While we are trying to find a new place to hold our classes, I will be offering private and group sessions by appointment. I can hold sessions in the park, at a gym in midtown or at your home. Email me at kwittesq@gmail.com for prices if you are interested.

Surprisingly small turnout today. Justin, Leslie and Evan who was visiting from Chicago.

We started with the classic tabata squat and run warmup.

The workout was

3 rounds for time of:
250m run
21 pullup burpees - Do a burpee under a pullup bar and jump into a pullup.

Justin 12:29
Leslie 13:10
Evan 13:11

I was officiating.

As it says up top, our motto here is "until they kick us out", and it seems we've, once again, lived up to that billing.

Despite sharing space with people literally punching each other in the face, the friendly folks at Five Points had some 'concerns' about the insurance issues involved in letting us work out there.

So, until further notice, classes at Five Points are suspended. Sunday workouts in Central Park will continue apace.

Keith and I are looking for our next home; by now, after being evicted from countless other spots, we know the drill.

Keith started out the evening by showing us all how very, very poor our flexibility is, field-testing a Crossfit Yoga sequence he's pulling together for the CF Journal.

Then, sweaty but limbered up, we took on a surprisingly brutal little workout, The Hundreds:

10 sets of 10 reps each:
Kettlebell Swings
Burpees

It brought several of us as close to seeing Pukie as we'd been in months, including Max who, striding the fine line between impressive and insane, did the workout with a 2 pood 'bell.

I want my mommy.

A 3-2-2-2-1-1-1-.....-1 of thrusters took us downstairs for a change, where the kickboxers we share space with watched confused as we pushed around ever higher amounts of weight. We each dropped out of the rotation when we hit our relative max'es, eventually leaving just David and Justin alone for the last few rounds, with David barely edging Justin out in the end.

After, we balanced things out with a pullup ladder, and a one-minute jackknife challenge.

When I left my apartment this morning the rain was coming down, so I turned around and went back home. We'll try the park again next week.

Stay dry.

I suppose we could have made an effort to do the WOD as prescribed today since there were only 4 of us and 2 rowers and 2 benches. However, I thought it would be fun to modify the WOD so we could all suffer at the same time. We warmed up with situps, back extensions and gluteham situps.

For time:

30 Kettlebell Swings
50 Pushups
40 Kettlebell Swings
40 Pushups
50 Kettlebell Swings
30 Pushups

Alex 11:40 w/ 1 pood KB
Keith 13:14 w/ 1.5 pood KB
Dan 14:00 w/ 1 pood KB
Harry 15:16 w/ .75 pood KB

That was really hard. Ouch! We finished with some 20lb weighted pullups.

If the Sun is out, we will be in the park tomorrow. If it's raining, then you can all sleep in.

We started with 500m Rows to warmup. Then we did the Burgener warmup. We also added some snatch skills. I can't remember what this exercise is called but we started from the full extension point on our toes with our shoulders in our ears and then tried to jump into the bottom of the OHS. Followed with some hang snatches.

We kept it simple and did Jeremy: For time do 21-15-9reps of OHS & burpees. Instead of pvc pipes we did it with empty bars.

Max & I did it in about 5:07. Everybody finished shortly thereafter.

Then we did some work on squats, handstands, pullups, ring dips and muscle ups. Fun!

We stuck with the 'official' WOD today: as many rounds possible in twenty minutes of

95 pound squat clean, 10 reps
10 Dips

Not entirely sure the range of rounds achieved, but special commendation to Leslie and Harry who, in switching to a slightly lighter bar, ended up with one featuring knurling so intense it took out chunks of both of their hands.

Today's bonus work: a run through our favorite ring push-up variations. By tomorrow, we won't even be able to shampoo our own hair.

Today's park workout was fun. We had 9 people and did a bunch of fun feats of strength.

First, we did a circuit of 12, 9, 6 reps of the following:

Abmat Situps
Weighted jumprope
Slam Ball
Kettlebell swings
15# DB Thrusters
Pullups
Ring Dips
Handstand Pushups

Then we had races:
Take a D-Ball and throw it then chase it for 100 feet. Do 25 bench jumps and throw/chase the D-Ball back.

Then we had 1.5 pood Kettlebell tosses for distance.

Then 25lb D-Ball tosses over a high pullup bar for one minute.

Can't wait until next week.

Unfortunately, the CrossFit Mobile Command Unit might not be up to the task of hauling around 70lbs of equipment. It's already showing signs of wear and tear after only one day.

"This workout makes you want to go home and update your will" says Dan. I couldn't agree more.

For time:
25 Manmakers. Holding a pair of dumbbells, jumpback and do a pushup. Do a row with each arm. Jump forward and clean the weight to the shoulders, then do a thruster.

25 Turkish GetUps with each arm.

25 Step ups onto a bench box holding the dumbbells.

25 Windmills with each arm. With a dumbbell in each arm stand with the legs shoulder width apart. Press the right arm straight up and turn the toes 45 degrees to the left. Then while keeping the left leg straight and looking up at the right hand, hinge at the hip lower your left dumbbell to touch the floor next to your left big toe and then stand back up.

22:09 Keith w/ 25# Had to change into workout clothes during the workout.

29:06 Dan w/ 15# (started with 25)
30:00 Justin w/ 25# (started with 30)
32:14 Harry only up to the stepups w/ 10# (started with 20)
33:44 Leslie w/ 20# (started with 15)

Great work! See you in the park tomorrow.

Today we started with some pvc snatches a la the Burgener warmup. Then we did what Dan John calls "The Exercise." Very simple: power snatch to overhead squat, repeat. I didn't quite go as well as I had hoped considering we had 7 people and 2 bars. You can never practice oly lifts enough.

So we went on to do our workout:

3 rounds:

1 min right handed wall ball shots
1 min left handed wall ball shots
1 min box jumps
1 PVC snatches
1 min rest

We worked on some double unders and pullups for a while at the end.

After a PVC O-lift warmup, we returned to a CFNYC classic:

21-15-9
Thruster
KB Swings
Burpees

The twist: waaaaay too much weight on the thrusters and swings. As in, up to 75% of bodyweight on both (which I suffered through). Times ranged from a blazing 9:40 to an exceedingly respectable 23:45, especially considering the truly stupid amount of weight we were throwing around.

The plan was to have teams of two competing against each other for ultimate domination. Ultimately, I think the plan fell apart due to a minor flaw in the execution and some mismatched teams.

Here was what I envisioned:

5 teams of two.

4 stations: assisted pullups, assisted dips, hoover ball (medicine ball catch using a tree branch as the net) and standing guard situps (a la jiu jitsu - A jumps on B, A crosses his ankles behind B's back, A does situp going all the way back and touching the floor with his hand and then sitting all the way up and reaching over B's shoulder and touching him on the back).

25 reps each person at each station.

All the teams do a short sprint to the stations, the one team that is last to has to do 25 burpees each.

A team that finishes their station can go bump another team from a different station. The team that gets bumped has to finish any remaining reps as burpees before going to another station.

After the teams have completed all four stations, the two teammates will do a short sprint race to determine which of the two is the ultimate winner.

It made sense when I thought it up. Unfortunately, I had 5 stations today. The extra station was assisted parallette handstands for 25 seconds. That meant that there were less burpees for people. Oh well! Also the guard situps were not well received. You really need two teammates of equal size and strength and they have to be practiced beforehand. Apparently, they don't come naturally. I like them, so I'll keep torturing people with them until they come naturally to everyone.

Nonetheless, we all got good and sweaty and had fun with our teammates.

Then Josh decided we needed something a little more focused, so we did another workout of 5 rounds: 200m (ish) run and 20 squats. That cooked us good.

Then it was time to play on the rings doing an L-sit competition and skin-the-cats. Brian was there to perform levers and back levers and other cool stuff.

Given today's great park workout (which I'll allow Keith to describe, as he dreamt it up), and strong popular demand, for the rest of the summer, we'll be holding Sunday 10:00am classes in Central Park each and every week.

As always, cost is free dollars, toys are appreciated (medicine balls, rings, etc.), and brunch is likely (though optionally) to follow.

We tackled this fun workout today known as "The Bear."

Take a barbell and do the following complex: clean, front squat, push press, lower behind the neck, back squat, push press from behind the neck and lower to the floor. That's one rep.

We started with 3 reps and an empty bar. We added ten pounds every time. Then after a while we were just doing singles. Justin and I made it up to 165lbs. Not bad for a days work. Josh, Drew, Harry & Leslie also wrestled with the Bear and came out on top.

...or so the saying goes. Tonight was a family affair. We had brothers, husbands and wives, students and teachers. Huge turnout--around 10 people. So we warmed up with some ohsquats, pushups and knees to elbows.

The workout was inspired by Coach RutMan a/k/a the King of Dumbbells. Perfect for a large group of go-getters.

For time do
10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 reps with each hand of the following:
one-hand hang clean & jerk
one-hand overhead squat
one-hand hang snatch

Wow! Talk about pain...er, I mean fun! Some people went with light weights, some people did all the lifts from the floor. Some people made up new moves. Overall it was a badass workout.

Times ranged from 18:53 to 33:44

I used a 30lb DB and finished in 20:19. I was too overwhelmed to write down who did what weight and what time. Please post your load and time to the comments.

Here are the times to choose from:
18:53
18:54
20:19
21:05
22:12
22:16
23:47
26:16
27:21
29:10
33:44

There might be an extra time in there because I might have accidentally hit the button when I thought someone was done or I got a late hit...don't remember, I was wiped out.

On another note...Sunday will be a park workout provided it doesn't rain. :) 10am, same place. I am planning a "fun" workout. :)

We warmed up with some handstands and one-arm handstand rows. Then decided to do a little Diane-esque workout.

For time:
21, 15, 9 reps
Deadlifts
Pushups

Kris: 65# DL & modified pushups with hands on a bench. 7:35
Drew: 135# DL & regular pushups. 7:33
Josh: 155# DL & Handstand pushups. 7:20
Keith: 185# DL & regular pushups. 6:24

Played with the rope climb, ring supports and levers.

Fun stuff.