Ugh! Just saw my workout for later today...

At first glance it seems easy... but the more I thought about it, it's 420 reps...yikes!


"Blackjack" (Courtesy of CrossFit One World)
Complete the following for time:
20 push-ups/1 sit-up
19 push-ups/2 sit-ups
18 push-ups/3 sit-ups
17 push-ups/4 sit-ups
16 push-ups/5 sit-ups
15 push-ups/6 sit-ups
14 push-ups/7 sit-ups
13 push-ups/8 sit-ups
12 push-ups/9 sit-ups
11 push-ups/10 sit-ups
10 push-ups/11 sit-ups
9 push-ups/12 sit-ups
8 push-ups/13 sit-ups
7 push-ups/14 sit-ups
6 push-ups/15 sit-ups
5 push-ups/16 sit-ups
4 push-ups/17 sit-ups
3 push-ups/18 sit-ups
2 push-ups/19 sit-ups
1 push-up/20 sit-ups

Ripped my hands... for the first time

evidently this is a common crossfit injury.
but while doing 100 pullups yesterday (with a rubberband)
I felt my skin move.
the calluses I've build up on my hands started to move and pinch up toward my fingers. Then the skin broke and left it raw. Lucky for me this happened around number 50.

I suppose it makes sense. Let a guy who's 50 lbs overweight flail around while hanging on a bar and the part of his body holding him up is going to get hurt after a while.

so here's a couple picks of my hand. Zach thinks it's gross. He didn't care for me using the scissors to remove the extra skin.

Turns out that Eric, gives owns a callus remover and a stick with some sort of sand paper on it. They are a lovely baby blue color.

Crossfit is spreading

Wade Hodges, Lead Minister of Garnett Church here in Tulsa is now doing it.
Maybe one day he'll blog about it.

Today for his first real workout he did 50 pullups (with rubber band), 50 pushups, 50 situps, and 50 squats. I think he did it under 18 minutes. pretty good...

anyone else want to join.

Homeless Running club

For some reason this story came to my mind driving home from my workout today so I thought I'd post a link and part of the piece here. Maybe one day when I'm in better shape , and can actually run more than around the block something like this will materialize.

Anne Mahlum is a 27-year-old marathoner. And on her predawn runs in Philadelphia, she kept passing a group of homeless men.

An ex-football player is walking cross-country to raise money for 9/11 heroes.

"They would say, 'Hi' or they would say 'Hi Anne' or 'There's the crazy runner.' 'How many miles are you doing?'" Mahlum recalled. "And they would smile and sort of applaud and cheer for me, while I would start my day."

But one day in May, Mahlum said, "I looked back, and I was like, 'I am cheating these guys. Why am I just running past them and leaving them there?'"

"Running is so simple you know. You really only need a pair of shoes. You don't need a lot of equipment. You need heart and dedication," Mahlum said.

Anne thought to herself, "Maybe running could make these guys feel as good as it makes me feel."

So she decided to start a running club for the homeless and started asking businesses for help.

"I sent out an e-mail to a bunch of people, and I just said, 'I'm starting Philadelphia's first homeless running club. I need your shoes. I need your clothes,'" Mahlum said. "And the support that I received back is so astonishing."

Nine homeless men signed up right away.

"The guys had so many questions. They were so curious," Mahlum said.

The men didn't know what to expect, and they asked questions about how to stretch and what to do. But they were willing to give it a shot.

Mahlum was not intimidated by the men.

"I wasn't scared. People are people. And I feel like if you treat them the way you want to be treated, that's the best you can do."

"If anything would happen," she joked, "I figure, you know, they can't catch me anyway."

Mahlum's group, called Back on My Feet, has grown since then. They were out on the Philadelphia streets this morning at 5 a.m.

"People started showing up in the morning," Mahlum said. "This circle that we had just kept growing and growing, and the smiles got bigger, the hugs got tighter, and we started to develop this team, this family."

This story makes sense to me on so many levels. My hope for Tulsa is that people will take their passions and make a difference in peoples lives like this. It doesn't need to be a running club. But religion that is institutional and controling in nature must be abandoned for more life giving experiences like this.

Tomorrow: Deck of Cards.. who's in?

Ok. so tomorrow is one of my favorite workouts. anyone want to join me? I'm going tomorrow at 11am.
I've started doing crossfit 5 days a week. We'll see if my body can handle it. right now my shins and feet are killing me from jumping rope on monday and the "clean and jerk" today.

Here's what the deck of cards is:
"Deck of Cards"
Start with a fully shuffled deck of cards. Each card requires a set of pushups (red) or squats (black), depending on the color. Perform reps of the following:
Face cards (Jack, Queen, and King) have a value of 10. Aces will have a value of 11. Number cards will be face value (ex. 7 of spades = 7 squats).
Jokers are burpees, and are set to a value of 15.
Work through the entire deck as fast as possible and don't forget that card games are fun.

Workout for the Week

Wednesday:
Ring Rows (feet on 16 inch box)
Dive Bombers
21-15-9
For time.

My Time was 4:34 (It's sat. and I'm still sore from this)

Follow it up with 4 minute Bottom-to-Bottom (B2B) Tabata Squats and you'll be good to go.

Thursday:
Bench Press
155 X3 195 x2 205 x1 225 x1 235x1 (failed) I hadn't benched anything since college. this was fun.

Friday:
Bicycles
Mountain Climbers
100-80-60-40-20 reps for time.

My time: 21:40

This one you can try at home pretty easy. but it's harder than it looks.

Jolting the Brain: Sorta cool... sorta creepy

This is amazing stuff. It blurs the between humanity and machine in interesting ways. We really are redefining what it means to be human on some level. It's the word "normal" that gives me the creeps a bit. This feels a bit different than a pace maker to me... but I'm not sure why.

Imagine what a pacemaker does to your heart -- its electrical impulses regulate a heartbeat that's out of whack.

In deep brain stimulation for depression, tiny electrodes are implanted into a specific node of the cerebral cortex.

Now picture a pacemaker-type device that jolts the brain and regulates mood circuits -- potentially easing deep depression no other treatments can touch.

In what some are hailing as a brave new use of existing technology, researchers presented evidence this week at the American Association of Neurological Surgeons' annual scientific meeting that deep brain stimulation (DBS) does just that -- improving both severe depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder, a frequent companion disorder.

"Depression is a physiological disorder, and basically we are regulating the abnormal signals to brain causing the depression," says Dr. Ali Rezai, director of the Center for Neurological Restoration at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. Rezai conducted the research along with scientists from Butler Hospital/Brown Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

Researchers used deep brain stimulation on 17 severely depressed patients. Those treated with DBS had a 50 percent decrease in depressive symptoms after 12 months. Patients also reported a better ability to function, improved short-term memory and improved quality of life.

Link

Workouts for the Week: April 21-25

Wednesday: "Fran"
Thrusters (squats with an overhead press 95 lbs)
Pullups (I used a rubberband this week, that made pull ups way harder than jumping pullups)

21-15-9 (21 of each, then 15 of each etc)

Crazy heavy this week. 95 lbs is a lot. I wasn't sure I would make it.
My Time: 15:02


Thursday: Rowing Sprints
500 meter Sprints (3 sets) (damper set on 10)
My best time 1:38 (the other two were about 1:48 and 1:52)


Friday: "The Filthy Fifty"
For time:
50 Box jump, 24/20" box
50 Jumping pull-ups
50 Kettlebell swings, 35lb
Walking Lunge, 50 steps
50 Knees to elbows (hang from bar, lift knees to elbows)
50 Push press, 45 pounds (lift the bar above your head 50 times)
50 Supermans
50 Wall ball shots, 20 pound ball
50 Burpees
50 Double unders (I substituted 250 single unders on the jump rope)

My time: 41:14

uh. wow. 500 reps. not as hard as Barbara last week, but the Burpees are killers.

anyone want to join me next week for a workout?

My times: 1:38

Before and after closer up

Before and After

Today marks the end of my 12 week competition to loose weight. I'm not going to win the competition. But I'm in the best shape of my adult life and I'm still getting more healthy. I've lost 47 lbs. I'd like to loose 43 more. My body is way different than it was on February 4th when I started this journey. Not finished yet. But enjoying the progress.

Workout: April 14-20

Ok, so several folks said they wanted to see my workouts still. So I'll include one post a week for a while and see how that goes. This post doesn't include the cardio I do on most tuesday's and thursdays.

Monday: "Karen"

150 wall balls for time. (20lb ball/ 10 ft mark) My time 12:24.

Wednesday: "Barbara"

20 jumping pull ups
30 pushups
40 situps
50 squats

(5 rounds for time)
My time: 47:47

Killer workout. (700 total reps.) Never done anything like that before.

Friday: 6 minutes of goodness followed by 1 min. of rest.
(4 rounds)
1 minute of Box Jumps 20 inches
1 minutes of Ring Rows
1 min. of Knees to Elbows (hang from a bar and touch the two)
1 min. of jump rope
1 min. of Burpees
1 min. of sprint rowing
1 min. break

Less workout posts

So I've been blogging a lot about my workouts and little else over the past few weeks.. this has probably become annoying so I'm going to post less on that.

Workout 4-8-08: "Tabata This"

Tabata This:
Row for calories
Pushups
Squats
Pullups
Situps

You do 8 sets of 20 seconds on/10 seconds off for rowing; then you rest one minute; then you do 8 sets of 20 seconds on/10 seconds for pushups; then you rest one minute, etc. The whole workout should take 24 minutes (4 minutes per Tabata interval per exercise, 1 minute of rest between exercise).

Take the lowest number you do in a 20 second set and add them together to get your total:

My number 34.
It would have been higher, but I didn't get a score for my pullups as I was puking for the final 4 sets of pullups.

Workout:4-4-08: "Cindy"

"Cindy" workout

5 pullups ( I had a small jump in each)
10 pushups
15 squats

As many rounds as you can do in 20 minutes.

I did 11.

High puke factor.

Workout: 4-2-08

Turkish Get up

5 with each arm
5 rounds
25 lb dumbell

It really sounds easy. It even looks easy. and while it's not the hardest thing I've done with crossfit. I can tell my shoulders are going to be sore.

A great workout you can do at home.

It's not real exciting to watch, but here what they look like.

Workout: 3-31-08

I skipped my workout today because of a bruised heel and a heavy workload.

tonight i did a pushup burner.
I got to 17. which is good for me.

that's 1 pushup the first minute.
2 pushups the second minute.
and so on.
try it. tell me what you get.
you'll probably beat 17, but i feel good about it.

17 = 153 pushups in 17 minutes.

Workout: 3-26-08

Four Rounds for time of :

12 Burpees
24 Pushups
36 Squats
400 meter run

My time: 32:18

Workout: 3-24-08

Complete for time:

Run 400 meters
21 Thrusters (65 lbs)
Run 400 meters
15 Thursters (65 lbs)
Run 400 meters
9 Thrusters (65lbs)

my time: 12:24

by the way... I can do pull ups now. which is crazy. (I did 2 on Friday, and 3 today)

Thrusters by people stronger than me below:

Workout: 3-21-08

Exercise hard for 50 seconds, then take 10 seconds to rotate for 5 rounds with the following:
L-Sit
Box Jumps
Good Mornings
Wall Balls
Jump Rope

Workout: 3-19-08

Complete 5 Sprint Rounds of the Following:

500 meter Row (damper set on 10)

My previous best: 1:58

Today's Times:
round 1 - 1:41
round 2 - 1:54
round 3 - 1:55
round 4 - 1:53
round 5 - 1:54

Puke factor: 9+
Way harder than it sounds. wow.

Workout: 3-17-08

3 rounds of:
25 jumping squats
20 ring rows
15 Wall Ball (20 lb ball)
10 box jumps (16 inch box)
5 Dive bombers

My Time: 19:07

Then Eric had us do a Burner Workout: (Pushups)
1 pushup in 1 minute
2 pushups in 1 min
3 in 1 min
4 in 1 min etc

My score: 12 (it's harder than it sounds)

workout 3-14-08

10 Mountain climbers
20 bicycles
10 supermans
20 windmills

10 rounds for time

My Time: 19:29

Workout 3-13-08: Run another 5K

Ran the 5K again this morning.
Yesterday's time:42 min
Today's time: 38:52

Workout: 3-12-08: Run a 5K

Today I ran 5K. Which was difficult for two big reasons. First, I haven't run 5K in 10 years. Second, I still can't walk today because of the Wallball workout monday. (this morning going down the stairs, Jaden called me a "little old man".

nice.

My time: 42 minutes.

I can do better. but I'm content with this today.

Workout 3-10-08: Karen

"Karen" is the name of the Workout of the Day (remember in Crossfit, the benchmark exercises are named after women.

150 Wall Balls - 14 lb. ball (toss the ball to 10ft. mark)
My time: 12:22

Here's a brief example I found on line.
Squat. thrust, and throw, catch squat, thrust, throw. 150 times.

I have jello legs.

Workout 3-07-08

50 situps
50 pushups
1,ooo meter rowing (damper 8)
50 pushups
50 situps

for time.

My time: 20:10

Workout 3-05-08

Tabata Situps
2 minute rest
Tabata Shoulder press (20 lb. Medicine Ball)
2 minute rest
Repeat

Tabata is a kind of workout developed by Dr. Tabata from the National Institute of Fitness and Sports in Tokyo, Japan.
Basically he came up with a 4 minute workout that will eat your lunch.
Here's how it works.

A Tabata Situp regimine is a 4 minute routine.
20 seconds (as many sit ups as you can do)
10 seconds rest.. but here's the catch the rest is at a 45 degree angle. In otherwords, half way through the sit up, stop and sit there for 10 seconds.
This makes each round 30 seconds long. Each regimine is

4 weeks into a healthier me

Four Weeks Ago


Today

Wow. this is cool.
I can totally tell a difference. and i'm still loosing weight!

Workout 3-3-08 - J.T. Modified

My hammy has been bugging me when I do squats and such, so Eric had me do an all upper body workout today. His exact words, "J.T. is pure upper body hell." Then he smiled.

Handstand pushups (modified: my knees on a 20 inch box)
Ring dips (modified: Bench Dips)
Pushups

21 - 15 - 9

21 of each, 15 of each, 9 of each. (sounds easy huh.)

My time: 19:13

Then I did an additional 500m on the rowing machine (damper setting 10) time: 1:58

I'm feeling way better and have lost a lot of weight.
I've been working out for 4 weeks now and I've lost almost the weight of Mikayla.

Workout: Deck of Cards

There was 6 of us today for my crossfit workout.
Today's workout Deck of Cards.
We spread out in a circle and Eric threw one card at a time on the floor in front of us. the card told us what we did.

Hearts - Push-ups
Diamonds - Sit-ups
Clubs - Supermans
Spades - Squats

Jokers = 15 Burpees

Number cards= do that many reps of the suited activity.
7 hearts = 7 push ups etc.

Face cards = 10
Ace = 11

We did the whole deck in 33:33.

Workout: 2-20-08

100 sprawls for time. (burpees minus the pushup and jump at the end)
My time - 20:57

I hated these because it takes a level of flexibility that I currently don't have. So I stumbled through them. (literally)

(Burpees Race)

BTW - the video's insane. They make it look way easy. But try doing 10 of those babies that fast. man o man.

Workout: 2-18-08 "Little Annie" +

So yesterday I did 65 minutes on the elliptical. I'm burning about 675 calories each cardio workout.

Today's workout was named "Annie", but Eric told me I should do a scaled version of it.

Annie is:
Double Unders (jump once, rope goes round twice)
Situps

50-40-30-20-10
(meaning 50 double unders, 50 situps, 40 double unders etc)
All for time.

My scaled down workout was 25-20-15-10-5 ( I named it "Little Annie")

I'm still not good at double unders and I wanted a good workout, so I did single unders. The thing is when you do single unders you have multiple the number of double unders you would be doing by 5.

So I did 125-100-75-50-25 single under jump-ropes
then 25-20-15-10-5 situps

My time 10:00 which felt great to me. (though there was a girl there who did the whole workout (annie) in 10:47. dang she was hauling. amazing.

then Eric thought I needed more (as well as another guy in there) so he had us do a 500m rowing sprint (damper on 10) which I did in 1:57.

I can feel a difference in my body. I'm still exhausted from the workout but I feel like I'm doing more.

Workout: Fran

So today my workout is named "Fran". In crossfit they name some of the benchmark workouts. Most are named after women, much like hurricanes. A few others I'm told are named after special forces soldiers.

here's a link to a video that shows the entire workout.
It will take me longer than this... way longer. and it will be jumping pullups instead...
i'm not looking forward to this.
I'll let you know how it goes

21 thrusters
21 pull ups
15 thrusters
15 pull ups
9 thrusters
9 pullups
for time.

Update: I did it. but instead of lifting 95lbs for the thrusters i did 45lbs. which still wasn't easy. and i did jumping pull ups.

My time: 6:47

Workout: 2-13-08

Yesterday I did 65 minutes of cardio on the elliptical. And as always there's the warm-up which includes lots of stretching, rowing 500m, pushups,jumping pullups and the like.

Today's Crossfit workout:

Here's the routine:
5 Double Unders - (Jumprope and the rope passes under your feet twice for each jump. For those who can't do double unders it's 25 single jump ropes) Sounds easy right?

10 One Handed Push-Ups - uh huh.. 5 with each arm. that's right baby. one freaking handed push ups. Eric taught us the technique. The other hand is counterbalance and can support (according to Eric) up to 40% of our weight if we need it to.) Yeah I needed it to.

20 deep lounges - Think big step forward, keeping the ball of the back foot in place and "lung" forward. With good form this is harder than it seems. but still the easiest of the others.

The workout: Do as many rounds of the routine as you can in 20 minutes.

My result: 7 rounds - not great, but definitely an improvement from last week.

My body is getting used to it. I feel like I'm going to puke less often and I'm recovering faster. Though my arms are really sore from doing different kinds of pushups friday, monday and today. I'm praying for a break from pushups on Friday.

Workout: 2-11-08

Today's workout was deemed easy by the folks who did it earlier in the morning. Folks posted times like 9:30 and 12:15. For them it's a 10-15 minute workout. I knew better before I started.


Pushups
Situps
Jumping pullups
Squats
25-20-15-10-5

For Time.

The numbers mean: do 25 of each. Then 20 of each, then 15 and so on.
No breaks.

Puke Factor 9+ out of 10.

My Time: 25:05.... slow, but as fast as I could go.

I'm loosing weight. I have a goal for the week. We'll see if I can make it.

Money Quote my Crossfit Trainer

The Money quote from my crossfit trainer Eric last Friday was:

"Pain is weakness leaving the body."

nice.
and I like it.

Workout Today: You Go/ I Go

60 minutes of cardio yesterday. interval training on the elliptical.

Today:
I Partnered up Tiffany and completed the following:
Close Grip Pushups - Put your hands in front of you. Make a diamond with your index finger and thumb of each hand. do as many push ups as you can for one minute.


Good Mornings (45/30) = Put a 45 lbs barbell (I think that's what it's called. Bend over and work the hammy's. do as many as you can in 1 minute.

Underhand-grip Pullups - Yep. Pretty much what they sound like. as many as you can in a minute.

Leg Tosses - Lay on your back. Your partner stands over you. You bring your legs up to them and they push them toward the floor. (as many as you can in a minute)

Ring Rows - Lay back parallell with the floor and to pull ups using rings. (yep. as many as you can in a minute.

First person completes one minutes worth of the first exercise then rests for one minute while partner completes theirs. Immediately proceed to next exercise.
Continuous running clock for 3 rounds. No breaks.

Puke factor: I felt like puking twice. but never had to walk outside.
I'm going to feel this in the morning. I can't lift my cell phone to my head.

Today's workout

First let me say that I'm sore from Monday. Tuesday I did and hour on the elliptical machine, but it didn't help. I felt it walking down the stairs in my quads and my upper back (lats) were sore too. In fact I woke up 4 times last night from rolling over and feeling pain from moving my arms in a position my back didn't appreciate.

This is all good.

It means my body is responding to being active.
So today I worked out at my crossfit gym.

here's what I did today for my workout.

The Obstacle Course (7 stations each for 1 minute. no breaks. after all 7 are done. 1 minute break go as fast as you can.)

Ladder - Think hopscotch on speed. It's cardio, but it's also increasing agility.

Duck Unders - Picture a rope across the room 4 ft off the ground. Then ducking under witha certain form, back and forth. sounds easy right?

Quadrapedals - Bear Crawl on hands and feet (butt way up in the air) for one minute. sounds easy right?

Landmine Thrusts - Can't describe this one.

Hollow Rocks - didn't do this. too hard. instead we did situps.

Hammer Twist - 20 lb sledge. And twist to work the obliques (sp?)

Wall Sits - Sit against the wall. This is what hell will be like.

Crossfit

So today I started a new exercise regimen. I'm competing with Marko and 100 or so other youth workers to loose weight. 3 days a week I'm going to be doing cardio, elliptical mainly for about an hour each day. I did 45 minutes of interval training this morning.

Tonight I started Crossfit. Crossfit is best known for the type of training the actors in the movie "300" did for 4 months before they shot the movie. Link. Here's my local crossfit gym. Eric the leader of the class owns it and he kicked my tail.

I was toast after the warm-up.
Which included (as best as I remember)
400m jog
thorough stretching of my whole body
10 pushups
10 abmat sit ups
10 jumping pull ups
10 body weight squats
10 Wall Balls (squats and throwing a 14 pound medicine ball 8 feet up)
10 superman
10 body weight pull ups (picture reverse pull ups while hanging from gym rings)

then for the workout we were to:
Run 400 m
30 Wall Balls
15 jumping pull ups
X3 timed

I made it through once. barely. wow.
I'm going to do this three times a week with cardio the other days.
This combined with a good diet, I hope will help me loose some weight and reach my goal.