CrossFit Tri-Cities

Meal of the Day

Grass Fed, CSA’s, Locally Grown, and other Organic Foods:

One of the little known opportunities that we all have to get the best quality meat (and produce) available, is through joining a Community Supported Agriculture program (aka a CSA).  These programs deliver grass fed beef, the best quality pork, free range chicken, and eggs to a pickup point each month.   You have the opportunity to save a lot of money, versus going to Whole Foods and paying the $18.99/lb for a grass fed steak.  While prices vary, for around $85/month you can pick up about 20lbs of meat and eggs for the whole family to endulge in.  It can be frozen for future use, and the quality and taste is outstanding!

Check out these links to find out more about the CSA’s in the area.  With more produce coming in-season, farmer’s markets and CSAs featuring produce are available as well!  Awesome stuff!

-Local Harvest- Just type in your zip code and get a list of CSA’s nearby!

-Heritage Praire Farm- Located in La Fox, near Wasco, this produce CSA features a farm stand every Saturday May through October.

-Cedar Valley Sustainable Farm- Pickup is in Naperville, but has awesome chickens, eggs, pork, and beef.

-Walnut Acres Farm- Pickups at CF LGN in South Elgin, Batavia, and Yorkville.

Thanks to Julie Parrilli for some of the links on here!  We will be sure to add more in the coming weeks!

FOOD JOURNALS: Deadline for Week 1 is this Wednesday, May 11th.  The days to submit should be Monday, May 2nd, through Sunday, May 8th.  Remember to be as specific as you can with how you record your daily intake!  Weigh and measure especially for these first 2 weeks!

STRENGTH/SKILL

Back Squat:

3-3-3+

CONDITIONING

A:  AMRAP 5 Minutes:

-5 Chin Ups

-10 Goblet Squats 55/35

3 Minutes rest, then,

B:  AMRAP 5 Minutes:

-10 Toes to Bar

-20 Double Unders

Click here to reserve your spot in any of our classes!

Olympic Weightlifting Class Tonight at 6pm!

Does beating on a tire build strength? Heck yeah it does! It's also quite a bit of fun too!

“Bastard Strength”:

There’s something to be said about the strength of those with a job that revolves around hard manual labor.  Recently, Curt, Jon, and I were at the CrossFit Football Cert learning about the principles of making strong, powerful athletes. John Welbourne gave a few examples of other athletes he had played with, and against, in his College and NFL days, noting that not all of them come from a lifting background.  In fact, some of these athletes were pretty sub-par with regards to their “gym strength”, and the measurements typically used to determine who’s going to do play well in the NFL (the NFL Combine).  However, these athletes that lacked the “gym strength” made up for it in their “field strength”, almost always defined by an upbringing on a farm, or some other rigorous manual labor throughout childhood and adolcence.  I can remember when I was a kid, there were plenty of other kids in school with me that didn’t play sports, but were stronger than everyone else!  Hurling 300lb bails of hay all summer will most definitely have carry over into moving a 300lb lineman over to the side to make a hole for the running back.

So what does this “field strength” mean for our fitness?  We realize that we don’t have any NFL players working with us, yet, but we also realize that there is some great benefit to performing movements that can’t be replicated with a barbell, dumbbell, or with just your body weight.  These movements have a huge carry over into what you’re doing outside of training (safely) whether that be moving grandma’s funiture, lugging bags of mulch around the yard, or chopping firewood on your next camping trip.  More importantly, they’re different, fun, and can add a whole new dynamic to your weekly workouts.

So, now you’re wondering about what you’re doing now, or will be doing in the future, that will make you bastard strong?  Keep these movements in mind the next time you see them up on the site:

• Farmer’s walks
• Sandbag Get-ups
• Sledge Hammer Strikes
• Sandbag Runs
• Sled Drags
• Sled Pushes
• Tire Flips

These things could be considered the 4th element to our training program along side gymnastics, weightlifting, and running/rowing.  Remember, it’s ok to be (BASTARD) strong!

STRENGTH/SKILL

Back Squat:

5-3-1+

CONDITIONING

5 Rounds:

-12 Overhead Walking Lunges 45/25

-6 Chin ups (Deadhang)

-200m Run

Olympic Weightlifting Class tonight at 6pm!

Green Beer and Burpees! Great to see everyone out supporting CrossFit Naperville's event last weekend! Plenty more events scheduled for everyone else this year!

Nutrition:  The Struggle Between Mainstream Concepts and Understanding What Works (part 2):

We’re all familiar with the “low fat” diet or some variation of it.  We all know, or have known, somebody on this “diet” usually characterized by their fear of “FAT” at the dinner table, and sometimes of their use of cooking sprays/butter substitutes (polyunsaturated fat), which in effect are one carbon bond away from being a plastic.  These polyunsaturated fatty acids have been shown in studies to carry much more harm than good, with relationships to cancer.  Here’s an experiment, place any of these cooking oils, spreads, or sprays in a baking pan, let them reach their low melting point, then let cool.  Come back later and you will actually be able to peel what’s left of that polyunsaturated fat based substance off of the pan to form something that resembles a plastic sheet.  Interesting…..

But do we know where this ” low fat diet” concept actually came from?  Below is a clip from the movie Fat Head.  We get to learn a little about a biochemist named Ancel Keys, his study which created the “lipid hypothesis”, and the “low fat” diet……

So, what do we end up with?  Bad science with a profound impact on our health and wellness.  We become afraid of fat, and consume more refined carbohydrates, grains, sugar, sugar substitutes, and polyunsaturated fats which causes more harm than good.  Take the time and look into some of these tidbits of information, and just think of how interesting your next Thanksgiving meal will be when you debunk the the “low fat” diet for your relatives!

STRENGTH/SKILL

A:  Chin ups:

3x max reps, 3 minutes rest between sets.

B:  Makeup Back Squat or Press:

3-3-3+

CONDITIONING

AMRAP 5 Minutes:

-10 Box Jumps 24/18

-5 Med Ball/Sandbag Get Ups

Rest 3 Minutes

AMRAP 5 Minutes:

-10 Pushups with Reach

-5 Front Squats 135/95