gymnastics!

I think I'm addicted to Crossfit gymnastics.

See, I was a cheerleader from middle school through high school. I wanted to keep cheering in college, but I also wanted to have a job (I KNOW RIGHT? WHAT THE FUCK), soooo that was out. (seriously...COME ON. I was so stupid. To anyone debating a similar decision: you have, quite literally, the ENTIRE REST OF YOUR LIFE to work. You do NOT have the entire rest of your life to participate in organized sports/athletics and worry about getting to practice instead of getting to the restaurant for the night shift.)

Senior year of high school:

Anyway. My squad was OK - not great, but we had a lot of fun and we did some decent stuff. Stunting was, hands down, my favorite - I had a pretty strong stunt group. Second to that was jumps and tumbling. Junior and senior year, it was mandatory for us to take tumbling classes. I never really got my back handspring - probably because my abs were less-than-stellar - but I came pretty damn close, and I loved the shit out of roundoffs and handstands and front handsprings and all kinds of stuff like that. I mean, jumping around on a springfloor? Amazing.

So, once you quit cheerleading and DEFINITELY once you get out of college, your opportunities to do things like handstands and roundoffs are infrequent, at best. In fact, if I just ran out in the backyard at my dad's house and started doing what little tumbling I was able to master, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be invited back, and my family would be making fun of me for years.

But then you do something like join crossfit, and you realize that they have gymnastics-focused classes. Some of them are scary and things I am NOT good at (like rope climbs, muscle-ups and other ring work), but some of them are more tumbling-focused.

And for once, I was among the best in the class. Thursday, when we did roundoffs, Sammy asked if I had been a gymnast. HA. No, not so much - but WOW. It was easily the first time in ten years I'd done that kind of thing. And I forgot just how much fun it is to do goofy things like that.

(and also how it uses muscles in ways that you don't typically use them. I was feelin' it in my back and abs yesterday.)

This week's recaps:

Monday: turkish getups. 12kgx2-3; 16kg...2-3 fails and one success on the right; 2-3 fails on the left. was able to complete a TGU on the left, but my arm kept collapsing before i could get back down. metcon: "Hobbit Hole." AMRAP in 10 minutes of 1 TGU (both sides), 5 strict chest-t0-bar pullups. I used the 12kg KB and "average" band; completed 4 rounds + 2TGU. THIS WAS SO FUCKING HARD.

Tuesday: sumo deadlift, sets of 3. 75, 105, 135, 165, 175. metcon: 5 rounds for time, 10 american KB swings/10 pushups. I used the 1 pood (16kg) KB but I think I could have gone RX'ed at 1.5pood (24kg). Time was just under (or just over?) 5 minutes.

Thursday: gymnastics! bridge-ups, cartwheels, roundoffs. metcon: 5 rounds of short run (about .2 miles)/5 roundoff tuck jumps. Roundoff tuck jumps were beautiful. Run was UUUUUUGLY. Dead last in the metcon by a good 2 minutes.

Friday: front squat. My nemesis. Sets of three. warmup w/bar (45x5); 65, 85, 85, 95, 105, 115 (x2, failed on third rep). Blah. Metcon: 3 rounds of short run, for time, with 1:00 rest between. I really thought I'd kill this metcon, since it's what I like - short fast intervals with recovery - but HOLY SHIT it was hard. time (including 2:00 total rest) was 5:09.