Crossfit- week in review- plus, chicken antics

This week I made it to Crossfit every other day-- a first for me. After today's workout I'm exhausted! This week I ran 1.5 miles, did 230 squats (200 of them in one day), 140 situps (110 of those sit ups were today!!) something like 75 pullups, 60 dips and 80 kettlebell swings and 40 handstand pushups (with assistance). No wonder I'm starving all the time! I liked this week because it was a lot of body weight circuits-- next week is more heavy lifting which is not my favorite.

Today I also tried to do a "kipping" pull-up. Basically you put your foot in a large rubber band and swing back and forth allowing momentum, the band, and upper body strength to get you up. I couldn't quite get the hang of it-- I wasn't quite sure if it was a lack of coordination, a lack of strength or both, but I'll keep working at it-- when you watch people do it, it looks easy and fun, but it was actually much harder than I anticipated. Here's a video of what it looks like (minus the assist rubber band thing).

At today's workout there was a woman I haven't seen before who is training for a women's figure competition (this is like body building competitions only without the drugs). Before I learned she was doing this seeing her there made me want to quit crossfit. She has really very sizeable biceps and lats-- not freakishly steroid induced large, but much bigger than I'd ever want to be. Her quads were not small either. In our warm up, we three ladies that showed up for the early class today ran a half mile holding 15 pound medicine balls. We were supposed to run in a line, with the person in the back sprinting to the front each time. I was worried I wouldn't be able to keep up, seeing as how I can't run a 1/2 mile without the ball and sprints, but Ms. Muscles was complaining and practically walking the whole way. Apparently she is three weeks out from her competition and not really eating carbs, and likely eating no where near enough calories. She was dragging! I've tried that before-- working out a lot and not eating much, and it's a recipe for rebound weight gain. Bodybuilding is a very unhealthy sport in a lot of ways-- nearly starving yourself to get to single digit bodyfat only to regain most of it seems unnecessary and dangerous.

As for my chickens, they are being naughty. Every night they get on top of the chicken coop and then fly into the apple tree and hope we don't notice. First it was just Liz Lemon and Skittles, but tonight Miss Kitty and Muffin were up there too. Olive wisely went to bed in the coop with the little kids. I think they are doing this because they are usually cooped up most of the day and only get a couple hours to free range around the yard in the evening when we are home. They figure if they sleep in the tree they won't be stuck when morning comes. So every night we have to climb the tree to get them down. Last night we got home late from a movie and had to use a flashlight and a ladder. I think it is time to clip their wings so they can't fly, but it seems too mean and I don't want to do it. It doesn't hurt them, but they get so much pleasure out of flying horizontally all over the yard I hate to take that away from them. However, I am worried that eventually they will get tired of the tree and go on an expedition over the fence.