Did the Hill Disappear?

Saturday, March 3, 2012

Mobility:
Shoulder Prep

Warm up:
10 Deadlifts, light
10 Handstand Kick ups
10 Bar taps
8 Deadlifts, moderate
8 Handstand Kick ups
8 Kipping Pull ups
6 Deadlifts, moderate-heavy
6 Handstand push ups
6 Pull ups

Load up as needed on the deadlifts

“Zimmerman”
Complete as many rounds as possible in 25 minutes of:
11 Chest to bar pull ups
2 Deadlifts, 315 lbs
10 Handstand Push ups

Cool down:
Go to the beach!

Steward of the Barbell Sea.

One of my favorite running drills of all time has almost nothing to do with running at all.

  It is along the lines of Track Master Frank’s post about getting in the Zone.

  Our Track WOD was Hill Sprints and in the dead of night, he asked me to close my eyes while I was in the POSE position facing the hill, he held my forearm and told me to start leaning and pulling.  So I leaned and pulled, leaned and pulled, with my f#cking eyes closed, leaned and pulled.  It was freaky and weird, but I felt very efficient and smooth and relaxed and it actually didn’t feel like I was doing anything at all. 

Before I knew it, Frank told me to open my eyes, and holy sh#t I was at the top of the hill.  ‘Did the Hill Disappear?’, he asked me, to which I replied, astonished, ‘Yes.’  His lesson was, we usually run to a hill and make it hard in our minds before we really start running it.  The truth is, hill running is no harder than regular running, and is in fact more efficient than flat running because the ground is meeting you sooner.  But I immediately took the lesson as, how hard are things right now?  And have I made something harder in my head than it really has to be, before I’ve given it an honest chance?  This is true of WODs, tests, meetings, etc., after which you’ve come out of it and said to yourself, ‘That wasn’t as bad as I thought.

‘

Resonating with anyone?  Or am I just dense?