Mel - That is amazing! I always scout the fitness section at TJ Maxx but I've yet to see medicine balls.

One amazing thing though is I went to 4 stores yesterday looking for Medicine balls and most of them had something even if it wasn't what I was looking for but all of them had kettlebells!! I guess I get excited about kettlebells because when I first started buying them, not many stores had them.

Last night, I did fake throws with a 20 lb kettlebell and got pretty winded. With the kettlebell I can throw it in the air a few inches and catch it without fear of hurting myself or the floor (well the floor is concrete). This morning, I went on a run and its getting easier. Funny thing is I did 2 miles, first mile was mostly running, some walking and it took me 14:30 to do the first mile. The second mile was all walk/run intervals and it took me 13:50 to do the second mile. Good news is that I'm getting faster, bad news is I'm slow

Nelie, cool that you found one you like! I had no idea they cost $50, but I'm not surprised, after looking up kettlebell prices. I definitely mean to try the sand/basketball trick...I wonder if I could put some lead fishing weights in there, to make a heavier one.

Dixie, have fun with the skating! It's my fave exercise, since it doesn't seem like a workout, but it always is.

Everybody else, . I need some caffeine, then I have to get ready for my CF class. Only 3 classes left! (Please let there be somebody else there, to distract the trainer. She's way too evil when she's got just me to put all her focus on!) The boy is supposed to go with me today. He wants to play on the ropes and such while I'm doing my class, and the trainer said it was cool. I love that about CF...people bring their kids and nobody freaks about them romping around, being kids.

I love Tuesday Morning! (the store, not the day ) There is one near my niece's house in Freeport, ME - along with a zillion outlet stores.

Not much new.WIth DH away, I get into a bad habit of leaving the laptop at the kitchen table - spending too much time on it.

And that's where I am, and I really need to be in the shower.

Utica, Ohio. Yet another great ice cream town. We seem to have so many and I have way to much experience with most of them. But no Dixied, I'm not from Utica. Other side of the state. Like, think of the imaginary state line between Ohio and Indiana. That's where I'm from. As a matter of fact, my grandparents farm was on both sides of the state. My father went to high school in Ohio and my aunt and uncle went to high school in Indiana. Go figure.

Recovery day for me at the gym. I'm finding that my workouts are becoming full body strength training four days a week with recovery days in between. It's the functional training that is requiring this. I'm not losing strength and I can see where areas of my body are improving as well. So, I'll call it a success and keep learning. It's nice to have the recovery days to explore some more yoga moves or maybe do that little extra cardio outside on my bike since the weather is breaking.

Have a great afternoon everyone.

Wow, I'm behind on this thread... I was just reading all the cool things that you guys are doing and I feel like my Weider workouts need some spice! I've do a lot more on my exercise ball now and added in some dumbell work this past week, so I need to start researching what I'm going to add in next. I like the kettleball idea, but don't yet know how to use one. I'll read back through some of these threads for some inspiration! :-) You guys are wearing me out just reading them!

Hope everyone has a good day!

You gotta love a town with an Ice Cream Festival. (Shameless Plug: Anyone is the area should check out the Ice Cream Festival Memorial Day Weekend at the Old Mill in Utica, OH)

I'm from the opposite border of Ohio. I'm actually from Parkersburg, WV/Marietta, OH. Not quite as imaginary a line, since it's divided by the Ohio River. Must have been nice to have a choice of schools. But state taxes must be a pain.

Hey peeps. CF class was cancelled yesterday morning. The trainer called me at 8:15, luckily I checked messages before I left...she accidentally scheduled a doctor appt for her boy at 9 am on a Tuesday...the class is new to her, so she didn't think about it when setting up her appt, lol. NBD, but my boy was disappointed, since he'd gotten up early and was excited to see the gym. I was disappointed, because I got up at 6am and ate fish and broccoli for breakfast, so I wouldn't run out of gas for the workout. blech! We'll try again Thursday.

Yesterday was supposed to be kettlebell swing and rope climb for new skills, so we get to make that up Thursday. Rope climb. More like, "okay, pull"...(me) "I did" (still on the floor), lol. Last time I climbed a rope, I was in 6th grade. I was the only girl who ever made it to the top, but that was about 80 pounds ago, lol. Well, it will be entertaining, at least! I'm looking forward to learning the KB swing, though. I've tried those some with a dumbbell, but probably with bad form, so I didn't use much weight.

In the meantime, I've been practicing my pull-ups, or pull-up attempts. My grip is getting stronger, or my hands are getting numb to the pain, whichever...I can hang on a little longer. I think I'm doing really good with at least one foot on a box, but with no box, it's still a struggle.

I might put some dead hang pull-ups into my warm-up, since it seems it will be a while before I'm strong enough to do this kipping pull-up thing. If my trainer will let me, I could do some dead hang practice with the ginormous rubber band (or two), just to keep on building my strength for the pull. It's got to be better than all this business of trying to kip, not being able to, and never pulling myself over the bar, right? I figure, I can practice both, maybe switch them out in my warm-up, but at least if I have enough band assistance I can keep working those muscles. If she doesn't like that idea, I'll just have to hit the Y for the assisted machine and keep working on it there.

Whatever I did to my right shoulder (Saturday I think I pulled something during kipping pull-up practice at CF) is tweaking on cleans and snatches. Well, the good news is, I'm learning to use my freaking hip extension to get that bar moving, because any pulling with my arms is like a jab with a knife...that's better than a trainer to keep me legit on the form!I've got some swedish miracle linament stuff that I use for the dogs, that I'll try rubbing in there today. It has dmso in it, which makes me queasy, but since I'm home today, it will merely be an annoyance, so I'll see if it can help speed the healing along.

Lydia, I know what you're saying about the functional fitness moves. It's hard to do those without working every frickin' muscle in your body. That's all good, but cuts down on the fun BB lifting opportunities. I'm still trying to figure how to sneak in some totally useless isolation lifting, just for fun, but CF, even the baby workouts, kicks my butt all the time, and I'm afraid of not being 100% recovered for the next class.

Shannon, I'll give you the skinny on all the kettlebell swing cues after my next class, and dig up some video, so that might help you get started with the KB. Of course, you can do more than swings with them, I'm sure, probably anything you can do with a dumbbell, and vice versa, so you can use a DB if you don't own a kettlebell.

Pat and Dixie and Mel and Nelie, anybody I forgot, ! Hope you're all getting the good workouts in! Nelie, meant to say, my nephew has the same experience, though he's faster than both of us (I have about the same speed for a mile run, or a little slower than yours, so we could start a club, lol)...when my nephew does alternating running (as fast as he can) and walking when he gets out of breath, his mile time is faster than if he just runs the whole mile. He did a 5K like that last year, and made it in under 30 mins, I think...the punk! Of course, he's 6'5" and his legs are about a mile long!

Cheryl, I'm sorry to hear about your shoulder. I hope it begins to feel better with a little forced rest by good form. I can't believe that you ate fish and broccoli for breakfast. Wow. You got me beat! Nothing but oatmeal porridge before 11:00am.

I had to reschedule my workout for tomorrow morning. I'm going to bed early tonight. Today's workout was less than stellar. I think I just needed a little more recovery time today.

Dixied: My DH great aunt lived in Parkersburg. So, I actually know and have been there. His great aunt was an elementary school teacher way back in the Dick and Jane days. (I had those books too but only because my elementary school was really old)

Hope everyone has a great evening. Doing a little review work and I'm going to bed early.

Ice cream festival???? I drive that direction a lot I thought Columbus was the ice cream capital!

Cheryl, I have been eating fish and fruit in the morning lately. Mh ds and dh come into the kitchen and make gagging sounds, but I was getting to the point of dreading even the most elaborate egg white omelets.

Rope climbing is FUN! I was the kid in 6th grad PE (we called it gym class) who couldn't get more than 4 feet off the ground while everyone laughed. When I climbed a rope all the way up at 45 years old I was elated! Take that, every gym teacher I ever had

I was a rock star today a physical therapy (my life is so exciting). I was doing a series of exercises designed for the Phillies pitchers to rehab their shoulders. Somehow it involved doing about 100 body weight squats then step ups while doing external and internal rotation and circular moves with 2 pound weight cuffs on my hands. I asked the therapist what he did with people who couldn't do 100 squats (like the 80 year old woman watching me clutching her shoulder) and he told me this series was for athletes.
It takes so little to butter me up, it's pathetic.

Food was ON the last few days. Why oh why isn't it always easy?????

Mel

Mel, you are a rockstar! I'm glad your PT recognizes this! Just for the record, I never laughed at that kid, myself. Thanks for the encouragement on the rope climb.

Lydia, trust me, if I had some eggs in the house, I'd have gone for some other type of protein, but fish was my best choice at the time. This morning, I'm going for the turkey bratwurst, just because I can't take another fishy breakfast. I love salmon, don't get me wrong, just 6 a.m. is just too early for that and a ginormous amount of broccoli. My usual breakfast was yogurt for the longest time, but that's not enough to get me through the crossfit workouts.

I've been resting my shoulder the last few days, and yesterday didn't even fool around with any practice, since I'm supposed to try to climb a rope today.

I'll check in later today with the CF report!

I know we've discussed this before but I can't do front squats and can't figure out how to get the bar resting on my shoulders with my elbows up. It seems like my arms are built wrong. Maybe its inflexibility?

Anyway, I got my medicine ball yesterday and it came with a DVD of exercises so I did some of them. They are pretty decent but I almost killed myself on one. It is a russian twist on a swiss ball, here is a video I found:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZmpXrAQnMw

Basically, I twisted to one side, then went to twist on the other side but really didn't try to center my gravity and ended up rolling off the swiss ball all the time saying 'woah woah woah'.

Nelie, funny about falling off the ball. Did you get the hang of it after that?

The Crossfit Report is below.

---------
Class #10 & #11 (combined today)/Thursday

Since we missed Tuesday, we made up the skills part of that class today.

My Pre-Warmup:
Came out to leave this morning, had a low tire on the truck, so didn't get to class till ten minutes before class started (I usually have 20 mins to do this part). I got a walk and some jogging in, did some moving and stretching, then it was time to go do the class warm-up.

The Warm-up:
2 rounds of:
10 squats
10 push-ups (up to 5 on my toes each set...that's 7 more total than I could do 3 weeks ago!)
10 sit-ups

then:
10 shoulder dislocations w/pvc

New Skills:
1) Kettlebell Swing. Well, I promised Shannon the skinny on this move, but there wasn't a lot to tell. The main points were not to pull with the arm, and to keep the shoulder relaxed. For Crossfit, the standard is to get the KB up overhead, and that all has to happen via opening the hip. You take a wide stance (so you don't wack your knees with the KB), get down into a good squat position, start with the KB on the floor, about a half step in front of your feet, so it swings back when you pick it up, eyes forward, chest up, nice back/squat position, pick it up, let it swing back between your legs, stand up out of the squat and open the hip. It took me a few tries to get it overhead with just the hip power, but once I got the hang of it, it was easy as far as form goes. Lemme dig up a video:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/C...t_KBSwings.wmv

Watch when she does the heavier weights, you can see easier how she it takes her a few swings to get it overhead, and it's easier to see the hip drive. One thing I learned just doing this was to slow the descent a little bit, keep it controlled, rather than just letting gravity swing that bad boy back between your legs. This will save some wear and tear on your upper body, I think. Overall, a fun exercise!

2) Dumbbell Snatch (one arm at a time):
Snatches. Ahh. With my shoulder tweaking me, I wasn't thrilled to see this come up, but again, it was good for my form, because I could not pull from the shoulder without getting bitten. I had a lot of trouble getting this one right, mainly because I was trying to pull with the arm, plus I was going too slow, so wasn't catching it with a straight arm. I kept giving it a half-arsed dip-drive, which wasn't getting enough momentum, so I ended up catching it with bent elbow and pressing it out. After about a dozen tries, I started getting it right: fast feet was the cue that got me moving correctly. Also, fatigue helped, because once I wore my arms out, I HAD to use the dip-drive and a fast squat to get that DB overhead. My shoulder twinge was not noticable once my legs caught fire, and as usual, I just these oly lifts!
Here's the quick demo:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/C...t_DBSnatch.wmv
And a workout with DB snatches in it, just cuz it's cool:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/C...hPullupWOD.wmv

3) Beginner Rope Climbs. Okay, thankfully, my trainer L didn't have any illusions about me actually being able to climb a rope. Instead, we got a little chalk on the grip, cuz the rope is fat and a bit slick, then I just started standing at the rope, took a grip with both hands, then trying to keep my body straight, I lowered myself to the ground, trying to touch my shoulders to the floor first (not the butt), then pulled myself back up (had to bend my knees a bit for this part, which L said was okay).
This was the only video I could scrounge up. The beginner mods are at the end of this clip:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/C...eClimbDemo.wmv

The WOD: (aka workout of the day)
(My 12 y.o. son was with me today. He spent some time playing on the ropes, then he was bragging about how he could beat me in any workout, so L made him join in the class and put the poor boy to the test, lol.)
Row 500 meters
21 Kettlebell (KB) Swings, 25# for me
10 Dumbbell (DB) Snatches, each arm, 12# for me
3 Beginner Rope Climbs (lower to the floor, pull back to standing, rigid body)
15 KB Swings
10 DB Snatches, each arm
3 Beginner Rope Climbs
Row 250 meters

My Time: 13:45 I accidentally did 25 KB Swings on the first round..doh!
The Boy: Dropped dead after the first round of rope climbs. Hardly a fair contest, since he'd never done the rowing or snatches before, but it sure stopped his bragging, lol! He was the boss of me later, since he got a couple of kipping pull-ups on his own.

After the WOD:
Did the crossfit cooldown (lying on the floor, crying for my mama), then got the foam roller out and laid around on that for a while.

L says this is it, I passed, my movement is good, I'm ready, but I can have one more class with her, next Thursday, if I have any questions or want help with something, or I can just jump in and start joining the regular workouts. I told her I might have to wait till the second week of April, when I'm sure I can pay the dues, but she said I should keep coming anyway. I got home and checked my calendar, and was wrong about the date, and should be able to pay the first week of April, but still it's very cool that she said I could go on and start joining the real WODS now. That's a little scary, actually!

Cheryl - She is swinging a 70 lb kb!!! That video is interesting, I've never actually seen a KB go so high for a swing. I'm going to have to try it tonight and hopefully not kill myself.

As for the russian twist, the first one was the only one I fell on

Cheryl - Congrats on "passing" your Cf class. I want kettlebells sooo badly now. I checked to see if our TJMaxx had any last night. Nope. Looks like I'll be paying full price. I'm thinking that outside will be best for this exercise. I'm afraid the tile won't hold up to me dumping a kettlebell on it.

The CF Foundations class in Pensacola is $170, so that's going to wait until later in the summer, after I get done paying for trips home for weddings/reunions, baby gifts, wedding presents, etc. Evil people, getting married and having kids, don't they realize it's supposed to be all about ME!!!

Nelie, it might be your grip. At home, I was trying to grip this too narrow. To set the correct (for me) grip, I hold the bar about at the top of the deadlift position (about hip level), and put my hands just where my thumbs barely can touch my thighs, or even a smidge wider. You kinda have to play with it to find your sweet spot. With just a pvc or stick, the rack position will have you basically choking yourself, because there's no weight on it. If you can handle a little weight, it's easier and won't be choking you. Once the bar or stick is in the rack position, let it roll to the ends of your fingertips, hands are outside the shoulders, but not too wide, chest up, elbows as high as you can get them, stick the butt out like you're reaching back behind you as you come down into the squat. Coming up, try to lead with the elbows...that's a good cue that keep the chest up, drive through the heels but think about just driving those elbows up as you come up out of the squat.

Here's a good/bad short video for the front squat:
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/C...rontSquats.wmv

Here's a longer video that shows more of the training bits for the front squat. Hope some of this helps!
http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/FrontSquatsWOD.wmv