4/28/12 - Saturday

Training

Austin, McG

10 min. AMRAP @ 90%

5 Wallball

20 Double unders

50m farmers carry

walk/rest 10 min 8+20 du's

+

10 min. AMRAP @ 90%

5 Burpees

5 DB Push Press - Heavy

100m run

walk/rest 10 min 9+5 burpees

+

10 min. AMRAP @ 90%

10 double kettlebell lunges - 35#

5 Box Jumps

Row 150m Lost count. Consistent pace though. Felt good. #2 was the  hardest.

4/27/12 - Friday Training

Friday:

A. Snatch Grip Push Press - Work to 1RM 305#

B. 1xHang Snatch/3xSnatch Balance/1xFull Snatch

Rest 2 min; x 3 sets 195#, felt good.

+

30 Muscle Ups for time: only sets of 3 5:00 Not the fastest, but no misses. Upper body is pretty sore from Wednesday. Doing 3's slowed me down.

Africa! - Day 3 3/10/12

Day 3

Woke at 5:00 am. Packed up the night before to get ready to head back to Nairobi. On our way out today we are stopping to visit a Maasai village.

This mornings training:
Burpee Ladder
1 on the first minute, 2 on the second, 3 on the third, etc...
Made it to 18 minutes. I think that's around 171 burpees
+
3 sets:
50 double unders UB
30 air squats
rest split time

Took around :52 each set.
I trained underneath the kitchen patio of the campsite. There were bats flying over my head. One flew into my rope during the double unders. Pretty crazy.

Breakfast was bread and watermelon. Threw some beef jerky in there because I function off of just bread and fruit.

Mzuri = good/tasty
African Cake - Made of chapati (wheat), and ugaly (maize/corn)

Solomon was my guide through the Maasai village. Learned quite a bit about the Maasai Warriors.

-Married at 21 years old
-1 sister is worth 40 cows (yes, they trade sisters for cows)
-Drink the blood and milk of cows for nourishment
-The houses are made of mud and cow crap
-Circumcised without any antiseptics or anesthetics.
-Faces painted white if they don't cry - reward

Traded one of my knives for an Orinka ( tree root from and olive tree fashioned as a throwing object for past-time)

During the drive back we went through the Loita plains. Basically a desert. Saw several Yellow Fever Acacia Trees. Learned that our guide Antony was from the Kikuyu tribe north of Nairobi. Home of Pepita pineapples. Arrived back to Nairobi around 7:30 pm after breaking down twice and hopping on another passing tour bus. Glad they were there.

Had dinner at the famous Carnivore restaurant. Basically a Brazilian steakhouse. Tried several wild meats. Pretty good. Hit the bed around 11pm. Heading into Tanzania early tomorrow morning.

 Soloman and I, holding an Orinka

Hand fulls and hand fulls of goats

Inside the village 

 Invisible Brandi and I

Meat 

 The Crew!

Love it.

Africa! Day 2 3/19/12

Day 2:

Woke up around 5:30 am. Took the coldest shower in Africa. It was probably 50 degree F when I got up. Today we're going on a game drive through the Masai Mara games reserve.

So far we've seen:
Water Buffalo
Ox Peckers
Topi
Hartabeasts
Thomson Gazelles
Lilac-breasted Roller
African elephants

Secretary Bird

Warthog
Zebra
Hippos
Jackal
Ostridge
Giraffe
Lions
White headed vultures
Cheetahs
Dik Dik
Eland Antelope
Crocodile
Baboon

Incredible day. Perfect weather and saw a ton of animals. Learned that the Serengeti is 8x larger than the Masai Mara. Also that if a baby elephant can walk underneath the Mothers stomach it is less than a year old.

Water Buffalo 

Lilac Breasted Roller 

Chester 

Jackal

Wednesay 4/25/12 - Test Team Event #4

Team Event #4:

Male Portion for Time:

75 Back squats (135 lbs)
50 Pull-ups
25 Shoulder-to-overhead (135 lbs)
75 Front squats (85 lbs)
50 Pull-ups
25 Shoulder-to-overhead (85 lbs)
75 Overhead squats (65 lbs)
50 Pull-ups
25 Shoulder to overhead (65 lbs)

Took around 13:00. Reps were:

20/15/20/20
25/25
15/10
Not sure, probably broke 3x
25/25
15/10
15/15/15/15/15
Broke 3x
25 UB

*Not as hard as I thought but took a lot longer than I though. Definitely speed up during competition. Transitions were fast and our reps were smooth and legit. We MIGHT be able to speed them up a little bit. Other than that, just have to break a little less.

Africa! - Day 1 3/8/12

3/8/12 - Day 1

Arrived to Nairobi around 7:00 am. Africa Travel Company(ATC) had a taxi driver there waiting for us. Today we're going straight to the Masai Mara. Our taxi driver Timothy taught us some basic Swahili and some slang.

Niaje Poa  - What's up?

Poa - cool/I'm cool

Sorry Joe (in a thick African accent) - No thanks.

Exchange rate about 80 Kenyan Schillings = $1. Most woman in the city of Nairobi earn about $2/day which about half is spent on food.

Took about 45 minutes to get through the thick city traffic but we finally arrived to our departure point to head out for the 3-day trip through the Masai Mara. At the Acacia Camp in Nairobi, we met our tour guide Antony and our driver Steve.

Or better yet "Steve!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhyeyoC-TxU&feature=fvwrel

During our drive we passed some great lookouts among the Great Rift Valley. Which I learned extends from Israel all the way down to Mozambique.  Lunch was at a restaurant called Maai Maahu. Great food but a lot of rice and not much meat. Around 2 hours later, our truck broke down. So we all hopped out on the side of the road while the tour guide and drive play mechanic. Believe it or not, they get it running again. While on the side of the road our guide was telling us about some plants that contained a fruit call the Apple of Sodom, named after Sodom and Gomorah from the bible. It's a poisonous fruit that acts as a tear gas.

First time ever seeing acacia trees, which I called Africa trees until now. Some cool looking birds as well, Malibu storks.

Drive into the Masai ended up taking us all day long after several more truck break downs and slow bumpy roads. We arrived to the camp site just at sunset. Dinner was good. Spaghetti with peas and carrots added. Which I learned that Australians call "spag-bowl." Filled up my water bottles and got supplies ready for the next day then hit the sack. I was smoked.

Big green monster.

 First meal in Kenya!

Sunset in Masai Mara

Africa! - MEM to NBO 3/6/12-3/8/12

Arrived to Amsterdam around 12:00 pm. Locked out stuff in lockers and took the train to the city. Made it to Central Station in the middle of Amsterdam. It was freezing cold and rainy. Found a restaurant called "Allstars". Doug and I have some spare ribs with chimichurri. Marcy had the schnitzel. It was a ton of food!

After eating we left and walked around to some of the souvenir shops. Some pretty nasty stuff in this city. Lots of porn and weed. We spent less than an hour walking around. Too cold and rainy. Hopped on the train back to the airport and took a nap.

Woke around 7:00pm. Walked around the airport for a while looking at stores. This place is huge. In one of the liquor stores we saw the most expensive bottle of liquor in the world. $250,000. If you purchase they fly you out to the distillery and put you up for the weekend.

Dinner was croquettes from a Dutch restaurant. Deep fried gravy basically. Not very good.

Hopped on the plane and am now heading to Nairobi. Should be about a 10 hour flight or so.

Dinner was really good and had an entire row of chairs to sleep for myself! Not a bad flight.

Doug and Marcy freezing their faces off at central train station in Amsterdam.

Double Training - 4/24/12

Well went on quite the hiatus for a while. Training was super intense, spent some time on my side project Mobility Kits, and planned a trip to Africa. Things are settled back down now for the time being so I've decided to start posting again.

During my first overseas experience in Japan I took a bunch of pictures but everything I learned was never written down. So it's pretty difficult to go back and try to remember all the details. So I decided to keep a small journal of each day while in Africa. Now that I've got pictures and details from each day I've decided to post my journal entries and a few of the good pictures and vids from each day of the trip. I have a lot of content and don't want to feel overwhelmed so I'm going to start with one day at a time. Should take about 3 weeks if I can count correctly.

I also plan to continue posting my daily training and results for my records. Right now I have strayed from the BDB and have programmed Team Faction's training for the next few weeks to prep specifically and individually for regionals.

Tuesday 4/24/12:
AM: 

Part 1: A. Back Squat: Work to heavy triple, NOT 3RM
*365#, felt great! First time back squatting in months. 

B. Power Snatch x 2: EMOM x 6; increase weight per set
Cancelled power snatch due to shaky right shoulder. Did power cleans instead.
*245#,245#,250#,250#,255#,260#, felt great
+
4 rounds for time: 20 Wallball 30 sec Chin Over Bar Hold - accumulated

6:47, went pretty easy. More just wanted to practice holding my chin over the bar. Broke once per set. Wallballs were just there. :20-:25 will not be a problem in competition.


Rest 4+ hours


Part 2:

4-5 sets @ 97%: 
Row 250m, 
7 Hang Power Clean - Heavy 
Walk/Rest 6-7 min.
225# for all sets. Rows were around :45, 1:30 pace
Hang cleans got really tough. These crush me for some reason.