So we are 9 days events from my biggest race of the year. The Spartan Ultra Beast is a full marathon distance obstacle course. We are doing two laps of the half-marathon distance course. There is one water station half way through the loop, and we are allowed to access a drop bag between loops. And to be honest, I’m starting to freak out. I don’t know what it is that I am worried about… Most of the pressure and expectations are very much self-generated. I’m worried I won’t finish. I’m worried I won’t finish well. Reading the elaborate Facebook posts and blog posts from the fellow Ultra Beasters, most of whom seem to be already packed (!), only adds to the anxiety. I do not even know where I’m sleeping the night before yet! Physically, I am ready. I am strong. I have been training. I can do this. Now I just need to get my head into the same ready space. My plan for the next few days is to start packing my drop bag. The most immediate shopping list: – 20 gallon plastic bin with a lid – 2 head lamps (and batteries) – 2 glowsticks – face paint And… breathe. Hugs, SOLO

*This week is all about peak week, so bear with me… I may lack my usual brilliance and wit, as I ingest increasing amounts of water, and complete crazy amount of sets/reps in the gym. If you are wondering what is this peak week insanity, read about it here. We are still in the carb depleting stage… Increase salt and water intake. Decrease carbohydrates, and train hard!!! I am not 100% compliant with EVERYTHING, but again I’m doing my best, while minimizing the likelihood of doing insane. NUTRITION (same as yesterday): Eat 5 meals. Limit carb intake by avoiding all starches, sugars, and colourful fruits and veggies. For carbs, eat only “green and white” veggies such as leafy greens, broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, zucchini, celery, green beans etc. Eat 1 serving of lean protein (equivalent to 20g, or 1 palm of protein) per meal. Include ½ to 1 thumb of fat per meal. Drink 1 gallon (4 L) of water. It’s easiest to fill up a gallon jug and just sip from it all day until it’s gone. Add the same or slightly more salt than usual to your food. OTHER MISC PREP: (optional) 30-60 minutes of cardio –> ideally on empty stomach TRAINING: The training is specified every week. For peak week, we are continuing with the same workout from the couple of weeks before, but dropping the reps, and increasing the number of sets. 10 min, treadmill warm-up 65 minutes, main workout: This workout has been around for a couple of weeks, but with fewer sets and with 15 reps for each exercise! Today you’ll complete 8 rounds of each group, performing 8 reps of each exercise at a controlled pace, with minimal rest in between. Gah. Eight sets. overhead dumbbell press –> 5 sets with 15lb, 3 sets with 20lb alternating dumbbell row –> 30lb weighted rear lunge –> 5 sets with 30lb, 3 sets with 35lb 1/2 plank band pull –> 3 sets with 10lb, 5 sets with 12lb waiter’s carry –> 3 sets with 35lb, 1 set with 30lb, 4 sets with 25lb lateral fly –> 1 set with 15lb, 7 sets with 12.5lb supine hip extension leg curl on the ball (SHELC) 15 min, spin bike 15 min, elliptical *Breaking down the cardio into different machines, because cardio for the sake of cardio is mind numbing! Where is Dr. House when you need him? Total workout length: 1 hour 45 minutes (whew… haven’t spent that much time in the gym… ever?). RANDOM OBSERVATIONS: I spent most of the day at home, and it was definitely easier to get the water in! I had more than 4L today, I think – counting post-workout BCAAs and herbal tea. I miss chewier vegetables. Very excited to have peppers and mushrooms in an omelet for dinner. Almond milk is an ok dairy-free substitute, but I miss my milk in coffee! Have you ever noticed that at least one television set at the gym is always playing Food Network? It’s a little twisted, no? FOOD LOG: Today, at restaurant Solo we served… meal 1: 5 egg whites omelet with asparagus and olive oil 1-1.5 cups steamed zucchini + kale coffee with ½ cup chocolate unsweetened almond milk –> oh so worth it. meal 2: 3-4 oz lean ham → not ideal, but this is another social engagement, so chant Om and think of good-better-best continuum 2 cups lettuce salad meal 3: 3-4 oz lean ham 2 cups steamed zucchini + kale meal 4: 4 oz basa fish 1 cup lettuce 2 cups steamed zucchini + kale salt meal 5: ½ cup egg whites → maybe more… totally eyeballed this one. 2 cups peppers + mushrooms ½ cup raw cucumber 1 tsp olive oil salt soy sauce

Happy 1st blogoversary to me! On June 15th, 2012, my first blog post started with the words: “I did something crazy. I registered for the Spartan Death Race 2013”. Here we are, 365 days later, and the Death Race is less than a week away. Last chopping and splitting practice session to celebrate! Max [the axe] continues to teach me life lessons. Today’s nuggets of wisdom: 1. It always comes down to “knotty” or “nice”. In this case, I prefer nice. 2. It’s only physical for the first hour. Then the mental games begin. 3. Brute force is not always the answer. 4. Finding balance is the hardest part. 5. A log is a log is a log. It’s not trying to piss you off. Promise. Just keep swinging. It took about an hour of chopping to start feeling the first hot spots. I taped them up, and it definitely helped. Let me show you what frustration looks like: All done! [Axe included for size reference!] Meanwhile, back at the ranch… packing is in full swing. Salomon SpeedCross 3 Wet wipes, bug spray, Gold Bond powder, sunscreen, caffeine pills, hand sanitizer, athletic tape, extra batteries. Some “real” food: And, you seriously have to watch this Fiskars video. It’s like Tough Mudder promo meets a BMW commercial. Signing off, Solo

*This week is all about peak week, so bear with me… I may lack my usual brilliance and wit, as I ingest increasing amounts of water, and complete crazy amount of sets/reps in the gym. If you are wondering what is this peak week insanity, read about it here. Today we are cutting water and salt, and loading up on carbs. Bring it on. I definitely looked forward to my breakfast this morning. Mmm, mmm – sweet potatoes with some cinnamon. But it was dry, dry! This will be interesting. Although I am just relieved to not have to drink obscene amounts of water any more. NUTRITION: Eat 5 meals. NO veggies or fruit. Add dry carbs amounting to 1g/lb of bodyweight, divided amongst your meals (or 1 cupped-hand portion per meal). Eat 1 serving of lean protein (equivalent to 20g, or 1 palm of protein) per meal. NO added fats with meals. Drink 0.5 gallon (2 L) of water. Limit salt content in your food. If desired and not contra-indicated, add a herbal diuretic. TRAINING: Starting today until after the photo shoot, we are off from all training. I am pretty relieved about that actually. Can’t imagine having to work out today. RANDOM OBSERVATIONS: Once you take out the fruit and veggies, meals are kind of… UGLY. Monochromatic. Boring. Sad. People! Enjoy your vegetables!!! For me!!! Foods I’ve been craving… tomatoes and apples. Juicy. Crunchy. Not green. I totally overdid it with the “green” grocery shopping. Now I have all these lovely green vegetables teasing me from the fridge. Darn you! No headaches today, but boy, was I dragging my feet. Holy moly. Going up the stairs was a challenge. Talk about muscle depletion… Check! I’m also pretty sore, but not in a specific “I totally killed my triceps yesterday” kind of way, but rather all over. I’m still having trouble getting my seven hours of sleep with all the running to the bathroom. That plus no energy = passed for 1.5 nap. I needed it! As I reached for a blanket, realized how sore my abs are! I got my spray tan today. Walking into a tanning salon to get a spray tan is kind of like walking into McDonald’s to get a bottled water. You get to feel all superior and self-righteous… As of yesterday, my weight was back up by couple of pounds (probably all that water). Again, nothing major in either direction. However, the muscle tone has definitely increased over the past couple of days. Hello, striation!!! Striation = visible striped appearance of certain skeletal muscles. Another hot topic in the bodybuilding world! Ironically, the “muscle separation” workout often includes high reps with moderate weight. Hmmm…. ten sets, anyone? FOOD LOG: meal 1: 4oz tilapia ¾ cup sweet potato cup of coffee with ½ cup unsweetened almond milk meal 2: 4oz tilapia ¾ cup sweet potato meal 3: 3 rice cakes 5 large shrimp 2 egg whites meal 4: 5oz chicken breast “fried” with chicken broth (argh – realized it was full of sodium) and garlic and ginger 1 medium white potato decaf Earl Grey tea with splash of almond milk meal 5: 4 oz chicken breast “fried” with sodium free broth and curry powder 2 rice cakes ½ cup sweet potatoes –> mashed on served on top of rice cakes, pro-tip from a PN alumni! cup of green tea A friend of mine, who is a really cool chick tough as nails, posted this on her Facebook wall today, and I thought I’d share. Thanks, Liat. Squat bums rock! “I flipping LOVE my body. My goals are not aesthetic. I am not a figure, bikini, or fitness model. I don’t fit into a size 0, or think I will ever be a Victoria Secret model. That is not MY goal. I refuse to waste hours doing cardio and to undereat. I am an athlete. I eat healthy and train hard. I don’t desire the approval of a panel of judges to tell me that my body is good because of how it looks. … I want to be judged for what it can DO, in comparison to YOU. MY BODY is SO much more POWERFUL, STRONG, FLEXIBLE, and CLEAN than the general population. I refuse to be brittle, weak… ***wasted potential*** Anyone who tells me to stop lifting, do more or cardio, or cut weight might as well get on their knees and kiss my squat bum.” AMEN? Signing off, SOLO

I woke up with a strange feeling today… Nothing hurts! It’s been over a week since the racing weekend, and despite the brick workout yesterday, I am not sore. Bruises are almost gone. Time to hit the gym!!! I was avoiding the second weights workout from Lean Eating, because it involves deadlifts. Back in Soldiers of Fitness days, we did a one-week stint at CrossFit, and I pulled my lower back quite severely doing deadlifts, and avoided them ever since. Today I armed myself with the knowledge and expertise – not my own, but those of Alex, the director of functional training of my gym. He is a power lifter, so if there is a person to demonstrate form for deadlifts, it’s definitely him. Holy moly, deadlifts are hard! But apparently my form was wrong all along. My yoga habit of keeping my lower back flat, rather than curving it, did not help. Alex was also really helpful with determining the weight. We are supposed to use a weight that we can only deadlift 6 times, and then do it for 4 reps – leaving plenty of gas in the tank, so to speak. He had me settle at 135lb! I felt like I was playing with the big boys, putting those 45 pounders on the barbell. WOD PN weight workout #2 3 x 4 (135lb) modified deadlift 3 x 8 (15lb / 17.5lb / 20lb) tall kneeling overhead dumbbell press 3 x 10 fast knees to stability ball AMRAP in 60sec = 37/30, modified push-ups 2 x 15 (12kg = 26.5lb kettlebell) lateral squat AMRAP in 60sec = 15/17, inverted row AMRAP in 60sec = 14/12, 1/2 kneeling dumbbell curl 150min, teaching hot yoga Hugs, SOLO

Guess what is the one thing you really (really!) don’t want to do after you’ve been stuck in traffic for over an hour in a snow storm, hungry, on your way from work? Come home, change, eat, take your gym bag and go for a swim lesson. Yeah. Seriously. Getting wet was the LAST thing on Earth I wanted to do after work. What did I do? I came home, changed, ate, took my gym bag and went for a swim lesson. [insert pat on the back here]. The swimming lesson went well! I was worried about swimming aggravating my wrist, but it was fine. The aqua dance instructor was rocking out to the tunes from the 80s as usual. And the pregnant ladies were bouncing around happily in the neighboring lanes. The skinny lifeguard who looked to be about 15, was watching over them. I tried not to giggle, imagining him having to actually rescue one of the adult women with a joyous addition of a pregnant belly. We worked on our front crawl and back stroke today. Trust me when I tell you that it takes a very skillful swimmer to avoid bumping into a very mediocre swimmer (me) while the latter is doing a back stroke. Take ten very mediocre swimmers and have them do laps, using back stroke, and you have a recipe for a disaster. Or more specifically, head trauma. Somehow, no new bruises on my head today, but I did feel up a number of various body parts in the process. Most of them not mine. Ah, the things you get away with in an amateur swim class. On a food note… you MUST make this stir-fry. OMG. vegan edamame stir-fry *Note this stir-fry is vegan, and gluten-free, but not paleo. Ingredients: 1/2 zucchini 1 large piece bok-choy 1 cup sliced bell pepper 1 cup cooked edamame 2 tsp olive oil 1 tbsp soy sauce That’s pretty much. Heat oil in a pan. Add zucchini and pepper first, cook for a couple of minutes, add bok choy and edamame. Flavour with some soy sauce in the end. WOD: CrossFit back squat – looking for a heavy set of 3 10 x 35 10 x 65 8 x 85 6 x 105 4 x 125 3 x 135 3 x 145 3 x 155 AMRAP: 15 reps snatch (55lb) / 30 double-unders or 150 single rope jumps –> 3 rounds + 8 snatches 45min swimming lesson Signing off, Solo

In January 2012, I committed to Precision Nutrition, a year long program of nutrition coaching and physical training. Now that it is November, the program is coming to an end with a bang. We are scheduling an end of the year photo shoot to mark how far we’ve come and to celebrate our awesomeness in general. We’ve done quite a bit of experimentation as part of the program, trying to find what feels best for our body – paleo, low fat, plant-based diet, intermittent fasting, etc. One last experiment is the peak week… A bodybuilding style one-week long eating and training regime, designed to help our bodies look their best as we smile and wave for the camera. While Precision Nutrition, in general, is based on developing intuitive eating habits, rather than rigid prescriptions about anything, for this one week, we have detailed food and water intake guidelines, a specific training protocol and a plethora of miscellaneous tips and tricks. I first learned about the bodybuilding pre-competition protocols earlier this year, talking to Mike. As he was getting ready for a bodybuilding competition in the spring, I was curious about his diet and training. He trained twice a day, and ate every two hours – often the same thing for days… He snacked on raw spinach, and would have 10-15 raisins as a treat after especially difficult workouts. And here I thought I was crazy… I remember him saying: “Losing ten pounds is easy. You can lose ten pounds in a week… You manipulate water, salt and carbohydrate intake… Who cares? It’s the keeping it off that counts.” I also remember talking to a female trainer at my gym, also a bodybuilding competitor, who mentioned gaining fifteen pounds in one week after the competition. When I gasped at the number, she laughed. “You just get back to normal”, she said. “The muscle definition you see at a competition lasts for a few hours. Nobody actually looks like that. As soon as you start eating normally, you go back to normal”. The basic anatomy of a peak week includes increasing both water and salt intake and cutting out carbs in the first three days, and then cutting out both water and salt, while increasing carbs in the last three days before shoot.This macronutrient switcheroo together with muscle depleting workouts in the middle of the week results in a significantly more “cut” look for the day of the shoot. It’s called body-BUILDING for a reason. You literally design and create your body. The things you can do… it’s obsessive, crazy… amazing… intoxicating? Here’s the thing. Learning all of this was a real eye opener for me. It was like finding out that the pictures of celebrities are often Photoshopped. It was a whole other layer of “not real”. The people I talked to who compete, will be the first ones to admit to that. You look your best during a photo shoot. There is nothing wrong with that. But it’s kind of like holding your gut in for pictures – it looks better, but it’s not sustainable. Eventually, you have to breathe out. And I find a strange sense of relief in knowing that. I find relief in knowing how much work, time, obsession, and sometimes, sheer biochemistry (not to mention photo-editing), goes into producing the images we see every day. Don’t get me wrong – I like my amber ales, and lattes, and occasional cookie or two (or three or four). However, I do tend to take “try anything once” approach to life… More than once if I like it…:) So this week will be pretty nuts. I have a photo shoot on Thursday with Tim, the talent behind my current Facebook and LinkedIn profile photos. Until then, peak week protocols. Three brutal workouts. Four to five meals a day, consisting of 1 serving of lean protein and green vegetables. No dairy. No carbs. No alcohol. No… well, pretty much anything else. Mission of the week –> do my best, not go crazy (well, at least stay at the current level of crazy). That Greek yogurt will taste pretty damn good on Friday morning. Signing off, Solo

*This week is all about peak week, so bear with me… I may lack my usual brilliance and wit, as I ingest increasing amounts of water, and complete crazy amount of sets/reps in the gym. If you are wondering what is this peak week insanity, read about it here. I am officially naming this project Operation Smoke & Mirrors… NUTRITION: Today, water intake drops further, carbs go up, and fat stays low. Modify your intake as follows: Eat 5 meals. NO veggies or fruit. Add dry carbs amounting to 2g/lb of bodyweight, divided amongst your meals (or 1½ to 2 cupped-hand portions per meal). Eat 1 serving of lean protein (equivalent to 20g, or 1 palm of protein) per meal. NO added fats with meals. Drink 1 cup (250mL) of water. Limit salt content in your food. If desired and not contra-indicated, add a herbal diuretic. TRAINING: As with yesterday, there is no training today. Still too tired to miss the gym. Also, Wednesday, as my designated day from hell, is often an off day anyway. I saw this on Facebook this morning… Yeah… Forget training like my evil twin. I feel like the stronger fitter evil twin. Ok, I don’t know about stronger – still kind of dragging my feet. But definitely evil. Cranky. BITCHY. Do not eat apples in front of me, if you know what’s good for you. RANDOM OBSERVATIONS: I find it odd to be cooking for the sake of individual nutrients vs. flavour. We are eating chicken breast for protein, sweet potato for carbohydrates. No added fat. No added anything. Carb days are less exciting than they sound. I mean really! If someone told me I’d be eating 300g of carbs a day, I’d be jumping from joy. Until the rest of the rules comes in. No added salt. No added sugar. No added fat. Ummm….. Great. Options include: white potatoes, sweet potatoes, and rice cakes. Also dehydrated bananas if you care to put in the time and actually make them. Today’s carb intake is twice of that yesterday. I only reazed that late last night. Yesterday went well, but I went to bed thinking “two times that? really?”. Among things that may suck today, Precision Nutrition lists bloating and fullness. Yeah. No kidding. I mashed up two large sweet potatoes yesterday. Normally, this would be four servings or so. This morning most of that is gone. Wow. I’ve noticed this before, but the specific macronutrients you consume make a huge difference in the kind of “full” you get. The carb full feels much heavier than a protein full. It just… sits there. In the pit of the stomach. I mentioned the feeling of lightness after “lean + green” meals few days ago. Yeah. That’s gone. My throat is dry today. Big surprise. Three three-hour lectures today and half a cup of water. This is like a challenge from Survivor. Contrary to what you may expect, I have not been craving water as much as a hot frothy thick milky beverage. Latte. Hot chocolate. Something. Oh, the delirium. Another crave item – full fat greek yogurt with raspberries and raw cacao nibs. It feels weird to be this full, and to see more definition at the same time. Usually, the lean days and the fat days look and feel the same way. In this case, my body feels like it’s a fat day, but looks like it’s a lean day (on crack). Physically, this is a really weird feeling. I’m feeling kind of permanently flexed. I’m more than 24 hours away from the shoot. Will I see more definition? Holy cow. It’s kind of unbelievable for the body to be doing what it’s supposed to be doing. I mean you kind of expect it to, but when it does, it’s still pretty amazing. Science is cool. At the end of today, I am about 4 meals away from a beer. I think I am also eating more than I’m “supposed to” per plan. It may be the case of eating, since I can’t drink. I’m also just craving a different flavour in my mouth. Anything that is not a sweet potato. As much I am not really enjoying the carb load, I would still rather do this for a month straight than to repeat the 8L of water a day experience. That sucked more. To keep things interesting, I am trying different colors of potatoes… Sigh… The spray tan has dried to a lovely orange finish, and yours truly feels like quite a carrot. Speaking of carrots… I would love one. On a bright side, I am getting my make-up done tomorrow. There has been a lot of pretty going on for the shoot. Way more pretty than normal. LOL. An article caught my eye this morning. One of the writers at Offbeat Mama started telling her daughters she was beautiful. The author acknowledges how often it is to recognize beauty in others, yet fail to do the same for ourselves… “It’s easy to see that they’re beautiful”,she says of her children. "I see it behind their eyes, the calculating and impression. I see it behind their shining brown eyes, how glad they are that I believe I am beautiful. They love me. To them, I am love and guidance and warm, soft blankets and early mornings. They have never doubted how wonderful I am. They have never doubted my beauty. How confusing it must have been for them to see me furrowing my brow in the mirror and sucking in my stomach and sighing.” When I was ten or twelve years old, my mom asked me if I thought my dad was handsome. “Of course”, I said. “Well, of course, he is, because he is our dad, but do you think he is objectively handsome?”, she corrected herself. I couldn’t see the difference. I have enough social psychology crammed into me to know that physical beauty is often quite objective. We say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but the truth is, the same people are rated as physically attractive everywhere in the world – large eyes, smooth skin, symmetrical features. But it’s when we move away from the physical beauty alone, the things start to make sense again. “Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius. It is better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring”, says Marilyn Monroe, the quintessential woman. Well, that I am. Absolutely ridiculous… And yes, of course, dad is handsome. And YOU are beautiful today. Tomorrow. And a week from now. And so am I. Signing off, Solo FOOD LOG: meal 1: 5 eggs whites 3/4 cup sweet potato –> I mixed up the whites with potatoes and pumpkin spice and blasted it in the microwave black espresso –> if you thought I’d give up the one coffee, you are crazy. meal 2: 4oz chicken breast 2 rice cakes 1/2 cup sweet potato meal 3: 4oz chicken breast 4oz ground turkey 1 cup white potato 1 rice cake *Ummm… Not exactly sure what happened here. Moving on. meal 4: 3 rice cakes 1/2 cup sweet potato 4 oz ground turkey meal 5: 3 rice cakes 4 egg whites mixed with 1/2 cup sweet potato and pumpkin pie spice and vanilla extract, nuked in microwave 2 tbsp of ground turkey

*This week is all about peak week, so bear with me… I may lack my usual brilliance and wit, as I ingest increasing amounts of water, and complete crazy amount of sets/reps in the gym. If you are wondering what is this peak week insanity, read about it here. This morning, what do I want? Yogurt! What don’t I want? Water. Someone in my Precision Nutrition group called this week Pee Week. Pretty accurate I’d say, given that I’d just had the most miserable night. I don’t even know how many times I got up. Another 8L to go today. Just today. I’m not sure I could handle this any longer than the two days we have to do it anyway… I was feeling headachy in the first half of the day. Not sure whether it was a hunger headache, or less caffeine than usual headache. Carbs tomorrow!!! NUTRITION (same as yesterday): Eat 5 meals. Limit carb intake by avoiding all starches, sugars, and colourful fruits and veggies. For carbs, eat only “green and white” veggies such as leafy greens, broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, zucchini, celery, green beans etc. Eat 1 serving of lean protein (equivalent to 20g, or 1 palm of protein) per meal. Include ½ to 1 thumb of fat per meal. Drink 1.5-2 gallons (6-8 L) of water. [HOLY COW – TAKE 2!!!] Add the same or slightly more salt than usual to your food. TRAINING: The training is specified every week. For peak week, we are continuing with the same workout from the couple of weeks before, but dropping the reps, and increasing the number of sets. 5 min, treadmill warm-up 90 minutes, main workout: This workout has been around for a couple of weeks, but with fewer sets and with 15 reps for each exercise! Today you’ll complete 10 rounds of each group, performing 12 reps of each exercise at a quick pace, with minimal rest in between. Yes, you read that right. TEN freaking sets… Yippee!!! alternating incline dumbbell bench press –> all 10 sets with 15lb – managed not to drop weight at all, which tells me that I should have probably started heavier assisted chin-up –> used the machine thingy where you place your knees for the first time in years… dumbbell Romanian deadlift with arm raise –> all 10 sets with 12.5lb *This part actually was not bad. The first two sets dragged on, then the rest is a blur… Only one bathroom break. dive-bomber push-up –> I think I only managed the first two sets of actual dive push-ups. Then downgraded to regular push-ups. Good thing, I haven’t done those in a while… Oh, wait. dumbbell lateral raise (from split stance) –> all over the place with this one. Few sets with 10lb, then 8lb, then 7.5lb, then 5lb. split-stance cable curl / bicep curl –> Same as above. Used 12.5lb, 10lb, 7.5lb and 5lb. plank reach / plank row –> alternated between these two. 10 min, finish 2 sets of the main workout 30 min, stationery bike *This was the part of the workout that just would not end. Holy moly… I did my first set, and decided there was no way I was ever gonna finish it. Unfortunately, I was right. The 1.5 hours that I had before work was not enough, so I had to leave after 8(!) sets. So frustrating. Ended up doing the remaining two sets after work along with the optional cardio. So glad it’s over. Total workout length: 2 hours 15 minutes RANDOM OBSERVATIONS: Ten sets of anything SUCK. Especially if you run out of time, and can’t complete them. I think I spend way too much time planning the actual set, dragging dumbbells around, etc. The location of various equipment at my gym did not help… I am very excited about the off day tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. Three hard workouts in a row = I’m exhausted. And, yes, that’s precisely the point. I’m also very excited about not having to drink 8L of water tomorrow. So. Freaking. Excited. I haven’t really felt that hungry – mostly because of all the water I think. What I like about these meals is how light they are! You are not incapacitated for three hours after dinner – you can pretty much run around and be active right after. You know how there are some days you feel leaner than others? There are fat days? You feel bigger than usual, kinda bloated, and your regular jeans don’t fit? Well, I’ve definitely been feeling pretty lean for the past couple of days. This is mostly due to calorie reduction, I think. The muscle definition is coming through, and couple of people even noticed. I did explain that I was in the middle of the freak peak week, so this is not necessarily my usual look. My weight has dropped by a couple of pounds, but nothing major. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next couple of days. FOOD LOG: meal 1: 5 egg whites 1 cup mushrooms handful of spinach salt soy sauce coffee with a splash of unsweetened plain almond milk meal 2: 2 large romaine lettuce leafs 4 oz extra lean ground beef with onions and Montreal steak spice 1 cup cauliflower/broccoli mash with some garlic meal 3: 2 cups lettuce 1/2 cup green pepper 1/2 canned salmon 2 tbsp raw onion balsamic vinegar salt meal 4: 2 cups lettuce 1/2 cup green pepper 1/2 canned salmon 2 tbsp raw onion balsamic vinegar salt meal 5: 1 cup lettuce 4 oz extra lean ground beef with onions and Montreal steak spice 1 cup cauliflower/broccoli mash with some garlic balsamic vinegar salt

When I was little, and dad would run a yellow light, he’d always say that he was showing us “what not to do”. Here’s the thing. It’s usually a bad idea to show others what not to do. Because, you know… You are not supposed to do it. Anyway… I sprained my wrist in my Sunday yoga class, showing a student how not to do the crow pose. Once you are comfortable with a particular yoga pose, it’s actually difficult to do it the wrong way, so while demonstrating, I tilted forward, and landed hard on my wrist to save falling on my face (quite literal in this case). Ironically, it didn’t even hurt until hours later, until my (right and dominant) wrist started hurting “out of nowhere”. By the evening, I could barely move it. Great. If there’s one thing I learned from PrecisionNutrition is to train like an athlete. The rest will take care of itself. What does that mean for training? Injury does not equal time off training. Your body is a complex and beautiful machine – there is no reason to retire the whole thing, while one part is healing. No push-ups for me for a little while. Or burpees. Taking few days off CrossFit, to see how wrist feels. Meanwhile, lots of lower body work + running. WOD: 10min, 3.3 miles on stationary bike 4 sets of: 25 squats / 20 lunges / 25 situps 75 jumping jacks (these kinda bugged my wrist, so didn’t do any more) 10 min, 3.2 miles on stationary bike –> 5 x 20sec intervals I’ve sprained my left wrist before (yes, also teaching yoga… will I never learn?), so I know that many exercises can still be done if the wrist is stable. For example, you can still do push-ups on your knuckles (especially if the wrist is taped), because it does not load the wrist joint itself. That’s how I practiced ashtanga yoga every single day with a sprained wrist. A really cool side effect? Fighter bruises on your knuckles. My students were terrified. Signing off, Solo

I'm talking to a friend about visiting his CrossFit box and keeping him company for a workout. "Ok, but promise you won't make fun of my kips and my double-unders!", I ask. "Ha. So you have a DUI, eh", he grins. "A what???" "DUI = double-unders impairment",  he explains patiently. Indeed. It's been months, and my double-unders got worse, not better. :) I am really good at whipping myself with a rope though.  So if you are struggling with the same issue, and cannot do double-unders, here's a possible reason why: your rope is too short your rope is too long your rope is too cheap your rope is worn out and catches on the floor your shoes have too much traction, so the rope catches on them your shoelaces are too long your pants are too baggy you are not moving your wrists fast enough you are not jumping high enough your rhythm is off J.P. Morgan once said that a man always has two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and the real reason. It is perhaps telling that J.P. Morgan was a banker (cue loud laughter). Morgan, as in Morgan Stanley - a global financial services firm. But the sentiment stands.

Is there any upside to crawling out of your warm bed at 6am, getting into a freezing car that barely starts, gloomily staring at the thermometer that indicates -23C, and driving to CrossFit? Yes. The fact that very few people choose to do that. So few in fact that you may end up with a private training session on Olympic lifts. I was the only person to show up to the 7am workout. The whiteboard indicated deadlifts and met con (metabolic conditioning) sequence. I glance at Ryan, who is almost awake… “Screw deadlifts. My deadlifts are awesome. Help me with the clean?”. Last time we did clean and jerk, my cleaning was “atrocious”. What follows is 60 minutes of nothing but cleans. Over, and over, and… you guessed it – over again. Ryan is bombarding me with terms like “Burgener warm-up”, “loading”, “pull”, “shrug”, “jumping position”, “landing position”. You’d think I was doing Cirque de Soleil. I found myself asking questions like: “Do I use a hook grip for both the squat clean and the power clean?”. [The answer is yes.] Who is this girl? “Well, we barely scratched the surface”, Ryan shrugs after an hour. I’m exhausted. Not physically. Mentally. There are approximately ten billion microscopic movements in a clean… at least until it becomes automatic. And then it’s just one movement. One fluid, smooth, beautiful movement. Until then… it’s feet. Hips. Shoulders. Elbows. Back. Hamstrings. All engaged, and all doing different things in different order. Gah. By the end of the session it’s a miracle that I didn’t drop the barbell on my head once. P.S. In case you are curious, the Burgener warm-up is a sequence of movements, designed to warm you up for various Olympic lifts. Mike Burgener is an international weight lifting coach, and is a bit of a celebrity in CrossFit circles. Full warm-up is here. Leaving you with some salad inspiration = spinach + roasted beets + apple + raisins + walnuts. Signing off, Solo