The Tribe

Wow I'm feeling so inspired after an amazing weekend on the beach in Devon.  The Tribal Clash was immense - 100 teams from all over the country and a truly beautiful location.  Crossfit Avon had 5 teams entered (two of which were Masters teams).  The WODs were incredibly hardcore and while a teeny part of me would have loved to be part of the competition, the rest of me was relieved not be sweating blood and tears in the sunshine on the beach.  I did lose my voice cheering and screaming the teams on through their pain and exertion.  The sun shone the whole weekend and the Dartmouth regatta provided the backdrop to the spectacle.
The crossfit Avon camp (competitors and followers) was hard to miss, especially because of the yellow team t-shirts designed by the gorgeous Jules Hawkins.
 It was lovely to spend the evening around a fire pit, cooking clean food with the Avon family, with Dom's tunes banging out and Simon and Katriona mending the competitors after their exhausting day (I don't think I've ever seen so much rock tape!).  I was especially in awe of Cathy Smith who completed the second day with a broken rib.  All in all it was an awe-inspiring weekend (and not just
because of the topless men with their six-packs).



I was very proud to be part of the Avon 'yellow army' that weekend - where one of our teams got to the final and one of our Masters teams won the Masters' competition.  Very much looking forward to next year.

Cavegirl in the kitchen

As I no longer have the use of my arms or legs after Tuesday and Wednesday's WODs (and my shoulder is distinctly unhappy, so I am heeding the physio's advice and slacking off the Crossfit) I thought I would prepare for the weekend's camping at Tribal Clash.  We will be camped by the beach on Blackpool Sands near Dartmouth  with 100 Crossfit teams (hopefully crammed full of hotties!) and as I have been inspired by last weekend's camping trip I headed off to purchase a camping stove, table and other camping accessories.  As I everyone is likely to be fairly hardcore healthy I thought I had better play along.

 Soooo here is what a cavegirl takes camping:  Chicken kebabs from Sainsburys (or any other supermarket, or make your own), I can fry them on the stove and eat them with grated carrot salad, guacamole and courgette fritters.   I have bacon and eggs that I can fry for brekkie with a courgette fritter and readymade kofta kebabs that I can have for lunch with some homemade mayo, carrot salad and guacamole.  Supper on Saturday will be Ruby & White's awesome hamburgers with carrot salad and guacamole and fritters.  Same brekkie and lunch on Sunday as Saturday.  I am going to take some greek yogurt and blueberries along for sweet snacks along with some almonds.  I might also take some pork scratchings from the fab Mexican shop in Clifton - they are fully gluten free with no additives and they are a brilliant paleo alternative to crisps.
As will be very obvious the staples of my travelling menu are carrot salad, guacamole and courgette fritters.

 Carrot salad (this costs about 50p, maybe £1 with the olive oil and lemon juice)
4 carrots grated (I have a food processor and along with my hand blender, mandolin and slow cooker, it is a paleo necessity) - mixed with a big, big glug (no add a bit more) of your favourite extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper, toasted cumin seeds, half a lemon or lime, maybe some crushed garlic and grated ginger if you fancy it.  That's it!  It really is beautifully sweet and fresh and I don't tire of it.

Guacamole
There are loads of different ways of making guacamole and mine often depends on what is in the fridge, but with my food processor I can make it in a few minutes.  As it is so quick to make I only make small batches unless I am feeding more than me.   Blitz half a red onion and then soak in water for a few minutes so it isn't so tangy on the breathe (I often don't bother doing this if I'm by myself and there are no hotties around), then put onion (without water) back in the processor with a tomato (or about 4 cherry tomatoes), half a finely chopped chilli (or chilli flakes if you don't have fresh), salt and pepper, juice of half a lime (or lemon), 1 avocado without skin or stone.  Blitz. Eat.

Courgette Fritters
These take a little longer to make as I make them in larger batches and I only have a very small non-stick frying pan [note to self, get bigger non-stick frying pan].  I grate 1 or 2 courgettes, mix with 2 eggs and a cup of almond flour or a couple of tablespoons of coconut flout.  Season to taste - I like spiciness so I add smoked paprika, salt and pepper, chilli flakes and freshly ground cumin.  Then I fry dollops in coconut oil for a couple of minutes on each side, squishing them flat to make sure they cook through.

One other thing that is a joy to eat is homemade mayonnaise and it's absolutely encouraged on both paleo and wholefood 30.  I have found a really quick way to make it that avoids the endless drizzling but you need a hand blender.  Check this video for the full instructions, but basically you get the hand blender beaker and add an egg yolk, 1tbsp water, 1 cup olive oil (not extra virgin as it's too strong, you could use avocado or walnut oil - don't use canola or other bad oils), salt and pepper (I add a bit of mustard and juice of 1/4-1/2 lemon)  Then put the blender in the beaker to the bottom and turn it on.  Mayonnaise appears before your eyes - keep going until you have a beaker of mayo.  Should take less than 2 minutes.  You can add flavourings such as garlic for aioli or a dash of smoked paprika or some chopped capers or anything really that suits your taste.

Oooooosh!

I know, I know, it's been aaaaages. I am a bad person.  However I have been a busy bee trying to shed some lard!  I started wholefood30 having been inspired by the lovely Stubz who has lost about 6 stone doing wholefood for various periods of time - he's just started 120 days which is amazing.  Wholefood 30 is strict paleo; no grains, no dairy, no legumes, no soy, no sugar, no alcohol.   I know- NO ALCOHOL!  Oh my goodness it was hard, but I was horrified about how huge I looked in photographs from a weekend in Snowdon so I kept at it...AND I lost a stone (with a little help from a colonic!)
However after my first, ever festival and Cowes Week and no Crossfit for 3 weeks I have piled on a bit (not sure how much as I've been to scared to step on the scales).  Therefore I am going to do a mini wholefood until I go sailing with my Sandhurst girlies (no way I will manage avoiding the wine that weekend!).  I've also  got some friends who are looking at paleo/wholefood so I shall be posting the recipes that help keep me away from the cake aisle in Sainsbury's.
I've just come back from bog snorkelling in Wales and as you can see from the photo I've been wasting away ;-)

I spent the weekend with the lovely Nina and the fabulous couple Jules and Rich.  Jules is on a ketogenic (no carb) diet and appears to be thriving so apart from the booze my diet was pretty healthy.  Nina produced some fabulous sweet potato fritters which are a great mini carb boost for post-training energy dips.


Sweet potato fritters (should make 4 or 5)
1 sweet potato grated, 2 eggs, 2 tablespoons coconut flour plus seasoning (I use salt, pepper, freshly ground cumin, smoked paprika, some chilli flakes.  Mash it all up and fry in coconut oil for about three minutes on each side.  Super duper - we had them with half an avocado and a fried egg for breakfast.

As well as being a good girl in the kitchen (I've just whipped up a batch of courgette fritters to take away camping for next weekend) I have dragged myself back to crossfit.  Oh my goodness I currently can't move my arms from doing Fran but with ring rows instead of pull ups (my rotator cuff is still not healed).  Today's WOD was totally bonkers and I expect I won't be able to walk tomorrow - 7 minute AMRAP 8 russian swings and 24 double unders, followed by 3 x400m runs with 60 seconds in between, followed by 7 minute AMRAP 10 wall balls 10 box jumps.  Filthy...really!

Posh gyms don't sweat

Bloody hell!  I can't believe how long it's been since my last post.  Bad Bridget!  But it's been a whirlwind of activity. In the week running up to the European Masters I couldn't do any last minute panic training at the box because I was in Macclesfield on a case.  So I pack my PE kit and my skipping rope and downloaded a tabata timer onto my phone.  The gym had no free weights and loads of weird machines for working on one muscle at a time BUT there were kettlebells although bugger all space to use them (maybe they were just there for show?!)   So I did some skipping to warm up, which caused some consternation and then did a kettlebell Tabata which caused more consternation - I don't think they'd ever seen anyone sweat before!  Then I tried a power lunge/pressup WOD and finished my whole workout in 30 minutes.  Day 2 I found a barbell and worked on my clean technique - a girl sat down onto a weird thigh squeezing machine and carefully draped her long blonde hair over the back of the seat, then sat there for about 5 minutes checking herself out in the mirror before doing 10 squeezes and then a bit more mirror gazing....and no one batted an eyelid, while they looked at me as if I was a freak!
Soooo the work managed to take my mind off my nerves about the Raising the Bar competition and I suddenly found myself cooking a paleo breakfast pie  and packing all kinds of paleo treats for the next day...THE NEXT DAY aaaaggh! The only solution was chocolate (probably not the best preparation for a day of intense physical activity).   However the crazy early start and the 30 minute walk to the box was great preparation, at least it woke me up and took my mind off the impending ordeal.   The lovely Cathie Smith was competing alongside me and drove us to Dragon Crossfit in Cardiff along with her daughter and son and his friend who were acting as cheerleaders for the day.  The box was buzzing when we arrived and we met up with the dashing Hugh Thomas who was the third Master from Crossfit Avon

We got marked up with our numbers and wandered nervously around checking out the opposition.  I have to say I was ready to call for a stewards' inquiry into the age of some of the girls as I was hard pushed to believe some of them were over 40.  I jealously watched the tiny pert bottoms and the six pack abs and wondered what the hell I was doing there, but then the boys started taking their tops off and all was well with the world :-D.

The first WOD was a clean ladder, girls first and the weights looked epic, the over 55s started and it was truly inspiring to see ladies in their 60s and 70s with the most amazing figures shifting weights that I couldn't manage (well actually that bit was a bit humiliating!).  I managed 35kg which is fairly rubbish and was the joint lowest lifted in our age category although I  managed to do more bar hops in the tie breaker so I didn't finish last.  Some of the weights lifted were enormous and Cathie got a great personal best lift at 60kg.  I just had to make a vow to work on my oly lifting technique.

WOD 2 (50kg deadlifts followed by burpee barbell hops)was horrific and left me gasping so badly that I thought I'd bruised my lungs - I couldn't stop wheezing for an hour.  My thanks to Amelia who shouted at me so loudly to make me get over the bar exactly at the cut off point so I could earn another 2 minutes.

Then WOD 3 left me having to have a serious word with myself as my bottom lip started to wobble at the prospect of shoulders to overhead with a weight that I just couldn't lift, followed by box step ups with a 10kg plate.  I hate being a hobbit - that box was soooooo high.

 Luckily the lovely coach Caz gave me a pep talk and I pulled myself together and scaled the weight so I could complete the workout.  Unsurprisingly I didn't make the semi-finals but I didn't finish last (read into that what you will!)  and I got to watch some truly inspiring women (and men) workout for the rest of the day.  I avoided semi-permanent disability by warming down on a bike and went home for a very warm shower and a very long sleep with the intention of doing loads more training and coming back next year.

Walls and Balls

I do not like wall balls (deep squat with a weighted medicine ball that you have to throw at a target at least 9 foot high, catch and repeat).  I am going to say that again, I do not like wall balls, just in case anyone missed it the first time.  News of WOD 13.3 has crashed in and ruined my day.  I am signed up for tomorrow's class and therefore I have to face the wrath joy of 13.3 *sigh*.  12 minutes as many rounds as possible of 150 wall balls (7kg), 90 double unders, 30 muscle ups.  As many rounds as possible???  Only someone superhuman is going to get past the first round!!!  The excessive punctuation is an indication of my incredulity.  Made worse by the fact that my Karen time (150 wall balls for time) is longer than 12 minutes (just under 15 minutes in fact and that was with a 4kg ball to 9ft) so I won't even get onto the double unders (which I can't do either so actually not an insurmountable problem).  Now I've calmed down from my original WTF state I am simply going to concentrate on seeing if I can get my Nancy time within 12 minutes with a 5 or 6 kg ball.  I have watched K* and his crew with their top tips and I will have a go at battling my nemesis for 12 minutes of sweat and fury and possibly some tears (wall balls tend to be accompanied by a teeny huge reasonable amount of swearing).

Oooh I nearly got into so much trouble today - I had a battle to get out of bed to go swimming, little voice was urging me to stay in the warm and to avoid the pain and horror of the pool, other voice reminded little voice that if I didn't get my ample behind out of bed, into my swimsuit and off to the gym that I would receive a scolding text from Mark Durnford - beastmaster and evil genius.  That prospect was enough to get me scuttling to the pool.  I was, of course late, and informed that the scary text had been about to be dispatched *phew* .  So today's swim session involved lots of er....swimming unfortunately.  I scrimped on the warm up and we set of on 10 x2 length sprints 2 easy lengths 5 x4 length sprints (although this is all relative, my sprints are other people's warm up pace), 2 easy, 10 x2 length sprints followed by a very long lie down for the rest of the day cool down lengths.

  I am still slow but I can hold my head up high in that I keep my pace consistent even when my body is telling me to give up and go home and eat a cadbury's creme egg instead.  

It's weird what goes through your head when you are trying to swim faster than is comfortable - when you glide up and down the pool nice and slowly you can draft shopping lists, go over conversations, analyse them, rewrite them just in case you get the opportunity to have the conversation again except in a more mature and ultimately victorious way, plan what you are going to wear to impress that certain someone at the weekend or go through the plot of your next novel.  When you are made to swim like a demented octopus up and down the pool while an evil maniac with a stopwatch grins at you, you don't really think about anything apart from, "holy sh*t I need to breathe, my legs won't go any faster, why do my arms feel as if they are pulling through treacle...mmm treacle, aghh breathing, dammit, forgot, now I've inhaled a lungful of water bleurgh, ah at last the end, cr*p, I've got another length to go....." or maybe that's just me.  I suppose in a way it's more truly meditative than slow swimming because you really do just live in the moment concentrating on your breathing and very little else - no other intrusive thoughts poking through (other than the occasional "holy mother of God I'm going to die if he makes me do any  more!")

 So actually maybe that makes Mark a spiritual guide, a guru or a yogi as well as an evil sadist who inflicts physical torture swimming coach/personal trainer.

Still in the cave

I've fallen off the paleo wagon a little but I am still probably about 65-70% paleo.  I am going to ramp it up a little to try and lose a little more lard and the Lenten vow to give up chocolate and sweets is helping to keep my sugar intake down.  I have discovered a couple of brilliant recipes that are healthy but yummy so I don't feel as if I am missing out.  The first is the paleo pancake for which I shall be ever thankful to the lovely Jules Hawkins.  I have had it for brekkie virutally every day for the last couple of weeks - in various forms.  It goes brilliantly with bacon and a trickle of maple syrup, sausages, avocado and berries, and even this morning with fried, diced chorizo, peppers and courgette (for want of nothing else being in the fridge).
The recipe is really really really simple - for one person, take 2/3 banana and 1 egg, blend them into batter with a hand blender (or you can use a goblet blender for larger amounts), melt butter in a little frying pan, put a ladle of batter into hot frying pan - make pancake.  There should be enough for two pancakes and they taste blissful.  I have tried them out on friends and family - my especially fussy ones and they have all given it the thumbs up, even after initial scepticism.  My 4 year old niece Holly, who may be the fussiest person on the planet after her little sister Lottie, described them as "too delicious" and insisted I make some more.

The other thing I have discovered is paleo pad thai - I have to confess that thai and indian food are one of my many weaknesses, and I still haven't been brave enough to attempt cauliflowe rice.  However zoodles are the answer to my prayers when it comes to noodles.  Thin slices of courgette made with a sharp vegetable peeler or mandolin- maybe we should call them coudles over here?  http://www.health-bent.com/sides/paleo-pad-thai and I topped mine with some king prawns fried in butter and a few chilli flakes - totally delicious. 


I have also started to use model farm to deliver meat and veg.  I ordered the month freezer pack and a large bag of veg in the morning and it was delivered that evening.  They deliver in Bristol every Wednesday and I was amazed at the value for money.  It's all organic and the beef and lamb is grass-fed.  The pack was enough for me for three months, with a huge chicken, a pot roast, a leg of lamb and pork, plus a couple of packs of braising beef, a whole load of mixed flavour sausages, two large pork chops, 6 little lamb chops and 2 packs of minced beef.  Good thing I have a new freezer in my sparkly kitchen!  The veg bag was actually a sack nearly the size of me.  Loads of potatoes, parsnips, carrots and a turnip, plus beetroots, leeks, onions and a cabbage.  I couldn't quite believe it, and they threw in 6 free range eggs as a welcome gift.  I suppose I don't really have an excuse now not to fuel myself properly for my workouts.
 
 Talking of workouts, the intro video for the Open WOD 13.2 says "this will show how fit you are" uh oh!  I managed to get onto the 0700 class, which means I have seen 0600 twice this week (this may be a new record!).  10 minute WOD - 5 shoulder to overhead , 10 deadlifts, 15 box steps or jumps as many rounds as possible - the introduction of steps has caused all kinds of controversy on the crossfit discussion threads I can tell you!!  The RX was 34kg for girls - and as my workout log said 25kg is my 1 rep max for the shoulder press I was looking at 22.5kg but Andrew persuaded me to go to 25kg as that was the masters RX (I think for this competition Masters are over 55 but I'm claiming it because I'm not in the competition), and in order to do the whole think RX I had to use a 20 inch box although I was allowed to step rather than jump as there wasn't a hope in hell I could jump on the 20 inch box (it's my 1 rep max).   Watching the intro video was a real help so I managed 1 box jump short of 7 rounds (note to self keep going when the countdown reaches 1, you'd be surprised what you can manage in 1 second).   I'm now full of the joys of spring, a combination of the sunshine, warmth (well it's not subzero), and nailing a workout RX(ish) for the first time ever.  The great thing about crossfit is that everyone knows each other and there is an amzing sense of camaraderie so if you do well or work particularly hard you walk out with lots of congratulatory messages ringing in your ears - you don't get that in your bog standard gym :-D

I hate pyramids!

Pyramids!! Not the ones in Egypt I hasten to add.  I haven't seen the ones built by the pharoahs although I have sat beneath a crystal one to have my chakras balanced (don't ask!).  However I can definitely say that pyramids in the swimming pool are to be avoided at all costs (especially if you swim as if you are towing a brick - or possibly a wall in my case).  It was pointed out at 8am this morning that I hadn't written anything for about a month and to be fair this isn't a reflection of my training history.  I have been working like a demon (mainly to avoid eyebrow raising from chief nagger encourager Hugh, who is OC the Masters Team for the Raise the Bar competition in Cardiff next month.
After the wall ball epic that is Karen last week  I was traumatised delighted that the WOD the next day was 5 sets of 5 pull ups followed by a 100 20kg sumo deadlift high pull ups  interspersed with 3 ring dips every minute until all the sumos had been completed.  That was fun!

March has had some fairly horrendous workouts starting with a team WOD involving 6 minutes of rowing, thrusters, running, dumbbell snatches and situps- luckily I had the lovely Nina as my team and she's a ninja runner, while I run like I swim (see above).
The next killer little bundle of joy was 5 rounds of 3 overhead squats with 20kg interspersed with 3,6,9,12 and then 15 lateral crawls.  Lateral crawls are my new least favourite exercise in the whole world (and there is quite a long list to choose from) .  They involve you lying on the floor (that was the only bit I liked) and then pushing up into a press up and scuttling sideways like an asthmatic crab for about a metre and then doing another push up, ad nauseum (literally!).  Now I know that that doesn't sound a lot but you try doing12 of them especially after you've done 18 and 15 overhead squats!  But of course that wasn't enough because this was followed immediately by 5 rounds of 4 alternating split jerks with 25kg interspersed with 4,8,12,16 and then 20 squat bar jumps - ooosh!  Cue Bridge lying on the ground at the end attempting to breathe through every orifice.

Pistol squats seem to have featured frequently (or maybe I just notice them because they hurt so much) but I have been able to lower the box I've been using to aid me - 15 inches and counting.   I've even had a go at skinning the cat - this is not a euphemism!  It's a sort of somersault while holding on to gymnastic rings - I can't do it - that is all!
I have been daft unfortunate enough to schedule my visits to the box to coincide with the London throwdown workouts (Wednesday) and the Crossfit Games Open workouts (Fridays).  90 wallballs (my fave!), 70 kettlebell snatches, 50 over box jumps, 30 toes to bar (in my dreams), and 10 muscle ups (ditto).  I needed to have a lie down after that one.  It didn't get any better with the Open WOD - as many reps as possible in 17 minutes of 40 burpees 30 snatches (15kg) 30 burpees 30 snatches 20kg, 17 burpees (that's how far I got).  Burpees have moved quite a way down the list of my least favourite exercises and I was pretty surprised that I seem to have got the hang of them (although that is relative - having watched Annie Thorisdottir doing the workout on you tube I realise that I burpee like an epileptic grasshopper, except with less of a jump)
Now you might be forgiven in thinking that after all those epic workouts that I would be safe in assuming that Saturday would be a reasonably easy option - big mistake...huge!  Murph, one of the hero WODs (named after soldiers who have died in Afghanistan) holy mother of God! 1 mile run 100 pull ups 200 push ups 300 squats 1 mile run - I nearly turned round and went home.  I was allowed to do 3/4 of the exercises and used a massive band for the pullups, did the push ups on my knees and found out I can't do basic mental arithmetic when I'm blowing out my a** so I ended up doing 250 squats.  I have to confess I walked quite a lot during the run (especially the uphill bits) and I was totally in awe of the guys who did it in a weight vest!  I finished though and my time was under an hour, on the downside I looked like a tomato
I have been interspersing the crossfit with run/walking and swimming, which brings me back to the pyramid.  I don't have an excuse about getting up before 7am anymore as it's starting to get light,
so I started another 6 week session of swimfit.  I groaned inwardly as I slid out of bed and propelled my body in a somnambulent walk towards the pool.  Mark greeted us with a cheery smile (it's an evil facade I swear!) and after a warm up that was more than enough swimming for me - set us off on a sprint pyramid- 2,4,6,8,6,4,2 twice.  All I can say is that while I may be the slowest swimmer, by far, in the group - I am consistent...I'm always last-but I do manage to swim each of the steps of the pyramid in pretty much the same time, I swim 4 lengths in the same time regardless whether it is the first or last leg.  Spent the rest of the day unable to hear anything because I had water stuck in my ear - it does mean people tend to avoid me as I walk around with my head on one side, shaking it and grumbling to myself.