Al had to miss this class, so he sent us the WOD. This one was all legs, since all of the taxes were meant to tax your legs in some way, shape, or form. You basically decrease everything but the mountain climbers by 3 every round, but for simplicity's sake, I've written out the whole thing. Incidentally, take care to warm up your legs, since you're going to need them for the work out. The finish times were all pretty close to each other: the fastest was 16:15 and the slowest was 17:30.
The only exercise to really watch out for this time around was the floor press. We did it with partners, so that helped to minimize the possibility of injury. If you're doing this on your own, just make sure you keep good, tight form the whole time through. You're probably not going to be lifting enough to drop it, but you don't want the weight to come crashing down on you.
Warm Up
2 rounds of:
- 25 jumping jacks
- 5 T push ups
- 10 bottom downs
- 10 jump squats
- 5 lunge to elbows
Skill
For 15 minutes:
- 5 reps of floor press (with partners)
WOD
- 100 mountain climbers
- 21 box jumps
- 21 air squats
- 21 lunges
- 100 mountain climbers
- 18 box jumps
- 18 air squats
- 18 lunges
- 100 mountain climbers
- 15 box jumps
- 15 air squats
- 15 lunges
- 100 mountain climbers
- 12 box jumps
- 12 air squats
- 12 lunges
- 100 mountain climbers
- 9 box jumps
- 9 air squats
- 9 lunges
Exercises
- T Push Ups
Drop down in to a push up position, and lower your body until your chest hits the ground. Push your body up off the ground, but as your arms start to get fully extended, lift one of them off of the ground. Rotate your torso towards the side where you lifted the arm, so that you are now facing sideways rather than towards the ground. At the same time, extend the arm you lifted straight up in the air. This is actually where the name comes from: at full extension, your body will make something of a T-shape. Lower your arm and rotate your torso back in to a regular push up position. Repeat this motion by lifting your other arm in to the air to complete a single rep.
- Bottom Downs
From a standing position, reach down and touch your toes. Without letting go of your toes, squat down in to a full squat. Hold the bottom of this position for three seconds, and then stand up without letting go of your toes. Your feet should be as close to locked out as possible, so that you're essentially bending down to reach your toes. Hold that position for three seconds in order to finish the rep. The idea behind the hold is to ensure that you don't cheat by only coming up or squatting down part of the way.
- Jump Squats
Do a normal air squat, but as you come up to finish the squat, jump straight up in to the air. You finish the rep when you land and reset yourself. It's not uncommon for people to go right in to the next squat, though. This is okay so long as you're not bending over and losing the lumbar curve in the process. Basically, you don't get to cheat on your form because you're jumping.
- Lunge to Elbow
This starts like any other lunge: from a standing position. Bring one leg forward in a straight line, and then bend your knees so that both your knees are bent at 90 degrees. The back knee should be close to the ground, and your front knee should be directly over your front foot (otherwise you're putting undue stress on your knees). One cue that can help some folks is to treat your lunge like you're going straight up and down with your front leg. Your knees don't quite have to touch the ground (you might get burns/scrapes that way), but come as close as you can to that.
Once your lead leg is forward and your knees are bent, reach down with your arms and touch the elbow on the side that's lunging forward to the inside of your calf. If your right leg is forward, touch your right elbow to the inside of your calf. If you can actually reach your elbow to your instep (the side of your foot), do that since that'll make it harder. Try to balance without reaching down your off hand, but if you need to, put your off-hand down on the ground to stabilize yourself. Hold that for a couple of seconds.
Once you've gotten a good stretch out of the lunge, keep both feet where they are, and lean back. Your front leg will be fully extended and straight out, but your back knee will be bent, and you'll be sitting on your back foot. If your right foot is forward, you'd be sitting on your left foot. Since your front foot is still out in front, this pulls on/stretches your hamstring. Hold that for a couple of seconds.
Now you have to do the same thing on the other side to finish the rep. You have to do it once with each leg forward for a single rep (or "left/right = 1").
- Partner Floor Press
This is very much like a simulated bench press, only you're going to do it on the ground. You'll need a barbell (the most we managed to get on the barbell was 4 plates, or a little less than 90 lbs). Lie down on the ground so that you're facing the ceiling, and have your partner stand near your head. Your partner will lift the barbell off the ground and place it over your chest (your partner is essentially going to spot you). Reach up to grab it, and let your partner know once you've got full control of the weight. Pull your shoulder blades together, so that you're contracting your back muscles. From there, keep your elbows in tight to the side of your body, and lower the weight in a smooth, controlled arc. This is not a straight up and down motion. If the weight starts over your chest, it will be closer to your belly at the bottom of the arc. Push the weight back up so that it reverses the arc (starts closer to your belly at the bottom, and finishes above your chest). You have to bring the weight down and up for a single rep.
If you're curious, the point of this exercise was to help give us that final kick when doing a bench press. Normally you push your feet into the ground and drive your hips into the bench, using that force to help drive the weight up. Still, there's going to be a point when you get stuck and can't quite finish a rep. The motions in this exercise help teach you how to do that final push so that you can finish the rep in that situation.
- Mountain Climbers
Get down on all fours, almost as if you were about to start a race. It's also a bit like being in a push up position with a bend at the waist, with only one leg back. From the starting position, simultaneously bring your lead leg back & your rear leg forward. You want your knee to come forward as far as possible, but you also want it to slide to the side as you do this. Your knee should be farther from your chest than your arm. Do it again to switch the positioning of your legs, again making sure to try to bring your lead leg forward as far as possible.
This time around, you get credit for a single rep after both of your legs have come forward. For simplicity's sake, we describe that as "right/left = 1."
Scale down: Since you have a platform, you can make this easier on yourself by holding your upper body up against the platform. This takes some of the weight off of your upper body.
- Box Jump
You'll need to set up a platform with risers; most people use at least 4, but I've seen up to 6 on occasion. Before you even start the WoD, stomp on it really hard. You want to make sure it'll support your weight & won't move around when you jump on it. Just in case, look down at the platform when you jump. If it does move around at all, keeping your eyes on it should help prevent injury.
When you do jump on it, you want to make sure that you stand tall once you're on the platform. If you stay hunched over the whole time, you're not getting the full effect of the exercise. One way to think about this is that you want your hips to "open up" on both the jump up and the jump down; all that really means is that your hips should be pushed forward once you're standing on top of the box.
Scale down: Step up to the box, and then step down instead of jumping on the platform. If you do step, make sure you alternate which leg comes down off of the platform first.
- Air Squat
Make sure that when you go down, your thighs are at least parallel to the ground. If you can, squat farther down than parallel, so that your bottom ends up closer to the ground than your knees (i.e., "break parallel"). You want to keep your weight on your heels the whole time, that will help ensure you keep a good lumbar curve & will help with any potential balance issues. For some people, it helps to look up at about 45 degrees to ensure you're not leaning forward & straining your lower back. To ensure this happens, you can throw your hands up to 45 degrees and focus your eyes on your hands on each rep.
- Lunges
From a standing position, bring one leg forward in a straight line, and then bend your knees so that both your knees are bent at 90 degrees. The back knee should be close to the ground, and your front knee should be farther forward than your foot (otherwise you're putting undue stress on your knees). One cue that can help some folks is to treat your lunge like you're going straight up and down with your back leg. Your knees don't quite have to touch the ground (you might get burns/scrapes that way), but come as close as you can to that. If you need extra support, you can use your hands to push up off of your lead leg. You'll have to repeat the motion with the other leg coming forward for the next rep.
This time around, you have to bring both legs forward one time in order to get credit for a rep (or, "right/left = 1" for short)
Finished in 17:15
ReplyDeleteDid the first 50 mountain climbers Rx, then switched to using the platform