Saturday, August 31, 2013
Friday, August 30, 2013
Saturday 130831
Come and support the CrossFit East Baybarians at the Moxie Madness competition on Saturday and Sunday at the Spartans Stadium in San Jose!
For Event 1, we are in Heats 5 and 10 at 3:20pm and 5:25pm on Saturday.
Spectator tickets are available for $15 (both days) and $10 (1 day).
Here is a heat list and an event map.
Saturday 130831
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Sunday, August 25, 2013
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Friday, August 23, 2013
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Friday, August 16, 2013
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Monday, August 12, 2013
Spartan Race Recap
Top row (standing), from left to right: Alex, Ernesto, Mino, Zach, Marco; Middle Row (squatting): Jill, Chelsea, Lil’ JB, Sharon; Bottom Row (getting low): Audrey.
By: Jessica “Lil’ JB” Brown
This past Saturday, ten CFEB-ers donned matching shirts and glittering headbands as they completed the longest WOD ever: Monterey’s 12-mile Spartan Beast Race. Running as the “Wildlings of the East Bay,” we scaled walls, carried heavy buckets and sandbags, flipped tires, crossed monkey bars, climbed ropes, threw spears and crawled through the mud under what seemed like hundreds of meters of barbed wire. While a couple of us were experienced mud-runners, most participants were newbies to a course like this. Not only did everybody kick butt, but also, as you can see from the picture above, we still looked pretty darn good at the end of it all.
With a combination of walking, running and resting, the “race” took the group a little more than five hours to complete (5:05:41, to be exact). Though the obstacles were tough, many required movements similar to those we do regularly in CrossFit, and everybody felt pretty well prepared for them (if you couldn’t complete an obstacle, you had to do 30 burpees. At least we are familiar with those!) Undoubtedly, the hardest parts were the endless hills. Just when we thought that we were done climbing, we would see another steep hill off in the distance, mocking us and the pain we felt in our glutes, hips and hamstrings. Like CrossFitters, we accepted the challenge and powered through, keeping our minds on the non-paleo treats that awaited us at the end of the course.
While the Spartan Race revealed how well CrossFit has prepared us to overcome physical obstacles, it also highlighted what a strong community we’ve built at CrossFit East Bay. All of the CFEB-ers who started the race together finished the race together. We gave each other boosts over high walls, carried snacks for one another, cheered our teammates through tough obstacles, and raced other Wildlings up hills when it looked like they needed a little extra motivation. When it was all over, we shared mobility toys and tricks with one another to ensure that we could all hit it hard together at the gym come Monday.
Though we are still a little traumatized (and sore) from all those hills, it’s likely that there will be another mud-run in CrossFit East Bay’s near future. Truly, Spartan was an awesome experience and we would love to have even more CFEB members join the Wildlings next time!
Spartan Race Recap
Sunday, August 11, 2013
FemmeFit 2013 Wrap Up
Femme Fit 2013 (or BeeFest 2013, more on that) is a wrap! Once again this event proved to be well-run, well-designed and well-executed.Placings.
The first event was an unknown distance run on VERY rugged terrain. Sara Ordaz started with an early leading position, maintaining 2nd place for the first 1000 meters or so, then settled into the leading pack at a comfortable pace. Unluckily for her, she stepped on a beehive, and was swarmed by bees. She had to stop and have the bees slapped off of her for a matter of minutes. Finally she was able to start up again and finished in the top quarter or so despite having 20 stings. She will henceforth be know as “Stinger”. Andrea and Jess got away with a few stings each, but Mary sustained 7 or eight bites. Jo Ann Aita of Max’s Gym got hit 35 times!!!
Next was Oly Lifiting. Andrea took 9th place, here first top ten competition finish with a well-executed 125# snatch and 165# C&J. She took a shot at 175# but there was not enough time. Jessica Bernardini hit a PR with a 157# C&J .
The middle event was a classic metcon (thrusters and box jumps) where you could choose the weight. More weight meant less reps. Andrea, Mary and Jessica made tactical mistakes with overly heavy weights, a mistake none of us will forget. Sara went light (65#) and hit a very solid 8-minute time.
Moving on, a sprint bracket race was the best event for CFEB. Mary, Sara and Andi all moved on to the second heat. Mary stole the show with her first run, and revealed to the world that can, in fact, move like greased lightning when she turns it on.
The final event was a run/burpee/sandbag carry that Sara and Andi both crushed. Sara won the heat with a time of 6:00, blazing past the leader at the end. Andi brought in third about 11 seconds later. Mary and Jessica put in valiant efforts on this one but just did not have the gas to turn it on: both of them finished seemingly through sheer willpower, with Jessica losing the ability to walk in a straight line near the end.
In the end Andrea was 18th (12 placings better than last time) and Sara was right behind with 22nd. Mary and Jessica finished near the middle of the pack.
A great time was had by all, including spectators: this was inspiring and fun to watch. I think anyone who was there who ever hears the phrase “like a girl” can only laugh knowingly.
Serious Kudos to Jo Ann Aita, 43 who finished this competition with a high placing despite not training endurance and NEVER having done a metcon before! Ouch!
FemmeFit 2013 Wrap Up
Saturday, August 10, 2013
Sunday 130811
The Wildlings and the FemmeFitters have completed their events! Accounts of the competitions will be up soon, but for now, we need some rest!
Sunday 130811
Friday, August 9, 2013
Good luck to the Wildlings of the East Bay (competing in a Spartan Race in Monterey TODAY) and to Jessica, Mary, Sara, and Andrea (competing in FemmeFit in Martinez TODAY)!
The Future of the Program at GWPC
As most of you now know, CrossFit East Bay and the Current CrossFit Program at GWPC, 520 20th St. will become two completely separate programs once we move to our new space at 66 Franklin St. on Jack London Square. We are grateful for the opportunity that Touchstone gave us to start from a shoestring, with two classes a week in January 2008, and build the community we have now. It is now time for us to move on to bigger things, as our vision cannot be contained within the “L” and the parking lot at GW. We truly will miss the funky, old-school vibe and the great times we had at Uptown. Who remember CrossFit On The Roof?? It has been a wonderful journey and we are ever-grateful for the support of Touchstone and our amazing CFEB Community. From competing in the CrossFit Games to informal get-together, it has enriched our lives in every way. Some of you are coming with us. It’s going to be another exciting adventure! Some of you, for various reasons will not, and we are sure you are wondering what is going to happen at GW.
Touchstone has expressed interest in having Rafael run a replacement program at GWPC. I am formally endorsing him as my choice to take over where we leave off. Rafael has demonstrated over many years, a passion for fitness and a burning desire to make our clients better, to find their inner athletes. Rafael has grown as a fitness professional to the point where it makes eminent sense for him to be in charge of his own program. I went through similar evolution myself in 2007, when I separated from another local Affiliate where I got my start. This is entirely logical and natural.
I understand we will lose some potential members at JLS if Raf starts a new program at GWPC, But I firmly believe spreading the message is more important than the concerns of the moment. And I believe Rafael will join me as a fine ambassador to get our message out there.
It is my hope and desire that Rafael be brought on board to continue the tradition of quality and value we have brought to Touchstone over the last six years. I look forward to us being peers (Throwdown!)
You can let touchstone management know you thoughts by emailing Jeremy Yee, General Manager of GWPC and the person with authority to make this happen.
Thank You for everything!
- Maximus
The Future of the Program at GWPC
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Monday, August 5, 2013
Sunday, August 4, 2013
The SECRET To CrossFit Training!
We have analyzed this year’s top six CrossFit Athletes and identified the secret to success in CrossFit, and what it takes to get good or great at CrossFit!
Rich Froning Athlete Profile
Jason Kalipha Athlete Profile
Ben Smith Athlete Profile
Samantha Briggs Athlete Profile
Lindsey Valenzuala Athlete Profile
Valerie Voboril Athlete Profile
Every one of these athletes does a super-secret training program that can be described as follows: Constantly Varied (CV) Functional Movements (FM) performed at High Intensity (HI). These athletes strive to Increase Work Capacity Across Broad Time and Modal Domains. They move large loads long distances quickly. They use compound multi-joint movements that involve the whole body. In short THEY DO CROSSFIT! Read that again. Write it down if you need to. Every one of these champions and podium athletes do CrossFit. They DO NOT DO STRENGTH CYCLES.
Rich Froning has gone from a 155 pound snatch in 2009 to a 300 pound snatch in 2013. He has won the games three times in a row, and developed amazing athletic ability, without any periodization of any kind. Rich has a degree in exercise science and, as he says: “None of it really makes sense if I looked at this a few years ago and you told me this would work, I would have said, ‘You’re an idiot.’” Perhaps. Or perhaps, perhaps, it is simply that CrossFit is cutting edge, works, is not yet entirely understood, and traditional exercise science is lacking. We would say that we believe it is lacking.
Jason Kalipha does fairly un-extrodinary CrossFit training and Deadlifts 550 pounds. He has better overall placings than anyone besides Rich Froning, including a win in 2008.
As he says:
“Ultimately here is the secret.
Train CrossFit
Train Hard (preferably with others)
Stay Consistent
Enjoy the experience.
I promise you that the results will be amazing, it just simply takes time. Enjoy!!!”
Sam Briggs publishes her training. It is very metcon heavy. She deadlifts 370 pounds at a bodyweight of 132 pounds! What! This is not to say she does not strength train, simply that like all of these athletes, she folds in her strength training. In December 2012, she did a “Hero” almost every day. If anything, she has a “CrossFit-Bias”.
Lindsay Valenzuela is currently dominating in two sports: CrossFit AND Olympic Lifting. At the same time! If that does not tell you all you need to know about “periodization” or “strength cycles” we cannot help you.
So why is it that folks seem to desire strength cycles? Wish to do Secret Squirrel programming or “experiment on themselves”? We would posit that it is for several reasons. We know that in our current space our programming is incomplete because of space and time constraints. Strength Cycles are easy and fun, compared to CrossFit. Strength cycles are numerically rewarding: Yesterday I did X, today I did X+5, tomorrow I hope to get X+10. The problem is, for CrossFit, while you may gain strength (or power) a bit more quickly, removing the focus on all of your other abilities (speed, cardio, stamina, accuracy, agility, flexibility, coordination and balance), is going to leave you an unfinished work. It has been our observation, over and over and over, that strength cycles don’t make you better at CrossFit. In fact, in our estimation, the most likely effect of a strength cycle is to make people stop CrossFitting and take up Power Lifting or Olympic Lifting. Make of that what you will, but if the goal is to be a better CrossFitter, that is a bad outcome.
One caveat: for the SEVERELY imbalanced and SMALL athlete a brief, focused strength (or more accurately muscle gain) cycle can be called for. Chris Spealler put on 12 pounds to remain competitive, but this meant going from 139 to 151 pounds. And by the way he can do 106 pull-ups (Chris invented the butterfly pull-up). Not many people are in that boat. We can think of one person out of over 300 at CFEB who should do this.
Bottom line:
- Do CrossFit
- Come to every class (5X a week)
- Follow the program exactly
- Keep coming back.
Going forward at our new facility at 66 Franklin St. in Jack London Square, we will be fully enacting this philosophy. There will be no strength program or strength cycles. Our focus will be on cutting-edge CrossFit classes. Classes will be 75 minutes long, which will give us time, in five classes per week (6 1/4 hours) to deliver a truly comprehensive program which will challenge and completely satisfy all but true Regional-Level or Games-Level competitors, and possibly them as well. Weekend Warrior Athletes will have 7 hours of training a week, and the East BayBarians (Our 2014 Regional Team) will be doing from 8-10 hours a week of training, all within the context of our program. Here is an example using our Basic/Weekend Warrior/Competitor Template:
All athletes:
Run 800 meters
CFEB Dynamic Mobility
“Junkyard Dog”
Basic:
A: Hang Power Snatch 3-3-3-3-3
B: Box Squat 5-5-5+ @ 80% of 1RM
C: AMRAP in 15:00
50 Burpees
25 Box Jumps
25 Pull-Ups (sub JPU)
25 Push-Ups
Weekend Warrior:
A: Squat Snatch 3-3-3-3-3
B: Squat 3X 85% of 1RM EMOTM for 12 minutes
C: AMRAP in 15:00
100 Wall-Ball 20/14
50 Box Jumps
15 Pull-Ups
30 Push-Ups
5 Muscle-Ups
Competitor:
Specific training for competition:
If you are doing this we own you. You will not be doing anything else without permission.
This is not for the hobbyist, and has specific performance and attitude requirements.
The SECRET To CrossFit Training!
Saturday, August 3, 2013
Friday, August 2, 2013
The Future of CFEB
CrossFit East Bay and Touchstone Climbing management met today. We have mutually decided that it makes most sense for both programs to take on an individual identity. Therefore CrossFit East Bay will no longer operate at GWPC after we move on to our new facility in Jack London Square at 66 Franklin Street in Oakland. We continue to project an October 1 open date. This is an amicable split and we expect to have a friendly association, including a probable mutual discount for those who wish to belong to both gyms.
CrossFit East Bay’s new space will involve some significant program changes. Some of the things we are considering:
- Expanded class hours, possibly beginning at 4:45AM
- Expanded number of classes including 4:45AM and 9AM.
- Longer classes, possibly 75 minutes each. This will allow much more comprehensive programming.
- Reservation system: no more crowding or short equipment.
- Multi-Tiered Programming similar to CrossFit Invictus.
- Subject Matter Experts, OLY, PL
- Seminars: Kelly Starrett, etc.
The Touchstone Management Team is in the process of assembling the team to run the program that will supersede CFEB. You can expect to continue to see some familiar faces. Rafael Vega will be taking over some of the programming duties as a transitional pilot study in the reasonably near future.
The Future of CFEB
Thursday, August 1, 2013
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