Now that’s a cute baby!  [think Harry Caray]

We’re closing after the 11:00 Class (so right about 12:00 Noon) to allow for proper festivities!

Thanks so much for everything!!

-Also-

Think awesome Met Con thoughts for Jesse as he and Carrie drive down to Aromas California.  Jesse is the sole representative from LCF at The Games this year!!  Three workouts in one day!

1: "Fran" 21-15-9 Thruster 95lb and Pull-Ups

Ear must be visible on each thruster and squat be below parallel.

CHEST must touch the pull-up bar for the rep to count.

Must finish in under 12:00 minutes to continue.

-4 Hours later-

2: Deadlift #275 5 Reps, 10 Burpees, 5 Rounds for Time

Lock out the deadlifts and wait for a down signal.

During the jump of the burpee, straight arms must clap overhead with the ears visible from the side.

Must finish under 12:00 minutes to continue

-4 Hours Later-

3: 750m Hill Run

It’s a hill, 20 minute time limit.  This must be quite a hill…

3,2,1…  Go!

Rarely has one lift been so maligned, except for perhaps the squat, even though it’s so good.  Heck, it’s even useful!  Sheesh, it’s even MANDATORY TO REGULAR LIFE when you get right down to it!  How often do we pick things up off the floor of from anywhere below our waist?  I’d wager more than 5 times a a day. 

So let’s talk about how to do it right.  "The Deadlift?" you ask, no silly.  How to pick stuff up off the floor, be it an apple, a child, a car tire (no not flipping a tractor tire), a gallon of milk, sack of groceries, a/an [insert noun], and yes of course the almighty barbell.

Which of the below photographs mimic the posture shown in the diagram?

A.

OR

B.

You got it!  The correct answer is A.  Our model in photo A is demonstrating remarkable (and here I am remarking about it) lordotic curvature of the spine.  It’s ready to load.  It won’t yield to the strain imparted by the load about to lifted, it won’t succumb to mettlesome shear forces (the ones that make your back go *ouch*) it will develop static strength in the erectors to such a degree that will allow him to someday deadlift 3x bodyweight, and at the same time, pick up a planter pot at Sky Nursery and not limp home regretting it.

ALSO, I think it totally rocks.  Which is really important.  When a coach here says "tighten up", "get stiff", "ARCH!", "DON’T ROUND", "get tight", "stick your tailbone out", "butt up chest up!", all we’re really trying to get you to do is demonstrate lordotic posture in the lower and upper back so that we can mitigate the shear forces placed upon the vertebrae and make you stronger.

Sound good?  If you can’t get in that position no way, we’ve got to stretch you and make you strain like crazy with every deadlift along the way, it’s the only way to build you up to be able to do this essential movement.  Essential means that you can’t live well without it.  Crying baby in car seat on floor?  Sounds like a 15 pound deadlift to me!  Do you want to do it safely and effectively or possibly "throw your back out" (impinge a disc/spinal nerve or strain an intrinsic spinal muscle).

Respect the deadlift.  When you meet someone who can deadlift above 400# looking good while doing it - you’ve found someone you want on your side, no matter what the event.  From badminton to boating to battle to bar mitzvah.

So instead of asking everyone "How much you bench?" or even "How much you seated hamstring curl?" instead ask them "How much you pulling these days?" [Translation: How much do you deadlift currently?] Trust me, call it a pull - it’s instant street cred with the lifters, instant.

Clan Chieftan Out.

This brings a whole new meaning to "Do The Puyallup".  There’s six intrepid people from Local’s that’re going to compete at this years Rainier’s Strongest Man/Woman Contest in Sumner, August 2nd.  One of which is Abi

Below: Abi at 4:45 AM Friday the 27th

Above: Abi at 5:30AM Friday the 27th en route to Rainier Crossfit.

All in all it was a glorious affair.  We played with the implements, 90# Dumbbell, 120# Dumbbell, 160# Block, 220# Block, 525# Yoke, 595# Yoke, 250# Yoke, Stones of assorted weights, the "glued to the floor" 150#  etc etc :)  It’s gonna be a helluva a day!

Come support your gym!!!  Come down to cheer us on August 2nd, out in Sumner!

 It’s no surprise then that it works!! Picking up heavy stuff,

May I introduce Lee Myers.

He’s on vacation to Mexico - good for him.  What does he do the day he leaves?  Comes in early to make sure he doesn’t miss the WOD!!!   What does Lee do before he sleeps?  "I stretch my chest and hamstrings and work on my L-Sit’s with the paralettes that I got from the paralette party."

I actually let a tear slip out after I heard that one.  It’s breathtaking.  As is his 1 minute L-Sit….

Yikes

So this was good.  Norman came in Saturday last week for the "Hard Routine" seminar.  He signed up that day, after the prompting of his close friend, dear Charles.

After 4 workouts this week (he he he) this is where he was after mostly completing Jason, here’s our boy Norman.  He learned what a "PR" is

What he said was "I learned how to not give up on myself this week."

Yeah, I love my job.

Rich got a muscle up!!!

You’ll have to excuse us - we were in such hysterics yelling and jumping and freaking out that I missed the photo op of the day…  BUT WHATEVER.  This is why we put this stuff on the board!

Love my job

I’m gonna put out a couple of scenarios. 1) What if the coaches were the fittest people in the gym.  What if we could do 50 muscle-ups in a row, 1000 air squats and overhead squat our bodyweights for 25 reps.  And 2) What if we put a workout on the board calling for exercises that you, at this time, are unable to perform?  Say for example rope climbs, muscle-ups or front levers.

1)  First, if Deidra and myself were the fittest people in the gym, I feel that our focus would be shifted away from building our business and away from building up the fitness of our clients.  Which would be bad, my thinking follows that the fittest people on earth, the most elite athletes, don’t own gyms and aren’t top notch trainers, they work for home depot and live in Colorado Springs at the Olympic Training Center.  You get me?   Second, would us being the fittest people in the gym give us carte blanche to put up whatever heinous nastery we wanted to up on the white board, and hide behind the saying "well if I can do it, you should be able to too, gosh, why are you so weak?" instead of using the white board to challenge you to think about getting more fit.  Doing a few real pull-ups is an achievement, so is getting a muscle-up.  The only reason most of us have pull-ups is because they show up on the board and we’re upset inside at not being able to do pull-ups, so we fixed it.  Now go get muscle-ups!

2) I think I might do this all next week to get you guys to understand this fundamental CrossFit element.  IT DOESN’T MATTER IF YOU ARE UNABLE TO PERFORM THE WORKOUT, we scale it to your ability level now SO THAT LATER YOU’LL HAVE BUILT ENOUGH [insert any of the 10 general physical skills] TO BE ABLE TO DO IT.  Right now I’m not powerful enough to perform a muscle-up, I’m working on my false grip, pull-ups, ring dips, and kipping skills in general while losing more weight so that I can do a freakin’ muscle-up.  By the way when I get one, get ready to freak out  People have no problem taking less weight on a deadlift, thinking oh, that’s a lot of weight, I’m not that strong I’ll just scale the workout…  But when it calls for muscle-ups and we "scale" the workout to now include twice as many dips and pull-ups people get really bent out of shape…  I’ve got the solution to that problem.  Whenever you scale a load in a weight training movement, DOUBLE THE REPS.  Do you see how crazy that is?  With pull-ups, dips, calisthenics in general people aren’t going to get hurt, if it’s deadlifts, it’s really pretty common that when you’re really tired you get a little lazy and *ouch* your back hurts for a while, this is why doubling the reps on scaled squat cleans, or deadlifts, or overhead squats, is not smart.  But for dips and such it’s great!

AWESOME

Seriously.  What do you want to do?  Bench Press 315?  Do 20 Pull-ups in a row?  Run, really run and have it not feel terrible?  One-handed handstands?  Compete again?  Meet some new friends?  Listen to hard rock and sweat?  Lose 20 pounds?  Lose 120 pounds?  Gain 20 pounds?  Learn the Olympic Lifts, after all we compete in Beijing this year!?  Be able to kick serious ass at softball/volleyball/badminton this summer?  Drop your cholesterol?  Raise your HDL?  Fix your knees?  Fix your back?  Fix your Clean and Jerk?  Climb Everest?  Well, maybe we’d have to call some people about that, but we’d totally hook you up with the right people!

You get me?  Let us know your deep dark motivations for coming and working so hard!  We can then in turn really help get you where you want to go faster and easier.  Just remember one thing; there are benefits from not getting everything you want, and that adversity creates mental toughness, this toughness translates into everything you do, and yes, it atrophies when not engaged.  In other words, get more hardcore, and all that’ll happen is you’ll get more hardcore.  It’s kinda like Rambo.  In First Blood he was tough, fighting off the town cops and reserves right?  But by Rambo III he was straight chillin’ in the face of this massive Russian army with only a gun, a senior, a bandana and one helluva hardcore attitude.  His life had much adversity.  Perhaps we could add a little to yours?  What do you have to gain?

Clan Chieftan Out.

We’re tinkering of putting together a special Elite Class for our CrossFitters who are on their way to Level 2 and Level 3 fitness.

This will be an invite only kind of thing.  

Doesn’t look bad until you get to the bottom where your pull-up is so awesome that you can fly high enough to grab the 2×4 above the bar you used to be hanging on…  It’s about to get a little more serious.  

Cameras and heads will roll as our top performers get a chance to compete head to head.  Let D and Jes know when’s best to have a few of these classes a week.  We’re thinking like Thursday night and one day on the weekend?

Clan Cheiftan Out.