Ron Swanson is quickly becoming a favorite character of mine in modern-day television.
First was his inspiring example of true Leadership I featured a few weeks ago.
In his next contribution to my blog, he demonstrates his vast knowledge of proper nutrition. When we can find more people like him to lead, the world will be a better place.
Watch and learn, people. Watch and learn.
Hello friends!
Over the last two weeks, here are some of the things I’ve heard from members of our CrossFit Lakewood family:
I am BEYOND inspired by all of you. Every single day I see at least one thing that happens in our gym that shows me just how incredible you guys all are. There is no other point of this post than to say thank you.
Thank you for letting me share in the transformations that you are all creating in your bodies, in your minds and in your lives.
I’m so grateful to be a part of this family.
GET OUT OF THE WAY!!
When it comes to trying to control your safety as much as possible while in the gym, there is a very simple, yet often overlooked, skill you need to practice. That skill is how to get out of the way of a missed rep.
We get so excited, so nervous, so focused on lifting the weight/doing the squat/snatching the bar, that it’s not uncommon for a person to forget to actually let go of the bar if they are about to miss a rep! Even when you ARE trained properly (National Champion, properly…), it can be hard to get out of the way of the weight, sometimes. Check out this post I did a few months ago sharing the amazing story of Zach Krych!
So, how do we start training our bodies to learn how to get out of the way and let go of the bar?
By doing exactly that!
Watch the video below from Coach Burgener, and over the next few days, your homework is to grab a PVC pipe while you’re warming up in the gym, make sure no one is in front of or behind you, drop the bar (both forwards AND backwards) and GET OUT OF THE WAY!
If you’ve never even tried it before, what makes you think your body will know to do it when you’ve got 250lbs on the bar and you’re trying to clean it off of the ground?
Make sure the space is clear around you, and do your homework! Seriously! Awesome video.
New movement day! New movement day!
I’ve been a trainer at CrossFit Lakewood for over 6 months and had never seen the Sumo Deadlift posted as the exercise to focus on during the “Strength” portion of the day… until today!
It was also the first time that many people had ever done the lift, and I’ll tell you what, people did an awesome job!
Highlights of the day:
The main workout was a good one, too. Over the last few months, Orion has programmed a few workouts with Ascending v/s Descending rep schemes, and every single one has been an absolute crusher! That’s where there are only two movements involved. You do ten reps of the first and one of the second. Then immediately into 9 reps of the first and 2 of the second. This pattern continues until you’ve reached 1 rep of the first and up to 10 of the second. Brutal stuff!
Workout of the Day:
Strength
Sumo Deadlift – 6 sets of 3
WOD
Front Squat 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1
Pull-ups (Chest to Bar if you can) 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10
Athlete Results:
Sumo Deadlift
Jamie- 265lb x 3!
WOD
Jamie (95lb Front Squat / 1 Banded Pull-Up!)- 17:59
I have never wrestled a day in my life. I can only imagine the discipline and intensity that goes into becoming a good wrestler based on my years of 5+ hours a day of swimming.
There comes a time, though, when you realize an athlete just “has what it takes” in their sport. One of the more recent times that I’ve seen that kind of complete dominance is when I watch Usain Bolt run, at any distance.
Well, now I’ve found that dominance once again, and it’s in a 5-year old wrestler. FIVE years old. I would put ANY AMOUNT OF MONEY on this kid taking me down and pinning me in 10 seconds or less. This is unreal stuff.
I have a question for the birthday boy, Ricky Frausto Jr. (who is also a trainer at CrossFit Omaha), and other wrestler friends… How does someone get this good at such a technical sport at that age?!
Andy and Jamie came through for today’s Sunday Funday. Today’s workout would consist of Rowing, Kettlebell Swings and Ball Slams! All three of those movements, when done most effectively, require a very “violent” extension of the hips in order to move whatever the stimulus, as efficiently as possible.
With rowing, really leaning back to reach full extension ensures that the fan is spinning for as long as possible, is key. On the ball slams, keeping that chest high when picking the ball off of the ground (like a deadlift), guarantees that we’re “deadlifting” the ball and not lifting it with a rounded back. Finally, for kettlebell swings, getting full extension on the hips helps to send that KB overhead through momentum. When that happens, we really don’t need to “pull” the weight up in the air at all. The best part about these “cues” is that almost every single athlete can instantly tell when they do these movements “right” v/s “wrong”. The right way is simply easier!
Workout of the Day:
1000m Row / 21 Ball Slams / 21 Kettlebell Swings / 500m Row / 15 Ball Slams / 15 Kettlebell Swings / 200m Row / 9 Ball Slams / 9 Kettlebell Swings
Now, as you watch the videos from today, before anyone loses their mind… USUALLY the expectation is to catch the Ball Slams on the bounce in order for the rep to count. Today’s workout did not require that portion of the movement, so they were both doing them correctly!
Athlete Results:
Jamie (40lb Ball / 16kg KB)- 16:17
Andy (30lb Ball / 12kg KB)- 14:41
Alec Hanson called out his “Drive Time with Alec” viewers and challenged them to complete a “Drive Time”-like taping of their own.
If you’ve been following this blog for the last few months, you’ll know that Alec and I have had a pretty good back-and-forth dialogue, so I decided to take him up on the offer.
Do you guys see any benefit to a segment like this?
Basically it would become an “Ask Tom” segment to the blog. You would be able to send me topics via Facebook or through this blog, and then I would reply in video form instead of just a written post.
FEEDBACK, please! 🙂
Also, if the desire for this is out there, I need a name better than “Drive Time with Smashby.” It’s too much like Alec’s, and when I get more YouTube subscribers than him (*cough*cough*, subscribe to my channel), I want the name of my “Series” to be more original.
(What I mean by that is, no one can replace Alec Hanson, and I want to find my own niche out there!)
Let me know what you think, ladies and gentlemen!
So yesterday was the day that most of the athletes on the CrossFit Lakewood Competition Team completed the first workout for the 2011 CrossFit Games Open.
There were three full heats of competitors, and the energy was really high! After the dust settled, I think we were all very relieved to have the first week’s event over with.
A few hours later, though, they announced that the Week 1 Deadline had been pushed back one week.
I asked this in my last post, but am curious what you guys think:
Is it worth trying it again at some point this week to better our scores?!
I only filmed my heat (to check my form) of the workout, but if Orion puts together a video of the event, I’ll post it on here! For now, I’ll toss in a few pictures from Saturday, courtesy of Megan and Rachel!
Most of the CFLW Competition Team!
The ladies doing work, and their cheering section!
Me and Ben going for the full lockout
Well, for all of you who were rushing to fit in the Week 1’s workout, relax. You now have another week to get it done! Apparently, due to the website issues with trying to get people registered, CFHQ is giving everyone one more week to get themselves squared away.
If you already did the workout, will you try it again to better your score? Let me know.
Here’s the direct post from the Games Website:
“You now have an extra week to register and nail the Week 1 workout. All the rules are the same, but we are now allowing you until Sunday, March 27 at 17:00 PDT, a full extra week, to perform your workout and submit your results. As always, you are welcome to repeat the workout any time before the deadline if you think you can do better. The Week 2 workout will be announced on Tuesday, March 29 at 17:00 PDT, with the submission deadline Sunday, April 3 at 17:00 PDT (again, this is Week 2).
There are over 20,000 athletes registered to compete in the CrossFit Games Open. That is a historic number, both for the CrossFit community, and for online athletic competition in general. We want to be 100% sure that everyone gets to compete with fair terms. There have been too many problems with registering, the leaderboard, team creation, and account management. Our IT and support teams are working around the clock to respond to your questions and fix these bugs. They have made significant progress, but not enough.
This new deadline will give everyone enough time to make sure that they are registered to the site, assigned to the right team, and correctly submitting their performances. We hope that you take advantage of this time to participate fully in the Open.”
Alright, folks. Thank you for your patience these last 4-5 days while I moved into my apartment.
Today marks the first day that I am back at it, and will be returning to the blogging world more excited than ever! Be ready to interact, folks. It’s gonna be awesome!
Smashby's Training Blog 