Every 4 minutes for as long as possible:
10 Toes to bar
10 Burpees
50 Double-unders
10 Slam Ball 20/12kg
From the 5th cycle and beyond add 2-2-5-2 repetitions per round.
Score: Rounds/time.
Photo: Mel. Who doesn't love bench press day? So awesome to see our ladies getting strong!! Thanks to Mark B for the photo.
Comments are closed.
CrossFit journey reflection- Marie Saliba As an affiliate owner and coach I am asked quite often how our CrossFit journey started. This article will aim to articulate my journey- the how, the why and the impact it has had on myself and my family and why I love what we do day in and day out. Over 15 years ago Chris and I started Coastal CrossFit, and what a journey it has been. Far from being a sporty kid, I would always place 4th at school sports. It was during my 11 years in the Air Force that I developed a love of training. I wasn’t great at any sporting endeavors but I enjoyed challenging myself and the military fitness kept me “fit”. After having our first child (Chloe) Chris (my husband) and I moved back to our home town in the Sunshine Coast, with our daughter Chloe being 1 year and our son Jesse on the way soon after. After leaving the security of the AirForce Chris and I started renovating properties and at the same time started a Fitness Bootcamp in Beerwah & Kawana. Life was definitely busy with a young baby, renovating houses and running a business. At this stage we had a fully decked out home gym with the bells and whistles. However the lack of time meant we couldn’t spend hours in the gym so we had to learn to condense training into a short time block. This is the first time Chris introduced me to CrossFit (although I didn’t know that was what we were doing). Strength/cardio combined in short sessions (most under 20 minutes). Over a couple of months we were both experiencing improvements in all areas of fitness. What/how? – it didn’t make sense until we stumbled across one of the best articles ever written by Greg Glassman “What is Fitness” (CrossFit journal article). Little did we know that reading this article would change the trajectory of our lives forever…. It was a humbling experience for both of us. Who would have thought defining FITNESS could have such an effect? We had to take a step back and relearn everything we thought we knew about fitness. And this was just the start of our journey…The urge to help others and share ‘the secret’ saw us start Coastal CrossFit in March 2009. We asked our Bootcamp clients to take a leap of faith and train CrossFit with us for a month and if they liked it – stay, and if they didn’t, no hard feelings. We are eternally grateful to have our very first Bootcamp clients (who have become family) still train with us today. It is on reflection that I realize the things that drew us to CrossFit originally are the same things that have kept us in business and loving the journey. Why do I train?I hadn’t really given thought to why I trained, but it was to improve the quality of my day to day life. To have confidence in my ability to turn my hand to any given task I chose. So why was my (and most peoples) training so far from this – Specific strength days, cardio days, isolation movements, etc. This was not in line with what I was needing and yet I didn’t question it. “What is Fitness” created my new perspective. Functional movement- Amazing things happen when you start using your body as a whole and learning to move properly. Starting with bodyweight movements then adding more complex movements and weight as movement quality allows. My body responded – improvements in all aspects of fitness, my run times, strength, flexibility, stamina. I felt and looked the best I ever did. Simplicity-The no gimmick approach of CrossFit “Give me a barbell and somewhere to hang and we can create some of the fittest humans”. We sold off all of our fancy equipment, bought olympic barbells and Chris built pull-up bars and squat racks. I love the old school feel of CrossFit gyms – everything you need to get fit, no lace and frills. No ego-I thought I was fit, until I didn’t. If you asked me I would have said with confidence I had 10 strict pull-ups, until Chris held me to CrossFit standard of movement (not half reps) which left me with a total of ZERO.Many athletes are humbled and are then faced with the choice – work hard to improve or walk away and pretend it doesn’t matter (don’t train CrossFit). Realizing there are things you are good at and a list of things you need to work at – there are no shortcuts and moving with standards takes effort.I am proud that many of our athletes can do many things that most people can’t, simply because they are prepared to work hard. Achievement/Time horizon –Realizing I am training for me and my quality of life (now and into the future)I have achieved more in CrossFit than I ever thought possible and the best part is that it doesn’t end. The reward of challenging yourself and achieving your goals one step at a time, putting in the work now and for 50 years in the future.I want to lead an active life right to my end and I know this is the preparation time. Community-Through CrossFit I have met my best friends. There is unspoken understanding in our achievements and unwavering support for one another. Despite our individual abilities I have the best cheer squad a girl could ask for, and will cheer as loud as anyone for my crew. Many of our crew have watched my children grow from babies and vice versa. It takes a village to raise children and our village is strong. Family –What I am most proud of is the legacy we are creating for our children. Growing up in a positive environment, challenging themselves physically and mentally, leading quality healthy lives, surrounded by a loving community.My kids have learnt that they can achieve anything through hard work, discipline and dedication. I…
Click here – I AM READY!! The scariest part of making change is taking your first step, however once you do you will be rewarded immensely. When you enter our doors you are greeted by the most amazing community. We are of all ages (age 12 -74 years young), athletic abilities (Absolute beginners to advanced), shapes and sizes (big, small and everything in between), BUT we have a common goal that brings us together – we work towards better health and fitness and leading our best lives. If you are in our gym (box) everyone in our community is cheering for you!!!If you are ready to take your next step towards better health and fitness? Our 5:30pm session (Monday to Thursday) is the perfect place to start! This class is suitable for anyone new to CrossFit. Our experienced coaches will make you feel at home as they guide you from start to finish. All you have to do is book in and turn up!! Regardless of your training history, our goal is to build your abilities and confidence assisting you towards better health and fitness. Don’t hesitate – come and join us for a FREE TRIAL SESSION.To get started click here – I AM READY!!
Our Coastal CrossFit KIDS classes are designed to help young athletes improve in all aspects of fitness, improve confidence and most importantly fall in love with being active!!! Our program is age appropriate and includes elements of gymnastics, Olympic weightlifting, cardio-vascular work, nutrition and so much more. Most importantly each class is designed to be FUN and keep kids engaged!! Kids sessions are run via blocks throughout the school term.BLOCK 4: 1 October – 10 DecemberTuesday 3:30pm-4:15pm (Age 5-13 years). Contact Marie Mob:0432710684 for details or check our Coastal CrossFit Kids Face Book Cost:Casual $17 (Please contact us prior to ensure a position is available)1 Session per week $165 (11 Weeks)
Attendance has been much lower over the past couple of months – Let’s turn this around!!!Frequency and consistency is the key to improvement and improvements lead to higher levels of motivation. In an effort to light the fires of motivation we have decided to run an attendance challenge. Our Challenge to you all during October is to achieve a minimum of 4 days training per week, each week. Individuals that achieve this will have their names placed in a hat and one person will be drawn out at random to a receive a Coastal CrossFit Shirt & Funky sock Friday pack.Congratulations to Deb for winning the August/September pack. Notice someone missing? Remember we are all better together!!! Share the love and help each other out. If someone is M.I.A reach onto them – a training partner and our community is the best!! Want to see progression? Turn up more frequently:Base line- We recommend a minimum of 3 days a week (this will allow you to see progression and keeps your routine in check)4 Days a week (gets things rolling much quicker)5 days a week is considered 100% attendance (You can be guaranteed those that are performing best in the gym are hitting 5 days consistently).
Spitting Sparks – [noun] (spitting spärks) 1. A CrossFit athlete who is on their way to becoming a Firebreather. Welcome to our next series of Athlete interviews. In this series we asked three Coastal CrossFit athletes who have made significant progress in a relatively short period of time to share some of their tips and tricks for success in CrossFit. We hope you enjoy this latest series and as usual please let us know whether you get something out of it either in person or by posting a comment. The second Athlete in this series is Tess Napper: Please provide a bit of background about yourself: I am 47 years old. I am a bookkeeper in our business. Before CrossFit, my week of training consisted of boxercise, personal training sessions and bootcamps. At one stage I fancied myself as a runner, so I dabbled in running…actually you wouldn’t call it running, more like a slow jog…shamefully, I could power walk quicker!! Outside of CrossFit, I love to spend time with Drew and Madi. In the summer we try to get a bit of water skiing in. I also enjoy time with the girls for coffee and the occasional breaky! How long have you been training at Coastal CrossFit? I joined Coastal CrossFit in February of 2012. How would you describe your fitness when you started? At that point I was fairly fit and could do somethings ok..push ups, burpees, a couple of body weight pull ups, squats, kettlebell swings and even a few double unders (thanks to the boys at boxing). But I had no idea about cleans, jerks, snatches, overhead squats, thrusters or the metcon WODs in CrossFit…And my attempt on the rower was let’s just say..very interesting!! What has changed the most about your fitness? During my time at Coastal, the quality of my movements has improved considerably and most of all, my overall strength has increased. My once 1-2 strict pull ups is now 8-10 and I can do weighted strict as well ( I think my best is 5 at 7kg). I have no problem doing a kettlebell swing at 20kg and usually use that instead of 16kg in a workout. Movements like burpees and push ups are still cruel in a work out but the movement does not bother me. Olympic lifting has been the most challenging but also the most rewarding. I had never done these lifting movements until CrossFit. At first it was very confronting, especially the snatch! Just taking it a little at a time, listening to instruction and just giving it a go has made a big difference. My best so far is 41kg, when I first started I could barely lift 20kg. My best clean is 57.5kg and clean and jerk 55kg…40kg was hit and miss when I first started in these movements and couldn’t imagine how long it was going to take to go heavier. Other movements like overhead squat and back squat have improved greatly, now with a 1RM of 90kg in the back squat! How often do you train on average?I try to do a minimum of 4 times per week…I prefer 5 to 6 sessions. I haven’t done double days but would like to work towards that at least twice a week. I have done the development sessions on a Saturday and really enjoyed it. I will continue to do that, it’s a great way to finish a good week of training. What are your goals for the future? My goals with CrossFit are to continue improving my lifting and refining lots of the other movements..kipping pull ups, handstand push ups, ring dips etc… I would like to continue to be competitive in my age group and actually finish top 10 in Australia for the open and top 100 in the world would be very nice! What advice would you give to a new CrossFitter who wants to progress rapidly? To new crossfitters I would say listen to instruction and ask lots of questions if you are not sure. Try, try and try again, be prepared to fail but most of all don’t give up! There will be things that may come easier than others, so the things that don’t, keep practising. Most of all, don’t give away good form for the sake of being quicker, performing movements correctly from the start will make you better in the end. How would you describe your nutrition? In our house we are fairly regimented with food. We tend to stick along the paleo track with lots of good quality meat, eggs, lots of vegies and salad at most meals. Madi is a great cook, so she makes lots of great healthy treats without all the nasties. I enjoy finding different recipes and making great healthy meals with meat/chicken or seafood and vegies and salad. What are your favourite and least favourite workouts, movements etc? My favourite workouts are the ones that include movements I can do well… I also love when olympic lifting is included in a WOD..somehow that just puts a whole different spin on the workout…it always makes me nervous but I enjoy it! I do like being pushed beyond my comfort zone..that happens most days, for me it is such a buzz to be able to actually do this stuff and keep up…most of the time. I wouldn’t call it my least favourite but the snatch and I do have a love hate relationship…one day it will get better!! What keeps you coming back? I keep coming back to Coastal Crossfit because I enjoy being with the people that train there. I also love the fact Chris and Marie are so passionate about what they do….And how could you not fall in love with Chloe and Jesse!! Chris’s Notes: I would like to take all of the credit for Tess’s (and Drew’s) abilities but they pretty much turned up to us as perfect blank canvases for success in CrossFit. I specifically wanted to include Tess in this series because it could be easy for others to…
