Saturday Logistics for 15.1

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Whose excited? I know I am after last night incredible turn out for the Open Announcement!

Below I’ve included a run down for how we we’ll operate 15.1 tomorrow. For the TL;DR crowd here are the high points:

1. Sign up for Class now… like 5 minutes ago now.
2. Get here early there will no group warm-up
3. Be ready to judge
4. Know your weights and scaling options.
5. Have Fun

Class Times
We will run 15.1 in the 9 AM and 10 AM classes tomorrow morning. The earlier you sign up for class the more organized everything will be, so do so here asap! THE FIRST HEAT FOR EACH CLASS WILL BEGIN AT 9 AM AND 10 AM. Read that again. This means there will be no group warm-up, you will need to warm-up on your own and should get here appx. 15-20 minute early to do so.

Heats
We will run 3 heats of 10 in each class, and the tentative schedule for each heat can be found HERE.  We will group everyone into groups of 3 which means one person will do the workout, one person will judge, and one person will be warming up then we’ll rotate.  I will be updating the heat sheets periodically throughout the day, and tomorrow morning. So if your name doesn’t show up immediately on the heat sheet don’t freak out. Make sure to sign up ASAP to save one of the 30 spots available in each class.

Scaled, or Rx
Notice on the heat sheet you’ll be grouped as Scaled Men (S M), Scaled Women (S W), Rx Men (Rx M), or Rx Women (Rx W). Take a look at the listed scaling option and explanation of the workout HERE and HERE and be prepared to do the variation of the workout you’d like to do. If your listed on the Heat sheet in the wrong scaling option just let us know either by shooting me a quick email (wes@crossfitaustin.com) or when you get to the gym.  Additionally the workout contains a 1 RM Clean and Jerk at the very end, please have a number in mind for that as you will set up your station with the appropriate weight before the workout begins.

Finally make sure you’re patient even if everything falls apart and is a total wreck we’ll make sure everyone gets 15.1 in! Most important have fun!

#HeresToTheWins || Coach Adrienne Rampaul

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Welp. It happened.

The first few months of the New Year have come and gone. MARCH IS AROUND THE CORNER! I was inspired the other day by an amazing client. We’ll call her Lizzard. She mentioned something about a competition she has going and that she’s winning. After digging a little deeper, I learned what and who the heck she was talking about.

A little about Lizzard: She and her partner are working with one of our Coaches privately [personal training] with the goal for movement quality and quality of life. They are older clients who’d become sedentary… the comforts of life had just gotten the best of them – they’d become fragile.

Lizzard has achieved so much in her short time working with Coach Garland and is so proud of her accomplishments [earned!]. She can move. She’s motivated to move. She can do things she’s not done in years. She doesn’t hurt. She beams with pride in the fact that she’s ‘winning’ her competition.

With who? WHO THE HECK IS SHE COMPETING WITH?!

Her former self.

Lizzard views her progress, training and goals in terms of competing with “Lizzard of 6 months ago” and “Lizzard of 2 weeks ago”. She PRs regularly and has daily wins.

What. A. Mentality.

As we get into the trenches of month 3 in 2015, with Spring + Summer teasing us just ahead and for many of us, competition season (hello CrossFit Open 2015), our New Year goals may seem to be off somewhere in the distance… or perhaps somewhere behind us (oops! left those in the dust back there somewhere…) perhaps adopting Lizzard’s mentality can help us get back on track and stay hungry. Regular PRs and daily wins are something that we could all use a dose of.

How are you doing compared to the 6-month old version of you? 2-week old version? 2-year old edition?!

Take some time to appreciate who you are today and what you have accomplished. It might be a breath of fresh air compared to that laser-beam focus you have on what you haven’t accomplished. How you are faring compared to another doesn’t pale in comparison to how you are doing compared to your former self. #HeresToTheWins

-Coach Ade

The CrossFit Open is here… What do we do now?

The CrossFit Open officially begins in two days! For some of us that means year 6 of The CrossFit Open and for others it may be your first taste. Today I want to run through some quick logistics for how to navigate The CrossFit Open at CFA!

 

The Announcements
Workouts are announced live every Thursday at 7 pm central time. Once the workout is announced, 2 high-level CrossFit Athletes then go head-to-head and compete in that workout. We will be hosting a viewing party for the announcements and projecting the event on to our main whiteboard on the following Thursday evenings:

Thursday PM – February 26th
Thursday PM – March 12th
Thursday PM – March 19th
Thursday PM – March 26th

The only exception being Thursday 3/5 (Open WOD 15.2) when the announcement event will be held live here in Austin.


The Workouts
We will be doing the workouts as a gym on Saturdays. This will be a part of our regular group programing throughout the month. Since we do not know the workouts in advance we may have special instructions for Saturday’s classes once the workout is announced, so check the website and Facebook for any special instructions on Fridays. Also, be  sure to reserve yourself a spot in class on Saturdays at either 9 AM or 10 AM. If you can’t make it on a Saturday, you’re free to do the workout anytime during Open Gym.

 

Official Scores and Judging
To have an officially validated score you must have a judged scorecard. Judges will be provided and available on Saturdays however, if you can’t make it on a Saturday you are responsible for finding your own judge to judge your workout. We will have official scorecards printed and available after the workouts have been announced.

 

Scheduling
Programming for our group classes will be designed to work with The CrossFit Open workouts each week. My suggestion is to maintain your current training schedule and simply use The CrossFit Open workout as your last workout of the week. We will make sure folks are prepared to do their best throughout the duration of The Open!
And last but not least, remember to have fun! The CrossFit Open is a great time to test yourself and push outside of your comfort zone, but mostly – its a ton of fun!

-Coach Wes

Time Is A Valuable Thing || Coach Tim Garland

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Time is a Valuable Thing.

 

I get it, making it to the gym can be difficult. You work 40-60 hours a week and have family obligations on either side of those work hours. There are only 168 hours in week. Understanding this time frame, we have the opportunity to formulate a plan which allows us to attack the week head-on, as we see fit. Again, time is a valuable thing and our higher life priorities get the bulk of that valuable time investment.

 

Over the next few weeks, I will delve deeper into the valuable aspect of time as it relates to protein intake and results in my following blog posts. Today, I want to shift our focus from time to some different categories of protein, and give us a foundation and common terminology to build upon for the next installment.

 

Consider this; if you invest your hard-earned money in stocks, bonds and the like…you do so hoping and expecting for a positive gain or return. Hopefully you did your homework to have some understanding as to where you are putting your money. Similarly, if you invest a portion of your monthly budget on supplemental protein, you want a gain or return. That “return on investment” comes in forms such as added muscle size and tone, increased performance and faster recovery to name a few.

 

Any efforts researching protein or asking questions and conversing with a coach will inevitably lead you to hearing about amino acids and how they are the building block of protein. So, let’s break protein up into a few different categories that use amino acids to distinguish the difference:

 

 High quality

 Low quality

 Supplemental

 

High quality protein, also known as complete protein, is considered high quality because of its high biological value. The biologic value is in terms of the unique amino acid pattern similar to that needed by the body. Complete proteins are of animal origin and include chicken, fish, red/white meat and eggs.

 

Low quality protein, known also as incomplete protein, are of low biological value and deficient in at least one of the essential amino acids. Examples of these proteins are vegetables, grains and beans. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not vilifying these foods whatsoever! Remember, for our purposes, we are examining protein quality.

 

Complete and incomplete proteins (high and low quality proteins) come from the food sources we eat on a daily basis (hopefully). Now what about my protein shake I drink post workout? This, as referenced above, will be called supplemental protein. As many of you know, the most common form of supplemental protein is whey protein. Any idea why whey? A quick search on the ‘ole Google machine should reveal that it’s a quicker, easily digestible protein, thus jump starting the recovery/rebuilding processes.

 

Now that we have some base terminology of some different types of proteins (complete, incomplete and supplemental) we can move forward. Next time we will dig deeper, focusing on that valuable time aspect and why it is important as it relates to our supplemental consumption. In the meantime, just like a financial advisor would recommend, let’s diversify our portfolio and make sure our protein is coming from a myriad of sources so we can reap the myriad of benefits.

 

Stay healthy my friends,
Coach Garland

2015 – The CrossFit Open & The Road to Regionals || Coach Leigh LeGare

We Want YOU!!!

For your participation in the CrossFit 2015 Open
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The 2015 Reebok CrossFit Open is upon us! For those who have been here in the past, you’ll attest to this energy filled time contributing to five consecutive action packed Saturdays. Not to mention, it’s my favorite time of the year! For those of you who are new and have no idea what the Open is, let me explain…

The Open is the preliminary qualifier for what we see on TV, the CrossFit Games. It is a world-wide competition, lasting five weeks with a new workout released weekly. Members of CrossFit boxes have the ability to compete against not only their ‘box-mates’ with each workout, but by submitting your score online you can compete with and see how you stand against other all over the world. During this period, the weekly workout will be CFA’s Saturday morning workout. Imagine these mornings with hype music and/or a DJ, a larger presence of our community cheering each other on, tons of chalk clouds from the amount of clapping, and multiple PR’s/higher levels of accomplishment from everyone! ‘Hype City’ at its finest while we fulfill our mission of making it BACK to Regionals for the 6th year in a row!

 

How does it work? Sounds like way too much fun to be a competition!

The first workout will be released Thursday February 26th by CrossFit HQ. A new one is released each Thursday until March 26th. Once the workout is released, you have until the following Monday (5 pm PT) to complete that workout and submit your weekly score.

NEW!! There are two divisions this year; ‘Rx’ for those interested in competing/furthering their journey and ‘Scaled’ for those who don’t quite have all movements but want to get the best of their experience. Each division will be ranked based on scores. Scores go towards both individual and team scores. However, if you want your score to count towards your team’s score or move onto Regionals as an individual, you must do ALL workouts Rx.

 

Wait, Leigh, rewind…there are TEAM scores and I can contribute?

YES! Each week, the top 3 gals’ and the top 3 guys’ scores are taken. These six scores and who we pull from may change weekly based on whose wheelhouse that workout is in. One of the workouts may be in your wheelhouse and we’ll need YOUR score to help our cause towards Regionals. Each week, the collective total amongst the six scores determines where we rank regionally (against other teams/boxes) and ultimately where CFA ranks at the end of the 5 weeks. If we make the cut, we’re off to represent CFA at the LIVE Regional venue.

We’ve had a group of individuals training with the sole focus to have a team at Regionals.  We know this year will be increasingly difficult and in previous years have used multiple CF Austinites’ scores to help on our road to Regionals, even if competing at Regionals wasn’t their focus. We’d like to continue this tradition as there are some of you who have skills to contribute to these workouts (cough, cough…Bradley, Janss, Dayna, Doug, Miguel, Cody and many others of CFA…no pressure 😉 ).

Yes, I’ve secretly been watching and would love as many of you to be a part of our journey towards the Games! Besides, regardless of signing up, you’ll be doing these workouts anyway! You might as well register! New to CrossFit and/or CrossFit Austin? Don’t let that deter you from signing up and doing these workouts with the community!!!

 

This sounds fun, how do I sign up?

Follow the link (below) to register. Fill out appropriate fields and when prompted, choose CrossFit Austin as your ‘affiliate’. Registration is $20 but is fully worth it! REGISTER!!! It takes a village and I’m recruiting!

Join us for an amazing 2015 Open season. Results?! A stronger community and seeing many of you do things you thought you wouldn’t be able to do! If you doubt your efforts, don’t! It’s a great experience and an awesome tradition at CFA to be a part of.

Let’s get CFA to Regionals for the 6th year in a row! #weare1 #roadtoregionals #year6 #ittakesavillage

Coach Leigh

CLICK HERE to register

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ReTest Week(s)

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Our retests will be spread over the next two weeks, starting tomorrow. Below is the schedule

Monday 12/21: Clean Complex, & Burpee DB Snatch
Tuesday 12/22: OPT 3 (Snatch, Front Squat, CTB Pull-ups)
Monday 12/29: Ground to OVHD, Double Under, Run
Tuesday 12/30: Chipper: HSPU, PC to OVHD, TTB, Ball Slams, Wall Ball, Row

Merry Christmas!

– Coach Wes

Test Week Overview (2014 November / December Cycle)

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Tomorrow we begin our next training cycle, which means test week is upon us. This will be an abbreviated training cycle taking us through mid December with the retest week falling on the week of December 15th-20th.   This will give us 5 weeks of training book-ended by our test / retest weeks, and will also allow our transitional weeks to fall during the Christmas / New Year holiday weeks.   As we embark on this stretch of training be aware that with less time between test/retest improvements will be seen by focusing on the following elements.

  • Skill Development

  • Movement Quality and Technique Development

  • Mental fortitude

So be prepared for more learning and teaching from your coaches,  and more concentrated intense doses of work that will challenge your ability to “Push” both mentally and physically.  This will be our 2nd to last training cycle before the CF Open so most of our tests reflect movements and time domains that you will see in the open. Remember your ability to do well in anything starts with the training and work you do 12-24 weeks in advance of the event, not what you can cram into the week(s) of the event.  Below you’ll find the tests and schedule for the week and some quick notes on tomorrow’s tests. Enjoy!

Monday 11/5

A.
In 15:00
Clean Complex
1 Hang Clean (Power or Squat)
1 Full Squat Clean
1 Front Squat
1 Jerk (any variation, push press is allowed but not recommended)
*After warm-up with a partner start with an empty barbell, and build up to as heavy as weight as possible.

Notes:

Complexes such as this one allow us to train the ability to do more technical power movements under fatigue. They also force the athlete to be more precise and proficient in various elements of a given movement while maximizing training time. The increase physical and mental demands of this complex will allow us to simulate a 95-100% effort clean and jerk without actually putting that load on the bar.

B
7:00 AMRAP
7 Burpees
7/arm  Alt. DB Snatch @ 35 / 20
*Total reps recorded

Notes:

This amrap falls in the aerobic power zone (think 1 mile time trial)  for the majority of our athletes. As with a good deal of our tests this cycle managing the work and being precise and efficient with movements will be the key to a good score. With a “short” time domain and high turnover movement athletes must find a pace that is aggressive but also sustainable which is no easy task.  This is a great test to see what end  of the anaerobic / aerobic spectrum you fall in so pay attention to what your limiters are and refine for your approach during retest week!.

TUESDAY 11/4

Active Recovery   / Make up Day

Wednesday 11/5

“OPT 3”

A. 3 RM Front Squat

B. 2 RM Snatch

C. Max Reps of CTB Pull-ups (1 set)

*Record results for all 3 tests and add together for your “OPT 3” score

Thursday 11/6

4 Rounds
15 GTO @ 75 lb, 55 lbs
30 Double Unders
400 M Run
Time Cap 30:00

Friday 11/7

Active Recovery / Make up

Saturday 11/8

20:00 AMRAP
10 HSPU
20 PC to OVHD 135/95
30 TTB
40 Ball Slams
50 Wall Balls  20/14
Max Cal Row for remainder of time

Coach Wes

What to expect this cycle

Daily Extra Credit

This will primarily consist of cyclical aerobic work, isometric structural strength work, and additional mobility. Let me be the first to remind you that this is “extra credit” so if you complain that its not fun, you don’t have time, or you don’t like it my (or your coaches) response will simply be “Then don’t do it”. The extra credit is unsexy by design, if everything you had to do in training  was fun, exciting, and sexy everyone would be Lebron James. The extra credit is not extra work for work’s sake, its designed to support the primary training, and help your body adapt properly and efficiently.

Schedule 

The training for the first 3 weeks will follow a general progression week to week. Training 3-5 sessions a week is advised, however I’d advise against 6 sessions per week.   Mondays and Thursdays will be similar training sessions for the first 3 weeks, as well as Tuesday’s and Saturdays. So a good sample week could look like this:

3 days: M, W, Sa
4 days: M, Tu, W,  F or Sa
5 days: M, Tu, W, F, Sa

I’d also add for our experienced athlete (1 year+) it might behoove you to take a day during the week to work specifically on the skills that give you the most issues in our tests. If you do this remember that taking skills to extreme fatigue and/ or absolute failure is a recipe for creating bad habits. Instead be intentional and meticulous with your practice, specifically with the more advanced gymnastics and weightlifting skills. Lastly remember that on rest days we still recommend you be active in a non stressful was. So get outside and enjoy this beautiful city!

Weekly Life Challenges

Each week we will be posting a new nutritional challenge on the board. Just like the extra credit they won’t always be easy, but they will most certainly assist you in improving over the next six weeks. The challenges will be designed to help you create better habits, and primarily be focused in the sleep, stress, and nutrition department. So can continuing to adhere to the challenges for longer than the week they’re listed  will certainly be beneficial.  Stay tuned for the first challenge tomorrow.

 

Thoughts on Test Week Part 2

Lets dive right in…

Thursday
Strength Endurance, Aerobic Power, Recovery
3:00 Max Pull-up
3:00 Rest
3:00 Row for Cals
3:00 Rest
3:00 Max Power Snatch @ 75/45
3:00 Rest
3:00 Max Shuttle

This is by far my favorite test and the one most unique to this cycle. We have several items at play, the first of which is strength endurance in multiple planes of pulling. Since all of the first three intervals are full body movements that utilize a significant amount of leg and hip drive, we get a glimpse into how well the athlete can utilize the aerobic system to produce power. More importantly the rest interval gives us an idea of how well the athlete’s aerobic system can drive recovery  between bouts of higher efforts.

Saturday
Aerobic Power, Aerobic Endurance, Strength Endurance,  CP Battery 
20:00 AMRAP
5 Power Cleans 135/95 
10 TTB
15 Wall Ball 20/14

Ahh the traditional CrossFit triplet. This was actually taken from the 2012 CrossFit Open, and on the surface this looks like a straight aerobic endurance test. However saying that would negate the fact that this test (and all CrossFit tests for that matter) will be limited by a multitude of factors unique to each individual. This is the beauty and the struggle of testing with what we call mix modal tests. Limiting factors could be maximal strength, size, technique, flexibility, height, aerobic capacity, strength endurance…. the list goes on and on. So theoretically one could improve on this test by getting stronger, losing body mass, improving technique, or growing a few inches! The good news is athletes have multiple avenues to improve this test. However we won’t know for sure what specifically has been improved over time (besides the test itself). I’m not passing judgement or knocking testing in this fashion, rather pointing out a unique facet of testing fitness in this fashion.

One last thought, you may have noticed the lack of a true isolated cyclical test. I basically snuck it in last week 🙂 so look forward to retesting your mile run in the next 6 weeks! Monday I’ll have some extras we’re throwing in this training cycle to really help everyone knock the retests out of the park! Have a great weekend!

-Wes Kimball

Sentiments From Leigh | A Regionals Wrap Up

 

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Train/Adapt/Evolve=We Are 1

Regionals has come and gone and almost every year, I’ve compared it to Thanksgiving dinner. You plan, prep and cook for what seems like forever and once everything is cooked, the meal is consumed in a fraction of the time spent preparing it. Leaving most retiring to the couch, taking the longest food induced nap, and calling it a day. It’s probably the most anti-climactic holiday ever!

This past weekend was different and I’ve found myself reflecting more upon this year’s competition than previous years and have yet to take my nap! I’ve tried to figure out this difference and the thing that resonates with me is Aaron’s new motto, of ‘Train/Adapt/Evolve.’ Sure it sounds simple. You train, make adaptations and evolve into a better athlete. Repeat cycle. Easy! But this weekend proved this motto to mean much more to me than that.

To Lindsey, Lizzie, Stacey, Andrew, Blaz, Gold and Conner:

On a physical level, I think we all held true to Aaron’s motto. However, based on the demands of this year’s competition we had to train two things that were much harder than any physical test Wes and Aaron put us through; communication and teamwork. Unlike years past, there was no more hiding behind our stronger teammates. We had to learn what worked for the group and also on an individual level. We needed to know each other’s weaknesses, the cues/motivation to give when fatigue set in, use our strengths to make others’ weaknesses stronger, and set egos aside to come together as one.

We also needed to learn both our own and our teammates’ work thresholds during workouts…which movements we could blast through and which movements to lean more on our teammates to perform. We learned to pull each other towards success rather than push. We learned to trust each other’s abilities. Each week we got better…we adapted to the needs of the team and of individuals. We were evolving into one. We established a foundation of trust and camaraderie leading up to Regionals. We were ready!

To Wes and Aaron:

You two were absolutely necessary for this process. Aaron’s motto was present between the two of you. Both with different skill sets, knowledge base and even your personal relationships with each of us, provided a ‘power house couple’ that helped us train for Regionals. Both of you adapted to our needs as a team and as individuals…even our freak out moments were handled flawlessly by the two of you.

The constant feedback, guidance and support provided by the two of you were vital to ensuring our success on the competition floor. Genevieve and I joked about how this year was like choreographing a dance number where everyone had different roles but needed to come together in order to execute the perfect routine. You two ‘choreographed’ our performance with ease and we couldn’t have asked for better support and leadership throughout all of this!

To our community, CFA:

It is all of you who bring this cycle together. Our gym changes on a daily basis with fresh faces popping in but we adapt well to new personalities and accept them with open arms. We are on the same mission to lead healthier/more optimal lifestyles which makes it easy for anyone to fit in. We are constantly evolving into a bigger and better group because of the members it consists of. I’ve seen this community change and for the first time since the 2011 Regionals, it was about ALL of us on that competition floor; collectively, as ONE.

Our other motto, ‘We Are 1’ was established and cultivated these past few months and I saw both the team and community evolve into one unit…especially during this weekend. You all could’ve given up on us. But like every other day in the gym, y’all came together and rallied for us. I never once saw doubt from our fans and if anything, the CFA community helped provide that extra push to finish strong. I watched our team evolve over night. Everything we thought could go wrong on the first day went wrong. We ended up in 30th place (last place). Both our physical and team adaptations came unhinged on the competition floor. However, our fans and community made it clear what was seen on the floor, wasn’t a representation of what we were capable of. After close to two hours of ‘team huddling’ after our workouts on the first day, we came together and made it our mission to fight and gain some ground on the leaderboard. Considering more than half of our total points for the weekend came on the first day of competition, we made up some serious rankings. We ended the weekend tied for 20th!

What I’m trying to convey is I’ve been a member/coach of this gym for over three years. I’ve also been a member of our team for the past four Regionals. Each year, I’ve seen changes from one team dynamic to another. Same goes for our community. But this year was different. We were all on the same page as we have trained, adapted and evolved together.

This is the first year I haven’t looked at Regionals as an ‘end to a year of training.’ Rather, I see it as a ‘warm-up’ for what’s to come next year and am excited to train with the established group of members we have in our gym. Not to mention, work with and learn more from our amazing coaches. Maybe it’s because the process we went through this year and on that competition floor provided a solid foundation of community that is apparent and exciting to build off of!

With that…Thank you to everyone who came out this weekend and cheered us on. Thank you to Wes and Aaron for the time and energy spent on ensuring our success while never giving up on us. Thank you to Adrienne aka ‘Mama Ade’ for hosting fun opportunities for all to come together and also providing perspective during our weaker moments. Thank you to my teammates who turned it around and never gave up! Everyone fought through this weekend and even though CFA didn’t make the top three, our efforts as an entire gym and the support/fight I saw, puts us in first place! I’m proud to be a part of our humble gym and am excited to ‘train, adapt, and evolve’ with all of you! WE ARE 1!!!

Coach Leigh

 

In celebration of all the hard work these guys put in, come join us this Saturday (6/7) for a Regionals Wrap up WOD and BBQ/Potluck
>>DETAILS<<
LET’S RALLY ONCE MORE!