Monday, January 26, 2009

Back From a Great Weekend

(My Uncle and I just outside the Bell Center in Montreal, they had a large tent sent up with over 18 championship trophies, players doing autographs and skill contests. They also had every jersey frozen in ice.)

Today I went over and lifted with Ben and Jeremy at their place. It was great to have some good eyes watching my technique. I am working on getting some deep deep depth in my squat....Right now I am playing with the idea of dropping my training and focusing strictly on SS for at least 4 weeks.
Back Squat---------------------Bench Press
45x5 2 sets--------------------45x5x2
110x5-------------------------65x5
160x3-------------------------95x5
205x2-------------------------120x2
235x5-------------------------140x5
245x5-------------------------145x5
245x5-------------------------150x5
Deads
135x5x2
155x5
215x3
280x2
330x5

I had a great weekend in Montreal visiting my brother. The all star game was amazing. What an exciting game....it went into a shoot out and I was rooting for the West but the East ended up taking the win. Montreal fans are really hardcore....that city is very unique to say the least.

6 comments:

  1. Sean,

    These are strong lifts. What is your weight?

    I am a big fan of doing cycles on predominately strength or olifts in place of the standard CF mix of ME and METCONs. The cycles help me focus on technique and correcting weakness.

    Our TSC is not in April. I have started to snatch the bell some more. I am trying to get the down swing down without tearing my hands. My bell is not the best. I do like the TSC. That is another thing to train for me. A strength cycle with a little extra-KB work. I plan on doing that later in the year as our TSC approaches (in Sep)

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  2. My BW is 170 - 175

    Not ripping for me is all about tearing it down with my palm facing in towards my inner leg and the bell on my fingertips. I can do it well until I get really tired and my grip starts to go. That is when I tend to rip.

    I need to get back into the snatch's. Last TSC I hit 120ish ....i think it was 123 or 124. I want to smash that .... i like training for it by doing 5 intervals of Tabata. I may just do that on top of SS. The snatches 3 times a week shouldnt take away from my lifts. I also plan on greasing the groove with my pullups. I hit 15 last time. I would like to do upwards of 20 for the challenge.

    I will probably start SS seriously on Monday. It will be tough but I will not do any thing other than SS....except for some tabata snatch intervals.

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  3. 123 is a lot. Pass on some more pointers on the snatch. How do you swing it up, and down? Thanks.

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  4. I just focus on good KB snatch technique. Aggressive, punch hard at the top so it doesn't smash down on my forearm. I really focus on finishing so that my arm is straight up and down and you can see my ear. I really use my hip drive like in a KB swing. I found the five minute test more about cardio strength than strength to snatch the bell. That is why i worked so hard with the Tabata intervals to get my stamina up.

    Although, the KB snatch was a tough learning curve. I remember it took me a while to get the technique down. It is hard to teach to new people. Some people pick it up fast (like Steve)...and others (like me) it takes a while to get down. (did Steve ever tell you the story of when he competed in the TSC in Toronto and had never done a KB snatch before...i think he ended up winning it)

    I don't know if this helped???

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  5. Steve never told me the story..but he is humble. I hit 82 in my last TSC and that was my downfall. I could have done better with a better snatch. I think I used way too much swinging with the hips as oppose to a "snap" to both snap it up and then "bounce" down. The next thing that slowed me down was the grip, specifically, not pinching the skin where the fingers meet my palms. It ripped there. I am still trying to find that sweet spot on the descent. Here are a few questions:

    On the descent what did you mean by ripping the bell down? I think you mean you actively lower it, not let it pull you arm down.

    Also, which inner thigh did your palm point towards? If you have the bell in the right hand, is the palm facing the right or left thigh? Which finger is on top (pinky or thumb)?

    Finally, on Tabata did you shoot for 10/round? Or just max number in 20s?

    I really am getting motivated to get better at these, so I appeciate all your pointers.

    Pat

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  6. Pat,

    you have me really thinking about this...im going to have to do some snatches to give you a better answer..

    For the decent ripping down I mean keeping constant control of it so it doesn't tear your hand in that spot your talking about. So that the bell rests on the tips of the fingers with palm facing left leg if it is in my right hand. I'm not sure what you mean by which finger is on top. For Tabata near the end of my training I was trying to hold 11's....but now I would be lucky to hold 10's. It's really hard to do more than 12 in 20 secounds. I started doing a regular 4 minute interval then near the end I would go 5 minutes.

    Ill get more on the grip....I may have some pictures....

    Tear down hand position
    http://s246.photobucket.com/albums/gg91/crossfitlondon/?action=view&current=P1011773.jpg

    http://s246.photobucket.com/albums/gg91/crossfitlondon/?action=view&current=P1011772.jpg

    http://s246.photobucket.com/albums/gg91/crossfitlondon/?action=view&current=P1011778.jpg

    From here I spin tear it down to the top of my fingers and in towards my legs

    http://s246.photobucket.com/albums/gg91/crossfitlondon/?action=view&current=P1011783.jpg

    Mid punch

    http://s246.photobucket.com/albums/gg91/crossfitlondon/?action=view&current=P1011777.jpg

    not sure if this helps...Im going to have to do some snatches to really be able to talk about it more

    ReplyDelete