One of the best home equipment purchases could be a jump rope. Besides jumping with it, it can be used to assist with stretching, do pass throughs, over/unders, and fixing jet engines. Finding a rope of the right length, weight, and feel is important and there are so many options out there! I prefer a rope with a little weight to it and that helps me keep my rhythm. One of the best ropes I’ve used (Thanks Adam for finding this!) is actually available at Fred Meyers. It’s only $3.99 and it has just the right weight and spin to it. Get one and you’ll never be far away from a quick “Annie” workout of 50 Double Unders/Situps, 40 Double Unders/Situps,…10 Double Unders/10 Situps.
One component of fitness that is typically overlooked is quality of movement. This is difficult to teach in a typical set/rep format, so it isn’t often incorporated into many programs. We try to work in movement work during warm ups and cooldowns, but this is really just the tip of the iceberg. There is a huge area to be explored here, and we look at some of that in my Monday night mobility class. Training the body to “flow” has so many benefits, as you’ll see in the link below..
Coach Scott Sonnon has often referred to aging as the loss of complexity. Think about it…the easiest way to guess someone’s age is to simply observe how they move. Range of motion AND smoothness of movement both degrade in the modern aging process. However, this loss of movement is NOT an inevitable fact of aging – it is simply a consequence of our modern lifestyle that has engineered all but the simplest of movements out of daily life. Even those who exercise diligently often are simply reinforcing this aging process – most modern gym movements are very simple and only move thru one plane of motion. With this loss of complex movement ability, injury eventually becomes certain, and aging accelerates.
Some of you may remember my good friend Ido Portal from Israel. He was in Portland for the workshops here last May. Ido has launched a new project “The Floreio Art” that will be an invaluable resource for anyone looking to improve their movement ability and flow. I intend to incorporate his new material into my own training, and suggest that you check into it, too! If there is enough interest, we may look into more of this material in my Monday night mobility class.
From Ido:
Floreio is a movement modality that involves high end development of joint mobility, strength, endurance, control, balance,
quality of movement, flexibility and dominance of one’s body all blended into a flowing, beautiful art.
For a demo of Floreio flow:
Floreio work is great complement for people who are already involved in some form of physical development practice: fitness enthusiasts, movement
artists, Yoga practitioners, crossfitters, power and speed sports participants, circus performers, dancers, martial artists, etc…
2) 300′ overhead walking lunge 45/25. Video of the Affiliate Cup Final…near the end you’ll see the inspiration for the walking lunges This was awesome to watch and two teams were neck and neck down the stadium floor.
Kaitlyn is also an experienced dancer and she mixes in a modified grande plie on her snatch deadlift
We’ll settle this with a row off at high noon. Yesterday’s pushup, row WOD was super fun! People were diving out of the rowers into their pushups and all kinds of strategies were used to shave time. This was a fast workout with Nick clocking the fastest time of the day at 2:58 and Eric at 2:59.
A member at the gym just had their car broken into while parked around the area for class – that sucks! Please keep your valuables out of sight or bring them into the gym with you.
For an awesome recap of the Games weekend and pictures/movies of the team at the games, check out Adam’s write up at CrossFit Fort Vancouver. He was a competitor in the Affialiate Challenge and pulled the team along (literally on the hill run!) to a great finish.
Run 1 mile
50 Back squats 135/95
Run 1 mile
Compare to 5/22/09
I finally made the leap and split a 1/4 of a grass fed cow with Jason! After watching Food Inc. (highly recommend you check it out), we felt called to action and we are trying to feed our Paleo lifestyle with as much natural meat as possible. Turns out the best meat you can buy (short of hunting it yourself) is really affordable if you can get it in bulk. Compare that we got grass fed ground beef for little over $4/lb with mass industrial ground that goes for $3/lb.
We got our beef from Bald Hill Farms. Wonderful people to do business with and I am hoping (fingers crossed!) that we can develop a relationship so that we can provide grass fed meat to anyone at the gym that is interested.
125 lbs of precious grass-fed beef stacked like gold bullion in Jason’s freezer.
I’m at SJC International waiting for my flight home. The CrossFit Games were epic/nuts/harsh/effective/over the top. I’ve lost my voice a bit and will write more later. If you haven’t been following what’s going, you need to. CrossFit is bigger than just the gyms in Portland(or in the USA if you are following the results coming in!).
games.crossfit.com
Thursday, looking at the “Stadium”, before the Games kicked off on Friday with the Affiliate Cup.
This was awesome to watch and two teams were neck and neck down the stadium floor. 
