Week 9, Mar. 28 - Apr 3

This week I'll post for another non-contributor, Mark Pauli. He's a mechanical engineer who lives in Madison, WI. He's got babies all over the place so he did half of this challenge, but if he doesn't finish, I totally understand!

The Odd Couple

5 to 1 of the following exercises:

Muscle-Up Progressions
20 Double Unders
Handstand Pushup Progressions
20 Double Unders
Toes to Bar Progression
20 Double Unders

THEN

1 to 5 of the following:

135/95# Squat Clean
20 Pushups
135/95# Push Press
20 Pushups
135/95# Deadlift
20 Pushups


What I mean by "Progressions" is to do what you are capable of...if you can do muscle ups, do them...if you can do jumping muscle ups, do them...if you can't do muscle ups at all, do a ring pul up and a ring dip for each count.

HSPU are the same, if you can fully invert, do it...if not, use the box or whatever.

Toes to bar is the same, if you can't do it, knees to elbows.

the lifts, of course if you need to scale, scale.

This is a good week to play a little catch-up, since the last week was a lot of stuff!

Here's a motivational video...I think I saw some people doing this at the gym last week!

Week 8, Mar 21-27

This week is from Paul Fern, who finished the last challenge but was not able to do this one. He couldn't come up with a workout that he felt "was going to be hard enough" for our challenge, so I'll do it for him.

Max-Out!

Find your max reps/weights in each of the following exercises:

Pull-ups without letting go of the bar
Push ups in 2 minutes without knees touching the floor
Sit ups in 2 minutes
Bench Press (if you have a spotters!)
Deadlift
Squat
Overhead Press
Double unders in a minute
1600M run


Here's the deal this week: You can do these exercises split up any way you want. I kinda plan on doing them over several days. For the super-observant, I put the CrossFit Total in there (DL, Squat, Press), along with the strength portions of the Army PT test :P, so it might make sense to divide those two up into separate days.

I just wanna see my bench press max right now, so I put that in there, make sure you have spotters for that one! Plus, I expect to see Darcy turning in sub 4:00 miles this summer, so that's in there too.

Remember, good form is the most important thing, don't get hurt!

Here's a video of what I expect to see!

Good Luck!

Week 7, Mar 14-20

This week’s workout is compliments of Chris Tutka, one of the OLDEST Pipehitters doing the challenges.  Chris is pretty cool for being totally out of touch with my generation, and I think it’s pretty impressive that he can get on the internet (or “the interwebs” as he calls it), and navigate his way to this site.

 

All joking aside, Chris finished 3rd at “The Toughest Cop Alive” contest, and is a great CrossFitter and very disciplined…Who else can claim they do all CrossFit workouts to the max Range Of Motion by themselves, every day?!  Plus, we’re running the Las Vegas Rock and Roll Marathon on December 5th, 2010 together, and he’ll probably beat me at that too!  (P.S. If anyone wants in, we have extra hotel room space and it should be really fun http://las-vegas.competitor.com/).

Fran in a Boat (or on the Run)

21-15-9-5 Reps of:

95/75# Thrusters

Pull-Ups

After each round, complete a 400M Row (or run)

 

Due to great minds thinking alike, if you did the “Ode to Amundson” workout at CFMN that was scheduled last week, I will also accept that.  Just post your total time.

 

Ode to Amundsen

7 thrusters, 7 pullups x 3, then 800m
5 thrusters, 5 pullups x 3, then 800m
3 thrusters, 3 pullups x 3, then 800m

 

Good Luck!
 

 

Week 6, Mar 7-13

Halfway there! I knew Darcy would be a good week 6 workout donor, since she has a real talent for coming up with creative and challenging workouts.

Darcy is a CrossFitMN Trainer, an elite tri-athlete, and an all around good person. She also runs Fit Neighbor and a few blogs herself, including Late Bloomer (Time for an update, btw!).

Anyways, Darcy came up with this workout, she did it right after mailing it to me, and said it was a killer. So I'll include some scaling options at the bottom so nobody gets unintentionally killed by this workout.

The Bigger They Are, The Harder They Fall! (or, Are You As Strong As You Are Big?) (or, Man, Kevin Is Going To HATE This)


There is math involved. Get out your calculator and start strategerizing.

Body weight x 1.5 x 100 = Total weight to be lifted.
Add 3000 m in rowing.

Workout:
Total weight to be lifted/2 = total dead lift weight.
Total dead lift weight x .6 = total squat clean weight.
Total dead lift weight x .4 = total overhead press (strict/push/jerk/whatever) weight.
3000 m row

You can break the exercises up into rounds any way you want. See the example below.

Darcy did this:

I weigh 140

140 x 1.5 x 100 = 21000

DL: 10500 (85 reps at 125)
Clean: 6300 (97 reps at 65)
OH Press: 4200 (93 reps at 45)
Row 3000

Which equaled

10 rds
300 m row
7 dead lift at 150
10 squat cleans at 65
7 overhead press at 65

Mike's math looks like this:

185 lbs.

185*1.5 = 277.5*100 = 27750

Deadlift = 27750/2 = 13875
Squat Cleans = 13875*.6 = 8325
OH Presses = 13875*.4 = 5550

If I was going to do the 10 round model Darcy used, my loads and reps would be as follows:

10 Rds

7 DL at 200#
9 Squat Cleans at 95#
6 Presses at 95#
300m Row

There are MANY ways to approach this workout. You can go heavier loads and less reps, or go lighter weights and more reps. It really is up to you to feel it out and do what you're capable of.

Darcy said this was a "killer" when she did it, so if you want to scale it down because you aren't as familiar with the three exercises, just reduce the original multiplier from 1.5 to 1.25 or even 1.00. That will reduce the total weight lifted, making all three lifts easier.

Don't OVERDO it!!! If you feel out of control or like you're gonna die, just reduce the weight to where it needs to be. This should be challenging, but I don't want to see anyone get paralyzed because they lost sight of the goal, which is to challenge yourself while lifting properly and safely!

For Motivation, here's my favorite CF Video that I watch when I need a little boost:

"The Evolution" by CrossFit by Overload from CrossFit South Philly on Vimeo.

Good Luck!

P.S. It's all downhill from here!