Motivation
Since I seem to be spending more and more time on these forums, I decided to create my own training log. In doing this I hope to give myself some additional motivation by public justification. So, in part, I'm hoping that people will maybe critique my methods and reasonings and I'm hoping to visualise my own path to myself, in a way.
I started dabbling in the WODs on the 11th of October getting two workouts in in that week. The following week I increased to three WODs and was going to increase to the full four WODs the week after that. Sadly, a seminar I was attending that week interfered with my doing WODs and I only managed to include one in that weeks schedule. So, on the 1st of this month I finally committed to following the WODs in full.
At this point, after one full week of WODs, I'm rather shocked at how poor my conditioning turned out to be. I'd always imagined myself as being reasonably in shape, given my background. As it turns out my current strengths, if any, seem to lie more in the fields of low level endurance and running in general. The first week of WODs have already shown me some severe deficiencies which I plan to be working on in the near future. So, all that said about my motivation, here's my:
Background
Throughout my growing years I never really had to work hard for anything physical. I may have seldom been top of class in any single discipline, but often I'd average the highest score over all. I lost my love for ball games and team sports in general at the early age of seven, a shocking discovery for someone half English. I probably just noticed that I'm not good with balls. But, being a lazy sod anyway I didn't really worry about this since I'd much preferred to lie in bed with a good book than go out and play—a problem exacerbated by my not really having many friends since we (my family) moved a lot.
The first kind of sport I really got into was martial arts at the age of 13. I started out with Tae Kwon Do after one of our moves to England and soon discovered that I had somewhat of a talent for it, doing the first two certifications in one after just a couple of months of training. But we soon moved back to Switzerland and I had a hard time finding a good TKD club in the area we lived in. Because of this I decided to switch styles and took up Wing Chun which I kept up for the following three years, again fast-tracking through exams. As such it's a bit of a shame that I discovered rock climbing. I took to it immediately and was soon spotted by the regional talent scouts and singled out for competition training. After about nine months I was climbing about a 7c+ which let to my first ever sports "injury". I increasingly woke up in the morning with balled fists and had to physically pry my hands open before being able to do anything. This was probably down to severe muscle imbalance in my lower arms and some beginning tendon/band problems in my hands—naturally I pulled the emergency brake and put a temporary stop to my climbing. Sadly, after that, I never got back to my old levels of performance. But I did keep up climbing and bouldering for the ensuing years.
Right until I discovered kayaking three years ago. Bouldering only really features as a form of off-season training now. I started kayaking in August 2007 and was running class IV whitewater the following spring. The same spring I did my national raft guide certification and started working for a kayak school / raft company. The following year I did my national youth instructor certification and this last summer I did my ACA whitewater certification during a three month kayaking road trip throughout the USA. I currently regularly paddle class IV+ & V and have paddle US classics like the Green River Narrows, The Green Truss on the White Salmon and the standard stretch on the Little White Salmon. Those are all world class runs (but I won't presume to have styled any of those with ease and emotional calm).
Clearly with kayaking—and climbing before that—being my main physical activities. Muscular imbalance became an issue, and ever since starting kayaking I've had nightmares about dislocating my shoulders. Hence the reason for my taking up an alternate form of conditioning. I discovered BtGB through the American Parkour community (another sphere of interest) and specifically Chris Salvato. I soon decided that this kind of conditioning was the right kind for me, since I don't want to take up a gym membership and generally prefer the low-tech approach. But that was almost a year ago, I'll let you guys form your own interpretation out of that. I initially did something along the lines of the killroy70 but soon grew bored (a problem I've always encountered in conditioning). After returning from my trip this summer I decided to start following the WODs.
My future promises to be interesting. After deciding to turn my back on my commercial economical background I've chosen to spend the next summer season as a raft guide / kayak instructor and just generally kayak-bumming it. In the following autumn I'll be starting to study physiotherapy, which I'm really excited about. My kayak instructing career showed me my love for analysing and improving "movement" patterns. It only seemed fair, that I start with myself!
Anyway, after that long winded essay, here are my current benchmarks and goals. I'll be orientating myself along the lines of Eat. Move. Improve's. Skill Guidelines for Building Strong, Useful, Adaptable Athletes. I'll only be concentrating on locomotion and Bodyweight. My current estimated levels are as follows:
Locomotion
- • 100m — somewhere between L2 & L3 — 13-16s
• 5k — Somewhere between L2 & L3 — (I can run a 3000m+ Cooper Test)
Bodyweight and Gymnastics
Pushing
- • Push ups — L2 — 20 XR Push ups
• Dips — L1 — 3 PB dips (I might be able to force an L2 but only sacrificing form)
• Planche — L1 — 15s Frog (easily, but still nowhere near L2 i.e. 15s tuck planche)
Pulling
- • Pull ups — L1 — currently 8 strict pull ups; L2 would be 12 (Achieved 201118)
• OAP — n/a
• Back Lever — L2 — 15s flat tuck
• Front Lever — L2 — 15s flat tuck
Handstands
- • Handstand Hold — L1 — 65s against wall
• HSPU — n/a
• Handstand Press — L1 — 1 HeS Press, if even
Seats
- • L-sits — L1 —5s tuck, easily but I can't do 25s full LS yet
Legs (the jumps are all guestimates)
- • Broad Jump — L2 — 2.5m
• Standing Vertical Jump — L2 — 45cm
• Standing Box Jump — L2 — 70cm
• Single Leg Squats — L1+ — but can't do 5 full ROM yet
• Natural Leg Curls — L2 — 1 negative 3-5s, I can currently follow coaches NLC sessions with some assistance from my hands.
Combined Pull/Push
- • Muscle up — L1 — i.e. n/a
Clearly my weaknesses are everywhere where I'm stuck on L1 and as such I'll be focusing on those areas first. My long-term goal is to eventually be on L3 in all the listed skills. From there I hope to specialise a bit, but that's a long way off...
So, to put that concisely:
Current Goals (20101108)
FSPs
- • 25s PB L-sit with constant 90° at waist (L2)
• 15s tuck planche (L2)
FBEs
- • 10 PB dips (L2)
• 12 strict pull ups (L2)
• 5 HSPU against wall (L2) — this goes synergistically with increasing my HS max hold
• 5 clean full ROM SLS each leg
My plan is to do a max test of one skill set each week which means I'll be testing each set once in every 6-7 weeks. I'll be starting with a 100m sprint today, since I'll be out on the track anyway. I don't know if I'll generally test the maxes after a given WOD or at the weekend.
I'll be building in some intervals or sprint training on off days. I'm planning to do those about twice a week, alternating between routines.
I'll be posting workouts in the respective WODs and I'll be using this thread to aggregate those logs and to keep track of my periodical testing.
Any comments, critiques and pointers are and always will be highly appreciated and I'd like to thank everybody in this wonderful community for all the help they've already given.
But I enjoyed it nonetheless. I'll definitely be rotating it in in future.