Just finished my first week of the Krissy Mae Cagney Sexy Sculpt program, as accented by “Bo-gramming.”
You, yes you, are a bad *ss.
The program really is pointing up my weaknesses, which I like. It’s also – through feedback from my “Sculpt Buddy” Claire from Girls Gone WOD Podcast – pointing out where I actually am a bad *ss.
Here’s a funny thing – it just took me like 5 minutes to actually write the end of the paragraph above, though it’s really what I wanted to write. I wrote about this a couple of blog posts ago, but I have a hang up with just saying “Yes, I am a bad *ss.”
Both because I’m a bit older and I was taught to be more “self-effacing” (you know, “don’t brag, it’s not ladylike”), but also because I have to judge myself against myself – not against everyone else in the gym, where I am far and away lifting/pushing/pulling less than anyone else. Judged against myself, and how I feel, yeah baby, I’M A BAD *SS! ;-)
(So there.)
iTraining buddies rock…
I remember when I was training for the Ironman, I wound up with an “i-buddy” – Missy- who found my blog, and was training for the Ironman alone so started “training with me.” The coolest part was that we actually met at the race (HERE is a link to that post). I was training using the Team In Training/Leukemia Society’s training program – so I had a bunch of “real life” folks to train with – but she (after we asked LLS if it would be okay) used the same program, but trained by herself. She was a stay-at-home mom, homeschooling her kids, and she still made a hefty donation to my TNT page, in “thanks” for the training.
As I said, Claire and I are doing this together, and it makes it imminently more do-able. (They talked about it on the podcast this past week – if you don’t know their podcast it’s fun, you should check it out.) Claire is a Level-1 trainer and all around bad *ss her own damned self – we actually met when I was recently in Denver. So I was a little … well, not scared, but like … worried? … “hopeful that it would not be this way?” … that the fact that she’s way more of a killer Crossfitter than me would depress me. Far from it – it’s been a blast.
The training god(desses) smiled down on me…
OK so one thing that I can totally do are deadlifts. As Claire pointed out in their podcast though, since I’m 6’2″ tall, I basically have to lift the damned bar about three feet higher than she does.
The funniest part though is that our gym is all kg weights, whereas hers is pounds. She did the first workout first, and sent me her numbers…and I am all thinking “OMG. She really IS a bad ass. I can’t even APPROACH that weight!”
Yeah, shut up, you figured it out . . . she was writing to me in pounds, which are 1 for every 2.2 kg. So when she said she had done the movement with “70” I’m thinking 70kg – which is like 150 lbs.
That spurred the crap out of me to really reach for as good as I could get. I am not particularly competitive, and I didn’t feel like I was “competing” with Claire. What I felt like was that we were…like on the “same team” in a competition if that makes sense. I haven’t felt that in fact since I was on the Varsity Fencing team at Cal – my first year, we had an amazing team and went to the NCAAs – I was a freshman, the other women were seniors – and it was my first experience with that “Go Team” thing in what is basically a “solo” sport. It was exhilarating, and that’s how I’m feeling at the end of this first week “doing the Sculpt” with Claire.
Ooops, digression (how unusual). ANYWAY, so Claire’s numbers the first day really had me “kicking it up a notch.” But the COOLEST thing was that I worked out before she did the next day, and my deadlift is pretty strong (something like 77 kg?) Well, that spurred HER on – and she did a 1 rep max advance by FIFTEEN POUNDS. That’s just the awesomest EVER. Even awesomer ( ;-) pretend I’m 20 not 50 when I say that) was the fact she told me that my numbers pushed her to put up some numbers.
Anyway – all that said, I’m typing this with the computer on my lap, in bed, in my stinky Crossfit clothes, because I can barely walk (in a good way…) Today was an Upper Pull day, made up of bent over rows, kettlebell cleans (nearly knocked myself out learning how to do that – d’oh!), and then some other things, capping off with 8 rounds of 10 pull ups, 10 burpees, and 20 situps. (That last was added from the Bogramming.) When folks start drifting in for the 9:00 a.m. class now (I start at 7:15) I’m usually about 1/2 way into that last set – and I apparently have quite the evil face, because even the “competition girls” have commented on it. Today I left a gay pride rainbow of bands under the pull up bar after I was done, but I felt quite …. BAD ASS.
So you have a great weekend, and celebrate your bad ass self, ya’hear???