Martin does a great job here of getting his hips to generate upward lift for the upper body/peripheral limbs using explosive hip extension. This is his first use of the sumo high pull in a workout and his co-ordination is excellent. As he develops his technique and strength, he will need to push up through the hips more explosively and with dynamic control of his core to generate upward impetus for the lift.
The sumo deadlift high pull is a superb example of the fact that effective effort in moving loads in the peripheral limbs HAS to be generated from the centre or core.
Today I ran a WOD for my client Steve. The aim of today's session was to work a little bit more intensely and spend more time doing the workout itself than simply learning new skills. The last few sessions have been focusing on basic compound movements like deadlift and push up, while we have also started developing Steve's strength by using static holds on the rings.
Being in his mid forties and unused to exercise, let alone Crossfit metabolic conditioning workouts, I nevertheless wanted to give Steve a more substantial taste of the feeling that comes from working a number of compound moves together quickly for time. I was also very keen, for my part, to get the scaling right for him. When I first started Crossfitting, I of course overdid things by not scaling correctly. The result was for a while fatigue and longer recovery times.
The workout I put together for him was based loosely on Crossfit's recent "Bunch of Stuff" workout. Before Steve arrived, I had undetakien the workout myself in a modified format, as we don't yet own a rowing machine. By doing the WOD, I decided these things:
Leave out the dips for him for the time being
Cut the rep range pretty substantially
As it turned out and you will hear in the video, Steve took alot less time than I had suggested. I figured he should be aiming for under 17 minutes and he made it all in 9:40. I had scaled more than I thought, but - and this is crucial - FOR BEGINNERS IT IS WAY BETTER TO SCALE TOO EASY THAN TOO HARD!!!!
During the workout, we quickly changed the ring static holds for static plank holds at 15 seconds x2, as the elbows to knees and subsequent jumping pull ups really tired Steve's arms and he had no confidence to hold still on the rings at that point.
Above all, he KEPT GOING. I was really please that the workout had a great effect. He managed to keep a fairly consistent pace and had some left in the tank to speed up a little at the end. As you can see from the video, he was tired and breathing hard, but also happy and he began to recover quickly during a cuppa and a post workout chat. Awesome stuff Steve!
Also, it's been great to start working on some of the Crossfit basics with Steve's wife, who came to the studio seeking some nutritional and exercise advice. The session before Steve's today we started looking at proper squat technique, a push up progression from the knees and beginning upper body strength training using some Get Me Ups.
Steve's WOD was:
25 Sumo deadlift high pulls
20 up and downs
10 knees to elbows
15 jumping pull ups
15 seconds static plank x 2
10 Turkish get ups alternating arms
Tonight I worked with Steve on only his second session using Crossfit protocols. We began the session with a warm up which included some revision from the last session: practicing squat form, lever push up (from the knees) progressions with hollow body position and supine core progressions.
Then, tonight, we focused on starting strength development with static holds on the rings, which he had never done before. We also worked on developing a basic deadlift using some PVC pipe.
I felt we should work through a WOD that taxed him a little more than the previous 2 sessions, but still kept it tame and manageable. We went for:
7:00 AMRAP
8 deadlifts with 20k unloaded bar
3 negative lowers from chin-over-bar pull up position - each taking 3 seconds
I was pleased as Steve kept going through the whole WOD at a steady pace, and managed 7 rounds. He was soaked through but not exhausted. He left ennervated and stoked. This is perfect at this very early stage of his training and satisfying that the scaling was appropriate.
The video clip above of his ring holds was the last one. He was tired at this point but notice his hollow body set up at the outset:nice. He actually held for 22.5 secs on his best of 5 attempts, which we PRd him for to beat next time.
