Today Marshall came in inspired and suggested we do this workout:

21, 15, 9 reps of the triplet:

Stiff Leg Deadlifts 115#
Overhead squats 95#
Snatches 55#

and for good measure do 21 situps & 21 pushups in between the rounds.

David 17:45
Keith 20:25
Scott 25
Marshall 30:40

David decided that the 95# bar was fine for snatches and the rest of us decided the 55# bar was fine for both OHS & Snatches. It was hard no matter what.

Joe joined us after the main workout and we got him involved in our skills work which included L-sits, handstands, planches and mannas.

Yesterday evening, after a run through a snatch form warmup, the CFNYC crowd collectively faced off against Fight Gone Bad for the first time.

For those not familiar with the workout, our version was:

3 rounds, one minute per station, with one minute of rest between rounds:

20# db thrusters
75# deadlift high pull
20" box jumps
75# push press
Burpees

One point per rep. Scores weighed in at:

Leo: 335
Court: 310
Scott: 283
Ben: 268
Sean: 234
Marshall: 218

Afterwards, we retired inside for a quick l-sit competition, a look at kipping form, and a basic planche progression.

Our sweaty, happy faces were magic, as four different trainers in the same space came up to ask what the hell we were training for, and to see if they might be able to join the fray. Obviously, we'd be thrilled to have them join the 'fun'; if you've been quietly reading along at home, we'd love to have you, too.

Strictly the WOD, NYC style:

For time:
20 inch Box jump, 50 reps
50 pullups (20 towel)
1.0 pood Kettlebell swing, 50 reps
50 sit-ups
40 pound dumbbell Hang power clean, 50 reps
0.5 mile Run
50 Back extensions

Average time: 36.5 mins

Keith and Court both were both out of town this weekend. I decided to give yesterday's WOD a whirl.

Linda: 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 reps composed of:

Dead lift: 1.5x body weight
Bench press: body weight
Cleans: 0.75x body weight

I scaled back a bit:

Body weight: 165
Dead lift: 205
Bench press: 135
Cleans: 95

Time: 46 mins.

This was the my first experience with Linda so I took it a bit easy (it turned out to be plenty). The dead lift killed me, my the grip was giving out after rounds 6 and 5. This slowed me down to doubles and singles with rests in between. Bench press not a problem- straight through all sets. Cleans the same- they were the easiest part of the work out.

Lot's of fun!

As expected, we finally freaked out enough of the other trainers that the owner of the gym we're using pulled me aside yesterday before class.

Not as expected, he wasn't looking to throw us out; instead, he was rearranging schedules and space assignment to give us a good-sized studio all to ourselves. He's even offered to help us ceiling-mount rings. Paul, you rock.

As that rearranging has yet to happen, however, yesterday we headed to the outside deck for our workout - another rather unused space, especially in 96 degree heat and pea-soup thick humidity.

After warming up through the Burgener o-lift progression, we decided to use the WOD as our workout, though with a slightly longer lunge walk distance.

Five rounds for time of:
45 pound barbell overhead walking lunges, 65 feet
21 burpees

Scott and I duked it out on this one, pouring sweat in buckets, and nearly passing out from the heat. Marshall, a former college rower who'd fallen off the fitness bandwagon, banged through the workout with such grit and determination that I'm absolutely certain he'll be a CFNYC rock star in six months.

Scott: 16:14
Josh: 16:22
Marshall: 31:36

Followed by the official CFNYC warm-down: lying on the floor in a gasping heap.

Today Court, Scott and I decided to play with Cindy's Snatch. It looked like this:

Complete as many rounds in 20 minutes as you can of:
5 one-arm snatches with each arm. 35lbs
10 pushups
15 squats

Keith 11 rounds
Scott 10
Court 9

Brutal. Simply brutal.

It was "Cleaning Day" at Crossfit NYC. We spent our whole hour practicing cleans, front squats and presses/jerks. We started with the bodybars to warm up, then moved to the empty bar. The workout wend something like this:

Clean, Front Squat, Press/Jerk
3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3,....etc.

Started with an empty bar and just kept adding weight until we couldn't do any more. Unfortunately, we ran out of time at 135# just as we were getting into a groove. There was lots of good coaching and advice going around. The form was definitely improving as the hour went on.

Our newest recruit, Calvin, then proceeded to show us his awesome muscle up skills! Rock on, Calvin!

A small team with some new faces in it got to know a new workout tonight that was coined by the group, "Scott's Mom". I won't protest. It's better than "Bitch" which was the first choice for its naming. The workout began with a quick 'warm up' of a:

Squat-jump Tabata interval. (introduced to me by Jason at Crossfit HQ)

Keith: 10
Josh: 15
Ben: 9
John: 10
Court: 12

This was followed by Scott's mom which consists of three rounds of:

Weighted overhead dumbell lunges across the patio (~30 ft)
Turkish Get Ups (5 for each hand, 10 total)
21 Knee's out sit ups (this must have an official name)

Folks chose various weights for the workout.

Keith (15 lb dumbells): total time: 7:46
Josh (15 lb dumbells): total time: 8:38
Ben (12 lb dumbells): total time: 12:24
John (10 lb dumbells): total time: 8:38
Court (12 lb dumbells): total time: 9:02

This was a first go at a new workout. My goal was to expand our repetoire of mid-body fitness excercises. I wish we had also rowed or climbed rope. But, nonetheless I have to say it looked fun. Too short perhaps without the Tabata interval first. Next time it should be for five rounds with 25lb dumbells. I am hoping to hear from everyone how they feel the tomorrow.

In the spirit of 'if your not bleeding your not doing it right', Court rocked a dumbell off his noggin but was unfazed and engaging in casual conversation despite the stream of blood running down his face (pic coming).

At the end of the workout Josh put together a short snatch training for us all. Happy Birthday to Josh who is 26 on Saturday.

You start in downward facing dog. Hands on parallettes and hips up and back in an upside-down "V" position"^". Then you jump your legs forward into an L-sit. Hover for a second and make it look pretty. Then you bring your feet back behind you and jump back into the bottom of a pushup position. Push up then back to downward facing dog. Repeat. Obviously, your feet shouldn't touch the floor as you go forward and back.

You can make it very fancy and smooth and keep the legs and arms straight the whole way, you can try to swing the legs higher than parallel and approach a manna or at least a pike. You can swing back into a planche or handstand if that appeals to you.

To make it easier you can jump the legs forward into a tuck sit if you can't do the L-Sit. You have the floor underneath you for assistance whenever you need it. You can start people just jumping their feet between the parallettes, then jumping them out in front of them. L-sit with one foot on the floor, then the other, then jump the feet back half way, then jump back all the way to the pushup.

For the pushup, you should start with the feet on the floor but if you want a greater challenge, then start with the legs higher on a bench so that you have to jump the feet to the higher position on the way back every time. Also you can do planches, mannas and handstands in there depending on your skill level. The yoga purists can also do an Upward Facing Dog after the pushup and before downward dog....makes it prettier.

You can also do it on rings, phone books, blocks and with the hands on the floor for variations in intensity and stimulus.

I'm hoping it catches on. We are doing what we can to put NYC on the map!

We had three new members join us today. I'm impressed that anyone would be up for this sort of torture at 7am, but this is New York and the city is filled with freaks.

I started off the morning by introducing a new exercise into the Crossfit lexicon that I hope will catch on. I have dubbed it "skinning the dog" because it compliments "skinning the cat" and because it is based on a yoga exercise involving the dreaded dog pose. It made for a good warmup before we got down to business. More on that later...

Court sprung a workout on the crew that hails from the sadists at Crossfit North.

5 rounds for time:

25 Sotz Press
15 situp+medicine ball pass/catch
10 One legged deadlifts with dumbbells.

The Sotz Press. With a snatch width grip rack the bar behind the neck. lower into a squat. From the low position, press the bar overhead. Then stand up with the bar overhead. They used bodybars ranging from 12 to 45#.

Court and I assisted with the medicine ball passes. The victim lies down with the medicine ball and sits up and passes the ball to me or Court, then we toss it back to them and they do another situp and pass. Ivonne used an 8# ball that, according to Court, hurts like hell when it makes contact with your groin. Of course, since the death of chivalry everything is fair game including beaning Ivonne in the face with the medicine ball. Luckily her nose is not as delicate as Court's groin.

The deadlifts were done with 20, 25 and 30# dumbbells. You hold the dbs in each hand and keep a stiff arched back as you lower the weight towards the floor while balancing on one leg. The floating leg goes behind you as you lower down. As you stand you bring the floating leg forward until both legs are side-by-side and you are standing up straight on one leg.

Matt 19:41
Jon 26:39
Ben 27:30
Ivonne 28:20

Great times! It was a grueling workout. But everyone survived.

We finished up the session with some play time on the rings. Mostly "skinning the cat" so that the workout was bookmarked with the two skinning exercises. Heard lots of muttering by the other trainers as we worked out...something about not sharing the dumbbells. I can feel a storm a brewin'!

CrossFit NYC is a bit unusual in the CrossFit family, as it's sort of a gym co-op: classes are led by the members themselves, who rotate through taking charge.

To that end, here's the class leader schedule for the rest of the month. Nearly all of the classes are being led up by two people, but it's the person listed first who wields that day's stopwatch. (I point this out mainly for the benefit of Scott and Court, who are still looking to wield revenge on poor Keith.)

The schedule:

7/12 Court & Keith
7/14 Scott & Josh
7/17 Keith & Court
7/19 Court & Scott
7/21 Josh
7/24 Keith & Josh
7/26 Scott & Court
7/28 Josh & Scott
7/31 Court & Keith

We're hoping to find additional New Yorkers interested in getting certified to lead classes, and also hoping that some already-certified New Yorkers who haven't been able to fit classes into their summer schedules will be able to take a few on here and there as we move ahead.

If you fall into either category, certainly let us know.

Decided to lay down some early benchmark times today, with our first official run through Helen.

Warmed up with practice on deadlift form, working our way up to 135#.

Then on to Helen:

Three rounds for time:
400m Run
21 DB Swings
12 Pull-Ups

Keith: 14:07
Court: 15:07
Scott: 15:12
Henry: 16:12

Keith started with a lighter weight on the swings and worked up with each round (I believe 35#-45#-55#), Court and Scott rocked out with 55# the whole way through, and Henry used 25# to ease into his first Helen ever, putting in a rather impressive starting time.

Post-Helen, we headed out to the deck to try some new lateral and rotational movement drills using a 15# medicine ball, none of which were quite painful enough to seem truly CrossFit-worthy. Then back inside where Keith demonstrated his excellent handstand, and I pioneered a new "straddle planche to high-speed faceplant" technique. Yes, we're really pushing the boundaries here.

Still, we did catch our first muttered "those crazy CrossFit people..." from another trainer as we headed out the door, so it seems we're doing something right.

Tonight I learned that leading a Crossfit workout is not a good way to win friends. I now have four sore yet slightly-more-fit Crossfitters that are plotting revenge on me. I put them through the Crossfit Warmup with pushups instead of dips and in a slightly different order�but close enough to be called a Crossfit Warmup. Then we got down to business with this workout:

3 rounds of 1 minute each of
Burpees (with or without pushups)
Box jumps
Dumbbell swings (25, 35 or 55#)
Dumbbell thrusters (15 or 20#)
I min rest

Score was 1 point per rep.

Court 77+64+63 = 204
Joshua 78+61+48 = 187
Ivonne 55+56+53 = 164
Scott 61+33+41 = 135

� Court and Ivonne didn�t do the pushups and used lighter weights. Scott and Joshua used the heaviest weights and did pushups.

Everyone was totally taxed and swore to get their revenge on me. I am enjoying the few days I have left before the next meeting and getting my affairs in order in case I don�t return.

1. Just added a sidebar link to "What is Fitness?", a great article from CrossFit headquarters that clearly and succinctly lays out what CrossFit training is all about. Any NYC CrossFitter who hasn't seen the article already is strongly encouraged to give it a careful read. If nothing else, it makes great ammunition when trying to explain to friends, family and gym-mates what the hell you're doing.

2. Also, a note about easing in: a fair number of the people who've joined the CFNYC fray so far are brand new to CrossFit, are fired up about getting seriously fit, and have started to follow along with the Workout of the Day individually (found on crossfit.com) between our group classes. All of which is excellent. At the same time, CrossFit, when done at full-out intensity, cripples even world-class athletes. It's brutally hard. So start slow and build up gradually.

In the past few weeks, trainees at several other CF gyms have had serious cases of rhabdomyolysis, or, as we affectionately call it, Uncle Rhabdo. Rhabdomyolysis is basically caused when very large numbers of muscle cells break down, releasing their contents into the blood stream and overwhelming the liver, which temporarily shuts down.

Most cases of Rhabdo are seen in people with severe muscle trauma from car accidents. Occasionally, it's also seen in elite marathon runners who tax their muscles at high levels for hours on end. CrossFit, performed at blazing intensity by people who haven't built up to it, has caused cases of Rhabdo after workouts lasting only about 15 minutes.

Which, oddly enough, stems from the same thing that draws us all to CrossFit in the first place: it's way more effective and time-efficient than anything else out there. Still, like with anything new and hard, start at your level, build from there, and save your liver for CFNYC's other favorite liver-damaging activity instead: after-work drinks.

Not even post-Independence Day hangovers can stop our brave New York Crossfitters, as this morning's class proved.

We blew through Fran, practiced PVC snatch drills, worked on L-sits, and generally attracted bewildered stares from the other personal trainers with whom we share space.

In the next 24 hours or so, we should have up the instructor schedule for the rest of this month, but with two classes down, we're unquestionably rolling ahead.

Woke up and went to our first Crossfit NYC workout. I thought I would just be handling the stopwatch and making useful commments like, "Keep your heels down", "gut it out!", "Get some!", "3 more, don't quit!" But somehow found myself agreeing to do B2B Tabata squats at David Wood's suggestion. In the future I will ignore David Wood and anything he suggests.

Then of course I grabbed some 35# dumbbells for the Deadlift/Pushpress-a-thon. But realized that would be far too light for the deadlifts so I grabbed some 55# for those. Now we were ready to go. After my first 21 deadlifts, I was wondering how I got stuck doing this and Norma got to go around and tell people to keep there heels down. Seems unfair.

Got to turn people upside down for handstand practice then banged out a 26 second L-sit.

I don't why I didn't stop there but I suddenly remembered Alvaro Romano was in town doing a Ginnastica Natural seminar. It's a movement system that incorporates, jiu-jitsu movements, yoga, animal forms and other weirdness. It is sort of like Scott Sonnen's body flow stuff if you've seen that. Anyway, two hours of that and I was a sweaty mess.

Now it's time for a nap. Can't wait for the next Crossfit Gettogether.

Keith

We're off and running. This morning at 9:00am, CFNYC officially launched, with an astounding 14 people at the first class.

We started the day with a look at squat form, practicing air-squats and PVC overhead squats, then launched into a round of Tabata squats (with a few masochists going bottom-to-bottom for 'style points').

Then onto the workout itself, which, due to the unexpectedly large turnout, was:

21-15-9, for time:
Dumbell Deadlift
Push Press

The times:

2:22 Henry
2:43 Ivonne
2:49 Joe F
3:08 Melinda
3:18 Allison
3:29 Zoey
3:54 Court
4:28 Tariq
4:46 Dave
4:50 Scott
4:53 Keith
5:07 Leo

The weights varied quite a bit, with some starting at 12# and working on their form, and others (most of those at the longer end of the spectrum) using 45# and working to fall-on-the-floor exhaustion.

Afterwards, people rotated through a couple of skill practice stations, playing around with handstands and handstand pushups, L-sits, and pullup kipping.

Apparently having too much fun to leave, we then played around with Tariq's rings, talked shop, and generally ran well over our allotted time slot.

With the aid of morning coffee, we'll be at it again this Tuesday morning at 7:00am. Come on by.