The Friday Runaround

Scaling options for this workout from the CrossFit/Brand X forums:
Big Dawgs:
As Rx’d
Try this with GHD sit ups for extra fun
Pack:
Three rounds for time of:
Run 800 meters
35 Back Extensions
35 Sit-ups
Puppies:
Three rounds for time of:
Run 600 meters
15 Back Extensions
25 Sit-ups
Buttercups:
Three rounds for time of:
Run 400 meters
10 Back Extensions
20 Sit-ups

17:29 as Rx’D

28:34 as RX’d(minus 90 seconds elevator wait b/c someone kicked the barbell out of the door…)
Interesting feeling, running on jello for a core…
About breast feeding – your child’s immune system is seeded through breast milk. Kinda important. This fact is the reason I’m for it.
About the article – I don’t buy it. It’s an opinion piece. The point isn’t to present a fair assessment, its to justify an individual’s selfishness and refusal to breastfeed her child and alleviate her sense of guilt for doing something she knows in the back of her head she should be doing (kind of like most Americans and exercise…). Clearly it’ll be skewed one way.
And about scientific research – having worked in that community for a year I can safely say that virtually any claim can be validated, given enough effort and funding. And I can think of a few corporations (i.e. gerber) who stand to increase profits from fewer mothers breast feeding who would fund such research. So judge for yourself, and do your own research.
Also, realize the disturbing degree of bias that goes into virtually all research. In America, most of it is funded by business entities to mislead the consumer (under the guise of “raising consumer awareness”) about their product. For example, in the case of breast feeding, Gerber could fund research which would cast doubt on previous research. Then pay magazines to write articles about it. Since they are so big, even a small dent in the population of mothers who breastfeed could equate to a huge profit for them in the form of a boost to sales revenue of their various products. Makes perfect financial sense. However, the base for doing so is hollow. Dollars and cents, and no regards to the people who they are profiting off of. I should know, my first job was doing statistics for a lab which validates claims for companies. Give enough money, and the bright minds at these labs will find a way to weave the numbers to fit any kind of story.
Another way to go about this is that the crossfit community has a very much “back to basics” approach when it comes to nutrition, with many eating paleo. Well, what is paleo for your child? It’s not nuts, vegetables and free-range beef. It’s breast milk.

Sneak preview of tomorrow’s Rest Day Black Box WOD and make-up schedule for those of you dying to know:
11:00 “Filthy Fifties”
12:00 Black Box WOD or “Michael”
1:00 Black Box WOD or Dead Lifts
BLACK BOX WOD (Partner WOD!):
“Battle Buddy Bar” (courtesy of Bayou City CrossFit)
4 Rounds for Time
40 Front Squats
40 Hang Power Cleans
40 Push Jerks
200 Jump Ropes
Done with a partner, sharing a 95# bar (or scaled down in weight as needed). Only one person can work at a time. Bar cannot touch the ground. Both must do half the work (20 reps of each exercise and 100 jump ropes per round).

Interesting article on rest and recovery. I just finished reading Body by Science, and, at least for building muscle and strength (not metabolic conditioning, endurance, skills etc.), it seems that the science supports a rest period of 7 days, i.e., one short intense bout of exercise that hits fast twitch fibers (he recommends super slow, continuous tension sets), then wait til next week!
A thought provoking point he makes, is that in evaluating the effectiveness of any protocol, you can’t look at the bodies of its successful practioners because there is a huge selection bias of survivors, i.e. people who makes gains despite the protocol because they are genetically gifted (or perhaps, he doesn’t develop this point, because they are outliers who for some reason are genetically or artificially suited to the protocol, i.e., freakishly fast recovery, steroids, etc.).
I wonder how CrossFit fits in with all this. It seems if you have the goal of building muscle and strength alone, it isn’t ideal. I am beginning to wonder whether most of the results are just “getting better at CrossFit,” i.e. the specific movements and endurances trained for, but at the cost of some potential strength gains etc.
That’s not to say muscle mass/strength gains aren’t achieved, so they are too by the 3x a week bench presser, but they are actually compromised by the other goals of CrossFit.
That’s also not to say that those other goals are valid, so is wanting to run a marathon, but training for a marathon is not going to make you stronger and more muscular.
It also seems from the BBS p.o.v. that a lot of the CrossFit routines hit slow twitch fiber, allow the slow twitch fiber the time to recover (they recover quickest) and they go on with the reps etc. I wonder how much CrossFit hits the FT?

Andrew,
There is no magic justification for the 3 days on, 1 day off. They find that it works very well — the science is in the need for rest to prevent overtraining, as you mention. Throw in the intensity level that Crossfit workouts demand of an athlete, and it becomes quickly apparent that going much more than three days at a time is not sustainable, at least not at the level of intensity desired of an athlete.
Beyond that, the 3 days on, 1 day off just tends to work. It tends to fit schedules relatively well and is therefore manageable within our daily lives. But I will say again, it’s not a magic formula, it’s not the only thing that works, and if Crossfit found something else that worked, they would presumably promote that just as readily. Speal, for example, is a 2 day on, 1 day off sort of guy. A lot of other people I know go 3 on, 1 off, 2 on 1 off, and repeat that cycle. It all depends on what works for you in your life, but hits home the point that we elicit through these intense movements a huge neurological and neuroendocrine response that mandates sufficient recovery time on a regular basis. So typically, you can hit 3 in a row at full intensity and at about that time, your body typically welcomes the rest.
Again, no magic to it, so play around with it based on your schedule, and go with what works for you.

re: “…Evaluating the effectiveness of any protocol…”
Crossfit has always evaluated its effectiveness through change in work capacity across broad time and modal domains. ie, are you going faster, getting stronger, doing more rounds, etc. Because CF strives to improve everything, all modalities/time domains, in unison, no single modality’s work capacity will be increased at the same rate as if one were to focus on it with singular attention. So yes, if your goal is to get really really strong, CF alone won’t get you there. Same with running a ultra-marathon or getting a sub 4min mile. All of these “fringe” efforts as Glassman would say, sit on a sliding scale with 1000lbs deadlift at one end, and 100mile race at the other with CF occupying a spot in the middle. Lately, CFE and CF Football have started to “officially” offer different programming to people who want to train more towards one end of the scale.
Lastly, the CF main site wods are great, but ultimately just a jumping off point for creating programming that gets you where you want to be.

Although the author of the T-nation article was generally very pro-crossfit, I wonder if he was really paying attention during the level I cert. Most of his criticisms were addressed in detail.
“3. No matter what anyone tells you, you’ll never get truly strong doing CrossFit.”
No one “tells you” Crossfit is for elite powerlifters. They specifically say in the cert that if you are elite in one category of fitness (like max strength) you will almost definitely be deficient in most of the others, and hence less fit by the crossfit definition.
“8. The notion of CrossFit slop is potentially injurious, especially for those new to Olympic lifts. I just can’t think of a good justification for it.”
There was an entire lecture on technique vs. intensity. I guess he can disagree, but to say there’s no justification for it is just wrong. And they specifically state the technique must be very good (i.e. not injurious), just not perfect (which would imply lack of intensity).
“9. A Quarter Pounder with Cheese is shit, no matter how Zone-friendly its macros turn out to be.”
I think he totally missed the point on this. Pat Sherwood in no way said the Mc’Ds QP was healthy. He used it to demonstrate how even something as bad as a quarter pounder is better than what is typically considered a healthy meal — oatmeal, banana, and juice — in terms of zone/hormonal response.
Maybe the Level I should have a test. This guy would not pass.

I read the T-nation article and wanted to see if anyone had a comment on bullet point number 7. I don’t know enough about that particular subject to comment but wanted to see if anyone else had a take on it.
7. The random program design doesn’t make long-term training sense. As noted by Alwyn Cosgrove in the earlier TMUSCLE article, potential overexposure of the shoulder joint to frequent heavy loads and high volumes is a real concern. While hardcore CrossFitters may scoff, I’d like to check back with them after a few more years of CrossFitting.

7. “The random program design doesn’t make long-term training sense.” What are the long term goals? GPP? 28″ biceps? Being to touch your toes? This statement is hopelessly vague.
I’ve seen shoulder injuries happen more from too many pullups and violent kipping without enough shoulder girdle strength rather than from too much loaded overhead stuff. Elbow problems seem to pop up too. My hunch is that most people can’t get loads overhead that are heavy enough to cause injury, even with poor form, whereas one’s bodyweight alone is enough to hurt you when doing pullups and kipping and such.

So, the alarm went off and I was going to go to the 6am class, but then I saw that this WOD involved running, and the resevoir loop out my door started calling my name. I did the situps/back extensions too, but the times is pretty meaningless.
Have any females invested in satisfactory weightlifting shoes and want to tell me where they can get a pair?

KJ,
I purchased a pair of DoWins recently from the Werksan website. I emailed them about sizing (generally the shoes are in men’s sizes but there are some specific shoes for women I believe) and they were really helpful.
I received them about a week later and they fit perfectly. They also happen to be reasonably priced compared to some of the fancier shoes (i.e. Nike Romaleos, etc.).
http://www.werksanusa.com/products-shoe-shirts.asp (wfs)

In reference to lifting shoes… i am a big fan of the Rogue Fitness shoes. I was amazed when the had the 13.5 size which you can’t find anywhere.

A few weeks ago VS Athletics had a 50% off sale on lifting shoes and POSE-approved running shoes. Not long after, VS Training had a 50% off sale on lifting shoes. Both sales are over.

good mornings, not swings

DoWins are awesome if you have a narrow ankle and don’t need a lift.
Tony- t minues 12 days-ready for a push up contest? unfortunately i will be doing mine on my knees! miss everyone! looking forward to kicking someone out of my pull up bar space very soon!

I got the VS Dynamos when Jeff posted that sale (thanks Jeff!) and I like them. First pair of lifting shoes I’ve owned so I don’t have any comparisons other than to sneakers or barefoot, but you can really feel a difference with them, and the price was definitely right.
Erik, on the random program design topic, I completely agree with what Brett said that it depends on what the goals are.
In my personal experience, in the past (pre-crossfit) when my workout routine included a lot more weight training, I always found I got better results and gained more strength the more I varied up my routine. Now this variation was somewhat confined in a leg day, back day, chest day, explosive day, etc type of routine, but it would often be weeks before I repeated the same workout for a muscle group, and at times they could be drastically different from week to week.
That said, I wasn’t doing specialized training for 1 rep max’s or anything, which probably further limits how much you may be able to mix it up and still get the desired results, but there is always some way to add variety into a routine that will help to prevent you from overly adapting to it while still keeping focused on your intended results.
Just my thought on the topic – hopefully it makes sense.
Today’s WOD – 23:54 GHD for back extensions
(11,11)

As Rx’d 24:14
Black Box(86,86)

Back at Sea Level!
Didn’t feel fast…but didn’t feel like I was gonna die…
3 Rounds for Time (RFT)
Run 800m
50 Sit Ups
50 Back Extensions
24:35
Post-WOD WOD
1 minute max reps 95 Push Press – 29 (respectable, but weak)
Rest 2 minutes
1 minute max reps Ring Dips – 15 (crap, crap, crap)

Round 1
800 M run
30 back extensions (fail)
30 abmat (fail)
Round 2
400 M run (fail)
30 Back extension (fail)
30 abmat (fail)
Round 3
400 M run (fail)
30 back extensions (fail)
30 abmat (fail)