Training Week 4, Day 3

C+J - 52kg.  
Sort of.  My left elbow isn't really locking out correctly, so I'm not sure if this would have counted in competition.

But in other news..
Snatch - 38KG HOLY EFFING ESS.  My current PR was 35.  I have no idea how I was able to do this.  I think I found the elusive "pocket" because it felt easy.  I pulled fast and somehow BOOM I was under the bar.  I tried again at 39kg with no luck.  

These numbers make me feel more confident about reaching my goals of 40 & 55 by the competition.  Four weeks down, five weeks to go...

Training Week 4, Day 2

PR HELL TO THE YEAH.

Clean + jerk - heavy single - 52 kg. PR!
I think.  I was by myself.   And there was a CrossFit WOD going on around me, so it was a little stressful.  There may have been a very small press-out at the top.  I need to start recording video of my lifts so that I can check on these things.  But the point is I hoisted 52 kg above my head and it stayed there.

Front squats - 80% - 5 sets of 3 (45kg).
I keep pitching forward on these and have also noticed that my rack position really strains that teres minor muscle I mentioned in another post.  I don't feel the pain until I finish the squats and put down the bar.  Then this searing pain shoots through my shoulders.  I think I need to work on my rack position a little more, keeping the weight on my heels.  Also tightening my upper back and squeezing my shoulders before the beginning of the clean may help.  Who knows.  Not me certainly.  My last 2 lifting sessions have been by myself, so I'm just working on instinct.

C+J deadlifts - 105% - 2 sets of 2 (55kg).
These felt weirdly heavy.  I'm not sure why.

Finally, I was supposed to do some snatch presses, but Baby E got bored of watching her mama lift and started crying.  So we headed home.  Oh did I mention I have a baby?   I'll have to make up the snatch presses some other time.

Training Week 4, Day 1

A good day.  I woke up late and asked if I could lift during the 10:30 am CrossFit class.  Gabe lifted at that time as well.  I think the 2 hour change makes such a difference for me.  I never feel fully awake at 8:15, whether I get out of bed at 6am or 10 minutes before class.  Also we were lifting outside in the fresh air which felt kind of nice.

I PR'd on my snatch at 35kg and think two things are helping me:  1.) Making sure I go through the Burgener warm up before the lifts and 2.) Just not thinking at ALL during the lift attempt.  I think by clearing my mind I am able to go faster and explode more on the 3rd pull than if I'm constantly mental-checking my knees, my elbows, thrusting my hips and so on.  So from now on I'll probably just walk to the bar, grip it, think "SPEED" and lift.  

Heavy snatch - 35kg (PR!)
Snatch balance - 80% 3 sets of 2 (27kg)
Back squat - 80% 5 sets of 3 (54kg)
Snatch pull - 105% 3 sets of 2 (39kg)

Finished with a set of bench presses at 30kg.

Just realized I should have done 33kg on my snatch balance.  I went down 3 kg instead of up 3.  Will have to fix that next week.

Snatch day OVER.  Looking forward to Wednesday's clean and jerk.

Training Week 3, Day 3

Heavy Lift Day

C+J - 50kg.  I feel as though I could clean 60 kg.  The jerk is what holds me back.
Snatch - 34kg (PR...I think).  Coach didn't see this, so I'm not sure if it would have counted in competition.  I think there was a little press out at the end.

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My shoulder has been bothering me.  However it's been hard to pinpoint the exact point of pain.  I went to a sports massage clinic and found that I've strained my teres minor, a small muscle that assists in rotating the shoulder.  My guess is this has to do with my poor snatch form.  Just stretching and icing for now...and hoping for the best.

Training Week 3, Day 2

Clean + Jerk - Heavy Single (50kg) New PR!
Overhead squat - 80% 3 sets of 2 (30kg)
Front squat - 80% 5 sets of 3 (40kg)
Clean pull - 105% 2 sets of 3 (55kg)

Body Weight - 141 lb

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I like C+J days 1000x better than snatch days.  The lift just feels natural to me.  Or at least the clean does.  My jerk is still pretty wobbly.  But both movements feel like something my body is made to do.  The snatch on the other hand feels unnatural and awkward.  I hope that will change soon.

One thing I learned today:  Weightlifting at 8:15am is difficult, but much easier if you wake up more than 30 minutes before you lift.  I've been rolling out of bed at 7:45 and dragging myself to the gym up to now.  This morning I got up at 6:15 and felt much more energized during the session.

Training Week 3, Day 1

A very bad day.

I blame 2 things:

My weak shoulders (10%)
My poor attitude (90%)

Training Week 2, Day 3

Max effort day.  But try telling that to my shoulders.   This is the first time I failed to reach a new PR on both lifts.  I hope I haven't hit a snatch plateau at 32kg.

Snatch - 32 kg

Clean + Jerk - 48 kg (new PR!)

I sometimes wish another girl was training with me.  It's definitely fun to lift with Neil & Gabe, but since they use the same bar there is a natural back-and-forth that just doesn't exist for me.  Not to mention they lift much MUCH heavier weights, so it's slightly humiliating to fall down on my butt trying to hoist a measly 30kg.  That happened twice today.

Before class, Neil was joking about how I was "hand-picked" by him.  

"That's a lot of pressure," I say, laughing nervously.  And then,  "Actually, it's not."  

"It's totally not." 

I am so new to this that there really aren't many expectations.   And a big part of him "choosing" me was that I have a flexible job that allows me to lift during the day.

"I'm probably going to come in last," I say.

"You probably are.  But you're going to go up there and do your lifts with amazing form."

That really is my main goal.  I want to lift at least 2 weights I choose for the competition.  I know failures happen, but if I'm going to lift the smallest amount of weight in the entire competition, I better lift the CRAP out of those little weights.  

Training Week 2, Day 2

I spent a long weekend in San Francisco with my sisters....and came back in no shape to lift.  So, Day 1 of this week was a bust.

Here's what I did this morning, with a heavy rainfall outside the garage and and a soothing classical music soundtrack.  So much better than Guns n Roses Radio.

Snatch, heavy rep (32kg - new PR)
Snatch balance - 80% 3 sets of 2 (30kg)
Back squat  - 80% 5 sets of 3 (50kg)
Snatch pull - 105% 2 sets of 3 (35kg)

Training Week 1, Day 3

Clean + Jerk - Heavy Single (47kg) New PR!
Overhead squat - 80% 3 sets of 2 (25kg?)
Front squat - 80% 5 sets of 3 (40kg)
Clean pull - 105% 2 sets of 3 (50kg)

Body Weight - 140 lb

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And now I'm off to spend a great weekend with my sisters in San Francisco!

A Little Wisdom from Henry D.

Black and Blue

I think I may need some more iron in my diet.

Training Week 1, Day 2

Warm up
Snatch - heavy single (31kg) new PR!
Back squat - 80% 5 sets of 3 (48kg)
Deadlift - 80% 1 set of 5 (63kg)
Push Press - 75% 5 sets of 5 (28kg)

Weight - 138lb  This was on the gym scale, which may be set differently than ours.  This would put me in another weight class for the competition.

Notes:
Drop into full squat on snatch lifts.
Keep elbows still and bar secure on push presses.

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And for your enjoyment, some gangnam style.

Training Week 1, Day 1

Warm up
Snatch up to Max (29kg)
Snatch 70% x 3
Clean + Jerk up to Max (45kg)
Clean + Jerk 70% x 3
Strict pull-ups 3 sets of 5 (used band for assistance)

Body weight: 142 (I'm tracking this because I may end up in a lower weight class).
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After class, Neil asked me for my goals for the competition.  His are:

Be injury free on Event Day

Snatch 85kg

Clean & Jerk 120kg

Have Fun

Here are mine:

1. Have fun

2. Make at least 2 of my 3 lift attempts (on both lifts). 
I don't want to make one and then miss the others - or worse miss all 3.  

As far as the numbers...I'm not sure how far I can go in 8 weeks.  Maybe this is something I have to wait to find out.

Based on nothing...

-Current PR = 29 (snatch),  45 (c+j)
-Numbers that would make me proud = 40, 55
-Numbers that would make me feel like a bad ass mo fo = 50, 65

3. Snatch ?? kg
4. C + J ?? kg

and yeah injury-free is a good goal, so I'm making that my fifth.

5. Injury-free on event day

Starting Somewhere

In May of this year, I joined CrossFit, everyone's favorite fitness cult.  I heard about CF from my younger sister, a former competitive gymnast who is much MUCH more athletic than me and 1000 times tougher.   I'd see photos of her on facebook lifting tires, running obstacle courses, hanging from bars.  It looked awful and painful and like so much fun.

The only thing I really knew how to do for exercise was run.  And that was getting old.  I wanted to shed some baby weight and, lucky day, there was a CF gym less than 1 block from my house!  It only took 3 months for me to find the courage to contact them.  I made an appointment with Neil, the owner.  On the first day in a private meeting, Neil put me through a simple fitness test and I nearly puked.  I loved it.

Four months later and I'm almost completely brainwashed.  I don't eat paleo and I don't wear cheesy t-shirts with quotes about burpees, but I love walking over to the little garage to be tortured 4 days a week.  I don't have my pull-up yet and barely have a pushup.  But I can crank out double unders with the best of them. And apparently I have a pretty good clean + jerk for a beginner.

And that's where this all begins.  A week ago, I hit a clean + jerk PR at 45 kg.  Neil pulled me aside after class.  He complimented my lift and mentioned an upcoming olympic weightlifting contest.  

"I think you should consider entering it.  You have a natural talent.  Talk it over with Mike."

If I was interested, Neil would start me on a weightlifting program and coach me up to the event.  I said I'd consider it, but on the walk home I knew I'd do it.  And so I registered.  Why not?  Anyone could enter.  You didn't have to qualify.  It would be fun.  What do I have to lose?   I pranced around cutely, telling Mike he was going to need to step up his game or his wife would soon be out-lifting him.  

I went to bed still riding high on my coach's praise and my 1 nice clean + jerk.  Then, around 2 am, I sat straight up in bed horrified. Oh God. What Have I Done.  What was I thinking?  Can one simple compliment really make me cocky enough to enter a WEIGHTLIFTING competition?  With WEIGHTS?  That you LIFT?  I checked out the scores from last year's competition and saw that the woman who took last place in 2011 lifted *significantly* more weight than I do.  I'm dead.  I'm dead.  I'm dead.  

Slightly calmer in the morning, I rushed to the computer and watched a bunch of clean+jerk and snatch technique videos.  I looked for blogs on this topic, but couldn't find anyone stupid/brave enough to enter a competition a couple months after learning how to do a snatch.   Or at least no one willing to publicly write about it.  So, that's what I'm going to do.  This blog will be both a (boring) log of my lifting progress and (probably more boring) journal of the experience.   Maybe I will help some poor gal out there in a similar situation in the future.  Note to future gal:  What were you thinking?

The competition is November 10, 2012.  There's a good chance I will come in dead last.  But I'm determined to get back to my original goal of having fun.  I have to think that my coach saw something in me; I trust him and know he wouldn't tell me to enter as some kind of 8-week long sick/complicated practical joke.  

Wish me luck.