Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Back to Leiden

Before hopping on the 1:00 train back to Holland, I went back to the box with Rob to watch him train another class. It was early, and I was SORE. My body has definitely taken a beating these past few days, and I’m sure all of the train travel hasn’t helped. However, not to be denied, Rob convinced me to join him and his buddy Stefan in one last workout before my trip home. Thankfully, for me, there wasn’t much legs involved. There was, however, more muscle ups. Though I typically would not do an exercise on back to back days, I felt compelled to bend to my host’s wishes and not bitch out.

The Workout:

Part 1 - Establish a 1 repetition max Turkish Getup with your weak arm.

This was fun. We started warming up for control, palming various medicine balls and light kettlebells. I worked up to 24 kg without using the handle. Stefan was able to do the same. Rob, Stefan, and I were all able to perform a repetition with the 32 kg kettlebell as well, the heaviest they currently have at Ansbach. They do, however, have a plate loaded dumbbell. So, I continued up to 42 and, finally, 47 kg before stopping. With my left arm, this was definitely a PR. 47 kg (103.4 lb) is much heavier than I’ve ever been able to do.

Part 2 – 5 rounds for time:

20 double under

10 handstand pushup

5 muscle up

Again, the handstand pushups were the weakness. I felt better than when I did them on Sunday, but still with plenty of room to improve. The last round I had to break the 10 repetitions into 4 sets. I still managed to finish in a decent time, 11:33, but sub 10:00 is definitely the goal here. Stefan finished in 15:28, Rob in 17:28. This gap is due mostly to the double unders, a skill they’ve just started to work on.

After grabbing some lunch with Rob, I was back on the train and heading home. Again, I was overwhelmed by the hospitality and friendliness of the people I stayed with. Rob and Susie were incredible hosts, going above and beyond anything I could have expected. As with Alex in Berlin, and Zdenek & Keri in Prague, I left feeling extremely lucky to have met them.

Here are my pictures from the weekend.

Berlin 2009

Prague

Crossfit Ansbach

2 comments:

  1. Blair,

    thanks for coming down to visit us. Hopefully you will have time to drop by again. Ansbach is pretty much in the mittle of europe. We will definetly be working on the technique and clock watching!

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  2. Hi Blair,

    I stumbeld upon this site thru the Evolve Your Fitness blog.

    I work in Leiden and do Crossfit too. I see you train olympic weightlifting at L.K.V. I have been looking into that gym because they have bumpers and my gym has not.

    Would it be possible to train with you and Hank? I have been to the Burgner weightlifing cert in Northern-Irland this summer and realy want to continue to train these lifts.

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