Category Archives: CrossFit

On your Mark, Get Set, Press – Deadlift – Box Jump! CrossFit Open 13.2 Workout

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Am I going to the CrossFit Games in 2013? Uh, no. But, just because I’m not going to compete to be the “fittest woman on earth,” doesn’t mean I can’t follow along with some of the workouts being dished out in the Open Competition which started last week. In fact, when I scale the weight-lifting elements down a bit, these WODs become a useful cross-training tool in my quest to become the “fastest woman on earth,” or maybe we should make that, “the speediest old lady in the neighborhood.”

So, I headed down to Fit & Fearless CrossFit to give WOD 13.2 an “unofficial” shot. This classic CrossFit triplet features shoulder to overhead, deadlifts and box jumps. Because the weights and time cap are moderate, this workout is focuses more on pure work capacity and pushing through the discomfort rather than raw strength or technical prowess. That being said, I still decided to cut the weight by more than one-half so I would not kill myself and have fresh enough legs to race a 5k this weekend!  I scored 290 with my weight Rx’d down, compare that to Iceland Annie who scored a legit  361!  Okay, I can run faster than her. Maybe.
Here’s the 13.2 WOD:

Complete as many rounds as possible (AMRAP) in 10 minutes (first weight male, second female):

  • 5 Shoulder to overhead, 115 / 75 lbs
  • 10 Deadlift, 115 / 75 lbs
  • 15 Box jump, 24 / 20 inch

So, if you’re looking for a little more information on how to perfect these moves, just get started, or tweak them to meet your fitness goals, here are some resources:

The deadlift builds strength in your legs, hips and back, perfect muscles to target for runners! An intermediate goal for women is to be able to lift 120 percent of body weight, that’s about my limit. However, some of these competitive CrossFit gals, can lift 160 to 200 percent bodyweight! In the video above, CrossFit coach Valerie shows a modified Band Resistance Dead Lifts for beginners. Or, you can check out an earlier post I did on Dead Lifts that even has a really cool diagram of all the muscled used in the move.

jennifer fisher_thefitfork_box jump ponytail

The box jump is an explosive move of plyometric power. If done right, box jumps can improve your running power by strengthening quads, hamstrings, gluts and calves. If done wrong, well, see my bleeding knees below! Carl Paoli (from GymnasticsWOD.com) and Kelley Starrett (from MobilityWOD.com) give their tips on how to tackle a box jump with the best body position possible. Check out their helpful tips on perfecting the box jump. The key take-away for me is to remember to fully extend the hips at the top of the box and then land with feet fairy close together to prevent a “torque dump.”

box jumps gone bad

Oops, box jumps gone bad!

 

P1000098

Technically, a shoulder-to-overhead could be one of three overhead lifts, the strict press, the push press or the jerk press. Even though it seems like you only need strong shoulders to succeed here, you actually use your entire body, including a lot of core, to get the bar up overhead in a fully-extended position. And, I could go on all day about how improving my core strength has helped my performance (and recovery) in running. The Tabata Times has a good explanation of these shoulder-to-overhead lifts and how to perform them properly.

So, have you done the 13.2 WOD yet? What was your score?  If not, do you use any of these moves (deadlift, press, or box jump) in your training?  Let me know in the comments ! Hint — get to the comments by clicking the little “speech bubble’ at top of post.

When You Can’t Run, Then Row Workout

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If I can’t run (or don’t feel like it), the rowing machine is my cardio butt-kicker of choice.  Plus, I love it when a CrossFit WOD has rowing as one of the elements; I know I’ll have a chance of making up time lost on dead lifts, cleans, jerks and other such “more muscle, less hustle” maneuvers.

If you’re exclusively a runner, it’s a smart idea to mix up your cardio routine every once in a while. Take a break from running at least one or two days per week!  It’s beneficial to your overall fitness to use some new muscle groups in endurance training, it actually can make you faster . . . so, let me introduce the rower!  This mainstay of the gym is well worth your attention. A rowing workout gives you one of the best cardio workouts around, requiring effort from both your upper and lower body. I also feel it working my core! Plus, rowing doesn’t put as much impact on your joints which means you have higher odds of remaining injury-free.

So if your knees (or your mind) need a break from the daily pavement pounding, try out this rowing workout. It should take about 30 minutes, give or take. The three progressively challenging bursts of rowing for two kilometers each feature “active” breaks in between. Enjoy and row like the wind!

If you don’t have access to a rowing machine, but want to get some of the same muscle strengthening benefits, you can try this rowing band exercise at home.  I like to call it the “faux-row”!

Faux-Row Band Exercise

Step 1:  Lay out a mat, this exercise needs a little padding on the rear. Sit with your legs partially bent out in front of you.  Wrap a resistance band around each hand and stretch it around the balls of your feet, move legs out to create tension in band.

jennifer fisher - thefitfork.com - row drive

Step 2: (above) Drive backward, first with the legs, then lean back with the core, and finally follow through by pulling arms back to chest (like boat rowing) all while keeping back straight.

jennifer fisher - thefitfork.com - row recovery

Step 3:  (above) While bracing your legs with the band, recover by bringing the arms forward first, followed by leaning the core up, and then bending the knees upward a little bit. Repeat steps 2 and 3 seamlessly for 20 – 40 combined reps. Aim for 3 to 6 sets.

CrossFit “Cure Duchenne” Workout – Dash and Donate!

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cureduchenne gang

The Cure Duchenne Benefit at Fit & Fearless CrossFit (don’t you love the Pizza Hut next door?!)

What a great morning spent at my friend Valerie’s CrossFit box, Fit and Fearless CrossFit in Austin, Texas. There were about 75 of us there to get our Saturday WOD in; but, more importantly we all had gathered to help support a little boy named Timothy with a rare disease called Duchenne. If you haven’t heard of it, Duchenne is a very rare muscle-wasting disease that has no cure and is ultimately 100% fatal. Only affecting males, the life expectancy for a boy with this disease is only about 25 years of age. But, through ongoing research, we all have hopes that discoveries will be made to improve this devastating prognosis

This is Timothy, he is 9 years old.

This is Timothy, he is 9 years old and has Duchenne.

For the second year, Valerie will be running the Austin Marathon on behalf of Timothy and the other 200,000 boys worldwide who cannot run because of this terrible form of muscular dystrophy. Through the marathon’s program, 26 Miles for 26 Charities, Valerie will run to raise money for the grassroots foundation CureDuchenne, a non-profit that supports cutting-edge research.  I hope you will please consider my plea to help cure Duchenne by making a donation of any amount.

You can donate here.

So, I’d also like to share the WOD we did today, it was lots of fun for me. Probably because it had a ton of running in it!

jennifer fisher thefitfork run-it-work-it WOD

CrossFit & Fearless, Annie Sakamoto and Sore Shoulders

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Well, it’s been about 10 days since my workout with CrossFit legend Annie Sakamoto who came to school us at CrossFit & Fearless in Austin While my shoulders aren’t sore anymore, I did wear my deluxe case of Delayed Onset Muscle Fatigue like a badge of honor all week. While I can now lift my arms over my head to shave my arm pits again, I do still have a nasty scab along my ankle from my not-so-dainty descent from a rope climb we did that day.

So do you want to know more about Annie? It seems wrong to say “cute as a button” and “she’ll kick your butt” in the same sentence, but it is oh-so true! Only five feet tall (if that), this Santa Cruz superstar, with hair I would kill for, made me feel like an uncoordinated (and very weak) giant bumbling through a WOD in Lilliput (no, not Lululemon land, I wish). According to the 2012 CrossFit Games site, Annie’s PRs are 178 lbs. for Clean and Jerk, 140 for Snatch, 280 for Deadlift, 260 for Back Squat and 46 pull-ups. Now, take all these records and divide them in ½ (and maybe even more) and that’s about what I can handle!   Oh, and did I also mention she’s a mom of two?

We spent the first part of our training doing some skill work with Olympic Weightlifting, fine-tuning our Power Cleans, Hang Cleans, Front Squat and Jerks. We were supposed to keep adding more plates, going up and up and up until near maximum effort. But, I decided to keep it semi-easy and focus more on the skill, ‘cause I was having a little trouble with one of them, ahem.

Next onto the WOD, and as usual it looked so easy written out on the whiteboard. But, I was singing a different song once I was through the first round.  It’s written out on the top photo of this post if you want to try it out in your free time – ha! Some of the highlights are below:

CrossFit box owner, Valerie and me like a little friendly competition.  Rowing like we stole it!

If my 6th grade P.E. class could see me now!

 

 

Guaranteed-to-be-Sore Core Workout

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the fit fork jennifer fisher core workout core exercises

Picked up this core workout from a CrossFit Gymnastics seminar I took a few weeks ago. Apparently all the elite, Olympian-type gymnasts do it everyday as a warm-up and cool-down to their hours and hours of grueling in the gym.So, I decided If these little pig-tailed girls can do it a couple times a day to bookend much harder and more difficult workouts, surely I can do the simple core workout just once, every other day, as a stand-alone event! Somehow though, it doesn’t seem so simple about 30 hollow rocks into the routine. So break it down in chunks if you need to.

So, who’s in? No flipping or flopping on the commitment; you have to agree to do the workout at least three times per week. Come on, it’s only going to take about 10  to 20 minutes depending on how long you have to rest.  Here’s the plan:

100 Hollow Rocks: Remember, lower back should be touching the ground. Keep legs straight and tight together with toes pointed. Arms extended straight and glued to your ears. Slowly rock back and forth without allowing the shape to break at any point.

50 Belly Rocks: Lay face-down on the ground. Extend arms straight and keep glued to your ears. Pull chest and lower legs off the floor, keep core tight. Slowly rock back and forth without allowing the shape to break at any point.

50 V-Ups: Lie on ground and start in hollow body position. With legs straight and together, bring them up and towards your torso. While raising your legs, reach for the toes with your hands. Finish in a pike position with your hands and feet meeting at hip level, then return to hollow body position.

50 Side Crunches:  Lie on side, claps hands behind neck. Slightly bend knees and keep legs together. Pull torso and lower legs up at the same time, as if they were reaching toward one another. Lower back down to the ground. Repeat on other side after 50 crunches.

More fun from today: