Epiphany – Part II

Sterling is right. He writes in his blog post that the squat clean is poetic when it's done right. Heck, it could be a Haiku.

Steel bar

It glides above

I jump beneath its shadow

Today was all about the squat clean – starting with six reps and working down to one. Mike and I started with a light weight to better focus on form. I'm slowly getting this one and the more I do it the more I like it. However, I keep pulling it up with my arms. This works with the light weight but is impossible with a truly taxing load. I did a couple of rounds and Sterling wandered over. "Like this", he said shrugging up with elbows wide. "Up a little bit on your toes."

Picture a marionette if you will, with strings attached to the elbows. The strings are pulled and the shoulders and elbows pull up and the marionette comes up onto its toes. So that's what I had in my mind as I deadlifted the barbell and then shrugged it up with elbows wide. When the bar reached my waist and felt weightless, I quickly jumped under the bar into a squat, with elbows upward. Voila! I was easily under the bar and driving it upward as I came out of the squat. This was promising. It was so easy like this. And what a sweet feeling! I kept practicing this, doing a few reps of shrugging the bar and coming up on my toes. I didn't get it every time, but enough that I'm encouraged to say that I understand the feeling of the movement. That's been so important to my progress. Not having a mental picture, not looking in the mirror, but feeling how the movement in my body before I do it. Sounds weird I guess and it works for me.

Alternating with these squats cleans we did weighted pull-ups. Mike and I did 35lbs each, starting with one and working up to six. By rep five, I was gassed. How I got the sixth rep out I cannot tell you. Anger mode I think. Following strength training was a cycle of burpees and straight leg raises, which I did as K2E.

I felt amazingly good today. My energy is peaking and pushing it hard like this in the morning makes my day better. My day job is stressful. Negotiations, politics, delays, changes, and surly department leads. All part of the package, you see. Having a deep grounding of a successful WOD in the morning makes all that go down easy like sugar coating on bad medicine.

Workout of the Day

Squat clean
6-5-4-3-2-1   115lb, 95lb, 95lb, 95lb, 135lb, 135lb
1-2-3-4-5-6
Weighted pullups 35lbs
rest 2 min
Burpees
8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1
1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
Straight leg raises (K2E)