X3 Championship Meet

It all started about a week and a half ago when the head Viking at my gym made a very passionate speech about the lack of CrossFit Iron Legion members competing... and then approaching me about this being a very local competition for me to try and showcase what I have learned from Coach J. It's VERY well-known that I have made some massive leaps and bounds in my snatch and clean & jerk despite the low 1RMs I have had.  Anyway... fast forward to today.

I did receive a bit of a devastating text from Coach J indicating that he had a family emergency he had to attend, but all through the day, he would message me with a mixture of cues, tips, and general reassurance and encouragement that I would do well.  Even from afar, he was basically walking me through and practically holding my hand and pretty much being there for me.

My high school English teacher buddy didn't know how to operate my camera to film, but she got a few good shots of me anyway on my 33 kg snatch.

The Bear then got my other two snatches, a successful 33 kg snatch and a spectacularly failed 36 kg snatch.

And then there were the clean and jerks.  I was only successful on the opener of 43 kg.  I got a little ambitious and went partway between how I was actually feeling and the plan that Coach J and I came up with for my jumps on Monday.  One thing I really love about Coach J is that he also trusts me with any choices and changes I make as well as giving me a rationale for why he recommends something for me. Plus he has a great way of helping me integrate music, martial arts, archery, and engineering into my lifting and training in general.

My cleans are significantly more reliable than my jerks.  I do have some issues with dropping under the bar quickly enough, and that is something that Coach J will be working on heavily with me. A lot of my issue seems to be a timing / rhythm issue lower down in the lift, so we will be addressing it soon. I suspect I will be getting a lot of dropping under work along with figuring out an optimal rhythm for my early pulls based on my natural balance and quirks.

And just for fun, I played with a Hercules hold again!

Pre-Competition Preparation 1/n

So Coach J did give me a really good outline of how to get ready for the upcoming Super Total X3 Competition. I'm only doing the Olympic weightlifting portion, but that is already a very tall order for me. There's also powerlifting and strongman as well as an award for someone who can do all three, but not at this point. Maybe next time, if I can ever get enthused about bench press and handling items of questionable sanitation.

Part of my preparation include doing 3x3 of my big lifts plus squats, all at around 50%, as well as my usual warmup drills to get things moving and remembering my position and timing.

My snatch is still struggling, and I did my lifts before Coach J showed up, but I did get to talk with him, and as always, he had some great insights. He didn't get to really work with me today, but I will be seeing him tomorrow morning for greater in-depth work.

And then there's the clean and jerk, which I did singly because it's a more fatiguing lift, plus my ride-or-die training buddy, who has shifted her focus to gymnastics to become a true CrossFitter and eventually qualify for the CrossFit Games, came around to give me some feedback based on what she's observed of me. Plus she did remind me of several of the cues from Coach J because sometimes, I'm more likely to listen to a fellow master's female athlete who is just as tenacious as I can be...

I really do find that I'm learning far more from Coach J than my last 3-4 coaches combined across 5-6 years, but then again, I think it has a lot to do with the mixed martial arts / music / dance / engineering background with the correct cues that work with my brain.  I still have a tendency to row the barbell in, but after talking to him after doing these lifts, it sounds like that can still be addressed without too much of a battle by adjusting my rhythm a bit.  This should be interesting in the morning...

I also did some blank-baling work yesterday as part of a plan to help calm my mind down, keep me active, and maybe gain some insights on some of my lifting quirks.

Absolute First Cut at Mononoke Hime

So I've been exploring and branching out with more contemporary music, especially with my keyboard NOT appreciating very much Chopin or Mussorgsky, plus I think I do need to use my fingers with slightly less brain power.  I got very lucky and came across some sheet music for a small subset of the Mononoke Hime Suite adapted for piano plus a fourth movement that I will be working on integrating into it.  Mononoke Hime is a film by Studio Ghibli, and what many of my classmates at Caltech consider to be the inspiration for the creation of Cylithera in my D&D campaigns and stories.  I am probably not very far from posting a follow-up video after cleaning up a couple of parts, particularly in the first movement ("Legend of Ashitaka") and the third movement ("Mononoke Hime") as well as integrating a fourth movement ("San and Ashitaka").

More Snatch Work: Dropping Down

I am elated at the progress I'm making in my Olympic lifts, particularly on the snatch! Coach J has been doing a wonderful job of providing me with insights on how to improve my form and leverage my mobility and build.  He has also pointed several amazing resources to me as a supplement to all the coaching he has provided me with along with being extremely patient with me when my brain starts overthinking and/or I make errors in interpreting the physics and cues. 

My 3 position snatch from the ground up prior to the dropping under drills, 65 lbs. It's been a while since I've been able to reliably snatch 65 lbs with halfway decent form. I'm catching very high, and I'm still having a lot of work with position and rhythm, but it's slowly getting there.

And then the drills to help correct my tendency to catch my lifts really high... There's a lot of position work involved as well as remembering what's supposed to activate.  Coach J has a good way of identifying cues that actually work with my brain as well as helping me reverse engineer a lift so I know how to minimize the degrees of freedom for error.

Adventure in Music: Going Outside of the Romantic Era

It's pretty well-known that I have a very strong preference for piano music in the Romantic era with composers such as Grieg, Chopin, and Mussorgsky. I decided to explore something a bit more contemporary recently, partially because I found something online semi-randomly while searching for something else, partially because something is a bit unhappy and needs something less technically demanding.  So I stumbled across the Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet.  Usually projects like this make me slightly nauseous because I thoroughly despise most Shakespeare, especially that awful play I had to read and analyze in 9th grade. However, I also took it as a challenge to explore expression and mild improvisation... and here's the first take that didn't result in any of the following: camera falling, incoming phone call messing with the recording, or muscle cramp.

Today is an absolute rest day from the rigors of CrossFit after realizing I went a straight week plus change without any rest, and I have had at least two coaches and my nutritionists get on me about that.  Then tomorrow, barring unfortunate circumstances, it's back to corrective and supplemental drills, Olympic weightlifting, and of course, the CrossFit WODs themselves.