Fenrir's Mayhem 2017, 1/n

This is the first installment of pictures. I did surprisingly well for someone who didn't train as much as I wanted to. 

First there was the Urban Assault Obstacle 5k.  Wooden walls, concrete blocks, a couple of dump trucks, tires, netting, piles of pallets, more tires, and what was called "Paul's Palace of Pain".  Any obstacles that I either couldn't do or didn't feel safe doing involved a 3 burpee penalty. Suffice to say, I took A LOT of burpees! Paul's Palace of Pain involved picking up an unlabelled slam ball. I got especially lucky with picking up a 10 lb ball instead of a 15 lb or 20 lb ball. Stage 1 of the Palace involved throwing the medicine ball as far as possible, then doing burpee broad jumps to the ball, repeating the process until I got to the next flag, which I think was about 50 meters away. Stage 2 was supposed to be a crab walk about 30 meters with the ball on my belly. Crab walk was not happening, so I opted for more burpee broad jumps.  The final stage of the Pain Palace was bear crawling 50 meters on a mild downhill while pushing the ball. I was pretty darn slow on all of the obstacles, especially the Palace of Pain, but I was told that I finished the obstacle 5k in about 45 minutes. Running was the easiest part by far, and I actually overtook several people on the longer runs, even if they overtook me again on the obstacles... only to have me overtake them again on the final run. 

Fenrir 2017 Prep

It's been quite the week, which has included the following PR's:
80 lb snatch (up from 75 lbs)
120 lb clean & jerk (up from 110 lbs)
205 lb back squat (up from 190 lbs)
105 lb overhead squat (up from 95 lbs)

And then there's Snatchsquatch... 75 lbs achieved! It was hideous enough to shatter mirrors, but I did it!

Black and White Warbler

After a rather satisfying day in Barbell Club at my second home, which included multiple snatches at 65 and 70 lbs as well as comfortably doing three consecutive 145 lb back squats (approximately 75% of my 1RM), I made a new friend...

This little guy was flopping around on the ground while lying on his back, and if I hadn't been careful, he could have ended up in far worse shape.  I knelt down to investigate, and next thing I knew, he decided to perch on my hand.  He stayed there for a good 10 minutes before flying up onto a ledge above the box entrance.

The little guy rested up there for another 5-10 minutes before flying off into the evening sky.  Hopefully he made it home all right after his little accident with a window.  My guess is that his prognosis is pretty good because his wings appeared to be fully functional, even if he needed some time and a bit of clearance from predators and klutzes!

Fenrir Prep 1/n

I've got quite a way to go in preparing for Fenrir's Mayhem this year, but I stand a chance of being not-bottom 5, assuming my allergies and respiratory system cooperate with me.

I'm starting to build up on my Snatchsquatch complex, which is three iterations of snatch grip deadlift, hang squat snatch, snatch balance, and overhead squat.  All movements have to be unbroken, even if pauses are allowed.  I still have some issues with getting under the bar faster as well as losing some power at the knees as I transition from first to second pull.  This is only at 55 lbs, but I need to be able to do all three iterations at 75 lbs to get the points at Fenrir's Mayhem.

And then there's the Berserker complex, which is two iterations of deadlift, hang squat clean, front squat, shoulder to overhead, back squat, and behind the head shoulder to overhead.  Like the Snatchsquatch complex, all movements have to be unbroken.  This is only 85 lbs, 30 lbs shy of the requirement for the scaled female division.  This is a much longer stretch for me, given my current 1RM on any form of shoulder to overhead is 110 lbs.

Buggy With a Near Certainty of Rain

This was the first time I actually did something other than the practice butts at TBOF, mostly because a handful of friends from the gym or the SCA had shown up.

The pictures below are courtesy of D. Ruse from the box.  I'm shooting alongside fellow athlete and sword enthusiast.  These targets were definitely up close and personal!

To Xibalba With It!

Despite the other stuff going on, I was still able to get a touch of time to myself for sanity's sake. How else is one supposed to survive prior to school starting and being semi-forced to put up with perfume demons from the deepest bowels of the Abyss?  Most of my Wolf Pack has gone over to a competition that I unfortunately wasn't able to sign up for and compete in due to nebulous lack of plans on perfume demon visitors, some arbitrary social event that has no logic attached to it, and the nuclear fallout for choosing to take care of myself instead of catering to inane tomfoolery.

And then there were the stills my camera somewhat took of me... Usually I would not have gone in on a Saturday, but it was sufficiently early in the day and my usual happy haunts were unavailable.

Barbell Clean: Debugging

Here are the other videos including a 3 position clean to better assess where my form tends to do well and where it falters.  It's the transition that gives me the most difficulty, but premature pulling has also crept in when my central nervous system fries.

And then there was the snatch balance, where I tend to do a bit of a lurch and a heaving motion, turning it into a heaving snatch balance.  This is good practice for me to drop down faster to catch the bar lower after I hit triple extension and pull the bar as high as it will go.

Finally there's the jerk balance, which is the jerk version of the snatch balance.  I chose to use a split jerk for this because it is the one that gives me the best shot of dropping below the bar quickly and maintain better control of the bar, although a power jerk or a squat jerk may also be eventually feasible once I get my strength and mobility up to par.

Barbell Debugging: Clean

Clean & jerk is NOT an easy lift, nor is the snatch.  Both lifts are highly technical, so I'm spending time debugging my form at steps where I know I struggle.  My primary issue appears to be in that transition from first to second pull at the knee, although I also tend to do the high pull on the bar a bit early before I fully go into triple extension at hip, knee, and ankle.  This holds for both clean & jerk and snatch.

One thing I concentrated on was my hang clean so I can start reverse engineering how to get to each step.  I have trouble with hitching, which stems from not engaging my hamstrings and glutes in time as well as not shooting my knees back at the appropriate instant.

The other lifts will show up in a future post once I filter out the more embarrassing clips and the files are actually uploaded to YouTube.

Double Unders...

I'm still a long way from being remotely proficient, but this was a baseline clip I took of myself early during practice.  One of the coaches has since worked with me on my form to make sure I use my wrists a whole lot more.  Nearly every class has involved said coach yelling to me, "Less arm, more wrist!"

And then there was Barbell Club, where I focused on my form on especially light weights. I'm still in wimp mode with flawed anatomy and physiology, but extra wimpy is better than nothing.  Most of the focus was actually at about 50% of my clean & jerk and getting the following to happen: engaging my glutes and hamstrings, making sure to open up my knees once the barbell approaches my knees from mid-shin, getting my knees to spring back simultaneously with my hips opening forward, and making sure that I am only moving in the y-plane.  The change to my cleans also apply to my snatches.  I also had a coach have me stand uncomfortably close to the rig so that if I do the hitching / giddy-up movement, I would feel something poke me in the rear end.