crossfit

Ever Since I was a Lower Case c…

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Recently, I had the opportunity to sub for one of the larger evening classes at CrossFit Humanity where I co-coached with my friend and senior coach, Alan. Reflecting on the experience, what seemed like a routine sub gig played out as coaches  rite of passage for me. Currently, we have two coaches running the evening classes because they are so big.  Keeping a pretty busy schedule during the week I hoped I could bring the energy level needed to be on my game. Not only did I feel my senses heightened but I felt a strong sense of confidence in myself. Coaching or leading any fitness class can be like a stage performance. You are required to be 100 percent present 100 percent of the time. You enter with a plan and a heightened sense of how long each activity takes but then tweak that plan when you start to recognize what your group actually needs. Having done a ton of running and squats the day before our members needed some loving (i.e.mobility) to their posterior chain.

Not regularly coaching large classes it can be nerve-wracking entering a class twenty plus people deep as a sub. I always picture and fear our members rolling their eyes or sighing. Hey, I don’t like subs. I get it! How could I measure up to your favorite coach and gym owner? Well, I can’t so I won’t try to. I’ll be Coach Hannah and pray that’s enough.

Co-coaching was a lot of fun because I could feed off of Alan’s energy and vice versa. I’ve always loved his sense of humor and looked up to him as he taught me from when I was just a baby coach shadowing him all those hours for all those months in the back driveway. Last night was my first time co-coaching where our load was evenly split. I wasn’t sure how much Alan would reign me in but I’m happy he trusted me. Sure I’ve been coaching every Friday for a year now but Alan hadn’t seen my growth. If my memory serves me correctly, this is the first time we have co-coached a general class together and it was a blast! We had a mutual respect, rhythm and had fun with it.

Coach Alan and me

Coach Alan and me goofing off

I discovered co-coaching is different from my usual Fridays solo because it is the definition of team work. You have to communicate before class. You have to communicate with body language only during class. You have to COMMUNICATE. It also showed me how important it is to have chemistry with the other coach. If you’re on the same wavelength and can easily read the other coaches body language it’s easy.  Last week was a rite of passage for me. I no longer feel like I am Alan’s shadow and was given the freedom to bring my own style, game plan, and coaches eye as contribution to the class. Coaching requires a lot of preparation, tools and improvisation during the 11th hour. There’s nothing more nerve wracking than a gaggle of athletes staring at you and deciding in the first 20 seconds of you opening your mouth if they respect you or not.  Coaching is challenging, requires a ton of mental & physical energy and I’ve loved every step along the way learning, failing, refining, re-trying. I told myself in the beginning I’d just keep swimming and that’s what I’m continuing to do.

The Value of Rest Days

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puppy in gymnast rings

Listen to your body

You can see it on the faces of women at your gym: Mentally and physically exhausted but slogging through a workout at half speed and intensity. Perhaps you’ve been there too. Maybe it was the only way to have some release from the stresses of life but what if you or someone you know is pushing themselves into the red zone weekly or even daily?

It’s taken me a long time to adopt the idea of exercise as being good to my body and not punishing it because I see it as heavy, ugly or it makes me you uncomfortable. A big part of honoring your body and all wonderful ways it performs is to not skimp on the rest it needs.

I like weight lifting but since it is not a restorative sport I need my rest. When I started training in power lifting I still wanted to CrossFit 5 days a week like I had been. I learned after just one day of CrossFit and no rest day in between I was operating on 75% of the strength I could recruit from a well-rested body. The percentage would decline from there for each day I over trained and got frustrated as to why I wasn’t making bigger gains.

sloth wrapped in banner

Rest Does a Body Good

It has taken me 30 years to start prioritizing my rest as much as my exercise and tuning into my body. When I start to feel mentally and physically drained I am always on the brink of crying as I feel overly sensitive. I used to show up for class, my coach would correct my form and I’d almost burst into tears I felt so judged. I finally realized this feeling means I’m in the red zone. Now when I’m at my office job feeling tired I picture my coach critiquing my form and imagine myself at the gym. Do I want to start crying or am I cool with the feedback? I know it sounds silly but it totally is how I can assess if I really need a rest day or two or sometimes three.

Action Steps:

1) Start listening to your body. If you’re feeling drained, overly tight, irritable or emotionally just not like yourself take a day off and do something good for your soul: Comfort tea, reading, going to dinner with a friend are a few things I like.

2) A rest day doesn’t mean you must be inactive, it means you are taking a full day off your sport. So if you’re a runner you are not running on your rest day. If I’ve been lifting heavy during my training an active rest day looks like swimming, walking or jogging the beach, mobilizing or yoga.

3) You’ll be amazed at the increase in your performance when you return from a day or two off. Sometimes extra sleep, hydration with light mobility or flexibility is what your body is calling for. You just have to honor it.

I Lift and I Like It (part 3)

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After my first class I felt like I had a coach who was compassionate and heard my needs. I also realized as fit as I thought I was I had no upper body strength. I was unable to pull up my body weight and able to only do two push-ups without putting my knees (insert grade school taunting here: “You do push ups like a girl”). It was then that it dawned on me: If I’m as fit as I think I am, I should be able to pull up my own weight.

I still thought lifting heavy weights with a barbell was unfeminine but decided to join to be able to conquer the body weight movements and gain some upper body strength. Looking back, I think I really joined because I saw one or two super strong fit female members and I wanted to see if I could ever be like them.  My first year I loved going to CrossFit Humanity and taking as many CrossFit classes as I could. Like endurance sport training, I didn’t have to come up with a random gym routine, the programming was all done for me but even better than my endurance sport background was it didn’t over work the same muscle groups. It was also the first time I became aware of my soft core. I ran with a soft core, I swam with a soft core, I biked with a soft core. When a Strength and Conditioning class began I decided to give that a go and found how much I enjoyed the act of lifting a heavy barbell. With each small gain my confidence increased as well as my appetite for a challenge. I was still worried I’d look manly but I noticed the harder I pushed myself the opposite occurred: my waist shrank, my overall body fat decreased significantly and my body shape began to change into that of an athlete: my lats grew, I had visible traps, shapely quads and hamstrings, but I still looked feminine. I was getting compliments from my family and at almost 30 years old was kicking myself for not lifting weights sooner. As my confidence grew so did my curiosity for competing. The first team competition I did was a last minute fill in for Pete’s Paleo team. It was at least 80 degrees at La Jolla High School and while we got our butts annihilated, I loved being a contributing member of a team putting in work.

Last year, a power lifting coach, Sal Ocampo, joined our gym and was training three girls for a November lifting meet. Three weeks prior to the meet one of the girls couldn’t do it and the coach asked me to take her place. I was thrilled to be exposed to power lifting. At this meet I saw all sorts of female body types and was stunned to see some of the most petite girls moving huge amounts of weight. Since then, I’ve trained seriously for and competed in 2 more powerlifting meets and an Olympic weightlifting meet. I currently deadlift 290 lbs, back squat 240 lbs and bench press 133 lbs. I am 5’4” and weigh 133 lbs. Not only am I the leanest I’ve ever been but the byproduct of all of this lifting has been an exponential growth in confidence: the way I carry myself, the way I own a space when I walk in a room, the way I pose for photographs instead of hiding half of my body behind someone else.

CrossFit showed me I was strong and power lifting has taken my fitness journey to a whole new level. Gaining strength has increased my CrossFit abilities. As a personal trainer and CrossFit coach, it is always the top of my list to encourage women to quiet their fears and put the body image thoughts in a time out to just try. You can try with me as your trainer or without me, but please, TRY. You don’t get big from lifting big weight you lose fat and lean out. You get big based on whether or not you have a healthy relationship with food and an understanding of what it means to eat clean. If you love to run or hike or do triathlons don’t give that up but discover how adding weightlifting will make you faster and stronger in whatever sport you play. Still skeptical? Don’t worry, I was too. I believe strong women change the world and if all you need is information and a little encouragement I want to be the one to show you what I’ve discovered because I’m never looking back.

Action Steps:

1) You don’t get big from lifting weights. You get huge from eating crap or a combination of both.

2) Building strength builds confidence. Who doesn’t want a little more of that?

3) Try is a polite way of saying be CONSISTENT with your new training program and give it enough time to take effect. Then decide if it’s right for you.

I Lift and I Like It (part 2)

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After doing two more marathons throughout graduate school, I began to question how I was measuring my fitness. I would run for hours thinking. I started reading about the benefits of cross training and decided it would be a challenge to do a triathlon and it would mean incorporating two other disciplines as cross training. I bought a bike and started swimming in a pool to train for my first fall triathlon in Lake Geneva, WI in 2006. I still vividly remember feeling the lake weeds tickle my belly as I swam too close to the shoreline trying scared of getting kicked in the face by an intimidating pack of swimmers.

In 2008, I moved to San Diego and was excited to have arrived at the birth place of the triathlon! I scaled back the running limiting myself to half marathon distances and made it a long term goal to continue with the sprints and complete an Olympic distance triathlon.  One day my best girlfriend took me to try out a free class at her CrossFit gym, CrossFit Humanity. My skepticism soared and I remember asking her, “Is this for ultimate fighters?” “Why do I want to do boot camp stuff and get yelled at?” “I see a lot of guys getting ripped doing it but what do the girls look like?” “Are they huge?”

The gym environment she took me too looked like a playground for adults: Ropes hung from the ceiling, pull up rigs lined the walls and a putting green for sled pushes ran up and down the center. Fitness toys occupied each corner: barbells, kettlebells, and medicine balls to name a few. I feared my exposure to CrossFit would be too intense to enjoy and I believed that lifting weights would make me look heavy. Silly me. Below is one of my very first CrossFit workouts. It’s not apparent what lift I was attempting to accomplish (don’t mind the poor form) but it was a struggle to get 55 lbs overhead and I was sore for almost 5 days post workout.

Action Steps:

1)  If you’re not questioning the definition of fitness you’re probably not as fit as you think you are. Fitness is not all cardio or having visible abs for your instagram. Fitness is three dimensional just like you.

2) Challenge yourself to work new muscle groups. For example, if you are a runner, set a goal to be able to pull up your body weight.

3) Don’t judge a workout routine until you’ve tried it.