…

…but I just watch the Updates for the lolz.

Thanks guys!