Today, we rarely see Handstand Walks in CrossFit Programming these days. That movement requires (at the very least) balance, coordination, and strength. The good news, however, is that even if freestanding handstands, or handstand walks, are out of your ability level for now (which I’d say they are for most people), some of the drills discussed below are still very relevant and helpful for a variety of the other movements we’re regularly asked to do in CrossFit.
Take a few minutes and watch some tips to improving overall balance and spatial awareness. If nothing else, this will teach you ways to safely “eject” from a Handstand-Gone-Bad! (I know I’ve been there on several dozen occasion…)
Thanks to Jon Gilson, and the Again Faster crew, for another great resource!
Today is going to be called “Feel Good Friday”. Yep, sure is.
The video I am about to share with you guys was created by the crew at Again Faster Equipment. Instead of trying to explain the video on my own, let me paste their summary of it from the YouTube page where this video can be found:
“Filmed in August of 2011 in San Antonio, Texas, at Alamo CrossFit, the first ever Again Faster Adaptive Athlete Summit featured some of CrossFit’s best coaches as they came together with a group of adaptive athletes for two days of gymnastics, olympic lifting and mobility work. Coaches Jeff Tucker, Jay Leydon, Austin Malleolo and James Hobart joined with Olympians Chad Vaughn and Kendrick Farris to put the guys through skill sessions and CrossFit workouts, proving–if it even needed to be proven–that CrossFit is for everybody.
The weekend culminated in six athletes being named to the Again Faster Competition Team, captained by Kyle Maynard, with the goal of further showing the world what is possible when you stop looking for excuses and start to adapt.”
The reason I am calling this “Feel Good Friday” is because listening to these guys talk, it continually proves to me that the human spirit can overcome ANY obstacle… if it WANTS to do so. We all have a choice. Every minute. Of every day. In every interaction and situation. It’s that simple. Why would (and why DO) we choose to be negative or pessimistic about things when having a positive outlook could help us achieve things we never even thought possible? Ok, off of my soap box. The point… try to give yourself one single day where you approach EVERYTHING with an optimistic attitude.
Just one day. See what happens? I’m curious to hear if anyone tries.
As if there aren’t enough CrossFit competitions or contests going on right now, I’m here to introduce you guys to yet another one!
One of the leading Equipment companies in CrossFit is the crew over at Again Faster. Aside from creating great gear, they also sponsor some of the top athletes in all of CrossFit with their Again Faster Competition Team.
One of the things they did a while ago was a workout series called “Beat the Team“. Well, the series is back for another round, and this time I think I’m going to do it!
The schedule of events for the workouts (pasted directly from their website) is as follows:
“There will be a total of eight workouts, with the first event beginning on October 1st and continuing until October 10th. Each subsequent workout will be open for 10 days. The final workout will end on December 20th.”
Basically, you do these workouts wherever you are, video tape and upload them and then get ranked among athletes around the world! For me, it’s just a fun way to keep myself accountable for training hard and seeing where I stack up against some of the world’s best.
Here’s the info on Range Of Motion requirements for the first workout of the series (with the standards video below it)-
“Stacey”
150 Air Squats, 2000m Row, 150 Air Squats
GOOD LUCK, and I hope some of you decide to do this, too!
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