workout Archives - WHOA lansi

Tag: workout

August in Instagram

On August 31, 2013

It’s vacation time! Woohoo! I feel like I’ve been waiting for this all summer and it’s finally here. I don’t usually do scheduled posts, but I didn’t want to miss out on an August Recap! When this posts we will hopefully be having a glorious time at a Wedding in Vancouver. Here’s what we got up to this month:

1. I’m always cooking (or at least it feels that way!) This recipe was fantastic! Paleo pork burgers topped with yam noodles. You can NEVER go wrong with yam noodles. I also made yam chips by deep frying yams in bacon fat. Yum!
2. I already posted about Color Me Rad, but it was seriously fun!
3. I went out to Columbia Lake and hung out with my folks. I love that spot.
4. N was away for a few weeks. I hated it, so we went for brunch at one of my favourite restaurants, Ox and Angela, to celebrate his return.
5. We went backpacking along Lake Minnewanka with some friends. We ran into bears and it was terrifying, but we made it out alive. It was a fun trip overall!
6. We experimented with a new paleo crust from one of my new cookbooks, Gather. It was delicious.
7. Fitness Friday is still happening every Friday. It makes me incredibly happy to see how much stronger all these people are getting. Our little group is growing and it’s amazing!
8. We hiked Grizzly Peak with T. It was a wonderful way to spend a sunny Saturday.
9. Mom treated me to a manicure and my first pedicure. I could definitely get addicted to having pretty nails!

Enjoy the long weekend! Excuse me while I dance the night away! We’ll be on the road tomorrow exploring the Pacific Coast Highway on our way to Portland. I can’t wait!

Color Me Rad

By whoalansi

On August 19, 2013

In Uncategorized

Fun runs seem to be popping up all over the place lately. I can’t seem to login to Instagram on the weekend without coming across at least one photo from some kind of charity or fun run. It’s great! I love to see people getting out, moving around, and getting healthy.

A few friends and I signed up for Color Me Rad this year. You dress in as much white as you can and run 5 km while people throw packages of corn starch dye at you. It was originally scheduled for July Long Weekend, but due to the flooding it got rescheduled to August Long and a lot of my friends couldn’t participate.

Luckily, Color Me Rad is an easily transferable race, so a few other friends took their places. We met at Crowfoot LRT Station on Saturday morning and took the shuttle bus out to Canada Olympic Park for the run. There were so many people up there. It was great to see everyone dressed up and running around having a great time.

At the start line we were given our first colour bombs, which we proceeded to throw at each other. We couldn’t start things off with pristine white shirts. The race itself was up and down the hills and trails at the Park. It was a mix of pavement and trail running, but all in all a fairly easy course. We weren’t with many actual runners so we walked a lot of the hills and just took our time, laughing at each other as we got more and more covered in colours.

As we rounded the last corner, they gave everyone one last colour bomb to use however they wanted. Of course, we saved ours and dumped colour all over each other at the finish area.

I really enjoyed the race. It was lighthearted and easy so there was no pressure running-wise. It was advertised as a 5 km, but I’d give it 3 km at most. Definitely manageable for all fitness levels. We got a lot of great photos and laughed a lot. If you have the opportunity to do Color Me Rad or some other colour run, I would definitely go for it. If you’re worried about the colour dying your hair (like I was), coconut oil seemed to keep the colour out and had the added bonus of leaving my hair super soft after I washed it.

Happy Running!

June Burpee Challenge

By whoalansi

On May 31, 2013

In Uncategorized

I’ve talked a bit about the CrossFit-style workouts I organize every week at work in the past. It’s grown quite a bit since I first started it, which makes me so excited. I love that my work lets me run these Fitness Friday workouts every week. They’re really no longer than a smoke break and are significantly more healthy. It’s also expanded to include a Yoga practice what happens a few times a week already. I haven’t checked that out yet since it happens at the same time as Fitness Friday, but I definitely would like to in the future.

For June, I’ve also decided to put a Burpee Challenge out there. I sent this out not only to those on the Fitness Friday distribution, but also to our All Staff distribution list. Fitness Friday is still a relatively small group of us and I wanted to remind everyone that they are all welcome to join us anytime and also challenge them to a month of burpees. Anyone can do burpees! They’re tough, but easily modifiable to suit any level of fitness.

The challenge started today. Yes, I realize that it’s technically still May, but since this challenge is happening with coworkers, I thought it made more sense to start it on a workday. So May 31 it is. We’re starting at 5 burpees today. From there, we’ll be adding one burpee a day until June 30. That means on June 30 we’ll be doing 35 burpees. It’s pretty simple.

I’ve also added that you can break them up into sets. So when they numbers get higher, everyone can still get them done. Obviously, your fitness will improve more from doing them all in one go, but that can be a bit intimidating. I figure doing them at all is a step in the right direction, so I wanted to make it attainable.

Anyone reading this blog is also more than welcome to join us in this Burpee Challenge as well! I’ve already challenged N to it.

If you’re not sure what a burpee is, you can check out the video below. Emad’s burpees could use some work, especially towards the end, but mine are mostly ok.

The main rules are that your chest needs to touch the floor and you need to jump up at the end. In the video, I’m always jumping my feet forwards and back, but you don’t have to. You can step forwards and backwards and it still counts. You also don’t have to do a push up. You can get down the floor and then worm your way back up. Check You Tube for more variations. There are plenty out there.

https://www.youtube.com/v/l2gEHGklvMA?version=3&f=user_uploads&c=google-webdrive-0&app=youtube_gdata

I made a little calendar that makes it a bit easier to understand how the challenge works. Check it out if you’re interested and leave a comment if you’d like to participate!

Have a great weekend and Happy Burpee Month!

Chest to Bar Pull Ups

By whoalansi

On April 5, 2013

In Uncategorized

I was going to hold off on posting about CrossFit until the Open was over. N took some photos of the WOD on Sunday and I’m trying not to come off as too CrossFit obsessed (although I am, I know).

Open workout 13.5 was announced last night though and I did it tonight. One of the movements is Chest to Bar Pull Ups. I’ve never attempted a Chest to Bar Pull Up. I currently can do strict pull ups, but I haven’t figured out kipping and I definitely haven’t figured out Butterflies. Since I didn’t have time to learn either of these things tonight before attempting 13.5, I did whatever I could to get my chest up to the bar, as many times as possible. This mostly involved a lot of leg swing, hip drive, and sheer determination.

We all had a pretty good laugh about my “technique” (or lack-there-of) afterwards. So now there are kipping pull ups, butterfly pull ups, and my method: Alanna pull ups. I got one of the coaches to video an example of what this looks like so I could share.

Enjoy, have a laugh, and, if you’re doing 13.5, GOOD LUCK!

13.2

By whoalansi

On March 19, 2013

In Uncategorized

I tried to take a little break from the fitness talk, but with the 13.3 announcement coming up tomorrow at 5 pm PST I figured it was time for a little update.

We didn’t go skiing the Sunday of 13.1 so I redid the workout. I’m so happy I did because the snatches that had been nearly impossible that Thursday were suddenly so much easier. I went from 107 reps to 120 reps, which was a goal I didn’t expect to attain.

My ranking after 13.1
Canada West vs The World

My first thoughts when they announced 13.2 on Wednesday night were, “It looks simple. That definitely means it’s going to hurt a lot.”. That was a pretty accurate assessment.

Workout 13.2
AMRAP 10 min
5 shoulder to overhead (115#/75#)
10 deadlifts (115#/75#)
15 box jumps (24″/20″)

This was one of those workouts that forces you to question any thoughts you may have had about how strong your cardio is. I’ve always done well at cardio-based CrossFit WODs and this one destroyed me. After ten minutes, I was literally sprawled on the floor wondering why I’d put myself through that. One of the coaches came over to high five me and said something about how he guessed I’d be re-doing it Sunday. I didn’t understand what he meant at first since I had no idea about the number of reps that I’d done.

It turns out that I’d done 197 reps. Obviously I was going to have a hard time accepting that as my final score.

We went skiing on Saturday at Lake Louise, so I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel on Sunday. I put on my compression socks though and hoped my legs wouldn’t be too sore. N and I both knew I was going to try for 200 reps.

I went in the second heat this time and watching the others do this WOD again made me wonder what was wrong with me. The look of pain of their faces had me second guessing my decision to do it over. What if I didn’t get a better score? What if I did the whole WOD over again and nothing changed? I had to try anyway. At least I’d know I’d be getting a good work out in.

I beat my score by 12 reps. It hurt just as much and I ended the workout flat on my back again, but at least I got over that 200 mark. I know I would have been really disappointed if I hadn’t redone it.

The best part of this whole story is probably the fact that I almost didn’t end up submitting my score. I watched one of my coaches do it (297 reps! Insane!) and then had to run home to shower and get ready to head to N’s parents’ for dinner. It was only once I got there and was showing him the video of my coach doing part of it that I realized I hadn’t actually submitted my new score.

I added my score to the website from my iPhone with 38 minutes to spare. Fewf!

Tomorrow they announce 13.3 and I’m excited to watch the showdown and see what’s in store for me this week. I’m betting on pull ups. There’s got to be some pull ups coming up somewhere.

Until then, I’ve been having some fun on the Reebok and CrossFit websites. You can customize your own CrossFit shoe! I was bored the other day so this is what I came up with.

Again Faster

By whoalansi

On March 8, 2013

In Uncategorized

I’ve been on a CrossFit posting kick lately. I apologize. This blog really isn’t going to be only about Fitness and CrossFit. It’s just a really exciting time for CrossFit right now! Don’t worry, I’ve got some recipes and photos and non fitness things coming.

The first CrossFit Open WOD (13.1) was announced on Wednesday and my first reaction was “Holy #$%*!”. Everyone had been dreading another rendition of last years 7 min of burpees or a snatch ladder. Those were the first two work outs of the Open last year: 12.1 and 12.2. Well, CrossFit did us one better and combined those two WODs to create a beast of a workout.

Workout 13.1

17 minute AMRAP of:
Round 1 – 40 Burpees
30 Snatch, 75 / 45 lbs
Round 2 – 30 Burpees
30 Snatch, 135 / 75 lbs
Round 3 – 20 Burpees
30 Snatch, 165 / 100 lbs
Round 4 – 10 burpees
Max rep Snatch, 210 / 120 lbs

I tuned in right at 6 pm to watch Scott Panchik and Dan Bailey go head to head in this workout right after it was announced. It was intense. If you missed it, this is the only video I can currently find.

Julie Foucher (the second fittest female in the games last year) also did a great demo of the workout. She is a pretty incredible lady. She’s toned down her training this year to focus on Med School and she still managed to score 195 reps. That’s nuts.

I did the Workout last night. I was pretty nervous and excited before it. I haven’t really done many snatches since last July so I’d practiced a few on Wednesday night, but I still wasn’t super confident about that 75 lb snatch.

I scored 107 reps. I’m pretty proud of myself. I did really well on the first Round. A 45 lb snatch isn’t that heavy, but after 40 burpees it was significantly harder than usual. I finished that round in 6:27 and moved on to 30 burpees. That also went pretty well so I had plenty of time for the next set of snatches. I failed my first 3 snatches at 75 lbs. It was a bit discouraging. The best thing about CrossFit is that you always have a cheering section to get you going. All I could hear was “You can do it. You’re doing amazing! You’re so close, just get under that bar!”. On my fourth try, I finally got a successful rep. The next 5 or so minutes was a mixture of successful reps and failed reps. I got down to the last minute and got 2 reps in. With 10 seconds left, I tried for another, but just couldn’t lock out my arms at the top so I ended with 7 snatches. I got high fives all around and took my turn to cheer on the next heat. It was a pretty cool experience.

Once I was able to breath again, I knew I wanted to try the workout again. They’re doing it on Sunday, so if we don’t go skiing I may just have to try again. I know I can get those snatches now!

My score is officially up on the website, which is pretty cool. I will definitely move down in the standings, but for a time I was in the top 100 in Western Canada, so I’ll just focus on that for now.

I obviously am not going to qualify for Regionals or the Games, but it was great to participate. I’m looking forward to the next WOD and hoping it doesn’t include things I can’t manage yet! Fingers crossed!

CrossFit Open Games

By whoalansi

On March 5, 2013

In Uncategorized

I went to CrossFit last night for a super cardio-based WOD. It was awesome and painful at the same time. I was the fastest of all the girls (just barely!) and afterwards, as we were stretching (or lying on the floor trying to recover), talk turned to who was going to participate in the Open this coming week. All of the girls said yes except me. I hadn’t decided yet, I told them.

It’s just for fun! You’ll get to see where you’re at and where you stack up next to everyone else. You may even surprise yourself. You did great today. You’ll probably do better than the rest of us, they continued.

I admitted that I’d gotten 3/4 of the way through the Online Registration. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one. They’d all done that at first too. They offered a few more words of encouragement before I headed home to register.

So I guess that’s it. I guess I’m doing the open this year. I really don’t expect to advance past the first workout (13.1), but it’ll be fun to be part of it. I’m pretty sure the gym is going to be packed on Thursday night. The WOD gets announced tomorrow so my box is doing it Thursday and Sunday. You have until Sunday night at 5 pm PST to submit your score. It should be interesting. I created a profile online and convinced a friend to do it as well. So it’s happening. It should be fun!

I’ve been catching up on CrossFit news and videos. This one is pretty awesome. Check it out.

Forging Elite Fitness

By whoalansi

On March 1, 2013

In Uncategorized

I’ve been doing CrossFit workouts sporadically for the last year and half. I used to just go to the website, write down the Workout of the Day (WOD), and do it at the YMCA after work. Sometimes I’d do it with friends, but it was never really more than once a week.

This summer I started going to a friend’s gym in his garage. I still was mostly running and only going about once a week, but I really loved it. Sadly, CrossFit is really expensive, so I went back to running for most of the fall.

You might be asking yourself what is CrossFit ?

“CrossFit is an effective way to get fit. Anyone can do it. It is a fitness program that combines a wide variety of functional movements into a timed or scored workout. We do pull-ups, squats, push-ups, weightlifting, gymnastics, running, rowing, and a host of other movements. Always varied, always changing, and always producing results. Kids, cops, firefighters, soccer moms, Navy SEALS, and grandmas all do CrossFit.” (CrossFit.com)

Last month, I got the opportunity to try out Airdrie CrossFit Edge for six months. I’ve been trying to go three times a week and so far it’s been great. I love the competitive nature of it and the fact that I always feel like I’ve worked hard. I used to waste a lot of time at the gym. I’d spend longer working out, but wasn’t as effective so I wasn’t getting anywhere.

Anyway, the CrossFit games are coming up. I watched a lot of the Games last year and they’re so inspiring. These athletes are incredible! I just love Camile Leblanc-Bazinet. Seriously, check her out. She just blows through that WOD after three days of intense work outs; it’s so beautiful! (Plus she’s French Canadian, adorable, and gorgeous – love her!)

In order to get to the games, you have to qualify. The process starts with the CrossFit Games Open, which anyone can enter. A lot of people at my box are doing it and they tried to convince me to sign up yesterday. If I go next Thursday, I’ll be doing the WOD anyway. Their argument is that if I register for the open, I’ll get to see how I compare to everyone else who does it. It costs $20 to register. I’m sure I won’t make it very far, but it might be interesting to see where I stand. I’m still undecided, however.

What do you think, blogger world? Should I register?

WHOA lansi

francophile, oenophile, logophile, turophile

Tag: workout

August in Instagram

Color Me Rad

June Burpee Challenge

Chest to Bar Pull Ups

13.2

Again Faster

Workout 13.1

CrossFit Open Games

Forging Elite Fitness

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