Seth Enjoying: I listen to a lot of Podcasts mainly while I am in the car driving, lately I have been enjoying the Ben Greenfield Fitness podcast. Ben Greenfield is one of the top trainers in the health and wellness world. Listen to a couple of his shows and you might think he is a little crazy, but it is interesting to see how he experiments and tries different methods for optimization. I suggest listening to the episode with Aubrey Marcus lots of great information.
Brandon’s Learning:
Continually learning on the CrossFit Journal. An excellent source for all things fitness put out by CrossFit HQ; I regularly find myself reading articles that are 5+ years old and thinking, wow I’ve been overthinking it! Mastering the basics is essential for anyone looking to pursue excellence in any endeavor. If you want to improve your CrossFit knowledge and delve in further than just the Whiteboard, Warm Up, and 3-2-1 GO, subscribe and get those Brain Gainz!
Cuz’s Getting Back After It!
We’ve all been there. Maybe you had an injury. Maybe you were out on a vacation. Or perhaps life has just gotten in your way. It’s inevitable that at some point, you will experience unexpected time away from what was once your passion, Mako.
This week, I wanted to share a few ways to get back into the gym consistently, and get your health and lifestyle back on track.
The most important things, I feel, are setting reasonable expectations, scaling and scaling.
When you make the decision to get back after it, don’t expect to be hitting PR’s on all of your lifts and benchmarks. Also don’t expect to be keeping up with your favorite rival across the gym everyday. Know that it will take time (way less than you think) to get back up to speed. Pay extra attention during class to the coach and be sure your movements are fundamentally sound.
For the first week or two, scale the workouts to get your body acclimated to the stress. Don’t assume that everyone looks at Wodify to see how you performed for the day. Mako is blessed to be a very sincere family, and everyone will just be glad to see your name back on the whiteboard.
Excuses can also play a role in our lack of attendance. It only takes a few days of kicking ourselves in the butt to kill the habit of making excuses. There are very few things in life as rewarding as a personal victory over familiar excuses that we’ve become accustomed to making. So just tell yourself to shut up, and get it done!
Make a plan, and hold yourself accountable. EVERYBODY uses “I’ll start on Monday” when planning. Start on a Wednesday or Thursday. This can help break up that long first week of something new, and also give your plan a little personality!
Whatever the reason, talk to someone about your issues or reservations. Your coaches are here to help in every way we can, and appreciate when you trust us enough for our advice on things other than increasing your back squat!
Carlos’s Experiencing:
Find what works for YOU.
When I first started getting into fitness and CrossFit I used to look up to elite athletes like Rich Froning and spend hours watching YouTube videos trying to figure out what all these athletes eat and do to achieve a great physique and results.
So I figured since I wanted to be a better athlete, I should follow one of them and do exactly what they do. One thing that took a long time to realize is that these elite athletes have different diets, training routines, believes, etc. There are athletes that eat 8 meals throughout the day, other athletes don’t eat much during the day and get all their calories at night, other athletes do intermittent fasting, paleo, keto, zone, etc etc.
The truth is that what works for them, might not work for you- everybody is different and our bodies react differently depending on our training volume, recovery, food intake, etc.
Don’t be afraid of trying out different things, and making some changes until you find what works for YOU. Find something that makes you happy, healthy, and that’s going to help you achieve your goals. We learn from failure, not from success!
