Becca Borawski’s Blog

9:00am – Foam Roller Class, at Revolution

Revolution Fitness has offered a foam roller class on Sundays now that I’ve been trying to take for months.  For one reason or another, holidays, travel, class being canceled, etc, I have yet to be able to take it.  Today was finally the day!

The class is small, 6-7 people maximum.  All the equipment is provided and the instruction is very detailed and diligent.  Cari Bjelajac, who is well known for her spin classes, teaches this class and is a great source of knowlege.  To say I enjoyed the foam rolling would not be accurate, as foam rolling is by nature excruciating, but I did truly enjoy soaking up all the information she had to offer in regards to what we were doing.

I look forward to trying this class again and seeing how it varies from class to class.

Rest Day – Massage

I really wanted to work out today.  I’m tired of sitting around.  But, when I woke up this morning, I was really congested and I decided even if I did a super light weight, I’d still be tiring out my system when I shouldn’t be.  Bummer.

But, I did go over to Willow Spa (just 2 doors down from CrossFit LA on Santa Monica) and treat myself to an awesome Sports Massage.  They are a little pricey there, but they are totally worth it if you want to treat yourself to really good massage.  My massage therapist was great and knew her stuff. Plus, the ambiance there is so mellow and relaxing and they definitely take care of you and make you feel comfortable.  I highly recommend checking them out.

My apologies for the lack of blogs lately — I was overcome with what was either food poisoning or a stomach virus mid-way through last week.  I spent most of last week and the weekend focused on sleeping, getting water in my system and hoping that a little food might stay down.

I am much better now — did my first workout today in a week and it felt good to be back, although not so good in the moment itself!

I’ll be back to posting regularly this week!

I took a day to rest and rejuvenate today.  I went to Willow Spa and experienced the Enzyme Bath and Athlete’s Stretch.  Willow Spa is right next door to CrossFit LA —http://www.willowspa.com/index.html

When we first arrived, we changed into robes provided by the spa and were treated to foot massages.  We were also given an enzyme drink and ginger tea to go with our enzyme bath treatment.  The enzyme drink was sort of like syrupy teriyaki sauce.  The ginger tea was great.  Our technicians were also very friendly and took great care of us the entire time.

The enzyme bath was HOT HOT HOT.  Holy cow.  It’s a bit like being buried up to your neck in hot compost.  I was focused on breathing to get through each 5 minutes between visits from the spa attendant with water and a cool towel for my face.  It was amazing how my heart rate was up the whole time just from the heat and enzymes.  It’s also a bit crazy that the heat does not come from an outside source, but from the chemical reactions happening in the mulch.

After 20 minutes in the enzyme bath, it was time to get out and rinse off.  I’m not sure if it was me or the shower, but the water felt painfully cold and I felt pretty dizzy.  I must have looked a little dizzy too, as the attendants walked me back to the lounge area.

After that it was time for the Athlete’s Stretch, which was essentially a Thai Massage.  I chose to have her focus on my upper body as it’s my upper back and shoulder area that I believe cause my migraines.  She also did some work on my hamstrings because the ridiculous soreness from Friday’s workout was causing my whole back to tighten up.

I definitely need to get back to my commitment to get regular massages.  I felt MUCH better after this treatment.  Plus, Willow Spa is such a nice little hideaway.  You would never know it from the street, but it’s a peaceful getaway inside that gate.  I definitely recommend it as a great way to treat yourself for a day!

7:15am – CrossFit, Master Class

Burch was Kahuna today and wrote something really different for us…

This workout is split into 3 parts. Each section’s weights/reps will count as total points for your score.

Part #1—10 minutes to achieve CUMULATIVE WEIGHT MOVED push press – weight could be increased/decreased. Count the total weight moved within 10 minutes (2 reps every 30 sec @ 100# = 4,000 lbs), divide by 10

Rules: No more than 2 reps could be done every 30 seconds

1 min rest

Part #2—2 min max reps knees to elbows (kipping allowed), multiply score by 10

1 min rest

then

Part #3—5 min max reps double unders

Total score is all 3 parts added together.

Push Press Score: 360
Rounds 1-6 95#
Rounds 7-12 90#
Rounds 13-18 85#
Rounds 19-20 90#

Knees to Elbows Score: 260

Double Under Score: 131

Total Score: 751

On push press, rather than do 2 at the top of every 30 seconds, I wanted to reduce the number of cleans, so I waited until 20 seconds in and did 2 push press.  Then I held it at my shoulders until the next interval began (like 1-2 seconds) and did my next 2 push press.  I’m not sure this enabled me to push press the heaviest weight, but it did reduce the amount of times I had to clean the weight by half, which was my goal.

Knees to elbows I couldn’t get the kip totally smoothly.  I always had to pause a little in-between each K2E.  The people at the games were so good at this!

Double under mojo was NOT present today.  Tripped over the rope a million times for no reason.

1:30pm – Acupuncture with Alyssa

I had my second acupuncture session with Alyssa today.  I’m taking the herbs she gave me a couple weeks ago every single day.  And I haven’t had a migraine in a month now, which is semi miraculous.  For anyone interested in affordable acupuncture, check out Yo San University.  Their interns work in a community clinic, which is very professionally run.

Rest Day

Today was a rest day and THEN some.  I got to work early, prepared to get lots done so I could clear my schedule to take Monday and Tuesday off to spend with my parents, who are in town for my birthday.  Well, when I got to work and unloaded my bag and started scurrying around my office…I looked up and noticed a card on my computer screen.

Come to find out, it was a note from Andy, my employer, telling me to LEAVE and take the day off.  Or, he wrote, better yet, I should drive myself down to the Burke Williams spa, as he had made back to back appointments for me at 10am and 11am!

At first I was a little stressed as I had so much to do, and then I realized what a great birthday present it was to just LET GO and leave.  So went to Burke Williams and lounged around in the hot tub and sauna, before having a Swedish massage at 10am and a crazy awesome water treatment called the “Hunter’s Retreat” at 11am.  Then I met my parents for lunch, took a nap, and then went out to a birthday dinner with my parents and my boyfriend (who were meeting for the first time).  It was a most excellent day!

Rest Day

I didn’t do Master Class today since I knew I would be teaching all three regular classes in a row.  I wanted to be rarin’ to go for the feisty Saturday gang!  We had a bunch of visitors in the 9:30am and 10:30am classes from Leslie’s housing community.  It was great to meet them all and show them a little bit about CrossFit.  Thanks for bringing them, Leslie!

3:00pm – Massage

I haven’t had a massage in a LONG time.  I finally got one today.  I decided to try out the Massage Company at Wilshire and Barrington, since it is close by and inexpensive.  It wasn’t the best one I’ve ever had, but it did help relieve some muscle tension.  Yoga makes weird parts of my obliques and upper back sore, as well as make my hips achy.  But I take that all as a good thing since it means I’m, hopefully, gaining flexibility in my hips and working core muscles.

Oh yeah, and when we started the massage the therapist said to me, “So, what sports do you play?  ‘Cause your upper trapezius are…uh…really well developed.” 

7:15am – CrossFit, Master Class

I was feeling not so hot this morning because my stomach was still cramped up from Friday night’s pizza party for Team Ocho.  Ugh!  Team-member Jennifer, aka Jen-Detta, had us over her apartment for a pizza party.  I had four slices and felt my stomach seizing up before I even finished them.  Then I had a cupcake and got really dizzy. LOL!  I’m not in condition for junk food anymore!

Despite my stomach still not feeling good on Saturday morning, my energy actually felt alright.

3 Rounds:
300 Single Unders
30 Dumbbell Burpee Deadlifts (25# d-bells)
30 Box Jumps (20” box)
15 Pull Ups
15 Weighted Sit Ups (25# d-bell on chest, other 1 used as anchor)
27:38

I feel that my strength on these sorts of workouts is being able to maintain my speed throughout.  I don’t start off like a bat out of hell, but I start off strong and try to never slow down.

The single unders I told myself I was only allowed to stop if I missed – no resting otherwise.  Burpee deadlifts I did in sets of 10-5-5-5-5 each round.  Box jumps I did in 10-10-10 each round.  Pull ups were usually 3 sets and sit ups were all in 1 set.

7:00am – IndoRow at Revolution

Chris was teaching again this week, as Bryan is in England preparing for a regatta to take place very soon there.  One of the other students and I were talking afterward how it’s nice to get instruction from the various instructors as they each have a little different take and see slightly different things.  With Chris I find myself really focusing on getting my hand speed correct….which, I came to the full realization of today, I SUCK at.  Ha!  Every time I got my hand speed up fast enough I got my slide forward too fast.  So, I kept trying to work on separating out those two in my head today, with varying degrees of success.

We did four waves of around 5 minutes each in length.  Our last piece was a relay race – Chris seems to like those, and I get a kick out of ending the class with a quick blow out like that, too.  We had two teams of three.  We rotated through the team three times—so each team member did three 100m sprints.  All three sprints I had my speed at around 1:36.  The computers are calibrated differently than our C2’s at CFLA, so I think it would read in the low 1:40’s on those.  But I’m still pretty damn happy.  Those are good numbers and it actually felt quite good.

8:30am – Appointment with Dr. Golub

I met with Dr. Marc again today so he could work on my upper back and neck.  I always feel more mobile after getting an adjustment.  Which is good because the afternoon’s workout was no doubt going to cramp it all up again…so maybe I did a preemptive strike against that by going to Dr. Golub, right? lol!

12:00pm – CrossFit, Level 2/3

Big feisty crew today as CBS was there to film Andy working out for a piece they are doing on him and the CrossFit Games.  Fun!

3 rounds for time of:
400m run
21 kettlebell swings (20kg)
12 hand stand push ups (half on wall w/ 1 abmat target, 1/2 toes on box & head to floor)
15:31

This was a really fun workout…in fact I wanted to do it again right after I finished.  Is that wrong?

The runs were slow as my legs are always toast from IndoRow on these two-a-day Wednesdays.  The swings I was VERY happy about though—I did all 21 swings straight on all three rounds.  I’m not sure I’ve ever done that with the 20kg kettlebell before.  Like yesterday’s Filthy Fifty, I found it was a mental exercise to go straight through more than anything else.

The hand stand push ups felt REALLY good today!  Each round I did the first 6 against the wall with the single abmat as then the target, and the second 6 off the 20” box—toes on the box, hips above my head, and touching my head to the ground.  I’m not sure the box felt any “easier” as it was a lower depth and I kept accidentally putting my stance much narrower than I do when I’m against the wall.  I did all my HSPU’s, regardless of where, in sets of 3’s for the most part.  I’ve never done that many all the way to one abmat before—hence why I wanted to do the workout again—I think I could have done the whole workout on the wall!  Next time we do HSPU’s, for sure!