He really enjoys making us suffer ...

Brian, that is. The owner and the (sadistic) coach for today's (5pm) WOD. You can see it in his eyes -- he does not appear to care that we are grunting (okay, perhaps I was grunting enough for everybody) and struggling. (Just joking ... it's the squint in his eyes of "I know this hurts but it'll make you better." At least that's what I'm convincing myself it is ...)

Today's WOD: deadlifts, front squats, and the dreaded double-jumps. Today I actually 20 DJs in a row! (Once. After that it was "oh no, we suck again" all over again.) Today hurt, and I certainly couldn't perform "as prescribed", but I didn't slouch either -- I pushed as hard as I could and didn't stop until the time was up.

On a side note, as Brian is looking at my squat form, he comments -- doesn't asks, just comments -- that I must jog/run.

• "Yes, of course I run." (I'm in the military after all.)
• "Don't."
• "Don't run?"
• "Right, don't run. It's keeping your hip-flexors too tight."

Apparently my hip flexors are hurting my form. (Beavis: are you reading this? I'm guessing you'd be arguing something against this point.) Flashback to a pashto class a couple of weeks ago ...

We've been commenting about how afghans (and arabs in general) often like sitting on their heels. In fact, they sit low and can for hours. Chris, being the show-off in-shape flexible kind of guy that he is, goes right into position without a pause and holds it for a while. Not to be out-done, down I go ...

Of course, you know where this is going. I can almost get "as low" as Chris, but certainly not as comfortable, as I just cannot stretch as much and end up balancing on my toes. This does two things: keeps me a little distracted because I inevitably rock trying to keep my balance, and it tires out my legs a bit faster.

To this Chris comments: "Bill, you are no-where near flexible in your hip-flexors. You should really work on stretching them out." Back to the present ...

Huh. Perhaps I should stretch them out a little more. I guess I should really listen to simple statements like "I didn't know how out-of-shape or inflexible I was until I did CF". Well, it's true. Honestly, I presumed heavy lifting did not work on true flexibilty as much -- in fact, many heavy lifters I've seen at the gyms ("Globo Gyms" is one popular phrase in CF-ease) are not flexible at all.

So, I'm inflexible. Guess I have another goal to strive for. So as I sit here with a small ice-pack on my knee (the front squats ached just a little), I re-gain appreciation for the finer things in CF: mechanics before consistency before intensity.

Beavis, I really think you ought to try a CF session or two. I'm curious to see how well you do at metcon! I think your SOPs are preparing you well, but ...

This weekend I'll try to visit a CF gym in Pensacola since I'll be there through Monday. I gotta be delicate, though, as Molly still does not know about me doing CF. Not sure how I'll get there ... she's going to catch on sooner or later.