Deth

I like longer WODs every so often. It makes me think about a how to approach it, so I don’t crash and burn in the middle of it. When I get it right, it’s just one of those things that is a little extra rewarding to me since I struggled with pacing so much early on when we started Crossfit. It’s also good to get the heart rate up for a longer period, sometimes.

Last week’s WOD from Thanksgiving that was posted by street parking was just one of those WODs I that I knew would be longer, so I wanted to do that one. I’d been feeling a little off last week, so I held off on doing it, just in case I was getting sick or something.

The WOD started out with three rounds of rowing 21 calories and then 21 thrusters. It is unclear to me why rowing calories is programmed so often, but they’re fixated on that. I did it, though. I went with the thirty pound dumbbells for the thrusters, and they felt really great at that weight. It’s lighter than I normally use, but I’m doing more than normal and for a longer time. That last set of 21 thrusters I went unbroken. The two previous sets I did sets of 7 with a quick breather in between the sets. I had three minutes of rest to recover, so I thought it was a good idea.

That three minutes of rest was nice, but I learned quickly that it wasn’t enough for a great recovery after redlining it the first round. Once the rest time was up, I had to do three more rounds, but 15 calories and thrusters each this time. Mentally, it was more manageable, and I knew I should go unbroken on the thrusters for this section. I did go unbroken, and it really got my heart rate jacked up. The dry air was reeking havoc on my throat this round as it was really drying up my throat. I started that dry cough in the middle set of thrusters. All in all, this was the best feeling section for me. The three more minutes of rest was welcomed, though.

The rest this time really didn’t do jack shit for recovery at all. My heart rate had only dropped from the mid-170s to around 140. I didn’t really catch my breath until about 2 minutes through the rest this time.

Finally, after that 3 minutes was up it was time to move onto the third and final part. This time it was 3 sets of rowing 9 calories then 9 thrusters. This was the time when I knew that I could and should treat it as a sprint. That’s exactly how I did it. It wasn’t fun or pleasant, but I got through those sets of 9 thrusters quickly, even with the “fran” cough going. The light at the end of the black tunnel here was knowing that once I was doing, I was done with the WOD. I got through it in short order, then died on the floor for a few minutes.

I devoured something for lunch and drank my protein after I gathered the energy to pick my ass up off the floor. Satisfied, then enjoyed the rest of the day feeling satisfied that I pushed myself on this WOD in just the right ways that it didn’t feel good, but I didn’t crash and burn. I do like these simple, longer WODs that are not overly complex.

Music for the WOD was Alice In Chains.