What's Your Excuse?
Taking possession of our space tomorrow; pictures to follow.
Trainers
Sean "dammit" Manseau, CSCS, is a CrossFit trainer and a Fairtex-certified Muay Thai instructor. He graduated magna cum laude from UMASS-Amherst with a B.A. in the Psychology of Religion and can do twenty-four rounds of "Cindy" (but "Elizabeth" as rx'd takes him almost 15 minutes).
Check out his interview with Dr. Kelly Starret at September's CrossFit Certification Seminar in Portland, OR.
Sandy Ji, CEO, is co-owner of Pioneer Valley CrossFit and the apple of Sean's eye. Aww. While some of her more endearing athletes absolutely insist on calling her The Punisher, she is really nothing but a terribly sweet and pensive gal who just happens to love seeing her athletes getting stronger, day by day.
Suck It Up, Buttercup
I'm about to go do today's Hero WOD (and more about that later), but first I wanted to share a video that is truly, truly inspiring.
None of us are ever allowed to whinge about how hard these workouts are ever again. This kid Al is the greatest. Stop by the CrossFit Affiliate blog and leave a comment to let him know.
What Has Your Gym Done For You Lately?
Found this on the CrossFit Boston site:
If you are a bodybuilder--that is, if you have strength trained for years and dieted so rigorously that your body-fat percentage is in the single digits--then it potentially makes sense to train individual muscles in isolation. The other case in which machine-based training makes sense is in rehab, when the body has become so disabled that it must be rebuilt brick by brick. But most of us are neither crippled nor on the verge of entering the Mr. Olympia competition, so why do we train as if either is the case? The answer is a combination of the gyms' desire to maximize profits, and our own desire to find workouts that don't involve work.
"The club owners bought into what the equipment industry told us," says Michael Scott Scudder, a former club owner and a leading consultant to the industry since 1991. And what the equipment makers ultimately told the gym owners was that if you stocked enough machines, you could do without as much one-on-one attention from trainers. "I don't think fitness happens best in isolation," says Steve Myrland, manager of Myrland Sports Training and a former strength coach for the University of Wisconsin and the San Jose Sharks. Various studies back this up, showing that people who exercise in groups maintain greater motivation to train than those who work out alone. "This is hard stuff, and it's a lot easier to share hard stuff than do it yourself. At the clubs, you are going to be turned loose on the machines, and a machine is like an isolation booth."
From Best Life Online: "Is Your Workout Wasting Your Time?"
Couldn't have put it any better myself. No really, I couldn't have, so thank God for ctrl-c, ctrl-v.
While you're surfing over to check out our Eastern MA cousins, be sure to stop by Jon Gilson's Again Faster blog. The guy writes some brilliant, inspiring articles, like this one and this one. Read more...
Walkin' In a Winter Wonderland
Not! Today's prescribed WOD was a 400m lunge walk for time. Well, here in the Northeast we've got about a foot of snow on the ground, and seeing as how I'm not training for the Army's Winter Warfare division, I decided to workout inside where it was nice and dry and toasty warm. But I felt kinda guilty, so I did my best to come up with something evil. Let's call it
This One'll Ring Your Sleigh Bells
For time:
30 KB snatches right (1 pood)
5 pistols R
30 KB snatches left
5 pistols L
25 KB snatches R
5 pistols R
25 KB snatches L
5 pistols L
20 KB snatches R
5 pistols R
20 KB snatches L
5 pistols L
15 KB snatches R
5 pistols R
15 KB snatches L
5 pistols L
10 KB snatches R
5 pistols R
10 KB snatches L
5 pistols L
5 KB snatches R
5 KB snatches L
My time: 21 min. As an early Christmas present, I spared myself those last ten pistols and finished up with hollow rocks and hand-stand practice. Try it for yourself, and let me know what you think.
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