I had to miss this one, too, but Al sent us all the WOD(s). You're technically going to do two quick WODs, but the strength portion is going to take you a little bit of time. Between the strict presses and thrusters, your shoulders are going to a really good work out, so be really good about warming up your upper body.
As far as safety goes, be mindful of your form for the strict presses and thrusters. You can hurt your back if you're not careful, plus there's the added fun of holding weight over your head. None of that should be dangerous, but if you do these exercises poorly, you can hurt your back. The same is also true, though to a lesser degree, about the sumo deadlift high pull and the dumbbell swings. Be careful not to round your back or bend over as you're doing either of those exercises.
Warm Up
2 rounds of:
- 30 seconds of jogging in place
- 10 bottom downs
- 5 lunges to elbow
- 10 shoulder rolls
- 10 strict presses
Strength
10 rounds of:
WoD
As Many Rounds As Possible (in 5 minutes) of:
- 5 dumbbell lunges (left/right = 1)
- 5 thrusters
Rest 1 minute
As Many Rounds As Possible (in 5 minutes) of:- 5 sumo deadlift high pulls
- 5 single-arm dumbbell swings (left/right = 1)
Cash Out
- 5 minutes of a plank
Exercises
- 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.
- 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 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 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"). You can either walk forward, or rotate your body so that you are now facing the direction that used to be behind you. Either way, make sure you do the lunges on both sides.
- Shoulder Rolls
From a standing position, rotate your arm without extending your arm away from you. You're essentially making a windmill of your arm. Do this in both a clockwise and counter-clockwise motion for each arm, so that you fully warm up & stretch the muscles. Most people just do 10 rotations forward with one arm, 10 rotations backward with the same arm, and then they repeat this with the other arm.
- Strict Press
Grab a barbell, but leave the weight off for the warm up. For the strength portion, weight it with as much weight as you can handle for 100 reps. I usually see between ~45lbs and ~90lbs for a plain old strict press, so you'll probably want to knock a bit off of that this time around.
To start, hold the barbell slightly below shoulder level with both your palms facing away from your body so that you can see both palms in a mirror. You want the weights "racked" against your chest, with your elbows farther forward than the bar. You don't need to bring them all the way up like you do with a front squat, but you do want your forearms vertical and supporting the bar from underneath.
Once you've got the weight racked, lift the bar straight over head without using your legs. You are not going to dip or do a quarter squat. This is pure shoulder strength, with no legs to drive the momentum. Be sure to lift the weight straight up and down. In order to do that, though, you'll have to move your head backward as you lift. Otherwise, you'd hit yourself in the chin with the bar.
At the top of the press, lock out your arms. The bar should be directly overhead, and you shouldn't have your back arched at. I've often heard this described as having everything "in line:" your legs, back, arms, ears, and the barbell should form a straight vertical line perpendicular to the ground.
Bring the bar back down to the starting position in a straight line, as well. Again, move your head out of the way as you lower the bar. Once you've got the bar back in a racked position, you've finished the rep.
- Dumbbell Lunge
Hold the weights at your side, one on each side. 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. Make sure that your front foot is firmly planted on the ground; the heel of your foot should be touching the ground. 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 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.
This time around, you get credit for a rep once both legs come forward (we call this "right/left = 1" for short).
- Thruster
You'll need a barbell for this exercise, and weight it as heavily as you can. I usually see between 45lbs and 90lbs.
To start, hold the barbell slightly below shoulder level with both your palms facing away from your body so that you can see both palms in a mirror. If you've got enough strength and flexibility in your wrists, bring your elbows straight up so that they point away from your body. This will force more of the weight against your upper torso and put more of a strain on your wrists, so only do this if you can sustain this position through a lot of reps. Regardless of how high you bring your elbows, the weights are "racked" against your chest.
Keeping the barbell racked against your chest, do an air squat so that your thighs end up parallel to the ground; if you can "break parallel," that's even better. As you come up, press the barbell directly over your head, until your arms are fully extended. The drive all comes from your legs, rather than your upper body. Still, push the barbell straight up & down, since any horizontal motion will put undue stress on your shoulders.
To finish the rep, you have to bring the weight back to a rack position. For this, you can actually make it a smooth motion, and go straight into the next squat instead of stopping at starting position. This is fine so long as you fully extend the barbell, bring the weight back down before you start your next squat, and keep a good curve on your lower back the whole time.
- Sumo Deadlift High Pull
You'll need a barbell for this exercise. Weight it as heavily as you can handle, but you're most likely going to use the same weight as you used for the thrusters.
With that out of the way, keep your feet about 1.5 shoulder widths apart, and do a squat. Keep your hands between your legs, and reach down to grab the weight without bending at the waist. You want your hands to be about thumb-width apart from each other. Come up from the squat, popping your hips forward and aggressively shrugging your shoulders as you do that. It might seem a little silly, but both of these things help you generate momentum and drive the weight, without having to just lift the bar with your arms. Finish by bringing the hand with the weight to about your chin. This is one of the few times that you want your elbows to flare out to the sides; it should look like your forearm is roughly parallel to the ground. Without bending over at the waist, squat back down to bring the dumbbell back to the ground to finish the rep.
Realistically, most people go right into the next squat/high pull; that's okay, so long as you don't compromise the curve in your lower back to do so. You can also keep yourself honest by making sure that you hear the sound of the weight hitting the ground for every rep. In essence, you're doing squats while lifting weight off the ground for every squat.
- Single Arm Dumbbell Swing
You only need one dumbbell for this exercise; I usually see people grab 15lb dumbbells. Do a squat, keeping a good lumbar curve, and hold the dumbbell between your legs at about knee/shin level. Stand up from the squat, and as you do that, swing your arm upward in an arc until your arm is directly over your head. If you do the motion correctly, your legs will drive most of the momentum, and you're essentially just standing & squatting.
Your arm should stay locked the whole time, so that you're actually swinging the dumbbell. If you start bending your arm at the elbow, you're doing more of a bicep curl. That's not what you're after in this case, so that's wasted effort. At no point should you bend over, that can hurt your lower back. You always want to be facing forward, with a good lumbar curve. If you get tired, it's preferable to stop for a bit than to do these reps with bad form.
This time around, you get credit for a rep once you've brought both arms up once (or, "right/left = 1" for short). Given that, you'll want to alternate the swings between your two arms.
- Plank
From a push up position, lower yourself so that you are about two inches off of the ground. Keep yourself there without moving up or down for a total of five minutes. If you have to stop at some point, you can, but then the clock stops. You will want to make sure you're in a plank position for five full minutes.
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