Monday, January 4, 2010

Still owned by OPT!

I just love the way this guy thinks! There is no doubt in your mind what it is he was gunning for after you have completed one of his workouts!
Yesterday he came after my posterior chain with a blast of a workout! Remember that I am still one day late in my blogging. This gives me the chance to fully evaluate the effects of the WoD, and how it felt. Yesterday there was no doubt how it would feel, and today I can only nod my head and admit that I was right. My posterior chain is smoked... I absolutely love it! The workout was:

Training:
A1. HSPU @ 2010 - amrap (-2) x 3 sets; rest 60 sec
A2. Semi Stiff Legged DL @ 4011; 8-10 x 3; rest 60 sec
B1. Ring Push Ups @ 2010 - amrap (-2) x 3 sets; rest 45 sec
B2. KBS - 25 unbroken x 3; rest 45 sec
C1. Dips @ 2010 - amrap (-2) x 3 sets; rest 30 sec
C2. GHD Raises @ 2010; 10-15 x 3; rest 30 sec

post loads, notes and reps to comments
amrap (-2) means you attempt a max rep set but stop approximately 2 reps short of failure on speed
swings to just inches above forehead


Mental notes to self:

I could have gone a bit heavier on the deads!
I am happy I took it easy on the push ups and dips, cause my bad shoulder feels ok today!
The swings were a lot harder than I thought they would be!
GHD raises must be the worst exercise ever. We had to modify the exercis since we dont have a GHD, and I bet they are a lot harder on the GHD than the exercise we did- but it still sucked the life out of me!

It has been a long time since I felt this excited about training, and just love that fact that we finally followed Martin Altemark into teh wilderness that is OPT's mind! It is a truly inspirational place to be, and it is packed with a bunch of very capable athletes, of which I hope to become one....... in a very distant future:-)

I cant wait to see what tomorrow brings!

Much love

Mads

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Going to school..

Do you remember the feeling of going to a new school, or to a new team or something like that, and you walk through the door and you see everybody talking to each other, joking, interacting, and having an all together god time- and there you are the new kid!
Fortunately, in these surroundings you often find your place pretty fast, ans some good spirited person takes it upon themselves to introduce you to the crowd!
I felt a bit like that yesterday when I did my first "OPT workout"! It took a masters degree in dechifering to understand what I was supposed to do, and at what speeds I was supposed to operate! After having looked at the site for a while, I decide to call the local witch doctor (Martin Altemark) and ask him how I was supposed to translate the whole thing:-) He, gracefully as always, helped me out and I was on my way!

So I got on my way to the gym to do the following workout:

Training:
A1. OHS @ 3010 - 10 x 10; 90 sec rest
A2. Supinated Strict Chin Ups @ 3010; 10 x 10; rest 90 sec
+
GHD Sit Ups - 3 sets of 25


That my dear friends is 100 OHS, and 100 supinated pull ups- in a preset tempo with a slower decent than acent, divided into sets of 10- with 90sec rest inbetween efforts..
Please keep in mind that I have not done any meaningful workouts since the beginning of december! So I had a pretty good idea that this was going to put me on my ass:-) and it did.
Jenny had gone to the gym earlier, and said that it was hard as hell- and if she felt like that I knew that I felt that I had my work cut out for me.

I am not going to bore you with the stats, since they are pretty pathetic, and I have decided to give myself a week of getting into the groove, before posting! I will however say taht I used 50 kg on the OHS- and it was a bit on the light side, I should have gone heavier!
The pull ups however were a fight for dear life! the first 4 sets went according to plan, and after that I had to use a rubber band, and I still have to break every set! I wish I was more like David "the BW monster", but I am not!

The conclusion however is that I a super stoked to follow OPT to the best of my abilities, and it will be a bunch of fun to see where this all takes us?

Much love

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Summary, and a look at the horizon!



It is old, it is very old with these geezers who at the end of the year lean back in their chairs and try to sum up the year that has passed, and begin to speculate on what the new year will have in store! Things like that should be done internally, and in a place where noone else can ever begin to grasp what is going through your head!
Why is that? Because it is boring as hell for everyone else to sit there and listen to or read about! That is the first obvious reason to avoid these things. The second is that memory has a way of providing you with only the best or the worst memories of the year that has passed (depending on what mood you find yourself to be in)! The third is that the predictions for the year to come very rarely pan out the way you thought- Tings go to shit, and ou find yourself in places you nver thought you would be in situations you could not have dreamt up in your wildest dreams!

My blog!

However, as most of you have already realized by now, I am not the sharpest tool in the shed, so I will just go ahead and do all of the above anyway! Another thing to consider is that this is my blogg, so if you venture on here you may have just a slight intrest in what I think.. Please remember though that this is my personal blogg, so whatever comes up here is nothing more than a mirror of my thoughts on certain subjects- highly personal and not official in any way shape or form. Can I make it any clearer? If you dont like what you read, please feel free to surt onto another site with more soothing conversation! Dont let my ill temper upset you:-)

2009!

The year that has passed has been a fantastic year, and I will take a second to list some of the things that made the year fantastic. If I leave something out it is very like ly that it is simply a lapse of memory, more than my intention- Please feel free to point it out o me- honestly!

2009- was fantastic year for a number of reasons- here are some:

1- My son grew into an even more fantastic personality, and I just love him to death! The years to come wil be an interesting journey! My sun rises and sets with him!

2- My dear wife and best friend, kept on being just that! The best thing that ever happened to me, and the best friend I could ever have asked for. She makes me a better person on a daily basis, and is the most supportive person I have ever met. I thank God for her patience with me- may I sometime be able to repay the favors! Besides that she is hot as hell!

3- Friends! 2009 was a year where I was blessed with the chance to meet some truly fantastic people who have turned out to be an inspiration, and a support that I could not have dreamt of in my wildest dreams. I am supremely thankful for having had the chance to meet these people, and I am very curious to see where out journey takes us! I thik big things may be in store!

4- HQ staff! being given the chance to travel with HQ staff and teach at certs all over Europe, has been amazing! To be able to hang out with the people at these certs, and just be a spounge, sucking up everything I possibly can from the participants, trainers, locations etc. has been phenomenal! I look forward to the years to come, and CrossFit sweeping all over Europe!

5- Leaving Grand! Getting the chance/ being pushed to jump of the ledge, staying true to the firm beliefs I have about training and personal training, and leaving Grand when the room for training was diminished to being virtually non-existing! Being able to look in the mirror everyday knowing that I did not compromise with what it is I am trying to bring to my clients.. Not everyone else can say the same!

6- Insight! Things happened during 2009! Some good, some bad! Some uncalled for! Some much needed etc. The list goes on and on! Whether these things were good or bad- insight was gained! That has to be good!

The loist could be a lot longer, but I will keep it at that for the time being! If I forgot something please let me know, and I will immidiately put it on the list:-)

2010!

Let us make this easy!

1- I want a box!

2- CrossFit Nordic to grow!

3- Continued succes as a HQ trainer!

4- A fantastic event at the European regional qualifier

5- a sub 3:30 fran on film!

6- a 200kg deadlift on film!

7- a +100kg overhead squat on film!

8- a sub 20 min 5K run!

9- a sub 7 min 2000m row! well documented!

10- a lot of Santa Cruz- you know what I mean!


If you have stuck with it so far and have read all my highly personal and sentimental bollocks- please share what your goals are for the year to come, and what was the high/low in the year that is about to pass!

Much love

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

I want to kill!

Tuesday was the scene of a disaster, the extent of which can only be understood by a genuine crossfitter!

The first Workout of the day was an attempt to improve my 500m row PB (PR is apparently a medical term in the UK that refers to inserting something Per Rectum- as of now all feats of true greatness are PB's).
So yours truly gets all warmed up, gets the Burg warm up out of the system, and spends some time going through the 9 basic movements. After that he spends some more time dialling in the row stroke. He finally feels ready to get to work, on smashing that 500m row time!
He had decided that he would get 5 attempts, with as much rest as needed in between the attempts! He gets down to business and hauls ass! He rows like his life depends on in. He rows like he was on fire, and nails a 500m row in 1:28 in the third attempt! He get's nowhere near that score in the two remaining attempts!
This dude is a happy camper, and he starts to whistle when he walks to the locker room- only to find that his notebook is nowhere to be found? Some rocket scientist has "cleaned up" the locker room, and along with it has decided to remove the old notebook with the scribbled hand written notes- A bit more than a years training notes are gone.... Now this dude just wants to go "falling down" on virtually the entire world!
I have still not recovered- It was like I imagine it would feel to have your heart removed with a spon.... A very dull spoon! WTF!

The disappointment and complete disbelief transgressed into the second workout of the day, which was suposed to be:

Run 800m
30 Hip/back ext
30 Toes to bar
30 hip ext
30 knees to bar
30 back ext
30 AbMat sit ups

In my battered state of mind I somehow managed to miss the first 30 hip/back ext! So my time is irrelevant, and completely useless!

Yesterday was not the finest of days, and I still pray to the CrossFit God (yes he exists) that my notebok will miraculously appear again.. If you are outthere- please come back to daddy! No harm is done! Daddy is not mad, he just wants you to come back home!

Over and out!

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Split jerks!

So the time had come to get back on the horse and start bustin' out some WoD's again! So I began the day with running some 400m intervalls at different inclinations on the treadmill!
I am not the best runner in the world, but I do enjoy these intervalls, at least after they are are over, and it feels like I am improving my capacity over longer distances as well after having done these intervalls! So I think I will just keep on doing things like that- God only knows I need it!

The second workout of the day was the 1- 1- 1- 1- 1- 1- 1 split jerks! I have not done singles in a while, so I had no clue what to expect! All I knew was that I wanted to really own the lift, and get a perfect landing in every single lift!
I worked my way up to 100kg, and nailed that lift with an ease that I had not expected! Still in complete shock after having gotten the 100kg lift, I decided to let it rip and went for 110kg! Needless to say I missed that lift, I was not into it and did not have the required focus, but it feels like it is within reach..
I am going to try to get some more lifts at 100kg, to try to get comfortable with the weight, and then try to move up!

After the lift I felt pretty good, and decided that I needed to do some squat clean and jerks- and worked my way up to 90g.. this is another lift that I have not done for a while, so 90kg felt pretty good, and I decided to leave it at that!

Super stoked with the workouts, and maybe this weekend of complete deacay was just what the doctor ordered!

Much love

Monday, December 7, 2009

I did'nt win!

As you all know my mom was here this weekend, and with her came a solem promise that I would not workout or eat anything that could be mistaken for paleo or the zone.. That part was actually easier than I thought! My mom made it super easy to just get comfortable and heaving down all the white bread and candy I possibly could!

The hard part was that I made a promise to the Bear of Upsala that I would try to make as great a weight gain as I possibly could! I ended up being only 3.6 kilo heavier today, than I was thursday morning!
I am not sure if that is an accomplishment, or a disaster, but I am thinking that the latter is probably the most correct answer! So today I am back in the race, only now I seem to be at least 300000000000 laps behind:-)

Much love

Mads

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Denmark calling!

It is almost x-mas which means that my dear mom is coming up to Stockholm to spend some time with us. So here is my solem promise for this weekend!
I will not eat anything that is zone or Paleo inspired!

I will not do any metcons!

I will not do anything that is taxing in any way shape or form!

Here is what I do promise:

I promise that I will spend as much time as I possibly can with my wonderful family, and especially with my mom! I will also do my best to share the complete decay with you over the weekend, before it is time to once again get inte to the proverbial suck again:-)

Mcuh love