Monthly: January 2011

If you knew this was your last day on Earth, what would you do? Pretend for one second money and transportation is not a problem. I am really curious and eager to see your responses. My wishes for you is to ultimately accomplish these things in your lifetime.

Besides the norm of spending time with family and friends, I would go sky diving, feed a shark, go to Santa Maria Della Pace Church in Rome, visit Machu Picchu, dance Flamenco, have a shot (okay okay, a couple shots) of Patron, play an acoustic guitar, drive a Ferrari 458 Italia, feed the homeless, watch some clips of Katt Williams, go to Colombia and ride my horse then go to Uruguay and drink mate, have an Indian theme dinner party with everyone I love at my house (a billion people) and lastly do a Fever WOD with all of my CrossFit Fever family members.

Whew! WHAT A DAY!

I love you all.

Xo

Natalia

Leave your tights, weightlifting shoes and iPods at the door. In this camp, your name doesn’t go on the whiteboard. It goes on your plain white T-shirt.

This is SEALFIT’s Kokoro Camp.

On the line to accept that challenge are CrossFitters including Mikko Salo, Kristan Clever, Rob Orlando, Tommy Hackenbruck, Caity Henniger, Jimi Letchford and original firebreather Greg Amundson.

So how do you get through a challenge that’s specifically designed to break you physically?

In Part 3, Mark Divine of SEALFIT explains that conquering challenges is about mental strength and teamwork. If you focus on small victories, breathing and teamwork—simple things that can sustain you in a storm—you’ll be able to go further than you thought possible.

“Collapse your reality to the now,” Divine says. “Set very, very short-term goals, achieve victory at them, and move on. Let those victories stack up, and the end result will be total victory.”

Some of the students learn this lesson, while others struggle. And some thrive.

“It’s been fun. It’s been really fun,” Salo says with a smile as darkness falls on Day 1. “At the moment, I’m not even near by my physical limits.”

Will the Finn’s legendary work capacity and Sisu get him through the rest of the trials at Kokoro Camp?

7min 17sec

Additional audio: CrossFit Radio Episode 146, originally aired Nov. 17, 2010.

With some of CrossFit’s top athletes in Lake Tahoe, Calif., for the Rogue Vs. Again Faster Throwdown, it was a great opportunity to throw the athletes into a room and get them talking with the cameras rolling.

In this installment, the competitors discuss the importance of recovery from day-to-day workouts and multiple workouts on the same day. The topic fuels some heated debate among the athletes.

“I think most people don’t have a clue how to listen to their body,” Chris Spealler says. According to him, his wrestling background has given him a keen sense of his own ability and recovery needs. “I don’t look at it as like I need to be exposed to all these workouts and just wear myself out. I know my body well enough that I know how I should feel every second of that workout.”

The debate continues over whether the stimulus of failure during a workout can improve overall work capacity, and the athletes talk about how they can test that stimulus. The athletes also discuss when to put their bodies to the test.

“It’s learning how to manage work and rest. That’s a huge part of CrossFit,” Spealler says.

14min 58sec

Additional reading: Rest and Recovery in Interval-Based Exercise by Tony Leyland, published April 1, 2007.

Want to build serious upper-body strength? Bill Starr says you should be dipping—regularly.

It wasn’t until my third year of training that I came across dip bars, in the weight room at the Wichita Falls, Texas, YMCA. From that day on, dips have been a part of all of my programs for Olympic lifting, powerlifting and strength training in general, and they’re even my current routine in which I do really high reps.

At first, I only dipped with body weight, but once I was able to do 40 reps, I decided I needed to add resistance. Because a dip belt wasn’t available, I used dumbbells. I could lock a dumbbell between my legs, as I had seen models do in the magazines, and knock out my reps. I discovered using a weight made the movement easier to do in that the resistance helped steady me while I dipped.

I encourage all my strength athletes to dip. It’s a great way to strengthen the shoulder girdle, and the strength gained is very convertible to every sport under the sun because every sport demands powerful shoulders and arms. In addition, when dips are added to a routine, the shoulder girdle becomes more stable right away.

This thread is dedicated for all of you to express what pisses YOU off!!

What pisses me off is when ….  PEOPLE DON’T WEAR DEODORANT AT THE GYM!!!! -__-

WHAT PISSES YOU OFF??

LOOKING FORWARD IN READING YOUR RESPONSES!

-NATALIA