Avocado

I failed rather miserably on my first two big attempts to be Paleo. On the first one, I had not planned ahead and I was tempted to the dark side by cakes and birthdays and there was no turning back. The second time, I went in with more of a plan and challenged myself (along with the challenge at The Cave) to 30 days. The timing was great, but by day 20 I was feeling rather weak and by day 27 (just 3 days short of the challenge) I could hardly work out. Roger thought I was probably deprived of fats. That day I went home and devoured some cheddar cheese and felt much better and stronger. But I failed.

So try three comes along and this time I planned to eat an avocado a day for the entire month to help my fat intake. I was also at this stage eating two tablespoons of chia (Mila brand… the shiny purple bags on your way to the bathroom) a day in my water and not having hunger cravings as it really does fill me up. The combination of the daily chia and the daily avocado made the 30 days a breeze. I was 100% Paleo for the 30 days and felt great! I have continues with the Paleo lifestyle, the daily chia, and never turn down an avocado. So I was super thrilled to try out the Avocado Soup recipe from “Cooking in The Cave” page 18.

Avocado Soup
Kitchen time: 30 minutes
Servings: 4

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, loosely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 medium avocados, ripe and peeled
2 cups chicken (or veggie) stock (broth can also be substituted, but then do not add the salt)
1 cup coconut milk (I have substituted coconut cream as well and that was yummy)
¼ cup fresh cilantro, loosely chopped (I freeze cilantro and use that too)
¼ cup fresh lime juice
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon oregano
¼ teaspoon cayenne

optional garnish: diced tomato and or diced mango!

Recipe:
With heat set to medium, place oil, onions and garlic in frying pan and sauté until soft (about 5 minutes)

Place sautéed mix in large capacity blender or food processor along with avocado, stock, coconut milk, cilantro, lime juice and seasonings. Blend until smooth.

Adjust seasonings and serve immediately or chilled with optional garnish.

I make this dish two or three times a week and need only make sure I have ripe avocados and fresh limes as everything else I generally have stocked in the house. The kitchen time says 30 minutes, but I think with my high speed Vitamix that I can get everything made in 20 minutes as I rush off to my meeting with my green soupy lunch. I made this for all of our teachers for teachers appreciation week (served in big jars) and have served it at a number of dinner and lunch gatherings. As I mentioned, I am rather addicted and it helps me maintain my fat intake and strength as well!

Workout for May 21, 2013:

A) Review bench press and spotting

B) Bench press: 5-5-3-3-1-1-1 (record it on the PR spreadsheet).

C) “3-Minute Grace”  Scale weight to allow each person to complete 30 clean and jerks in approximately 3-minutes.

D) 10-minute AMRAP: run 200m, max handstand hold.  Score is rounds and total number of seconds in handstand.

Cardio:

“Dirty Thirty” For time: 30 box jump / 30 jumping pull-ups / 30 kettlebell swings (1/0.75p) / 30 walking lunges / 30 knees-to-elbows / 30 push-press (20/15kg) / 30 good mornings (20/15kg) / 30 wall ball / 30 burpees / 30 double-unders.

25-minute cut-off.

This looks worse than it is. But it looks pretty bad!

There’s an injury risk for any sport that you play.  And while it’s been said that sitting on the couch is way more dangerous than doing CrossFit, the fact remains that people get hurt doing CrossFit.  This is one of the biggest points that CrossFit’s detractors make on a regular basis.  ”Exercise isn’t supposed to hurt people, but CrossFit does.”

It’s a valid point that exercise shouldn’t cause injury, but the problem is that CrossFit isn’t just exercise.  Sure, we do movements that you see in other exercise routines, such as push-ups and running.  But we also do movements that are entire sports, such as weight lifting, and we do them in a competitive setting, constantly trying to beat our last time, or to win against other people in the class.

Just like many people play other sports, like softball, to get exercise and stay in shape, us CrossFitters “play” the sport of CrossFit to stay in shape.  It has the advantage of including a combination of functional movements from many other sports, so it gets us in good shape to play many other sports, but, like all other sports, it has a risk of injury.

So, my answer to people when they ask about whether or not CrossFit is dangerous is, yes, it’s a dangerous sport.  But so is soccer, cycling, track, and wrestling.  The key here is to remember that when you’re doing CrossFit, you’re participating in a sport, you’re not just working out.  This is one of the reasons that we’re including so much ancillary and mobility work: those things help keep you mobile and strengthen the parts that are most likely to get injured during the WOD.

Pay attention to your mobility and other work.  Avoid injury by training and playing smart.

The international symbol for diabetes.

In it, the author discusses a study from PLoS One study that found a link between increased sugar availability and incidence of diabetes.  Duh, you’re saying.

What makes the study interesting is that it shows increased rates of diabetes irrespective of obesity.  Simply put, obesity doesn’t cause diabetes, sugar does.

From the article: “for every 12 ounces of sugar-sweetened beverage introduced per person per day into a country’s food system, the rate of diabetes goes up 1 percent.”

The author goes on to suggest that we need additional studies of the toxicity of sugar and he mentions a recent petition for the FDA to determine “safe” limits on sugar.

We’ve said for quite a while that sugar is toxic, so it’s nice to see this backed up with some pretty sold studies.  But what do you think about regulating sugar like we regulate other dangerous substances?

We’ll offer child care for parents who would like to work out for $5.00.  You can register for child care in the Member’s Area.

We’ll have the grill going, too, so please bring some food to grill and/or share.

This even starts at 9:00 AM, and we’re hoping to wrap up by 11:00 or so.

Workout for May 18th, 2013:

A) Partner spotted handstands: accumulate 2 minutes in handstand.  Scale to inverted hang or plank as needed.

B) 5 minutes shoulder mobility

C) 10 minutes rage ball.

D) Review WOD movements

E) 3 Rounds for time: Run 400m / 21 kettlebell swings (1.5/1 p) / 12 single kettlebell shoulder to overhead (1.5/1 p) switch arms as needed.  12 minute cut-off.

Workout for May 17, 2013:

A) 5 Minutes upper back mobility

B) Swords Day 18: Warm up: Front Squats 5 reps @75%, 3 reps @85%

C) Front Squats: 1 @95%, 1+ @105%

D) 15 min EMOM: 1 handstand push up / 2 pistols / 3 pull-ups

E) 3 Rounds for time: 10 snatches (35/25kg) / 30 double unders.  7 minute cut-off.

Cardio:

Tabata: Squat / kettlebell swing / push-up / row for calories.  Rest 1-minute, 10-seconds between exercises. (Takes 19-minutes)

Workout for 5/16/13:

A) 5-5-5 Burgener Warm-up with a bar.

B) 5 minutes shoulder mobility

C) 12-12-12 bent arm dumbbell flyes / hip extensions

D) 10-minutes of ring work: supports, L-sits, inverted hangs, levers, ice cream makers, etc.  Tailor to athelete’s needs.

E) Tabata push-ups

Cardio:

3 Rounds of max reps in 1-min of the following: Jump rope / Ab mat sit-ups / 60′ shuttle sprints / burpees / rest. (Takes 15 minutes)

Challenge Workout #2:

In this workout, you will perform a dumbbell snatch ladder.  Every 30-seconds, you will perform a dumbbell snatch with each hand.  Each successful round enables you to attempt the movements with a heavier dumbbell.  When you reach the max weight, or point that you cannot perform a 1-arm snatch with both sides, you move back to the previous successful weight and perform a 3-minute AMRAP of alternating 1-arm snatches.  The competition starts at 30# dumbbells for men and 5# dumbbells for women.  Your total score will be the last round you completed times the total number of rounds of you completed at the end.

For example, an male athlete performs the workout and is able to perform alternating side snatches for 30#, 35#, 40#, 45#, 50#, and 55#. At 60#, he fails.  At the end of the 30-second round where he would have moved to 65#, he instead starts a 3-minute AMRAP of alternating snatches at 55# (his last successful weight).  He performs 6 full rounds of alternating side snatches, and one extra rep on the right side, for a total of 6.5 rounds.  His score is 39 (55# is the 6th round, times 6.5 rounds in the AMRAP = 39).

Movement standards:

These are good reps. The weight starts on the floor and finishes completely locked out overhead.

The dumbbell must start on the ground, and move to a locked out position overhead. The knees, hips, shoulder and elbow must be fully open and the dumbbell must not stop between the ground and the overhead position (i.e. no dumbbell clean & jerks).  Note that “fully open” refers to the athlete’s normal range of motion– athletes that have mobility issues are free to do the workout, provided they do the movements safely.

These are bad. Seriously. Look at them.

Workout for May 15, 2013:

A) 5 Minutes hip mobility

B) Swords Day 17: Warm up: 5 reps @60%, 3 reps @70%

C) Front Squats 3-3-3 @75%

D) 5 rounds for time: run 400m / 15 toes to bar / 10 deadlifts (80/60kg). 20-min cut-off.

E) Remaining time: roll hamstrings & lower back.

CrossFit Cardio:

5 Rounds for time: 10 ring push-ups / 15 box steps (or jumps).  10-min cut-off.

8-Min EMOM: 5 squats / 10 lunges

Exercise zones and approximate heart rates.

This class will focus on developing aerobic capacity through high intensity functional movements.  Translation: simple, fun workouts that will make you sweat.

Don’t worry, this class is still CrossFit, it’s just a slightly different flavor of CrossFit.  We’ll be focusing more on the basics, such as sit-ups, push-ups, kettlebell swings, running, and less on the complicated strength and power movements such as snatches, cleans, and heavy squats.  The class will start off with a group warm-up, then you’ll spend several minutes practicing and perfecting the movements for the workout.  Workouts will last between 10 and 35 minutes.  The coach will lead a group mobility session at the end of class.

Also, this class will function as another way to join the CrossFit program.  Usually, you have to do the Foundations series, but for people who want to jump right in, they can attend this class at the regular monthly rates.  After attending 20 classes over at least two months, they are free to join any regular CrossFit class.  Go tell your friends, this is a great way to get started on the road to fitness without having to fork over $300 for the Foundations course.

CrossFit Cardio classes take place Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 9:00 AM and 3:00 PM, and Tuesday and Thursday at 6:15 AM and 6:30 PM.

Try it out and let me know what you think!

Workout for May 13, 2013:

A) 5 Minutes lower Back mobility

B ) Warm up: Front Squats 5 reps @85%, 2 reps @90%

C) Front Squats 1-1 @100%

D) 6 min EMOM: 3 Handstand push ups / 8 hollow rocks

E) Row 500m - 500m - 500m - 500m. 15-min cap.

CrossFit Cardio:

4 Rounds for time: run 200m / 30 squats / 15 kettlebell swings.  16-minute cut-off.

Why is this picture here? I dunno, it's nutritional and in the public domain.

The article makes the case that good things– like CrossFit, Paleo, etc– if taken to extremes too quickly can cause damage.  They talk about the dangers of combining deficit diets with CrossFit, as removing vital nutrients from the diet and performing high intensity training is a good way to hurt yourself.  They also talk about basal metabolic rate, and an interesting and counter-intuitive hack for weight loss.  Of course, it’s all about a gradual, scaled approach.

The “Gradually Awesome” approach is the antidote to the “Gradually Awful” approach they were formerly utilizing.  Nobody became obese overnight; it usually takes years of mindless eating and sedentary living to add on hundreds of pounds and no amount of self-abuse through excessive exercise will change that.  In fact, it will make you sick and set you back.  Take my advice and chill the heck out!

I completely agree.  Let’s take our time and do this thing right, folks!

Workout for May 12, 2013:

A) 10-10-10 back extensions / 10-10-10 standing barbell twists / 10-10-10 v-ups / 15 sec - 15 sec - 15 sec ring support

B) 10 minutes hip mobility

C) 12-min AMRAP: Run 400m

D) 5-minutes ankle mobility

E) 30-30-30 double unders rest 1-minute between efforts (scale up as needed)