Coach W11D3 - 4/6 Kentauros (Strength) + 2x 100 Squats + 100 Burpees

 4/6 Kentauros (X): 00:29:10 

 100 squats: *00:05:23 

100 burpees: *00:14:59 

100 squats : *00:04:29 (PB!)

After training two days in a row, I rested on Tuesday. Wednesday came along and with it, my third training day of week 11. I was determined to face and beat down the mental challenge this week has put me trough, and what better way to do it than with my good old friend Kentauros. I was scared when I saw the programming (Kentauros, strength version + 2x 100 Squats + 2x 100 Burpees), but having learned from the experience of the previous days, I didn't let that get into my head. I decided ahead of time I would, at the very least, do one set of Squats and one set of Burpees after the WOD, and I'd see how to go from there.

Even if it's just 4/6, it's the strength version of Kentauros I'm dealing with. I suffered miserably with the standard version until not too long ago, so I was both excited and scared to see the challenge rise, and to test myself once again. The modifications from standard to strength are subtle but meaningful; Burpee Frogs become Burpee DEEP Frogs (BDFs) and Jumps become HIGH Jumps (HJ). These seemingly little changes mean putting in tons of extra energy to be able to jump from a low squat position, landing accordingly (in case of the Burpee Deep Frogs) and higher, raising the knees to touch the shoulders and not only to hip level (in case of the High Jumps). As you can see from the picture, I was pouring buckets of sweat by the end of it.  I think  this is THE training session I have sweated the most, ever. I had never before seen drops of sweat run down my hair and fall in my shouders, back, neck, floor...

Overall I felt absolutely great. Pumped, motivated, happy to see my mind and body perform at unison. I think it helps tremendously to know the workout well. I know how and when to pace myself, when to speed up, when it's wise to rest a bit, when I can push harder. I'm extremely happy that I finished below the 30 minute mark, and I'm looking forward to repeating this WOD in the near future. I feel I have it in me to drop that time down a bit!. Just waiting for the Coach to give me that chance again. I feel much stronger; the BDFs were not that big of a challenge as I thought they would be. I actually struggled a lot more with raising the knees high enough during the High Jumps! *edition: while writing this, I realized I actually did Jumps and not High Jumps (so I removed the star I had first awarded me) because I started the workout with the confusion of how high the knees had to go in HJ. To be fair, I think if I had "known" (I did know but I was confused) I had to touch my shoulders with my knees, I probably would not have been able to do it in all reps or if I did, my time would have been significantly higher. So there it is. I was all happy about the time with a star, but hey, next time there will be no confusions and I'll hit that workout hard.

After hydrating myself and catching my breath for a little bit (about 3 min rest) I went in for the first 100 Squats. The most squats I've had to do in a row before is 50, during the first round of Aphrodite. I thought twice as many was completely doable, and it was. I had to break into series of 25-ish and rest for a couple of seconds in between sets (rest = kick the air to move around my quads and take deep breaths). I'm hoping to get soon to the point were I don't stop. I thought I'd be under 5 minutes, and I was close. One very interesting thing I noticed is, when I got around the 80th Squat, I felt some sort of smooth warmth expand in my quads, and pressure/pain release. I suddenly felt like I could keep on squatting for a long time. I think it may have been the same thing that happens when you jog; you suffer and suffer and then you reach a certain point, well into your run, when suddenly you feel like you could keep on going for hours. 

I took another break (around 5 minutes) walking around, stretching my quads a bit and drinking some water. Without thinking too much about things, I dropped to the floor to start doing the 100 burpees. If I let myself meditate long enough on what's coming ahead, that's when my mind tricks me into thinking I cannot do it. I didn't give my mind enough time, and it was a good decision. I have calculated before that my current burpee rate is 10 per minute, so I thought It would take me 10 minutes to do the 100 burpees. That calculus did not take into consideration having done 4/6 strength Kentauros and 100 squats before, so of course it took me 50% longer than anticipated to finish! The truth is, I was still thrilled. I had beaten my mind. I had done all 100 burpees, for the first time (just like with the squats, I had never done more than 50 in a row before), even when I was exhausted and pouring and pouring buckets of sweat. I WON. And it was an amazing feeling.

Just when I was doing my last 20 burpees or so, my GF arrived home from her CrossFit class. She saw me struggling a bit and cheered me on. Then, when I finished, she asked if that was my last round and I told her I was supposed to do 100 more squats and 100 more burpees, but that I thought I didn't have it in me to complete that. She said to me "I know you can do it, at least you can do the squats, so come on, I'll squat with you". Getting that support and encouragement from her was the biggest achievement of that training session. I cannot begin to describe how happy it makes me to see these changes in her, wanting to exercise, to get fitter, healthier, to the point where she'll do 100 squats after having done CrossFit, just to accompany me. She pushed me because I needed to be pushed, and it payed off. I got below the 5 minutes, as I had wanted to do in the first attempt. I set a new PB, when I thought I couldn't squat anymore. 

The only thing missing, to have had an absolutely mind blowing successful day, was the last 100 burpees. After the liters and liters of sweat, I really didn't think I could handle another 15 to 20 minutes doing burpees. In total I was already training for around 1 h, and it felt like if I kept pushing that hard, it might have been detrimental. So I made that decision, I don't know if it was 100% honest or if some mental weakness was there too but that was it. My first really real Hell Day, almost done 100%, with great achievements and even a PB. What an amazing day!

Push your limits

Coach W11D2 - Dione (Standard) // The REAL Hell Week

 Dione (S), 00:48:36 

Since this is, for me, THE REAL HELL WEEK, I figured I'd train as much as I can while I can. Therefore, my general planning of letting one rest day in between training sessions went to the freezer and I decided to attack day 2 on Monday after work. I was hoping to have a nice and "easy" workout to bounce back and regain some confidence after the previous night Gaia's mental debacle. The Coach said on day 2 I had to do standard Dione + 100 burpees + 2 x 25 High Jumps + 50 squats. Just reading that long list made me tired... It sounded like a lot, and I attacked Dione with that in the back of my mind. 

I was surprisingly only mildly sore. I thought after almost 1 h of Gaia, I'd be crushed. However no pain did not mean no tiredness. My muscles were noticeably lazy, I was slower than usual and I had to struggle with some movements. It actually took me  +12 mins than my PB to finish the WOD!!! Dione is basically tons of Jumping Jacks and Burpees + Ab exercises (Sit ups and Leg Levers). I still have a rough time with the Leg Levers because my lower back bends if I don't put my hands below my butt. So, once again, no star for me! I still need to develop more ab strength to be able to really move my legs up and down while keeping by back tight and touching the floor. #WorkForIt. I feel like my legs are super heavy and I just can't hold them in place without bending my spine (which of course, makes my lower back hurt a lot, and that's not smart!).

The other thing I noticed this time around is that I woke up the next day with very tight and sore calves, particularly the left one. About a month and a half ago I received a big kick in my left calf during a soccer match and after that I've felt like that leg is still not back to normal. I took care of it after the blow, but it seems it was not enough. It's like the muscle is much more ready to cramp when the one on my right leg is still OK. And today, after all the Jumping Jacks, I'm still noticing that difference; left calve is very tight, has knots all over and hurts when I stand on the tip of my toes, while the right one is just a bit tight. I'm massaging it and stretching thoroughly to make it go away fast.

I was sweating and feeling very tired after Dione so I didn't do any the loose exercises. I thought to myself I'd leave them for an extra training day with just loose exercises. Looking in retrospective, of course I should have done them, but its easy to say that now. In that moment, I was once again weak. I'm absolutely convinced that if I had rested 3 minute I would have been able to do the loose exercises physically. It all comes down, yet again to a mental thing. Freeletics is testing me both physically and mentally, and this particular week it's definitely more a mental challenge than a physical one. So far, I'm not doing all that well... Guess I have found my biggest weakness!

Coach W11D1 - 8/10 Gaia (Strength) // The REAL Hell Week

 8/10 Gaia (X), 00:58:39 

I had planned to do week 10 the last week of February, when I still had soccer, so I only asked for two WODs that week. I ended up postponing W10 to the following week (when soccer was over) so I trained on Monday and Wednesday and was ready for more right away. I thought I'd ask for four training days on week 11, to "compensate".

Remember how the coach asks how hard was your week of training? Well, since on W10 I did one of the best times I've ever done in Aphrodite, broke my PB in Venus and wasn't sore or even tired, I had the brilliant idea to tell the coach W10 had been "Way too easy". V-E-R-Y bad idea. When I saw the programming, I knew right away this was going to be a real Hell Week. I think this is one thing the Coach could be improved on. There are three options to "the level of difficulty for this week was...": WAY too easy, Hard but OK or WAY to hard. Its either all or nothing. Sometimes its just "somewhat easy/hard" but there's no way to tell the Coach that. Sometimes you just want to step it up a bit, but you get Hell Weeks...

I was up to the challenge, feeling confident I could survive this week. Along came Friday and I had to do Apollon (Standard), a nice WOD I have done twice I think, a looong time ago, which includes 400 m runs. Since I've moved to the apartment "in the city" I no longer can do runs as easy as I did at my parents', so I decided to go to a nearby park I had set my eye on and do it there. Here's a confession: I hate having to go out to workout. One of the things I like the most about Freeletics is the fact that I can train at 11 PM in the comfort of my living room. That being said, I know I have to go out for the runs (and also to find a Pull Up bar, which I still haven't!). I used the free run feature on the app to jog my way to the park as a warm-up. Now I know the park entry is located exactly 1 km away from the apartment; it took me 6 minutes 5 seconds to get there. I got in and started to look around to find a spot were I could settle up, do my burpees and squats and measure off the 400 m I needed to run. As it was Friday afternoon-nightish youngsters were messing around, drinking beer, smoking weed, doing slackline between the trees etc. Adults were letting their dogs run around and kids were playing on the games and sand boxes. Me, I couldn't find a decent spot were I could train at ease. Everywhere I looked I would have had to avoid dogs running over me while on the ground or inhale weed smoke. Nobody was exercising in that park! I felt really uncomfortable and out of place, so I went back to the apartment and I didn't do Apollon that day. I actually didn't do anything because my plan hadn't worked out and I was feeling really frustrated...

Along came Sunday and I went to my parents'. I brought along my sport shoes and everything, but I couldn't find the time to train. When I got back to the apartment at night I was feeling pissed, starting to consider to abort W11 altogether. In an impulse I said "f**ck it, I'm training right here, right now", so I looked at the app, skipped Apollon and went straight to the last training session the Coach had planned for me: 8/10 of Gaia, Strength version. Gaia is one of the Greek Primordial Deities, and is the personification of the Earth, the "great mother of all". According to Wikipedia (great source, right?), she was the creator of the Earth and all the Universe, and gave birth to all the Heavenly Gods, the Titans and the Giants. So, why did I jump to the almighty mother of everything and not the second or third training sessions? Well, because second and third are WOD + 4 heavy loose exercises (eg. 2 x 100 burpees + 2 x 100 squats) and I thought that would be too much to start. 

This was my very first time doing Gaia, and the strength version has Jumping Jacks, High Jumps, Froggers and Standup Jumps on it. I had never even done standups before (the escalated version of standup jumps) and I quickly learned I couldn't do them. I just physically couldn't break gravity if I did not use my hands a bit... just a tiny little push, but meaningful enough to make me feel extremely disappointed. As a good strength WOD, Gaia is highly metabolic work, very intense. I was pouring buckets of sweat and breathing heavy almost right away. I had a super tough time, mentally. Every rep was a struggle. I was already coming in discouraged and low on motivation with all the hustle to begin W11, and finding out I couldn't do standups, which seem fairly easy on the videos I must say, was too much. After the 4th round, when I was halfway done, I took a bathroom break; something I had never ever done before. The clock continued to tick, and I just sat on the toilet, arguing with myself, not wanting to go back. I was training in the living room while my GF was cooking. She was cheering me on, and clicking in the app when I was done with each set. I got back after 3 or 4 minutes and I told her "that's it, this is too much, I'm done for today". She wouldn't let me. We argued for about 40 seconds and for some mysterious reason, I just started moving, doing jumping jacks again. She pulled out the strength I had inside me to finish, and I love her even more for that <3.

At that point I thought that a long, slow WOD, using the help of my hands to stand up, was better than no WOD at all, so I kept pushing. Slow but steady, I didn't care about my time anymore (with the bathroom break it was all messed up anyways), I just cared about getting to the end. And eventually I did finished it, and it was a great victory. Maybe it was not the best physical workout I'd ever done, but it sure was one of the hardest mental workouts I've ever done.

There is no success without hard work.

~WE NEVER QUIT~

Coach W10D2 - Venus (Standard)

 Venus (S), 00:23:57 PB!!! 

Second training day of week 10. I was all pumped with the results of Aphrodite (the first WOD of this week) so I wanted to try and beat my Venus PB. I did this workout while being at the beach a week ago, so I had it fresh in my memory how it was like. I knew the push-ups were (are) my weak point so my strategy was to gain time with the squats and the situps.

I think I wasn't still fully recovered from Aphrodite because I had a bit of a hard time with the squats. My quads felt tired and sort of "lazy" right away and I had to break the first series of 50 into 5 x 10 reps (when I usually can pull a 20 - 15 -15 or a 25 - 25). The sensation got better with each round but it was never completely gone. Sit ups went by with no effort, but as I anticipated, the push ups were the killers. I can do some strict push ups, but certainly not 50 of them... 4 times. I actually suffer doing 50 knee push ups so you can imagine. I set myself the following mental schedule: do 5, take 2 breaths still in push up position, do 5 more and rest my arms (lying on the floor) for 5 breaths (10 breaths max when I'm dying). Its sort of breaking the push ups into 5 x 10 reps. When I write it and read it it sounds lazy as f**k, but its what I have to do in order to finish the WOD. Its a personal goal of mine to improve substantially my upper body strength. 

With all that strategy I did manage to lower my time and get a new PB. Still no star, but I'll #trainforit

Coach W10D1 - Aphrodite (Standard)

 Aphrodite (S): *00:31:32 

I got back from the beach to spend my last holiday week in the city. In my absence, the summer soccer team I'm playing in won and managed to get to the semi-finals, which we played and won on Tuesday 24 (February). We then played the final on Thursday 26. We knew from the start it was going to be an extremely hard game. The team we played against had 3 (semi)professional players on it. Unfortunately this particular summer amateur league allows a maximum of 3 pros per team, so it was all according to the rules... It was a tough game, and we evidently took quite a beating (can't remember the score but it was something like 8-0). We lost the game but were proud because we were the best non-pro team there. 

In other news, according to my "tradition", once I go into soccer break I try to donate blood, that way I can be well recovered once the matches start again. I did that first thing on Friday because I hadn't donated for a wile. I'm young, I'm healthy, I'm not afraid of needles; there's no reason why I shouldn't donate so I try to do it at least once a year (ideally two). You never know in life when you're going to end up needing a hand back of any sort...

With the two very important games and the blood draw I ended up not training that week at all, so I pushed off week #10. I know I shouldn't have, but it was just what I had to do; it allowed me a couple of days to recover well. I got back to work (*sad face*) on Monday, March 2nd and did my first week 10 training session that same night. It was good old Aphrodite!

I used to "hate" Aphrodite but now I cherish every time I have to do this workout because I'm very familiar with it, I know well when I can push harder, when I'm slacking off and I think it's the best workout for me to see improvements from time to time. I was feeling very good and motivated. I took very few and short breaks during the burpees. I usually "need" to lay around to catch my breath every 10 reps or so. I'm realizing more and more it's a mental thing rather than an actual physical need... This time, I flew, and it showed! In two weeks I lowered my time in about 4 minutes and I'm getting closer and closer to my old PB (the one I have my doubts about...). It took me a while, but it feels damn great to be here again!!! #trainforit

Coach Week 9 - all Standard WODs @ the beach

 Day 1, Kentauros (S): *00:44:40  PB!!! 

 Day 2, Venus (S): 00:27:02 PB!!! 
 Day 3, 2x Metis (S): *00:21:54 

100 m sprint: 00:00:20
100 m sprint: 00:00:19

I took one week vacation at the beach with my GF from the 16 to the 23 of February. I had planned on training three times during that week, and I did! I'm very proud of that because I (we) have a bad record... Usually when we go to the beach, we go into hibernating mode and we just lay around on our PJs, watch TV or series/movies in the computer and cook and eat yummy-but-not-so-healthy foods (and we eat A LOT). This time it was a bit different; it's the first time we've been on vacation since she has started doing CrossFit. It makes a big difference to be with someone who also wants to be healthy and exercise as much as you do. Since she was going to miss her classes that week, we trained together on days 1 and 2, and then she cheered for me on my third training day, which I performed in the sand. It helped a lot, having someone else motivated to train alongside me or push/cheer for me. If she had stay in bed, it would have been so much harder for me to go out and train on my own! We still laid around the other days, but it felt like a much more balanced vacation week.

The first day, I had to do standard Kentauros. In the meaning time my GF did some loose exercises. It was amazing to get a PB on Kentauros, but more importantly, not to suffer throughout the workout as I usually did. The feeling of finally conquering this WOD, that has made me suffer so much in the past, is indescribable. I was genuinely happy and proud. I still remember the first time I did Kentauros, when I couldn't finish it and ended up taking around 40 minutes to do half of the repetitions (and all that went along with me quitting...) and then the second time I did it, when I managed to do all the rounds in over 1h 15 mins!!! Now I'm doing it all, with a star, in under 45 mins... WOoooHOW!!!

The second day I did standard Venus alongside my GF. It was the first time she did the exact same WOD as me, at the same time, and it was a great. I still have a huge lack of upper-body strength (I definitely need to work on that) and therefore I'm still unable to do all the push-ups strict. I also got a PB here, which is nice, but no star. I think I still have a long way to get to the strict push ups. It discourages me sometimes not to be able to do strict pistols or push ups or pull ups, but I see the small improvements after every workout and I have to keep reminding myself things don't happen overnight and to get results, I just have to keep on working hard, consistently.

The third and last day of training we went to a lovely beach that is not suitable for swimming and where, therefore, there's just a few people here and there. It was a nice sunny morning and I did 2x Metis. Let me tell you, doing burpees and high jumps in the sand is NOT easy. Besides the added resistance, the ground is uneven and when you are constantly landing on the same spots you start digging holes that only make things worse. Also the sand sticks to your sweat so... You can imagine. It was a nice challenge and a good change of scenario though #TheWorldIsMyGym. After Metis I had to do two 100 m sprints. This was my first time running with the new coach, and I was worried about how to measure the distance. It turns out, the Coach can use GPS and measure it for you. I just had to sprint holding my phone and I would get an alert when I passed the 100 meters. It is pretty accurate, so I'm very pleased about that. Also, I improved my time by a second from the first to the second repetition, and all this in the sand so I think I'll certainly get a PB when I do this again, on a more even surface. Overall it was a great experience and a nice training day, perfect to end my fitness summer vacation.

Coach W8D2 - Metis (Strength) + loose exercises

 Metis (X), *00:18:48 (PB) 

Loose Exercises (PBs)

The second and last day of training of week #8 was a special feature. Good old Metis –but the strength version, which I’m doing for the first time- plus some loose exercises: 10 pushups, 25 squats, 50 situps and 10 Froggers (also the first time I have to do loose exercises to complement a WOD… if I recall correctly).

I could “hear” the Coach saying: “You’ve got Burpees under control? That’s cute; let’s try Burpee Squat Jumps (BSJs) then!” The strength version of Metis has BSJs instead of regular Burpees, Froggers instead of Climbers and High Jumps instead of Jumps; all nice little changes to push you a bit further –and you can feel those little things add up and matter a ton!  BSJs start like regular burpees but when you go from the ground forward and up you have to first get in a squatting position with the hips below the knees and from there perform a high jump (knees above hip line) instead of the usual small jump forward and up. It was a bit challenging to modify the movement pattern I’m already used to, but once I did a few reps and got the hang of it was good.  I got tired a lot faster than with regular burpees though because, let’s face it, during regular burpees I jump just high enough to make both feet lift the ground but not any higher to save as much energy as possible.  I liked the strength version of Metis. Doing Froggers is easier for me than Climbers. I always struggle with the Climbers, keeping the hips below the knees and the shoulders, hips and knees aligned while moving one feet forzard, then the other…  I think the problem there is that I’m still short on strength in my upper body and core so I can’t keep everything tight. Jumping forward with both feet made things simpler. Also I was already doing pretty high jumps during standard Metis, so nothing much changed there. The only thing I can point out is that I think I performed particularly slowly. The adjustment to the BSJs was very noticeable and I stopped to catch my breath probably more often and for longer periods of time than I really needed to. Lately I’ve been feeling this a lot, like I’m giving in to what my mind says more than what my body says. I felt it during Aphrodite (the previous WOD) too, like physically I could have gone faster but for some (mental) reason I just didn’t. I’m going to pay more attention to that in the next WODs, to make sure I’m pushing myself into giving my all at every rep.

I did this WOD at 8 AM on a Monday, during my holidays, while my GF went to her CrossFit class because we were leaving –just the two of us- for 7 days to the beach afterwards. A lot of people train early in the morning on empty stomachs and I think that’s a terrible idea. I’m in the process of writing a post about nutrition on morning  training sessions, so there will be more explanations on why I think it’s a bad idea there. I’ve been wanting to try one of the recipes of the Nutrition Guide to make high protein snacks for these type of situations, because if you eat a whole breakfast you’d have to wait a couple of hours to digest before dropping to the floor.  In the meaning time, we bought commercial protein bars that provide 15 g of protein a piece. We ate those (they tasted a bit funny so we do not think on eating these regularly) with a small cup of coffee and then trained about a half an hour later. The coffee decided to pay me a little visit during the first round of burpees, but other than that it was all good. I didn’t feel hungry or fatigued, so it was a good call to eat that prior to the workout. After training my GF came back to the apartment and we ate a proper breakfast with fruits, a bit of bread with turkey breast and tea with milk.  Then OFF TO THE BEACH we were!