Bro day, Saturday, 11:00 AM. Get signed up for ribs and beer afterwards.

Hey CFPDX-ers! Remember a few weeks back when Scott W wrote on the blog about Mikey’s stellar progress?

Remember the part of the story where Xi Xia told her to work on the pushing progression at home?

Making time to do the push-ups at home freed up Mikey to make progress with her other goals here at the gym. He’s a master of efficiency, that Xi Xia.

In case you didn’t pick up on it, there was a subtle suggestion embedded in that story: you, too, could do this work from home. You did pick up on that, right? No? Well allow me to not-so-subtly tell you that you can.

If you are working on Level 1 or Level 2 of the pushing progression, you can do it from home.

We can provide you with all the information you need to get it going. All you need is 10-15 minutes a day, 2 or 3 days a week. That, and maybe a little creativity when it comes to replicating the box heights at home.

Obviously when the pushing progressions were created, they were designed to be done here at the gym.

That’s why you get instructions to use various box heights combined with different-sized bumper plates as you progress.

I might be wrong, but I doubt any of you have such specific equipment laying around the house.

What I’m certain that you all have, however, is a wide range of comparable surface heights, along with plenty of common sense.

Counter-tops, table-tops, chairs against the wall, chairs against the wall with books stacked underneath them, a cooler, a coffee table, a helpful friend holding a plank position … the possibilities are endless.

Start high, and lower your surface height by about 2 inches each time you progress.

Not sure about your form? See if you can rally an accountability buddy to help you keep things in line (be sure and pick someone who will actually be honest with you here).

If you live alone, or if everyone you know loves you too much to tell you the truth when your form falls apart, take a video! Play it back for yourself or email it to any of the good coaches here at the gym for feedback.

You can also show up to class a little early once in a while and show off your progress/get tips from a coach to make sure you’re on track.

Contact me at sean@crossfitportland.com if you’re interested, and I will email you the progression so that you can get started right away. Let’s blow up my inbox, guys!

Our bodies were made to squat. It’s one of the most fundamental of all human movements, yet many people in our culture are unable to perform this movement properly. Properly, meaning with full range of motion without pain or discomfort.

That’s because when it comes to squat mobility, it’s pretty much use it or lose it (and boy have we lost it).

Seriously, think back to the last time you noticed a child who had difficulty squatting. Kids squat all the time, easily and without discomfort or pain. They do it naturally, and they never have to be taught how to do it safely or correctly.

Unfortunately, somewhere along the road to adulthood, we begin to gradually spend less time on the floor like the little monkeys we’re supposed to be, and more time sitting in chairs, at desks, on the sofa, behind the wheel, even on the toilet.

And where do these First World “comforts” leave us? In the land of hip disease, low back pain, immobilized hamstrings, and a whole slew of other remarkably unhealthy postural issues.

Interestingly these same problems do not manifest in other, more squatty cultures around the world, such as in developing countries and amongst aboriginal tribes.

All of that prolonged sitting may not exactly be good for us, but let’s face it, our desk-jobs, cars and furniture aren’t likely to go away any time soon, either.

So here’s your homework: turn on your television and tune in to the latest train-wreck with the mutants of Jersey Shores or Real Housewives, then slide your butt off the couch and try to accumulate some significant time in the bottom of a low squat.

What constitutes significant time? “Significant” means different things for people with different squatting abilities, but a good place to start is the 10-minute squat test from Scott W.’s man-crush Kelly Starrett. Essentially your goal is to try to accumulate 10 minutes in the bottom position of a squat, with your feet straight, rather than turned out.

I tried this myself recently, and after 10 minutes my feet started to fall asleep and my shins burned so bad I thought they would melt off (hence, the TV … having something around to distract you can be quite helpful).

Clearly this is something I need to work on more frequently, but I know I’m not the only one! So come on CFPDX, let’s get (hip)mobilized and start to make 10-minute squats a regular practice!

K.Star\'s Squat-fest

During Games Open WOD 12.2 last Saturday, I had the opportunity to judge for Carolina. Like most people who did the WOD, she was a little nervous beforehand. She knew that she could get all 30 reps at 45#, but the 75# was beyond her max, and she wasn’t sure if she would be able to make it that far.

We decided that after she completed the first 30 reps, she would take her time and gradually build up her bar to see how far she could get.

She stuck to her plan, and broke up the first 30 with brief rest periods so she wasn’t too tired before attempting heavier weights. It took about 4-and-a-half minutes to get through it.

Afterwards, she started to gradually build her bar, making one or two attempts at each weight to build confidence before progressing.

Eventually she got close to 70# (I forget the exact weight) and got stuck. She tried again and again, but couldn’t quite seem to get under the bar. When time ran out, her final score was 30 reps … she got close to 75# but didn’t quite make it.

There’s no question that Carolina worked hard for those 10 minutes, but what impressed me the most about her performance was that the whole time she did it with a smile on her face.

I witnessed many other well-fought battles with the snatch ladder that clearly left the athletes feeling frustrated by the end. This WOD seemed to have a knack for getting into people’s heads and affecting their confidence.

If that was the case for Carolina, it didn’t show. In between attempts on the bar, she was laughing and making jokes. By the time it was over, she was all smiles and high-fives. She never seemed to get frustrated or upset at her “failure” to reach 75#.

Instead, she was celebrating her accomplishments – she PR’d on her Snatch at 63#, and she finished those first 30 reps under her goal time of 5 minutes.

To me that is exactly what the Games Open is all about. It goes without saying that we all want to do well in every workout. We do our best and try to get the best score possible, but when all is said and done, that score does not represent the totality of our accomplishments.

While it’s fun to track your score and your ranking on the Leaderboard, at the end of the day that score is just a number. It’s not the only variable for measuring success during the Games Open — or any other WOD, for that matter.

I want to personally congratulate Carolina for her accomplishments last weekend, and thank her for being an example of how to keep things in perspective and approach the games WODs with a positive mindset. Carolina, you are a total badass (can I say that on the blog?) and you deserve to be recognized for it! Keep up the hard work!