I’m going to write the end of this post first, and then I’m going to come back up here and write my original post.

Ok, original post time.  There are so many things I want to say, so I think I’m going to limit this to one topic and make more posts (I swear) over the coming weeks.

About 6 weeks ago, I was supposed to start training for the Rock n’ Roll San Antonio 1/2 Marathon.  I only needed 6 weeks because, well, I CrossFit, and I know I can run 13.1 miles.  It was just a matter of how long it would take to do so, and whether I wanted to PR that race.  Then… life kicked in.  One bachelor party in Vegas.  One trip directly from Vegas to Uruguay.  ACL.  Swine flu (serisouly, I got fucking swine flu).  Recovering from swine flu brought me to 3 weeks out from the race.  Then I had a confluence of shitty scheduling on my part (see end of post).  Fast forward to 2 weeks out.  I decided that with 2 weeks left, it was time to start training.

• I went out on a Tuesday morning and did the CFE WOD.  10k, 85% effort for the first 5k, 95% effort for the second 5k.  47:something.  Not bad.
• Continued my regular CrossFit regimen.  3-on, 1-off.  Strength and metcon mixup (which I going to organize soon).
• I went out and ran a 10-mile race last Sunday.  1:17:something.  7:41 pace.  That puts me spot on for a 4-minute PR for the Rock n’ Roll.

3 weeks of training, folks.  3 weeks.  Why? Because I CrossFit.  Because I focus on strength and muscular endurance, 13.1 miles at a pretty decent clip isn’t so hard.  It just takes a while.  Combine this with some proper CrossFit Endurance protocol, and I know I’ll see huge PR’s in my future.  Maybe I can get that 25mph bike pace that I need to start placing in Duathlons.

Which brings me to my next point… CrossFit Central Endurance.

Tomorrow (and I know no one has read this in weeks, so I’m going to assume that no one will show up because of my blog, but if you do, holler!) we’re hosting a free community workout at the Austin High track.  We’ll show you some run efficiency skills and drills… breaking running into the “first principles” that Christopher McDougall so eloquently describes when he talks about his book.  Then we’re going to put you through a light CFE WOD, some 100s, hopefully using your newfound skills.

Here’s the kicker… are you ready for the kicker?

We’re going to continue these free track workouts.  Wednesday mornings (6am) and Thursday nights (6pm) in December, over at the O’Henry track.  I’m coaching the Thursday nights and one Wednesday morning… December 3, 10, and 16.  Show up.  Improve your running.  Add some quality to your miles, not trash miles.  No. more. garbage. miles.

See ya at the track!

–e

Now for the blur… quick recap since I last posted on my blog (sad, I know.  I shouldn’t have to do this)

• I participated in the LiveStrong Challenge 5k and 45-mile bike ride, raising over $300 for the LiveStrong Foundation. HUGE thanks to my supporters for donating to a great cause!
• I rode a Team Time Trial for the first time on November 2.  The Tour de Grune 27.3 miles is pretty tough — hilly, chip seal, some crosswinds.  Fun ride, but we didn’t keep the 22 mph pace I wanted.  Next year.  Moving on…
• I ran the Run for the Water 10-miler on November 8.  First distance longer than 10k since February, and it went well considering that I haven’t run.
• All kinds of cool shit is happening with CrossFit Central Endurance, Pure Austin, The Label Says Paleo… it just keeps coming.
• I’m a Nuun Ambassador.  Hell yes, Nuun!
• I’m starting to see the power of tribes and the communities that can be formed.  Mind boggling.

I can tell you what they will say.  They will say you need to hit the gym and get stronger.  There’s a concept.  Here’s the problem:

Bullshit.

You may hit the gym in the offseason, but the moment you need to start training for the season again, you stop the weight training… something about dropping muscle because those big arms and legs aren’t going to make you aero on the bike.

Those big muscles are the ones that propel you… and they don’t have to be huge.  (aside: if your legs and arms are growing out of control, check out your diet… I bet you’re eating stuff that promotes packing on muscle… like lots of milk… or maybe that protein shake (again, with more dairy) you get after every workout, I mean, really, do you not get enough protein through your regular diet?)

The notion of an offseason is garbage. Like you’re really going to stop running, biking, swimming, because you need to lift weights.  If anything you’ll stop because it’s too damn cold out to bear it.  But you’ll replace it with an indoor pool, a treadmill, a spin class, maybe even a rower.  You’re still putting on those miles, maybe a few less.   But you still neglect to hit the gym… and here’s the kicker.

You’re an athlete that’s not training like one.

Sure, the concept of getting stronger is useful and worthwhile.  So is the concept of focusing and improving your skill at a certain sport.  But you should be doing all of these things, all the time, anyway.  We’re athletes — we’re always trying to get better, we’re always trying to improve our skill.  It’s not like the season begins and you’re stuck at that 8-minute mile or 19mph bike split (or whatever gain you made during the offseason).  You can always improve!

This “offseason,” try something else… change your perspective…. be always on… train like an athlete. Train like you’re racing at any time.  Instead of piling on long miles during the season, cut those miles down into quality miles, executed at high intensity across broad time and modal domains.  Doing more of the same crap isn’t going to make you faster, it’s just going to solidify the fact that you can run 10 miles at that 8-minute pace, but damn, you can’t break through!

What about recovery, you say?  Take time off as you need to, always listen to your body.  But to be honest, you should be actively focused on recovery anyway.  Fix your diet!  Go find that TriggerPoint kit!  Hit the Yoga class you’ve been meaning to!  And please, one more time, fix your diet!

Then, you won’t need an offseason.

I’ve been traveling a  bit lately for work, vacations, Level 1 certifications… and whenever I travel, I always visit a local CrossFit affiliate.  I usually just shoot an email off to someone who coaches there, and then I just show up.  Here’s the summation of my experience:

• Every time I go, the coaches and athletes are super nice.
• The movements are exactly the same, the standards vary a little, but it’s remarkably consistent.
• Warm up and cool down are always different, and that’s ok.  This stuff isn’t boilerplate.

And just to back it up, I’ve been to a bunch of affiliates (in no particular order):

• CrossFit Central (Austin, TX) — my home affiliate.
• CrossFit Santa Cruz
• CrossFit Invictus (San Diego, CA)
• CrossFit Whistler (Whistler, BC, Canada)
• CrossFit Las Vegas
• CrossFit Park City
• CrossFit San Francisco

It makes sense that the experience is always good and the workouts are always tough.  I read Seth Godin’s Tribes a while back, and CrossFit is actually mentioned in there as an example of a tribe.  We work out together, and that’s just the beginning.  We eat and drink (too much) together, we travel together; the community is so much more than working out and getting your ass kicked.

It truly is open source fitness.

Signing out from Salt Lake City (where I visited CF Park City three times this week — thanks to Chris and Eric for the awesome classes!)…

Two things happened today that led me to this conclusion:

I watched a video from Tim Ferriss on TED.  Now ignore most of the video… there’s a bunch of controversy around it, especially if you read the comments.  There was one thing he said that really stood out, about “deconstructing things that scare the living hell out of me.”

“fear is an indicator. sometimes it shows you what you shouldn’t do; more often than not it shows you exactly what you should do.”

Good call.  When I get into a WOD, and 30 seconds later I “realize” how screwed I am, I need to embrace that fear and my training needs to kick in.  I’m surrounded by awesome coaches and great athletes to compete with.  We push each other.  I need to be open to being pushed, and I need to trust my training.

The second thing that led me to believe that most of my trouble is in my head is a quiz I took on Facebook today.  “How CrossFit are you?” it asks.  It tells me that I’m “Awesome”… which may or may not be true (but is certainly fun to read).  The best part is two of the questions asking about your reaction to the WOD, and how you compete when you’re in there.

How do you feel when you walk into a CrossFit gym? A little scared to find out what the workout is, but I’m going to beat everyone else

Who would you compare yourself to in terms of overall performance? I keep setting new personal bests for myself, that’s all that matters

Next time, when I walk into the gym, I’m going to beat everyone else — AND it’s going to be a new personal best.

So, John, just keep telling me “it’s all up here” — and know that I believe you now.  I just have to follow through.

My life is so scheduled, it’s amazing that I can even think without checking my calendar first.  Then I flashed back to a conversation over drinks at a dinner table with some coworkers and a customer last night… “why do you choose to do this to yourself?  what do you get out of it?”  That put a quote from Trainspotting into my head.

Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves. Choose your future. Choose life… But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin’ else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you’ve got heroin?

Ok so I don’t do heroin.  I swear.  Those marks around the veins on my arm?  That’s acne from shaving my arms and then proceeding to sit with them closed in some fashion all day long (which is officially over with… I will continue to manscape the arm region, but no more razors.  people stare at me like I have track marks.  it’s hilarious, kind of.).

Everyone has a drug of choice.  For some people, it’s booze, for others it’s stronger substances.  For me, it’s bourbon.  No, not really.  Well, maybe, but I digress.

My heroin is building stuff.  I sat in a conference room for 90 minutes watching a customer and several coworkers present a proof-of-concept of my software running on their systems.  It worked.  It took like an hour for me to integrate it.  Watching other people be successful with what I’ve built is a rush.  So that explains why the waking hours of my day are filled with often-annoying conference calls and trying meetings with frustrating processes.  But it doesn’t explain what I do before and after the “real job” — my other job.

What am I building when I’m training and teaching?  I’m building people.  They’re learning they can do so much more than they thought.  They’re getting stronger; they’re going to that first triathlon, running that first half marathon, or just getting out on a bike and cycling.  I’m building myself; confidence that I never had is emerging.  I can do stuff I never thought I could do.  Hell, at 6 AM I jumped onto a 27″ box 100 times and threw a 20lb med ball 50 times.

I want to build more.  It’s a rush that doesn’t compare to anything else, because it doesn’t happen immediately.  You have to work for it, and then when you have that epiphany — that moment where you can step back and survey what you’ve done so far — all you can see is your successes, built on all of the failures and shitty situations you overcame to get there.

Builders are inspiring to me.  Jeremy at CrossFit Central is changing Austin, one person at a time.  CJ at Invictus bailed from an arguably more lucrative job as an attorney to change lives in the way his life was changed.

I got my Crossfit Endurance cert to help my own training succeed in ways that we just don’t do in Austin right now.  I’m getting my Level 1 in the near future, because I want to share what I’ve built in myself with others; I also want to continue to refine and build within myself all I know I can be.

My heroin is building… what’s yours?

• Paleo pancakes, courtesy of the Performance Menu
• Scrambled eggs
• Bacon!
• Lemon tarts, also courtesy of the Performance Menu (see earlier post)

All in all, the paleo pancakes pretty much rocked.  We messed around with various toppings: dark chocolate chips in the pancakes (awesome), raspberry topping (awesome), heavy whipped cream topping (awesome again)… all three combined, amazing.  Ryon did an awesome job with the eggs and bacon; I screwed up the flipping of the first couple pancakes, and handed that job over to Ryon, who then rocked it.

I did my first intermittent fast from 5pm Saturday through 1pm Sunday… about 20 hours.  I even ran 5k Sunday morning, while still fasting!  I can say that my performance didn’t degrade at all, I just need to remember to drink a lot more water.  I think I’m going to start a weekly IF protocol, just not sure which day — in true CrossFit style, I’m going to keep it interesting and just fast whichever day seems most appropriate.

Today’s WOD: run 5k. 22:02, PR.

Today is the first true rest day I’ve had in a looong time.  Like in a couple weeks, at least.  Full rest day; we’re talking at the moment, I’m laying on the couch, balcony door is open, cool breeze coming in, golf is on in the background, and it feels like Sunday to me.  Which is great, because tomorrow is Sunday, and that just means I’ve got an extra day in my weekend (I know, I don’t, but whatever).

On more Sundays than not, I tend to have an introspective, contemplative attitude.  Sundays to me mean getting ready for the week ahead, getting some last-minute errands done, and then figuring out how to hold on to those last few hours before you have to turn everything back on and re-engage with the world.  Part of that attitude has to do with me being tragically hungover on Sunday mornings, especially lately.  It’s for this reason that I usually find a way to listen to A Sunday by Jimmy Eat World (iTunes link).

Not this weekend, no way.

This weekend I’m focusing on regrouping my life from end-to-end.  As Gwen Stefani so eloquently put it,

This shit is bananas

B-A-N-A-N-A-S

My training schedule is beginning to collide with my teaching schedule, which is also colliding with my work schedule (can’t link… employer would not be pleased, let’s just say that my current job requires a lot of collaboration).  The convergence of this banananess is causing havoc in my life… I’m 30 years old, and I can’t keep up with the fucking dishes.  I mean really, Eric, the dishes?  C’mon!  Really?

I used to think I needed structure.  I’ve got calendars and schedules and all kinds of lists and shit.  There’s enough structure to build the 42-story building that’s going up next to my 4-story apartment complex.  I’m beginning to think it’s not structure, it’s simplification and efficiency.  I need to go back to what Mom taught me when I was growing up — take the dishes as an example; just put the fuckers away when you’re done, and then you’re caught up on the dishes.

So my new goal is to stay current, stay engaged, stay present.

Let’s see if I can squeeze out any extra time to pursue other goals and perhaps dreams.

Introspection over.  On to what I had originally intended to post this week.

• The Healthy/Fuck Off scale.  First off, I just recently stumbled upon Byers’ blog and she cracks me up.  This post, and the one on bacon.  The Healthy/Fuck Off scale is a scale of foods that you know are healthy and you’re cool with eating, down to foods that are totally not healthy, but if you told me I can’t eat them, I’d tell you to fuck off.  The idea being that if you can identify the fuck off foods, you can control your consumption of them and not totally block them out of your diet.  I can tell you right now, booze, pizza, some cookies, and molten chocolate cake are on low (very low) on the healthy scale and very high on the fuck off scale.  What’s on yours?
• The Performance Menu.  Anyone who tells me they don’t have time to cook is lying.  Simply lying.  Read the beginning of this post.  I cook, you can too!  And the free recipes on this site are so damn good that it makes me want to buy the book(s).  Top that off with most of them being quick… Performance Menu FTW!  I made the Lemon Tarts the other day, amazing.  Tomorrow for Easter brunch, I’d like to have a few friends over for an attempt at the Quick Paleo Pancakes.  Later this week, we’re going for the Paleo Pizza.  So many options, and you just feel good eating this stuff!
• A quick recap on wtf I did to my blog layout.  I got really tired of the time-formatted posts, so I decided to start messing around with the Interwebs and “mashups.”  As someone with an MS in Computer Science, I thought the whole mashup concept was total bullshit.  Until now.  I took the feed of my workout log from Dailymile, a filtered version of my twitter feed, and BAM! Food log and training log line the sides of this place.

I’m going to shuffle around my training and teaching schedules a bit in the coming weeks.  I’ve also got a cool conditioning class I’m starting up at Pure Austin in May.  I’m excited about the future, but it’s time to stay present and stay engaged.

–e

p.s. Jeremy tells me I need more pictures on my blog.

Every day, Jason Dinant chows down 16 hard-boiled egg whites, one and a quarter pound of meat and four cups of vegetables, sprinkled with an occasional carbohydrate.

it’s a tough diet to follow,  but it really does work!

Empirically, I tell them they won’t… that weight training using the CrossFit method will shred body fat and increase strength and muscle definition, but they certainly won’t be looking like a female bodybuilder anytime soon.

Why?  I never really knew why until I started reading a little bit.  I just know that all the women who work out at our affiliate are not bulky.  They’re just ripped in awesome ways, and they look great.

So I came across an article on CrossFit Delaware’s site that really helps break down what women do in the gym, why it’s ineffective, and why CrossFit won’t make you huge.  The short of it is that you need testosterone to build a ton of muscle, and women simply don’t produce enough of it to pack on muscle.  You have to try to get that much muscle — you have to intend to grow it.

Thoughts?

the day before

wake up at a reasonable hour, from a good night’s sleep, and do something athletic.  don’t blow it out, just sweat a little.

eat a great breakfast.

run last-minute errands and stay hydrated all day long.

take a nap.

get some dinner, usually a steak with some vegetables and a few more starches than i’d normally eat.  alcohol’s fine, just no more than 2 drinks.

put together race bag, assemble race belt, ensure that all of the following are in the race bag:

• gels: 1 for every 40 minutes. usually no caffeinated gels, depends on how i feel.
• 1 water bottle to run with that i’m ok with losing (for foot races).
• 1 water bottle to drink from with some sort of caffeine in it.
• 1 water bottle with recovery drink.
• post-race shirt and towel.
• race belt with number attached.
• bodyglide!

go to bed at a reasonable hour, have some nuun right before bed.

morning of

wake up 1 hour before i need to leave the house.  have some coffee and some breakfast, not too much food.  usually some eggs and fruit or some bread.

leave for the race, begin drinking first water bottle.

get to the race, get organized, hit the bathroom, and warm up.  use the standard crossfit warmup without the pushups and with extra running drills.

race!

drink recovery drink.

sleep!