Live Lift Flourish – postcards from the journey to wellbeing

Granite Games reflections: Competition prep starts in your head

September 17, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

It has been a week since I returned from the Granite Games, and I’ve processed so many thoughts and feelings about my experience, I’m not quite sure where to start. So here’s a little background on how it came to be that I spent last weekend competing alongside thousands of athletes, in St Cloud, MN…

Rewind to early July: over the course of 2 weeks, my partners and I completed 6 workouts that made up an online qualifier for the Granite Games, one of the largest Crossfit competitions next to the Crossfit Games. Our placing for those workouts (10^th out of 50 teams), earned us an invitation to the main event, held Sept 8-10 in Saint Cloud, MN. Initially I was surprised and satisfied just to qualify. However, upon discussion and reflection with my teammates, we decided we’d step up to the challenge and accept the invitation.

Many people ask me what I do to prepare for competitions, and the simple answer is, keep doing what I’m doing: training. The only thing we knew for sure about the workouts was that we would each need to complete a 400 meter swim. As such, the only thing I did specifically for this event was to brush up on my swimming. Although I have swum in competition (triathlon) before, it had been a good 15 years, so needless to say, there was some work to do there. For the experienced swimmer, 400m is a sprint, but I had such a mental hurdle about getting back in the pool, it took 4-6 swim sessions to feel like 400m was doable. And even then, I had lingering concerns about the water temperature (would it be super cold?) and the nerves of swimming in a lake with 89 other people.

As the competition drew near, reality set in that we were really going and more concerns cropped up: that we’d be competing next to some of the best athletes in the country in our age group (35+), and we’d be doing it all two thousand miles away from home! Yikes! Fortunately, the weekend before the event, the details of the workouts were released, giving us the opportunity to test out each event. Whenever it is possible, and will not cause undue stress, I always test competition workouts. On the one hand, knowing what movements and transitions feel like in advance, allows me to make more informed decisions about pacing on the day of the competition. But more importantly, trying out the workouts allows me to eliminate the anxiety around the ‘unknown.’ I only had few days to test the workouts, so I choose to focus on the ones that looked like they’d be the most challenging and left the others alone.

Between the testing I had done in advance, and knowing myself and my own strengths and weaknesses, I knew which workouts would be the biggest challenges for me and which would allow me to showcase my fitness. There were 3 workouts that made me really, really nervous and coincidentally, they all fell on the same day – Saturday. The first was the swim (relatively speaking I had the least experience with this movement). The next was a sprint involving a couplet of gymnastic pulling plus lifting a heavy, odd object a dozen times (in practice I had strained my shoulder working with the odd object and I was scared it would happen again). And the last one was another sprint involving multiple sets of heavy front squats – another movement that is not a strength for me.

I did my best to calm myself, reminding myself that by earning our spot, we were by definition, qualified to compete. The other technique I used to manage the anxiety was to focus only on the stresses that were within my control. When I thought more about that, I realized one of my stresses was around ‘finishing last’ or ‘not doing well competitively.’ The corrective thought process I used was this: first of all, consider the consequence, what if you finish last? What is the worst that will happen? People will laugh? People will think I am not a good athlete? Neither of those would likely happen, but even if they did, so what. But more to the point, I have zero control over other people’s performance. I could be up against 80+ Olympic swimmers or 80+ people who have never swum a day in their life. The only thing I can control is my own performance, so that is the only effort I will focus on. I promise myself before every event, that I will race MY race, and not worry about anyone else’s.

The good news is, in all three of those events, positive thinking helped propel great performances. In the case of the swim, I felt good (not too cold) and was able to hold my own (and excel) in a large group of swimmers. On the other events the weights felt completely manageable and I focused on quality movement to ensure I kept my body safe and healthy. We ended up finishing all events, feeling strong. That alone was a HUGE win in my book! And, as it turned out, 2 of the 3 workouts that were of biggest ‘concern’ to me, ended up being our best finishes, competitively! The feeling on Saturday night, having successfully completed those events, is indescribable. I felt as if I had just won the whole competition, despite the fact that there was still another whole day ahead of me… More on that coming soon!

Where the rubber meets the road

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

Crossfit Open Intro Wow. It is 2017. Where does the time go? In my mind I’ve written so many blog posts, yet somehow haven’t managed to get any of those ideas down on paper… So, we have a LOT to catch up on! No better time than the present, right?

Today let’s talk about the Crossfit Open, since it kicks off in exactly 2 short weeks! The Open entails 5 consecutive weeks of competition to begin the process of whittling the ever growing community of Crossfit athletes down to the ‘fittest’ athletes in the world. For 99% of participants, the Open is a test of fitness, an opportunity to see how your fitness has progressed and how ‘fit’ you are relative to the general Crossfit population (for the other 1% it is a cutthroat fight to the end). The Open stirs up so many feelings for me, but before I get into that, let me give you a little more context about my experiences.

This will be my… let’s see… 4^th year participating! How can that be? Amazingly, every year has been a truly incredible experience – each with distinct memories – like they happened yesterday. During my first Crossfit Open workout (14.1) I was defeated by double unders. I could not for the life of me, string more than 2-3 single-double-single-doubles together at a time. It killed me. Mentally and physically. I knew I had more in me, but just couldn’t get my body to do them. Determined to do better, I came back to the gym the next day, and parked myself there UNTIL I FIGURED IT OUT. It took a good 30-40 minutes of stop-start-stop-start, drenched with sweat and covered in whip marks, but ultimately I got rid of the single between the doubles and strung together sets of 5-10. I called it a day and returned to face 14.1 again, on the Monday scores were due, practiced for 10 minutes, repeated the workout and improved my score by 82 reps (135 reps to 217 reps). That is called urgency.

The very next workout (just 5 days later!) called for overhead squats + chest to bar pull ups. Having JUST gotten my first PULL UP, I hit a wall at chest to bar pull ups. Couldn’t do a single rep, let alone the (2 sets of) 10 reps that were programmed, and ended up with a score of 10 (overhead squats). Demoralizing , yet incredibly motivating. That workout was repeated the next year (364 days later) and I got through multiple rounds of the dreaded movement, improving my score from 10 to 81 reps!

I could go on and on (and maybe some day I will share more open stories), but suffice it to say, the Open has been an extremely motivating and rewarding experience for me. That sense of urgency has stayed with me ever since 14.1, keeping me motivated to continue to improve. Sometimes improvement comes just in the nick of time (‘getting’ double unders in time for 14.1) and sometimes it takes months and months of hard work, frustration and persistence. Sometimes it comes in giant steps and sometimes the change is so slow it is barely discernable week to week, or even month to month. But with a yearlong timeframe, chances are good that improvement can be seen.

So back to how I’m feeling about this year’s Open. So many feelings. Mainly, I’m excited! It’s a fun time – a time when friends and athletes come together to watch the workout announcements and strategize and cheer each other on. There’s the healthy heckling and competition between athletes, as we move up and down the leaderboard, each with his or her own strengths and weaknesses. With tears of happiness and pride in my eyes and voice hoarse from yelling, I have watched countless friends and fellow athletes achieve their first Pull Up/Muscle Up/Handstand Push Up/PR a lift during the Open. I feel the same amount of respect for the athletes (like me) who spend 10+ minutes of an Open workout TRYING (and sometimes failing) to get a first [pick your poison], yet refusing to give up. The shared experience of achievement and challenge that the Open brings is truly meaningful and creates a lasting feeling of connection unlike anything else.

My personal goal every year is singular. I want to do the best that I can do in every workout. I HOPE that means that I will be ‘better’ than last year. By ‘better,’ I mean better than myself. Lucky for us, there is usually a workout that gets repeated from year to year– this is really the one place I can judge whether I’ve gotten better. Did I get a better score (time, # reps) on this workout than I did last year?

Assuming I put forth my best effort on all workouts, I also HOPE that means I got better, faster than my peers, and therefore, my relative performance (rank) will be better. I would love to outperform the vast majority of my peer group, and land myself in the top 200 of my age group, worldwide (and therefore move on to the next level of competition). I’d also like to see my rank improve vs. all athletes in NorCal. My trajectory has been pretty good (from #325 among women in Northern California in 2015 to #106 in 2016). But frankly, I have zero control over my peer group, so my only concern is me.

In the coming weeks, I’ll share more about my Open experiences, physical and psychological prep, plus the strategy I will use for workouts and other rituals that help me. Stay tuned!

Back to basics

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

exhausted With so much time, energy and effort going into the nutrition challenge, it has been an easy topic for me to write about. But today I’m going to switch gears a little and share some thoughts as it relates to what motivates me in the gym, day-to-day. When I first joined RVC, my primary focus was exercise, ‘getting in shape,’ looking and feeling better. It never occurred to me to have performance-related goals. It took a few months: becoming familiar with the movements, wrapping my mind around the strategy involved in getting a faster time, more reps, but I soon became hooked. I figured out my strengths and weaknesses, where I could make up time in workouts and what movements I’d have to scale. Seeing people around me reaching milestones like getting their first pull-up, or linking double unders was really powerful and encouraged me to believe in myself. When you are working towards these skills, struggling through workouts, it can very easily feel like you will never be able to achieve them. But when you witness the people around you, doing the same thing you are doing day in, day out and reaching those milestones, the impossible suddenly seems possible.

During my first few months of Crossfit, I believed with my whole heart that I was one of those people who would never do an unassisted pull-up. Remember the Presidential Physical Fitness Challenge from your middle school days? It was my worst nightmare. Forget pull ups – I couldn’t do the ‘flexed arm hang’ for more than 5 seconds! Pull-ups would never happen for me. What I didn’t understand was the progression of skills to get there, and that with a little work and a lot of consistency, anyone could work through those progressions. So, I settled into place in the scaled world as most newcomers do, assuming that’s where I would spend my ‘life.’ I was pleasantly surprised when I graduated from green band, to blue for my pull-ups. After that first step up, seeing the progress I made, and seeing others progress, I began to trust the process. I committed to doing a little bit of extra work a few times a week after class, with the goal of someday doing a pull-up without a band. Initially I worked slow negative pull-ups (jump up to bar from a box and s l o w l y lower down) for as many reps as I could do for 2-3 sets, generally each week that number would increase. After a couple of weeks, I decided it was time to try the red band and wouldn’t you know, it was a struggle, but I made it through most workouts. I continued with the negatives, also did volume on the bands and lots of push ups to help build upper body strength. Then one day in January (I remember it well – the day has been memorialized!), almost 6 months after starting Crossfit, I decided it was time to at least TRY an unassisted pull-up. To my utter disbelief, I cranked out not one, but three and then three again and three in a third set! I was so happy I could have cried (ok, I did cry – but only a little). And it really wasn’t about the pull-ups. I don’t think I fully realized it at the time, but that one little victory gave me the self-confidence to continue to set my sights higher, on goals I never would have thought to conceive of, let alone work towards, or achieve.

For me, this is what it is all about: picking a milestone – one that boggles my mind to think about, that scares me to verbalize – putting my faith in the process and dedicating myself to it every day. In many cases, the work is the easy part, it is the consistency that is the hard part. After failing to do a single muscle up in the Crossfit Open in 2015 (it would have been blind luck for me to get one since I hadn’t worked on them at all), I set my mind on getting comfortable doing at least 1 by the end of 2015. Several days a week I worked strict pull-ups, then strict chest to bars, then strict weighted pull-ups and strict weighted chest to bars, in addition to the transition and dip. Once a week, I’d attempt a MU and once week I’d fail. I spent about least 6 months, failing to do a muscle up on the rings. It is frustrating – agonizing – to work so hard, want something so badly, and not get it, over and over and over. It definitely requires a sense of humor. But more importantly, it requires persistence and determination. Give yourself permission to try, and to work at something even when there’s no sign of progress. Believe that you are getting better just by doing the work, and although your work may be consistent, improvement isn’t always linear or consistent. Know that the outcome is not certain, the only thing that IS certain is that you won’t get there without hard work. Thinking about things this way, the hard work IS the payoff. And it is what keeps me coming back for more.

Stick to the Plan

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

sticktotheplan_700x300

I am closing in on the end of the second week of my 6 week nutrition challenge, and I am happy to report it is going well! For me, ‘going well’ means a few boxes have been checked: I have been sticking to my nutrition plan and, for the most part, hitting my macros. This makes me feel good psychologically because I really WANT to be successful, and knowing that I am doing what I need to do to be successful FEELS GOOD. I also feel good physically. I’m not starving. I do feel hunger, but I am able to acknowledge it and move on, knowing I have a yummy meal coming soon. I can also feel my body changing, if ever so slightly. While the scale hasn’t moved more than a few pounds, I feel leaner, less puffy, and that’s a good feeling! More importantly, I feel strong and fast in the gym. On the heels of back to back competitions, I am back to my ‘regularly scheduled’ training and that feels good, too! I even celebrated a 5 lb PR on my back squat – I’ll take it!

I do weigh myself on a day to day basis, and that is helpful directionally, but also a little challenging because the natural inclination is to want to see numbers move, and when that doesn’t happen, or the numbers don’t move as fast as you want them to, that is FRUSTRATING! So Friday morning, I got on the body comp scale to check in, and found that I’ve put on a couple pounds of lean body mass and lost a few pounds of fat. Those indicators are moving in the right direction. This was a good reminder for me of a couple really important points: 1) the scale at home is absolutely not a good measure of what is going on with your body; better barometers are how you feel day to day, pictures (yes, I am taking weekly pictures, maybe I’ll gather up the courage to share those at the half way mark) or measurements; 2) trust the process. The fact is, if you are following the plan, chances are very high that you will be successful! It is easy to become impatient and want immediate results, but the truth is the slower the numbers move, the more sustainable the change is in the long term.

Sticking to the plan is hard when results are slow, or when you are not used to putting so much focus on what you eat. The single biggest thing I focus on is also the question I get asked most: hitting my protein target – and how to do it. The best answer is to eat real foods and lean protein sources like chicken breasts, turkey breast, fish, and eggs; greek yogurt and cottage cheese are also great sources of protein, if your body can handle dairy. I eat about 2.5 – 3 lbs of chicken breast each week. I also eat a lot of egg whites and low-fat greek yogurt. Realistically though, that IS a lot of food, and to be perfectly honest, I really enjoy my protein (and spinach) smoothie for breakfast! It has been my go to (post- or pre-workout) breakfast for well over a year and I know it works for me. On days when I do 2 training sessions, I may even have a second protein drink along with a rice cake or banana as a post workout meal, simply because it is quick and convenient. In a perfect world, I’d be eating perfectly balanced meals within 30 minutes after my workout, but my world is far from perfect and I’m just doing the best I can. Overall recommendation: eat whole foods when you can; if you are doing that and still missing your protein number (not unusual), try adding a post-workout protein shake, or maybe even one at night to make sure you hit your protein target.

With that being said, the follow-up question is typically which protein powder to use? With so many types (whey, casein, blends. plant proteins…) and brands it is extremely overwhelming. Generally speaking, ‘one serving’ is usually about 23-25 g protein, so don’t worry about the quantity. For me, and this is a bit of an oversimplification, it comes down to a couple of factors: does it taste good and does it blend well. A third factor is the time of day, which influences the protein source. Some protein powders also include carbs, which is a nice perk but since carbs are relatively easy to consume in solid form, I usually stick to powders that are predominantly protein (there may be 2-5g of carbs but those are mostly for flavor). I also like to have control over the number of carbs I take in, so I tend to eat them separately instead of having them incorporated into the powder. As far as flavor goes, I prefer chocolate flavored powders. Vanilla and other fruity flavors taste artificial and overly sweet to me. In terms of blending, I like ones that dissolve nicely in a shaker bottle and don’t REQUIRE a blender to mix well. Lastly, if I am consuming the protein at the end of the day (like after dinner, to round out my protein intake for the day), I will take micellar casein protein, which is slower to absorb, and more gradually releases amino acids, which means it is a good way to feed the muscles overnight.

As for specific brands, I’ve tried lots. Here are several that I would recommend (no incentive for promoting any of these):

Progenex Recovery, Mocha (hydrolyzed whey protein). Flavor is delicious mixed with water and even more so with coconut water. Mixes really nicely with a 15-30 sec of vigorous shaking. $60 for 30 servings ($2/serving)
ProJym, Chocolate Cookie Crunch (whey/casein blend). Great flavor (I use this in my spinach smoothie and it tastes like a chocolate milkshake); never tried it blended in a mixer bottle. Reasonably priced at $55 for 46 servings ($1.20/serving).
Optimum Nutrition Gold Stardard 100% Whey, Extreme Chocolate Milk (Whey). Good flavor, good mixing, good overall product. $57 for 71 servings ($0.80/serving)
Dymatize Elite Casesin, Cinnamon Bun (casein). Good flavor, I mix 3/4 scoop with a few tablespoons of water plus a tablespoon of nut butter and make a ‘pudding’ out of it. Good way to round out macros for the day and you can kind of think of it as a dessert. $49 for 55 servings ($0.89 per serving)

I’m always looking for recommendations and high protein snack ideas. Please share your favorites here!

You asked for it… a sample meal plan

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

As promised, here is a sample day of what I will eat during my nutrition challenge. I am 5’5″ and 144lbs, looking to lean out (5-7 lbs fat loss) while maintaining or gaining lean body mass. I work out about 90 minutes per day, 5 days a week, and do a variety of strength, conditioning and high intensity intervals. Each day, I will be looking to hit ~2000 calories: 200 g carbs (mostly unrefined and keeping sugar to <60g); 135 g protein and 60-70 g fat. Since I’m looking to lose fat, I’m ok with being a little under my target fat consumption each day assuming I feel good and am not starving – but the carbs and protein I want to get within 5 grams. I’ll be looking to cluster my carb intake around my workouts (consume ~70-80% of carbs in the 6 hours around my workout – mostly after), save my fat intake for the meals far from my workouts and generally spread protein evenly throughout the day. Check it out and holler if you have any questions or comments!

Single morning/mid-morning workout

7am – Breakfast (Smoothie + Oatmeal)

breakfast

9-10:30am Strength + Cardio Workout

post-workout

1pm

lunch

3:30pm

snack

6:30pm

dinner

8:30pm Casein Pudding

casein

The homework is done… Let the fun begin!

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

chopped-foods-700-x-300

One statement wraps up the most important learning I could pass on about success and failure (having experienced both!) as it relates to nutrition: ‘By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.’ With my fall nutrition challenge starting in just a few days, I’ve been hard at work doing some advanced planning and preparation to set myself up for success. What I mean by ‘preparation’ extends beyond cleaning out my fridge and cabinets of unhealthy foods, and stocking it with nourishing foods. That’s part of it (and I’ll share more what I do to prepare as it relates to food), but there’s another aspect of planning that doesn’t get much attention, and that is situational planning. I’m already thinking about how I’m going to handle the challenging situations that I know I will come up against during the 6 weeks.

For example, every year there are 2 days in October that really put my resolve to the test: 1) my son’s birthday and 2) Halloween. What am I going to do when faced with my son’s birthday dinner of choice – bacon pizza, of course – delicious cupcakes, and what about the gobs of candy and CANDY CORN (aka crack) on Halloween! Even on the best of days, if faced with these temptations, things could go horribly wrong in an instant. Instead of making an impulse decision, I’m going to make a plan. That plan might be to forgo the pizza but indulge in a cupcake (I can’t have my son’s memory imprinted with his mommy bitterly knawing on carrots on his birthday), or maybe I’ll do something really special with him during the day just the two of us, and forgo the ‘food’ part of the celebration. Either way, I will plan for it in advance and stick with the plan in the moment.

The other set of challenges are the ones that pop up out of nowhere, like the donuts that show up unexpectedly at a meeting or the glass of wine that gets poured for you at a restaurant, or even that hunger pang you get in that afternoon lull around 4pm. Knowing how I will tackle those unexpected situations will increase the chances of a positive outcome. There are a couple strategies I like to use in these circumstances: the first is to be prepared to politely decline food/drink that I haven’t planned to consume in a social situations, and have a 2 sentence explanation of why (curious minds!); the second, in the case when hunger strikes me unexpectedly, is distraction. I identify a few activities that I enjoy and can hold my attention for 5-10 minutes. Maybe that’s going for a walk outside, removing myself from my surroundings and ‘treating myself’ to listening to a few of my favorite songs, or a podcast. Having those ‘distraction techniques’ in my back pocket is usually just what I need to put my attention on something other than the feeling of being ‘hungry,’ just long enough for the feeling to pass.

So there’s one aspect of my planning covered. The other big aspect is the nutrition and food component. This time around, I’ve chosen to follow a macro-based nutrition plan. This means every day, I’m looking to hit certain number of grams of protein, carbs and fat for that day. In addition, I’m timing my carb intake such that it is around my workouts, and saving my fat intake for the meals furthest from my workouts, spreading protein intake generally throughout the day. The only restrictions I’m putting in place are 1) no drinking for 6 weeks, and 2) no Halloween candy (gasp)!!

Based on my experience in the past, I know that when it comes to having to hit certain numbers by the end of the day, I really need to know what I’m going to eat with each meal in advance. When I wing it, and just eat haphazardly, I end up either short 50 carbs at the end of the day and having to scarf down a banana before bed (that can’t be healthy); or blasting through my fat by noon and having to eat my salad or vegetables at dinner totally naked ( the vegetables, not me). So what I’ve done is mapped out a few days of eating. Literally what foods I will eat and when I will eat them. Here is a link to what that looks like for 1 day. You can see what my daily goals were and I’m pretty darn close on the protein and carbs and a little low on fat (I’m ok with this because the other days are pretty much spot on).

With that being covered, if you are starting down the path of a nutrition challenge or just want to put some order around your meal planning and prep, here are some other things you can do to set yourself up for success:

For at least 1 week (preferably all 6!) during the challenge, plan to log all the food you eat in MyFitnessPal. This will really help you understand what you are eating, and works / doesn’t work for your body!
Think about the different ‘types’ of days you have, and plan out (in MyFitnessPal) what you will eat for breakfast, lunch dinner and snacks. Start with what you normally eat, and see how that adheres to (or doesn’t) your nutrition plan of choice. Modify as necessary.
Any meal that has multiple ingredients that you anticipate eating more than once (let’s be honest, there’s probably at least 3-4), save as one of ‘My Meals’ in MyFitnessPal. There’s nothing more gratifying than saving yourself a few clicks here and there!
Every night before bed, plan out and enter into MyFitnessPal what you plan to eat the next day. Don’t wait to log on the fly! If it’s already programmed in, all you have to do is EAT THE FOOD! No thinking! You might even choose to do this a few days in advance!
Taking it one step further, if you have planned several meals in advance, you now know what needs to be in your fridge. Go ahead and assemble the meal as much as reasonably makes sense. Please do not apply salad dressing to a salad you are eating 3 days from now. But you can certainly chop up all the veggies and put the lettuce into one container and pre-package the veggies and protein source so they are ready to grab and go, or toss onto that nourishing salad.
And while you are at it, since you know how many grilled chicken salads you will be eating, you will have a pretty good sense for how much chicken you’ll need to buy to have enough protein for those salads (for the record, there are roughly 139 grams of protein in 1 lb of chicken breast). Put another way, assuming you want about 20g of protein per salad, 1 lb of chicken breast will last you about 7 meals. So now you can start building your weekly shopping list around the foods you know you will be eating.

Wow. This is too good to be true! So much organization! Truth be told, I haven’t exactly made it this far in the planning process myself. The meal planning, pre-logging, pre-packaging, YES. The shopping lists, NO. My dream is to get to the point of knowing exactly what I’ll eat each week and having a shopping list that has exactly those items and just the right quantities – no waste and no 5:30pm runs to the grocery store. A girl can dream – and who knows, maybe I’ll get myself there during this challenge. Please pass along any other tips or strategies that have helped you!

And that’s a wrap!

May 9, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

competitionn700x300

Quick follow-up from this past weekend’s competition(s). So happy to report I did my best, had a really fun time and met some great people. I will spare you the details of each and every event, but suffice it to say the workouts were super challenging, yet still fun. And as it turned out, my ‘best for the day’ exceeded my expectations – and even my stretch goals – for the workouts. In this competition, my best yielded me 7th place in a division with 13 competitors. Right smack dab in the middle, with one 3rd place finish, one 6th, and one 11th. I could not be more proud.

Oddly enough, the event I am most proud of is also the one I was most anxious about. This workout in particular had, among other things, bar muscle ups in it, a movement I have been working on (and struggling with) for over a year, one that I’ve never had to do in a competition setting, and only in the last 6 months done in a workout with a time component. It happened that all the pull up bars were in use for the 90 minutes leading up to my heat time, so I didn’t even have a chance to warm them up! Just a couple tick tocks and pull ups in the 2-3 minutes leading up to ‘go’ time… I really had no idea what was going to happen. But when it came time to jump up to the bar – from out of nowhere I pulled out 5 muscle ups…. UNBROKEN! Say whhhhaaaatttt? And then a few more sets. Sure, I struggled with the last one, had a couple fatigue-induced missed reps, but I finished the workout, inside the time cap, and took 6th place! Just finishing that workout was enough to call the whole day a success. It was a real confidence booster to take on something I knew would challenge me and come out of it feeling not just good, but great.

In a roundabout way, this leads me to what is really the heart of this post. In addition to gauging your fitness level among your peers, competitions are a great way to challenge yourself to step out of your comfort zone. In my experience, I’ve found Crossfit competitions and the community of people who participate and spectate, to be uniquely inclusive and supportive. There is a common understanding of the depth of physical and psychological exertion involved, and that connection brings people together in a way that I have not seen in other sports. The other point I’d like to emphasize is that there will always be a movement or lift that makes you nervous. Don’t let that deter you from participating. You will always want to be better/faster/stronger, so don’t use that as an excuse to not go for it. Get out there and throw your hat in the ring! You won’t regret it.

3-2-1… Go!

May 8, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

I’m baa-aack… And setting a really unsustainable precedent: multiple blog posts in a week! But I have to get this out there. I have some competitions coming up and I can feel the nervous excitement building. With 2 years of competing in Crossfit under my belt (and many before that doing endurance events), I suppose some would consider me a ‘seasoned’ competitor. But compared to many who have been at Crossfit for 6, 7, 8 years, I am still a novice competitor, and I definitely feel that way in the heat of the moment.

There are so many aspects of competing to explore, but what I want to address today is the mental preparation that goes into competition. And really when I say competition, this could be competition at any level, whether that is a Crossfit Open workout, a benchmark workout, a time trial or foot race, or even just a class workout that has you nervous. If you’ve ever faced a situation where you are ranked based on your score or you are going up against a previous personal record, you know what I’m talking about! As a naturally competitive person, I feel the excitement and nerves of competition quite frequently in the class setting.

Regardless of the situation, there are several techniques that I’ve adopted that have helped me approach workouts where my nerves come into play. First and foremost, I remind myself that competing at all is a privilege! It is all for fun and if it’s not fun, it’s not worth doing. Nonetheless, to calm the jitters, it helps me to tell myself that it really IS just another workout, and that I have done all the work I could possibly have done to prepare. At the sound of “3-2-1 Go,” I relax and treat it just like any other day at the gym and do the best I can for that day.

In cases where I know the workout in advance, I like to think about the workout, about times I’ve done other workouts like it and develop a plan. I actually have a lot of fun doing this! Factors that influence the plan include workout duration and how I should pace myself given the time domain; the movements themselves, the weight, sequence and number of repetitions of each movement also influence that plan. Once I have a plan in mind, I will actually rehearse it in my head. I visualize myself doing the workout according to plan, imagining how I might feel and – THIS IS IMPORTANT – recalling what I will tell myself when things get hard and all I want to do is stop. This is really important because chances are, if you are going hard, you will get to this point! In a split second, in a moment of weakness, things can go drastically wrong, if you are not prepared for it. For me, being aware of this, visualizing myself reaching that point, recalling my mantra and carrying on, has been a game changer. I will change up the specific words depending on how I’m feeling, but recently the simple statement “you got this” has been my go to.

whiteboardpics-small

If you are lucky you might even have time to test the plan in advance, or in the case of benchmark workouts, you might have notes from the last time you did the workout (a topic for another post, but in short, do yourself a favor and take notes on your workouts!) But that isn’t always the case. When it’s go time, you just have to go for it – be confident and stick to your plan. Dig deep and listen to your body. Know that there are times when the plan you develop just doesn’t work! Maybe your grip gives out sooner than you think or your plan was too conservative and you can go harder, faster or do more reps than you planned. As important as it is to have a plan, being flexible and in touch with your body is just as important. It’s ok if you have to change your strategy. That said, I do recommend making a mental revision and coming up with a new plan, as opposed to winging it!

Ultimately, good day or bad, I like to remind myself that whatever the outcome, it is a blip on the radar, just a snapshot in time. If I have done my best for that day, I can call it a good day. Those are days to savor. There have been occasions where that is just not the case – when I’ve been mentally defeated early in a workout, or missed a lift I should have made. The best way to manage times like this is to make a mental note of what went wrong, learn from it and move on.

The last point I’ll make is you’ll notice I never once referred to my performance with respect to other competitors. I feel fortunate in that I’m really only competitive with myself. Sure, it’s nice to make it to the podium or the leaderboard, but when it comes down to performance, my focus is really entirely on myself. That is the only thing I can control, so worrying about others is truly a waste of energy!

I will be back after this weekend with some post-competition thoughts and of course, analysis. Until then, send your positive vibes my way! And if you have thoughts or other competition mental prep that helps you, please share!

Where it all began…

May 8, 2017 by betsy Leave a Comment

fall-farmers-market-700x300 I’ve been contemplating starting a blog for some time. The last few weeks have been particularly chaotic for me, but as I sit here, I’m finding some calm in putting ‘pen to paper.’ So, what better time to launch my new blog, Live Lift Flourish! A forum for me to share my passion for fitness. Seeing as I can probably count my readers on one hand, I’ll go ahead and say hello to both of you. Hi mom! Hi Matt (my husband and Chief Technology Officer of Live Lift Flourish)! Aaaaaaand, that’s everyone! Hopefully not for long. So there it is!

It’s fall (although today it didn’t feel like it), and like the elephant in the room, there is something on my mind. The Ross Valley Crossfit fall nutrition challenge is around the corner. How fitting for the topic of nutrition to be the kickoff for my blog! So much of who I am today is a result of actions set into motion via my first nutrition challenge three years ago.

Although I often credit ‘Crossfit’ as having changed my life, in fact it was the focus on nutrition and change to my diet, which often (but not always) comes along with Crossfit, that really moved the needle for me in terms of the physical changes to my body. Many in the fitness world will focus on exercise as the primary factor in fat loss, yet I am a firm believer in the saying ‘abs are made in the kitchen.’

So let’s rewind back to 2013. I had reached an inflection point in my life. With a family established (2 children under the age of 3), I had left my job in the corporate world to pursue independent consulting engagements, in search of more balance and joy in my life. I had also decided to shake up my boring fitness routine and was a few months into my Crossfit tenure, when my gym, Ross Valley Crossfit, announced its fall nutrition challenge: 6 weeks of sticking to a nutrition plan of your choosing (‘cut the crap’, Paleo or Zone).

I was apprehensive, but I signed up. Six weeks isn’t so long. It would go by in a flash. Or so I thought. I chose the Paleo diet – one that is based on eating meat, fish and eggs, vegetables, some fruit, nuts and seeds and healthy oils – and eliminates dairy, grains and refined sugar or sugar substitutes.

Let me stop here for a minute. What I’m about share is not easy for me. At the time, I was 26% body fat, weighing 161 lbs (for reference I’m 5’5″). Certainly not obese, but on the heavier side of average, and definitely carrying more fat than I needed. [Did you see that? I didn’t JUST look my body weight. Body composition – the percentage of your body that is made up of fat vs. bone, water and muscle – is really a critical concept to be aware of when you are looking to ‘lose weight.’ But more on that another time.] Going into this challenge, I had what I considered to be a ‘moderately healthy’ diet, avoiding refined carbs, sugar and saturated fats, but didn’t pay a lot of attention. I had had varied success with attempts to ‘diet’ in the past, and I really wasn’t sure what to expect. I didn’t have some miracle number in my head that would define success for me this time around – I just really wanted to change my behavior.

As it turned out, sticking to a Paleo diet for 6 weeks was not easy, especially when it came to eating out, dinner parties and weekends in general. But day to day, it wasn’t as hard as I expected. The worst part was the change up to my coffee. No cream. No Splenda. What??! By the end of the six weeks, I had lost 7 lbs of fat and gained 1 lb of lean body mass – a net change of 3.5% body fat. Wow! I considered that a success! Over the next year, I stuck to a Paleo diet roughly 90% of the time, leaving room for a few drinks and maybe 1 dessert per month. By October 2014, I had lost about 15 lbs of body fat and gained about 5 lbs of lean body mass (putting me at 17% body fat, at 151 lbs) in total.

During the next fall nutrition challenge (2014), I layered on the Zone Diet (weighing and measuring foods and eating prescribed amounts of carbs, fat and protein at each meal). During that 6 week challenge, I lost an additional 5 lbs of fat and with it lost only 0.25 lbs of lean body mass, leaving me at 14.5% body fat and 146 lbs.

body-comp-change Since the end of 2014, my body composition has fluctuated between 10-14% body fat and 138-144 lbs. All said and done, I’ve lost over 20 lbs of fat, and put on about 5 lbs of lean mass. I’ve dabbled with various approaches to diet and nutrition: strict macros, loose macros, macros with specific nutrient timing. I definitely indulge from time to time. Sometimes I’m very strict and measure, weigh and log my foods, but most of the time, I listen to my body and feed it what it is telling me it needs. The pictures to the right (yikes!!) demonstrate how the body composition impacted the shape of my body. These pictures evoke many emotions in me and I have so much to say on this topic, but will save that for another post!

Here are a few of the things I’ve learned in the last few years of experimenting with nutrition for fat loss:

If you have never done it before, log your food intake for at least one week. If you don’t measure it, you can’t change it. Download the MyFitnessPal app for your mobile phone (so you can log on the go). Play around with it – it is very intuitive. You can find almost any food you eat, and ingredient you can imagine in their database of foods (for each food they list the key nutritional elements – the ones I look at most closely are grams of carbs, fat, protein, fiber, sugar and calories). This is a really good tool to bring awareness to what you are putting in your body, both in terms of the big picture (how much protein am I getting?) and small things that add up, like habitual eating.

It is all an experiment! Different nutrition plans will work at different times of your life. You will probably have to tinker with various aspects of any plan to find something that works for you! For example, when I started Paleo – the one thing I found I really couldn’t live without was cream in my coffee. Six weeks without it was ‘doable’ but that is the one thing I added back immediately and saw NO change in my body composition or performance. So I added it back and kept everything else pretty much the same. You do not get extra ‘purity’ points for being more restrictive than you need to be.

If you have a lot of fat to lose, Paleo is a good way to kick start that process. If you have a sugar addiction (and many people do), you will most likely kick it. One of the best things to come out of my year of Paleo was giving up sugar and/or sugar substitutes in my drinks. No Splenda, no diet drinks. I just don’t drink that stuff anymore. Back to Paleo… one thing to be aware of: for someone who has less fat to lose, it is very easy to overeat fat (the macronutrient) on a Paleo diet, which will definitely slow down the fat loss.

If you are trying to lose that last 2-5% body fat or have been eating pretty well (whole foods, minimal refined sugars for at least 3-4 months – most likely longer – the Zone Diet is a great exercise in understanding macronutrient balance and portion control. The calculus is a little intense for the long haul, but for a period of 6 weeks, it really helps imprint some good habits. For me that means with every meal, making sure I consume protein.

Six weeks is a perfect amount of time to achieve significant change, and instill some really good habits (and get rid of bad ones!). Some people can make a change to their diet and never look back. If you are not one of these people, fear not! The idea isn’t necessarily that you perfectly adhere to any plan forever. If you change one small thing about your diet as a result of your challenge, that is a win!

So here I am, about to start another nutrition challenge. This time around, my goals are twofold: I have about 5-7 lbs of fat I’d like to part with, while maintaining (or increasing) my lean body mass (this can be difficult). What is more important to me, especially as we head into winter and holiday season, is establishing some new, good eating habits and eliminating the bad habits I slip into when I’m not 100% committed and focused. Thanks to these nutrition challenges, I know what works for my body – what I need to do to feel good, and perform well. The challenge is to stick with it!

For those of you still reading, thanks for stopping by! I will keep you posted on how the challenge goes! Here are some of the topics I expect to cover in the next few posts: food prep, competing and a few of my favorite workouts and how to approach them.