IGX

Tracey Bethune
Head Trainer, CrossFit Paris Landing
CrossFit Level 1 Certified
American College of Sports Medicine CPT
Over 14 years experience in gymnastics and weight lifting
2008 NPC Tennessee State Bodybuilding & Figure Championships: Third place, Figure Short Division

Kazuya Mishima wrote:the athletes rival the gold standard of male beauty: the Calvin Klein underwear model (without the boyish fragility used to sell white briefs). Compared to the male CrossFitter, bodybuilders look swollen and exaggerated by hypertrophy, often also suffering from disproportionately large biceps and child-like calves.

“CrossFit girls,” as they are endearingly known, are arguably some of the hottest women on Earth

Kazuya Mishima wrote:Is that Lord Farquaad from Shrek?

Kazuya Mishima wrote:Shoreline Crossfit is still slinging the KRAZEE with their talk of "rock-star sex appeal".

Shoreline Cultfit wrote: In the quest for elite-level fitness, CrossFit has successfully delivered its most devoted followers with another, less-advertised gift: radical, unparalled, delusional narcissism.

That benefit is just an unavoidable side effect of increasing your work capacity at life’s most basic tasks.

The principle is laid out clear as day in Level 1 Certs: you can muddle your way through unknowable markets or you can pursue excellence with the belief that free markets will reward excellence.

The men of the CrossFit look the part of hunters and warriors.

CrossFit athletes may be attractive by any standard, but they are, first and foremost, functional. They can move heavy loads long distances in short times.

The men of the CrossFit look the part of hunters and warriors.

Gin Master wrote:And this guy doesn't. Where does that leave us?

protobuilder wrote:

Gin Master wrote:And this guy doesn't. Where does that leave us?

It leaves us with a bunch of dumbfucks who don't know shit about hunting or warrioring.

Yes I Have Balls wrote:

protobuilder wrote:

Gin Master wrote:And this guy doesn't. Where does that leave us?

It leaves us with a bunch of dumbfucks who don't know shit about hunting or warrioring.

but, but, but those are broad modal and time domains, no? QED.

Gin Master wrote:

Yes I Have Balls wrote:

protobuilder wrote:

Gin Master wrote:And this guy doesn't. Where does that leave us?

It leaves us with a bunch of dumbfucks who don't know shit about hunting or warrioring.

but, but, but those are broad modal and time domains, no? QED.

The funny thing is that most @F testimonials start with "I was always picked last for dodgeball/ I didn't play organized sports/ I was the gay towel boy..." Yet now they are the elite warrior class. I guess dropping a few grand and slinging PVC will do that to you.

WildGorillaMan wrote:I recall saying about fifteen pages ago that I really hoped that @fit would amp up the craziness this year. They really know how to deliver, don't they?

justpassingthrough wrote:Oh man, cut the poor guy some slack.

1.) He's probably a beginner doing some on-ramp type program
2.) He's still stronger than Bony Pudding:

BP.jpg

Kazuya Mishima wrote:

The body compositions of Roman gladiators were actually a far cry from those of the sub-10% BF, muscle-bound model-actors depicting them in movies; helped along by a diet high in barley and other grains, real Roman gladiators were sheathed in a substantial protective layer of visceral body fat. To us, they would have looked like your average CW-touting slob, but in reality, they possessed incredible functional fitness – it’s just that they existed in an extremely narrow environmental niche, wherein the right amount of adipose tissue protected against serious wounds without compromising one’s ability to swing a mace or thrust a trident. Thus, a functionally fit body composition, for the Roman gladiators, was pudgy, bulky, and dense. But were they fit, in the broader sense? They might survive the arena, but would they reach old age, or would the effects of a grain-based diet eventually catch up with them?

Roman gladiators were fat vegetarians
Robert Koch
Agençe France-Presse


Monday, 5 April 2004

gladiator

Russell Crowe may have won an Oscar for the role of Maximus in the movie Gladiator but scientists say he wasn't fat enough (Image: Reuters/Ho)

Roman gladiators were overweight vegetarians and not the muscle-bound men protrayed by actors like Russell Crowe, anthropologists say.

Austrian scientists analysed the skeletons of two different types of gladiators, the myrmillos and retiariae, found at the ancient site of Ephesus, near Selsuk in Turkey.

"Tests performed on bits of bone taken from the skeletons of some 70 gladiators buried at Ephesus seem to prove that they ate mainly barley, beans and dried fruit," said Dr Karl Grossschmidt, who took part in the study by the Austrian Archaeological Institute
"This diet, which has been mentioned in the oral history, is rather sad but it gave the gladiators a lot of strength even if it made them fat," said Grossschmidt who is a member of the University of Vienna's Institute of Histology and Embryology.

The Austrian palaeoanthropologists relied on a method known as elementary microanalysis that allows scientists to determine what a human being ate during his or her lifetime.

With the help of a sonar, they could establish the chemical concentrations inside cells in the bone samples taken from the skeletons at Ephesus.

From this, they could deduce how much meat, fish, grains and fruit made up the diet of the Roman fighting machines.

A balanced diet of meat and vegetables leaves equal amounts of zinc and strontium in the cells, while a mainly vegetarian diet would leave high levels of strontium and little zinc, Grossschmidt said.

Fabian Kanz, from the university's department of analytical chemistry, said the gladiators' bone density gave us clues to how they lived.

"The bone density here was higher than usual, as is the case with modern athletes," he said.

This line of testing allowed the scientists to debunk another myth, that gladiators wore strappy Sparticus sandals in the arena.

"The bone density is particularly high in samples taken from the feet, which would suggest that the gladiators fought with their bare feet in sand," Kanz said.

He believed that because some gladiators fought with little more than their bare hands, they could have "cultivated layers of fat to protect their vital organs from the cutting blows of their opponents".

A gladiator's life
In ancient Rome, the classical battle of gladiators usually pitted a myrmillo armed with a sword, a helmet and a round shield, against the lightly armed retiarius who carried only a net and a dagger, or a samnite who wore a visor and a leather sheath protecting his right arm.

They were mostly slaves who volunteered to fight because sometimes the victor would be freed as a reward, or poor Romans who fought for pay.

The Austrian scientists are still carrying out further tests, but if their initial findings are confirmed it would change the glamorous image of the men immortalised in Spartacus, the 1960 movie starring a young Kirk Douglas, and the more recent Gladiator with Crowe in the main role.

"It seems that the gladiators tried to put on some weight before their battles," Kanz said.

"But this does not mean that they did not work hard to lose it again once they stepped out of the ring," he added.

The archeological site of Ephesus is one of the most important in Turkey.

The Greeks founded the city but it was the Romans who made it the capital of their Asian province and turned it into one of the wealthiest cities of their empire.

The Gladiator Diet by Andrew Curry

How to eat, exercise, and die a violent death

The Café Westend, just across the street from Vienna's main train station, is a city landmark. Its green felt-lined booths and weary waiters in wrinkled black suits have seen a lot over the years. But when he agreed to meet me here instead of in his lab on the edge of town, Karl Grossschmidt, a paleo-pathologist at the Medical University of Vienna, promised to show me something new even to this century-old coffeehouse. Pushing aside empty cappuccino cups and the remains of a dry croissant, Grossschmidt takes a quick look over his shoulder to see if our waiter is out of sight. Coast clear, he reaches into a plastic grocery bag and pulls out a white cardboard box. Inside, padded with crumpled paper towels, is a jawless skull. Grossschmidt lifts it gently and passes it to me. "Don't drop it--it's real," he says.

Reaching out with both hands, I take the skull of a Roman gladiator who lived, fought, and died more than 1,800 years ago in Ephesus, in what is now western Turkey. Together with more than 60 of his young comrades, he was buried in a 200-square-foot plot along the road that led from the city center to the Temple of Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The recent study of the bones from the world's only known gladiator graveyard is filling gaps in the literary sources and archaeological record concerning how gladiators died. But the biggest revelation to come out of the Ephesus cemetery is what kept the gladiators alive--a vegetarian diet rich in carbohydrates, with the occasional calcium supplement.

Contemporary accounts of gladiator life sometimes refer to the warriors as hordearii--literally, "barley men." Grossschmidt and collaborator Fabian Kanz subjected bits of the bone to isotopic analysis, a technique that measures trace chemical elements such as calcium, strontium, and zinc, to see if they could find out why. They turned up some surprising results. Compared to the average inhabitant of Ephesus, gladiators ate more plants and very little animal protein. The vegetarian diet had nothing to do with poverty or animal rights. Gladiators, it seems, were fat. Consuming a lot of simple carbohydrates, such as barley, and legumes, like beans, was designed for survival in the arena. Packing in the carbs also packed on the pounds. "Gladiators needed subcutaneous fat," Grossschmidt explains. "A fat cushion protects you from cut wounds and shields nerves and blood vessels in a fight." Not only would a lean gladiator have been dead meat, he would have made for a bad show. Surface wounds "look more spectacular," says Grossschmidt. "If I get wounded but just in the fatty layer, I can fight on," he adds. "It doesn't hurt much, and it looks great for the spectators."

But a diet of barley and vegetables would have left the fighters with a serious calcium deficit. To keep their bones strong, historical accounts say, they downed vile brews of charred wood or bone ash, both of which are rich in calcium. Whatever the exact formula, the stuff worked. Grossschmidt says that the calcium levels in the gladiator bones were "exorbitant" compared to the general population. "Many athletes today have to take calcium supplements," he says. "They knew that then, too."

That's not to say life--or death--as a gladiator was pleasant. Many of the men Grossschmidt's team studied died only after surviving multiple blows to the head. "The proportion of wounds to the skull was surprising, since all gladiatorial types but one wore helmets," says Harvard's Coleman. Gladiators usually fought one-on-one, with their armor and weaponry designed to give opposite advantages. For example, a nimble, lightly armored and helmetless retiarus with a net and trident would be pitted against a plodding murmillo wearing a massive helmet with tiny eye slits and carrying a thick, long shield. Three of the Ephesus skulls had been punctured by tridents, weapons used only by gladiators. Ten had been bashed in with blunt objects, perhaps mercy blows with a hammer. Other injuries illustrate the gladiator's ideal death, finally accepting the coup de grâce. Cut marks on four of the men were evidence of a dramatic end. "When they lost and were lying on their stomachs, their opponent stabbed them through the shoulder blade into the heart," Grossschmidt says. "We also found vertebrae with cut marks. They would have been from a downward stabbing sword wound through the throat into the heart."

Contributing editor Andrew Curry is based in Berlin.

Gin Master wrote:

Yes I Have Balls wrote:

protobuilder wrote:

Gin Master wrote:And this guy doesn't. Where does that leave us?

It leaves us with a bunch of dumbfucks who don't know shit about hunting or warrioring.

but, but, but those are broad modal and time domains, no? QED.

The funny thing is that most @F testimonials start with "I was always picked last for dodgeball/ I didn't play organized sports/ I was the gay towel boy..." Yet now they are the elite warrior class. I guess dropping a few grand and slinging PVC will do that to you.

Time off

Hey all, I have been doing Crossfit as a back yard privateer for roughly 3 months now, and I really dig it. I've lost thirty pounds, and started to recover the body I had before my last high-stress job 4 years ago.

Anyhow, one of the things I loved about crossfit was that with the varied exercises, I wouldn't aggravate old injuries and get shut down. If I started to feel my IT band act up, there probably wasn't running the next day, for instance.

However, it seems to have now caught up with me, and I feel like I've broken everything all at once. My IT band is always tight, so I stretch it. My patellafemorral (sp?) issues (weak VMO) are very aggravating, and the PT isolation exercises aren't keeping up. And finally, between picking up climbing this summer, and the pullups, I've given myself elbow tendonitis. Tendonitis has always been a problem and is one of the things to sideline any athletics on my part very quickly (wrist issues for 3 years from computer-work, shoulders, wrists, elbows at other times).

So, I have decided to take some time off. Niggling injuries not going away, and feeling kind of beat generally, sounds like overtraining. I have also just started taking Cissus for the tendons.

So my questions are as follows:
What is the best way to cycle time off like this? one week, two weeks?
Any suggestions for this miserable climbing/pullup elbow going forward?

Thanks in advance for your time and feedback.

Mike, 38yo, 210lbs.

Re: Time off

Thanks Steven. That site does a great job bringing together a lot of what I've read in disparate places.

And going over the last few WODs, including 80+ pullups, a 365# deadlift (woohoo!), and 45 weighted pullups all within the last two weeks, this isn't too surprising.

But I am going to have to be very careful about what I eat, so as not to go backwards.

How do other athletes cycle their training time on and off?

Re: Time off

One week update.

Golfer's elbow tendon still hurts like a mother-lover. Maybe I actually tore something. I can feel a lump in there right where it hurts. I massage it and push on it like a knot, and feel some relief. At this rate, I don't know when I'll be back to working out again.

As a plus to taking the Cissus, my computer tendonitis has gotten better. Not all the way gone, but less aggravating.

RE the PFPS, I think it has been wise to take the time off, and I will take more. I was operating with the idea that if I could get the VMO up, then balance would be restored and ti would feel better. Now my knees still hurt, and I haven't been working out for a week. Which I am taking to mean that I needed to take the time off before cause more/worse problems.

I have scoured the CF forums, and other places and followed this link

http://www.ualberta.ca/~alester/cond...html#Treatment (wfs)

which has a nice protocol of stretching and various leg exercises. I'm thinking that if I take the time to do these over the time off, will result in better knee health when I start back up again.

Weight is holding steady at 210, which I am pleasantly surprised with. Got to keep that in check.

Anybody who has any suggestions or ideas, I will happily accept. Thanks also Steven for the links earlier.

Re: Time off

Two week update.

Arm is much better, but a long way from all the way better.

Knees (PFPS) have not improved as much as I had hoped.

Weight is holding steady at 210.

I really really really want to get back to working out, and think I could handle it. My main cncern with that would be starting to soon and re-injuring things, maybe worse.

I am thinking that if I do start, perhaps I could use BrandX buttercup scaling, subbing for pullups and such. I could go slow, if I'm really worried, or I could go fast, working on intensity.

OTOH, this is going to be a busy week or two at work. Perhaps I should just let it heal.

Re: Time off

Update:

It's been 5 or 6 weeks since I quit. I've been taking Cissus, massaging. The knot has gone down, and the nub tendons attach to does not feel quite so much like a constant bruise anymore. It's still not well, but it's better.

The PFPS in the knees has subsided strongly. The exercises I have been doing while not crossfitting have been deep squats, light deads, and good mornings for the hams and butt. The goal was to strengthen the posterior and the VMO. It also is not well, but it is much better.

So, I am starting to ramp up to crossfit again, using BrandX scaling. I am incorporating 3x5 or 5x5 110# dumbbell squats (held at the shoulder) as part of the daily warmup. Maybe the good mornings too (50# kb).

Anything smelling like a pullup, I am subbing bodyweight ring rows. For yesterday's muscleups, I just got a different WOD off the american parkour site.

Hopefully this plan gets me back on track. I'll keep this posted in case anybody cares.

Also: holiday damage is about 5lbs. Could be worse, considering I wasn't working out. But still. (Dear Wife's lasagna is good)

Copious Alcohol consumption and post WOD pain

I'm curious to know if anyone has experienced this:

I have been eating Zone at about 80% Paleo and dedicated main page CF since April 2009. Overall, everything is going great and I couldn't be happier with my training.

On New Year's Eve I drank alot of alcohol (and for many months previous hadn't had any). The next morning it was quite clear that I was a touch dehydrated. I drank alot of water but negated any positives with an equal amount of coffee trying to get awake.

I then did my normal warmup and threw down the 2010-01-01 WOD: "CINDY". I made a point of going extra hard because my last two scores showed little improvement - plus wanted to welcome 2010 with a bang. I destroyed my last score and set a new PR by 3 clear rounds.

But the following day I was very very sore - way more than usual. In fact I felt like I had my first week of CF. I noted unusual pain in both my elbows and knees which lasted longer than the muscle pain. (I have never had that before nor do I have any history of injury etc.) Even today, 2010-01-04 during the main page WOD my knees are still a touch tender. (No it's not bad squat form). I'm still a bit beat up.

I usually drink huge amounts of water, so have never knowingly worked out dehydrated before. Is this purely related to the alcohol consumption do you think? Would any form of dehydration do that? Any comments and feedback would be appreciated...