Sunday 21.9: Squats, Power clean, Box, Pull-ups

Sunday. Strength, Smolov squat 1x5 (122.5kg). Metcon, 6rds of: 3 power clean (80kg), 10 box, 10 pull-ups. Time 9.31

I'm telling ya my body felt crashed in the morning! God damned it was beaten up. Unfortunately I underestimated the importance of mobility and stretching for upper body. Hero workout JT really was a hero workout. It was a little deceiving as it didn't get to my lungs that much. But my muscles were sore as hell. This day would have been a perfect rest day for sure. Luckily Pauliina suggested we'd go explore the woods and nature instead of hitting the gym early in the morning. We slept like little babies until noon and I really needed that. The work week was long and during weekdays I don't get that much sleep anyway so it's vital in the weekend to get something back.

Strength.

• Smolov squats, 1x5 (122.5kg)

This was the last "easy" set of back squatting in this cycle. On Wednesday it's gonna be real stuff. Lots of volume for legs. Today it was only one single set of 5 reps with 122.5kg. I took warm-up with 60 and 100kg, couple of pause squats and explosive squats, to really get body prepared for this "set of the day".

My lovely fiancé <3

I'm a little scare of squatting 4 times a week for 3 weeks. That means 12 high-volume back squat sessions in 20 days. That would probably be okay, just need to do lots of mobility too but I need to do classic crossfit at the same time. Just need to listen to my body carefully not to overload the system. Because I got to be ready to have that bar on my back and do some serious work.

Squats of the day

Metcon. Time 9.31

• 6 rounds of:
• 3 power clean, 80kg
• 10 box
• 10 pull-ups

At first my initial feeling was to hit a 20 min amrap but then again I realized my body is indeed quite tired. Okay it felt much better than in the morning. That long walk and play in the woods made its work for recovery. In the morning I simply wouldn't have been ready to train but in the evening I was eager to get some training done! I'm happy for these quick recovery abilities. Anyway, I reckoned I'd better keep it shorter still.

Took some power cleans from ground and from hang and they felt fine all the way with 60-70kg so 80kg felt a good choice and I'm very happy on this decision. I took them all as singles, and at times I dropped the bar because there were no other souls at the gym. Cleans felt good all the way.

I still tend to bend my arms too early. There's this movement pattern that I've learned in the past and it's pretty damned hard to get rid of it. Hang cleans might have made it a little better but still this technical improvement would make a huge difference in the effectiveness of my lifts. Better technique smells like heavier lifts and PR's. But it's not that easy to correct. I'm working on it though.

100kg

Box jumps have been non-existing lately. I've been careful not to burden my legs too much so that's the sole reason why these haven't been part of my metcons. I figured it can't be that serious to have them involved too so they got in today. No problem with boxes. They're one of my strengths.

Pull-ups, the number of them wasn't big but the combination of them and power cleans somehow got to me and they didn't feel that light towards the end. There were no problems to knock them unbroken anyway. I would have done them ub for at least 10 rounds, I'm sure of it.

This workout was good, definitely so. And the reps were good too, wouldn't have changed it in anyway. With a fresh body I would have made it either 10 rounder or then a 20 min amrap. It would have constituted a lot of box and pull-ups, 100+ in total.

Metcon

Mobility.

• Overhead squat
• Stretching, mobility

In the end I took mobility drills, below is one of them. This one is designed for overhead squats. I need to get my armpits shown forward instead of downwards. We worked on this positioning with Toni. My stance is wider than in normal front / back squat and I'm really pushing it to get my arms / shoulders in good position. This is not easy for me. But I need to stop bitching about it and start improving it! =)

OHS mobility