17 December 2008 - - Cleans & The Shrinking Ass

Before I get to the Shrinking Ass part, as our WOD following warmup, Sam and I did the following...

WOD: Maximum Clean

The Clean, full squat clean that is, is an extremely potent and challenging movement, and also my favorite in the Crossfit regimine. Strength, power and balance; once you start loading up the bar a heavy clean really calls for complete body awareness, requires full range of motion and demands a heavy dose of good and nasty aggression to execute properly. Note, properly implies safely.

Sam and I both began light, but soon worked our way up to our max efforts. There were no set amount of sets and reps. Just load up the bar, hit it, hit it again it you like for good measure, then kick it up a notch.

Early on Sam had some difficulties keeping stable at the bottom of the clean (This is where having a solid front squat comes into play. Remember, stay on those heels and reach as high as you can with those elbows). However, he pushed through some troubles and kept hitting his weights. We did have a loss of focus during Sam's first max effort attempt of 135# (Note: Front Squat max recorded the other day at 145#), but the culprit of his meanderings, thoughts on a mechanical dog fetcher of all things...giggle...were beaten on the second attempt...Success! Nothing To It!

I then continued with my efforts, and after failing on my first attempt at max effort, I hit my second attempt quite soundly, matching my previous PR of 190#.

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Which brings me to my thoughts on the Shrinking Ass. The tale of the Shrinking Ass, brought to my attention just last week, after dawning a pair of slacks purchased and fitted just this past summer, actually begins almost six weeks ago when I departed for San Diego with then a month long layover in El Salvador. And the theory that this tale precipitates, but also assuming no significant change took place before departing for San Diego (none was observed), has caused me to have a bit of a reflection on the way I pursue fitness. Considering the type of workouts performed in the gym as well as my lifestyle of extensive traveling and array of athletic activities, the focus of course being over the past few months, I believe that real change to my current fitness philosophy could be put forth to maximize the little time I do spend strictly in the gym and likewise improve my fitness and performance in my other arenas.

How will this tangent affect our small band of Nothing To It'ers? I don't know, I still have not gotten that far, and in fact this whole thing may remain just that, a tangent, and nothing more than a isolated, inspiration laced thought process spawned by office procrastination. In any case, I will continue with the tale itself, and we'll go from there.

The tale of the Shrinking Ass...TO BE Continued...giggle...