Articles, Stories, Journals....

I come across lots of articles and I really like to share them with you.

Smiling is Contagious
This is written by Michele Letendre, a crossfit games competitor. She never realized before how or why she inspires other athletes; she has recently realized that she does indeed have an impact on many of us. Also to close her little journal, she includes a very moving bit that makes me look up to her even more, beyond just a crossfit athlete.

Mind Over Matter
I may or may not have read this two or three times. It's that good! But not just good-it's true, 100% accurate, motivating, inspiring, and so much more. This is a MUST read if you train, compete, or just simply want to. It may give one an epiphany if they find excuses or lack motivation or just not 'there' yet. It will make athletes push even more and really undestand what it takes.
Seriously, I absolutely love it. I have shared it with many of my friends and even forwarded it to my motivation, Andrea Ager, who I'm sure would appreciate this writing as well.

BoxLife Mag: Andrea Ager
Speaking of Andrea Ager, here is the link to the article of her from BoxLife magazine. Again, she is probably my number one motivation and always has been. Reading her words always drives me.

Training Crossfit vs. CrossFit as a Sport Article

This is pretty awesome:

http://chrisspealler.com/training-crossfit-vs-crossfit-as-a-sport/

Long Week

Geez this week just went on and on. With work and the WOD's, my body was exhausted.
My whole family is sick and I could tell I was catching a lil cold. Oh no, I put a stop to it! I took airbourne and vitaC twice a day, ate lots of fruit, took night time medicine and what do you know, cleaned that sucker up!

Now that it's getting colder here in Cali, I have been bringing out my tea collection. This one here is from David's Tea and is Jumpy Monkey. It is loose tea so I put in a steeper and allow to steep for about mins. While that's working, I heat up some almond milk with stevia. I use a frother and once all frothed up, I pour the milk on top of my tea. Perfect to warm up my body.
I am a tea fiend, so I have many different flavors from David's and Teavana.

Heavy Squats: I have a love/hate relationship with these suckers. I love the strength I possess to lift that much yet I hate them cause...hmm I cant think of a real reason lol. When I do heavy squats, I gear up with my knee supports and weight belt.

Heavy squats to me are 1-2 reps. With the last rep being hard as heck getting out of the hole. I take my rest in between sets as well. I don't superset heavy squats cause I'm giving my full attention to them. I make sure I'm good and warmed up, do higher reps and then worked up to a semi-heavy load. When I'm coming back up from the hole, my focus is knees out, knees out, knees out! I swear forcing them out will get me up and out of that period where you're shaking and in that half squat. Knees out will force your biggest muscles of your body, your butt, to get you out.

 Heavy deadlifts! Same concept as squats: low reps, not supersetted, full attention. What goes on in my head while coming up is straight back, straight back, straight back! During heavy deads your back tends to curve forward which is really, really bad and you can totally hurt yourself. I use the bounce from hitting the ground to help get back up and then I drive through my heels like no other.
When I see heavy deadlifts on the agenda, I wear knee socks cause I want to keep that barbell close to my body through the whole entire lift so sometimes I scrap the bar against my shins; my legs are already scarred up so I'm trying to not ugly them up any more.

 Song is by Rob Bailey and The Hustle Standard, "Hungry." Seriously such a killer song to workout to! All they're songs pretty much are.

Handstands are my weakness and a skill that needs lots and lots of practice. I practice them every day and I see some progression but I'm just inpatient with them. Once I can hold a handstand for longer periods, Ill move on to handstand walks which are my ultimate goal. Have to take the steps to reach that goal. I have watched videos on the progression to handstand walks. I usually do them in front of a wall so if I have that support. I will then push off the wall to try to find my center again. I do occasionally step away from the wall cause I mean you really need to just let go of the support system of the wall so I get more used to kicking up and finding my center. If I feel I am going to fall backwards, I release one hand and push off the other so ill land on my feet. I also saw that some just tuck and roll out of the fall. I have seen handstand walks with legs up in the air and with the knees bent.



 

 So I took this picture to show off my SoxBox Navy socks. I love them and are my all time fav...wait I do love my Bad Ass ones too! haha The Navy has a special place in my heart. Why? Cause indeed I will be joining. That's another story so I wont get into that.

Also my booty shorts are from WODGearClothing and are the exercise shorts. I have these as well as the Tron, neon yellow and black pair. I love this brand and am actually a rep for them for 2013. They make ALL their clothes by hand, well sewing machines run by pple, here in CA. So made in the USA!

 

 

So this WOD is brutal, hands down. When you start, you begin with burpees, do as many as you can until the time is at 2min, You then jump up and do 8 toes to bar. Get right back at the burpees until time is 3mins.

I set a pace where I got in 10 or 11 burpees in between each TTB. So depending on how fast you get your burpees in determines how long your WOD will go. My time was 8:47:30.

This pretty much sums up how you feel after this WOD. I resumed the CrossFit post-WOD position on the ground.

I saw a ecard thing similar to this one but with a different saying. I made this one my own so I wouldn't be copying.





 

 

So I posted my box jump failure picture the day it happened. Well this below is what it looks like today:

yeah my leg looks pretty ugly right now. But my scabs are healing up really good since I am putting Emu Oil on them twice a day.

One of yesterday's WOD was 100 power cleans for time. This sucked so bad. My chest took a beating for sure which resulted in these bruises. My chest is so tender and really hurts if I touch it.

 

 

Garret Fisher Interview

Most crossfitters are familiar with this handsome lad: Garret Fisher. I'm sure this years CrossFit Games wont be the first and last time we see him there. He was a rookie this year but man did he make a statement and let his name be known to the crossfit community.
Not only is he a handsome young fellow (How you doin? ...read in Joey T voice), by young I mean young enough for me to date haha, anyways but he also showed his abilities by landing himself a good ranking in the games. His hair sure does have some fans; you can even purchase a Garret Fisher "Johnny Bravo" status shirt in womens and mens. I'm pretty sure I need me one (in a size small please lol)!
In the interview you get to know a little more about what's underneath that epic hair! 

Link to Interview:
Fisher Talks

Picture used from athleticbuilds interview page.

Monday Monday Monday...

So I had some fun, ok thats a lie, more like annoyed making this video. It took me forever to find an app, tried two different ones and didnt like them, makde the video 4 or 5 times, found a good app, made the video...and it still turned out weird when I uploaded it to IG. But oh well I'll figure it out eventually. Anyways here is a photo-video of me doing a clean (& jerk but you cant see the jerk part). I started put mat on the ground in front of me so if I have to drop the weight, I can.

For me setup is so important, I make sure my body is where it needs to be. Hand placement, foot placement, body alignment, neck/eye concentration...etc.

I drive through my heals, pull and shrug

Squat down beneath the bar and catch under it into the front rack position, (as you can see I exhaled out my breath)

Drive through the heals, push the knees out, keep back straight, and stand that baby up!

 

These are brutal but I love them. Im increasing my weight gradually as to not hurt myself or be macho. Jerks are harder for me because I seen to have issues with my shoulders and I dont have bumper plates so I cant just drop a heavy wt. So Im kinda stuck at a particular wt right now, one where I can handle setting it down....I could only imagine my capabilities if I had bumper plates...bummer dude!

Week Recap

My first week on my new Crossfit program and man I tell you what, I love it! I am sore every single day in different places and feelings stronger! My coach is setting me up to increase my strength so I can compete.

My third day was motility day so I went to the gym and stretched out, massaged myself, practiced handstands/walks, and rolled out. It was hard to actually just do this but man I needed it cause my bod was hurtin! My coach strictly told me and wrote it in BOLD that I could NOT touch a weight lol I was grunting about it but then I know the saying "Trust your Coach" is so accurate. I want to commit myself 100% because Crossfit is what I love.

Heavy squats with lower reps. My coach saying lower reps are going to be best for me. So again Im listening. And what do you know, next day I wake up walking funny. Gotta love it! As you can see from my face I was holdin my breath for sure. IF the picture captured me right before descending, Id look like a fish with my mouth wide open sucking in a breath.

Doubleunder massacre! When you're in the middle of a WOD, you're gased out, and you have to do DUs, they can get a little sloppy. This is why I am always practicing because I want to bust out DUs even when Im tired. I talked to a fellow crossfitter who told me to focus more on the rope swing from my wrists and not my elbows. Makes total sense; the next day I tried them again and used my wrists instead. Practicing these just about everyday and I can totally notice a difference in just a few days of how my fluidity is with them.

I bruise like a peach thats why my whips look so bad from day 1 to day 2.

Wall balls are seriously so awesome...when performed correctly. You have to break parallel coming down and have to throw the ball above the target. Every single rep has to be this way or it's a no rep. I am my own judge and cutting myself slack doesnt help me now and it wont help me when I'm competing. The crossfit standards for women are 14lb balls and a 9ft target. These are very exausting and taxing on the whole body so during a WOD these are not considered your 'rest time.' A fellow crossfitter told me to make sure and keep my chest up, know my body position to the wall because too far can make you lean forward and too close can make you lean back, and to push my knees out.

Rowing...well I have grown to love this ol' thing. Even before my program started, I incorporated more ever since the 2013 Crossfit Games revealed the half marathon on the rower. I practiced my 500, 1000, and 2000m speeds...I need to keep practicing. Im trying to figure out the speed aspect without looking like a tweek on it and you know what I mean. Most of us have seen people on these and are not using it correctly.

I researched videos and learned to aim for your belly button and not your upper chest: I watched the athletes at the games hitting their chest up high to increase their s/m. Keep you back straight always and dont round when going back to the starting position. Push through legs and then pull, not visa versa.

Ahhh...when you finish your WOD...that feeling. Well I consider the end of a WOD to be a series of phases.

Heck ya, freakin rocked that!

Yes, Im done.

What's tomorrow WOD?

AHHH, I'm so sore!

Pretty much how it goes cause immediately after you feel so awesome and like "oh yeah what now barbell, I crushed you!" Then you calm are like "glad thats over." Then you get so pumped to feel that rush again you wonder what tomorrow has in store. After a while, when you're rolling out, you'll be hurtin.

Sunday is my active rest day and yes I needed it again. My activeness was simply washing my car inside and out. My coach told me to keep it low key on Sunday's so Ill stick to bicycling, walking, hiking, jogging, rowing etc.

As for my diet, Im still 90/10 Paleo eater. I have noticed Im even more hungry more often. I have always eaten frequent meals because that works for me and my stomach has adjusted so it's smaller. My metabolism is increasing so I am literally hungry every 2-3hrs. I am trying to increase my post-WOD meals because I know that is the most important time. Carbs are key after. I have been increasing my meats and really thats what I have been craving: chicken galore, tilapia, hard boiled egg whites, tri tip, bacon...Im turning into a real cavewomen.  My family has even noticed my protein intake cause they are always referring to me always waiting for the meat or what meat are you eating now haha. At work I seriously make myself grilled tilapia with a side of hard boiled eggs or chicken.

Men can feed me lots of meat and I'd be a happy beast!

Essentials in my Gym Bag

I always have these in my bag or with me:

-pr wraps (A MUST!!!)

-weight belt

-speed rope

-tape

-chalk

-my new journalmenu WOD book

-beverage (water or cellucor BCAAs)

-gloves

-towel

What I need to get or my bag:

-a bigger bag!

-Oly lifting shoes

-shin sleeves

-hand grips 

-more knee socks 

My number one thing I'm researching right now are Oly lifter shoes. So many options by many awesome brands...Adidas are on my mind right now though. Adipowers ($200) and Adidas powerlifter ($90). 

But really I need money first! 

11 things only Crossfitters would understand

100% correct:

http://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=X4tlOvXkZC8&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DX4tlOvXkZC8%26feature%3Dyoutu.be

First Time CrossFit Competitor: Garret Fisher

Man Beneath the Hair

This video goes into the thoughts and ideas of Garret Fisher. Who is he? He is a Crossfit athlete who made it to the Crossfit Games this year for the first time. He even kept up with the big boys like the infamous Rich Froning and Jason Kalipa.
Watching this video is so inspiring and I wish I could personally tell him that. It's amazinf how the power of Crossfit athletes influence me so. Garret came out of nowhere and has made such a huge impact in a matter of months. That is the beauty of the Crossfit Community, sharing and broadcasting athletes left and right. He made it to the (upper) top and his hard work should be noticed. I do notice it; I follow his IG and FB account. Want some inspiration, go follow him.
His 19 year old sister, Lauren Fisher, is equally amazing. She will be someone to watch for sure. I follow her on her IG as well. Here is a video of here doing a 72k snatch. Seriously she may be young but man she is on my list of inspirations! Check her out!


I keep tabs on the Crossfit Games Site because of what they post and put out their to the Crossfit community. I find inspiration with the big and small athletes and I want to thank the community for putting their athletes on blast!