3/10/14: Deep Movement

Let me start off by saying that 14.2 was everything I thought it was going to be and more! Once the forearms went, the battle truly began. I watched many individuals do it over the past few days and surprisingly, the muscle groups that went out on them seemed to be all over the board. It was in a range of lower back, shoulders, biceps and forearms/ grip. After hearing this I would immediately think back on what I just watched and then pinpoint exactly what was happening to cause this. I don’t think I need to say that everyone moves differently because thats a given. I feel that I am stating the obvious when I say that muscle fatigue was directly based off of how they used their bodies . I would relate the lower back fatigue to that person changing their overhead squat stance suited with butterflies that weren’t completely connected. Meaning, that they were possibly in a tighter arch position with little to no hollow engagement on their way up. I have also spoke to many athletes which told me they have sore quads from this workout. This came from bringing their grip width in to have a more stable shoulder. What it also did was put their torso and more of a vertical angle making it that much more quad dominant. That mixed in with a little intensity and there you have it.
Inevitably your forearms were bound to hit a state of fatigue that you couldn’t recover from in time to complete the amount of reps needed. The athletes who concentrated on their hip doing the work first, gave them a fighting chance to move on. That, paired up with a good strategy seemed to be the deciding factor in the workout. This leads me to my thought for the day. A majority of the crossfitters our are not patient enough when kipping!!!  A kip is using your hip to get your body from one plane to another. The hip creates an extreme amount of power that we then apply to the rest of our upper body.  With butterflies pull-ups, you will see the hip open accomplishing the same thing. So with that being said….LET YOUR HIP DO WORK! Just like when we are weightlifting. The sequence of events has to take place for our body to generate as much power as possible to the bar. As coach B says, “slow is smooth, and smooth is fast”. I believe that understanding of being patient in regards to every other movement that doesn’t touch a weightlifting bar is just as important.
Two things I saw from 14.2
1) There wasn’t enough aggression with the hip
2) He/she pulled to early before the power fully transferred from the hip.
I don’t have an exact skill for you today but instead my goal is to get you to think about making every kip aggressive as well as the timing when doing any of these movements. If you are repeating 14.2, concentrate on this when warming up. If you aren’t, spend 5 minutes applying this to a movement you aren’t consistent with. A handstand push up is one of the most challenging in regards to timing the kip. I will be diving into that tomorrow!
One day at a time!
Coach Poppa