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.