Workout July 29, 2010 - Hydrant Testing and Pack Test

This morning at work we did our yearly hydrant tests, to make sure that the hydrants in our area are in good working order. I turned it into a mini workout by wearing a set of running shoes and jogging at a moderate pace from one hydrant to the next. I focused on maintaining good breathing technique, breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth as detailed in mc's begin2dig post

http://www.begin2dig.com/2010/07/run-longer-easier-right-this-minute.html

Later this afternoon, I drew inspiration from the Forest Service Pack Test for the second workout of the day. The Pack Test is part of the basic requirements for all FS wildland firefighters. It involves walking (no running allowed) with a 45 lb. pack, 3 miles in under 45 minutes on level ground. Smokejumpers perform the same test with a 110 lb pack in 90 minutes. My first wildland pack weighed 40 lbs, so I started there with my weight vest. Then I programmed the treadmill to mystery hike, max incline and max speed of 4.5, for 15 minutes. My Vibram Five Fingers worked out better than expected on the treadmill. I could feel my feet working the entire time, in addition to my hammies and glutes, especially on the incline portions. This was a nice compliment to the stair master and bike workouts that focused on my quads. At the end of the 15 minutes I completed .83 miles. Next time I'll increase the max speed to 5.0. Once I complete a full mile within the 15 minutes, I'll add 5 lbs. at a time until the weight vest is maxed out at 60 lbs. Once both weight and distance goals are achieved I'll start adding on time until I complete 2 miles in 30 minutes with a 60 lb weight vest. At this point, I want to keep my cardio sessions at half an hour or less, working instead on increasing the intensity, rather than time.

July 27, 2010 Healthy Firehouse Meals

Yesterday was my turn to cook yet again. For lunch my crew and I shredded the meat of two rotisserie chickens, mixed it with pesto sauce and parmesan cheese, topped it with tomatoes and fresh spinach, and then toasted provolone cheese on ciabatta bread. This is a quick and easy meal that's pretty much always a crowd pleaser.

For dinner we had Chipotle Macaroni and Cheese

http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=671466


Marinated grilled chicken


Garlicky sauteed kale

http://www.chefmd.com/recipe_display.php?id=118


and Watermelon, Pine nut and Feta Salad with fresh Mint

http://www.chefmd.com/recipe_display.php?id=30


I like to add corn, olives and occasionally black beans into the mac and cheese. One station I worked at loved this recipe so much that they requested it every time I cooked. The kale went well with the mac and cheese. The mint did a great job of accenting the flavor of the watermelon. This was made for a very crisp and refreshing summer salad. All in all it took about two hours to prepare this for ten people.

Time to Ramp Things Up

After Denver I decided it was time to start training like I mean it. There are several upcoming events for which I want to be in peak condition. The first is rugby sevens. There's an even slimmer chance that I'd be selected to go to New York with the Grizzlies, but I didn't think there was any chance that they'd pick me to go to Denver either. After that there's a sprint triathlon in September as well as possibly another full gear stair climb, the tough mudder in October and Rugby 15s season in the fall.

A minor wrist sprain this past weekend edged me away from my kettlebells and towards the cardio machines at the station. This actually worked out well. I'm using a slightly modified version of the tri-newbies sprint tri training program. Yesterday I spent 15 minutes on the stair climber, borrowing a page from Andrew Read RKC II's post in Hardstyle magazine Summer 2010 and performed 15:15 Viking Warrior style intervals. I slowed my pace, but kept moving to work on my active recovery. The plan is to rotate between stair climbing, weighted hiking, and running on the days listed as run days. This should help to build up my leg strength and save my knees.

I also performed the following reps for CC

Wall pushups, 1 arm - 3x25

Knee Tucks 3x40

Since my right wrist is healing, and my left arm is a bit weaker than the right, I went ahead and went back to step 1 of the CC pushup series, cut the progression reps in half, and only used my left arm. The knee tucks are feeling good, and will probably progress to the next step after another week or two.

This morning I performed 20 minutes, random hill program of 15:15 on the exercise bike. I'll treat the cardio the same as the Viking Warrior Protocol. When I reach 40 minutes in this fashion then I'll move on to 36:36 protocol.

Once my wrist heals up the kettlebells will make an appearance again following the new TRX Kettlebell video.

http://www.dragondoor.com/dv068.html

I can feel the burn already just thinking about this workout plan.

Playing with the Grizzlies at the Denver Sevens Rugby Tournament

A while back I wrote a post about my experience trying out with the Pacific Coast Grizzlies Rugby Sevens team. This previous post details my experiences at the tryout.

http://nuffsaid6.blogspot.com/2010/06/rugby-sevens.html

Again, I went to the tryout simply to learn as much as possible about the sport. Since I had only been playing rugby for 3 months at the time, the chance of making the team seemed pretty remote. I continued experimenting with my minimalist training routine of CC and Viking Warrior. About a month later on July 8, the coach sent out an email with the team roster. My name was listed as a reserve. I had to reread the email about 4 times to double check, but there it was. For me, this was a huge honor in and of itself. Still, I didn't think there was any real chance I'd be asked to Denver. Well, July 14th I got another email saying that they did in fact need me to attend the tournament July 23-25th. After I ran around my house and jumped up and down a few times, it finally sunk in the Denver is in Denver. They don't call it the mile high city for nothing. Last time I was at Altitude for any real length of time was 11 years ago working on the helicopter rappel crew. The station was at 7500' elevation, which made those first few workouts absolutely kill. Sustained cardio has never been my strong suit. I had begun to work in and experiment with my active recovery routine, but this was a program designed to be carried out over months, not a week. Most articles I've read on the subject state that it generally takes a good two weeks for the body to benefit from the effects of cardio workouts. This was well past my 9 day time frame.

I stayed with the same workout routine but began focussing on nutrition, adding in a chlorophyll supplement to increase the number of red blood cells in my system, and also iron, to increase the oxygen carrying capacity of those red blood cells. Three days later I participated in the Transamerica Building Stair Climb

http://nuffsaid6.blogspot.com/2010/07/july-17-2010-transamerica-stair-climb.html

While my stamina and recovery had improved since the last climb, I still didn't climb it as hard as I would've liked, which might've been slightly influenced by the wildland fire the shift before. Hydration and nutrition remained my main focus.

My flight to Denver arrived a good 8 hours before the rest of the team. I used the time to rest and hydrate, drinking a good gallon and a half of water. This apparently was not quite enough as my eyes and throat both felt pretty dry upon waking the next morning, and at the tournament site before playing I felt a little lightheaded upon standing, from the altitude. Yeah, not a great sign.

We had 14 people, just enough to make two teams of seven. This meant that I played on team two, the whole time for all three games that day. Yup, another surprise. The first game absolutely kicked my butt. Due in large part to being new to rugby sevens defense, I often found myself out of position and ended up doing a whole lot of sprinting to make up for it. The second and third games I was able to learn bit by bit, my positioning improved some and I didn't get nearly as winded.

The next day I continued to learn as we had a combined 5 hour practice with another team that was at the tournament. I made a ton of mistakes, got yelled at a lot, but this was another incredible opportunity to learn from players and coaches alike. Besides, I don't mind getting yelled at if it makes me better. There was so much new info to process that I wished I had brought along a notepad to write it all down. Feeling a little bit more pressure to perform, I found it a bit tougher to relax and just have fun like the tryout. Once I reminded myself that ultimately my main goal was simply to learn and improve, which I did steadily throughout the weekend, I was able to relax and enjoy this incredible opportunity.

Still though, the major lesson here is even if I think there's a barely a chance of making the team, I need to be fully prepared for that possibility. Rugby knowledge will come over time with practice and experience. Physical conditioning on the other hand, just takes knowledge that I already have and hard work.

July 22, 2010 CC, Hike, Rugby 7s Practice

Today's workout

Warm-up - Joint mobility/Neural warm-up, balance and vision drills


CC

Horizontal Pulls 3x25 performed using dining room table

Close Squats 3x20

Finally noticeable improvement in the horizontal pulls. My grip and overall strength both felt a significantly stronger. Hopefully in a few more weeks I'll be able to progress to step 3 of this progression. My ankle flexibility and range of motion is also improving. I'm having a much easier time staying balanced in the bottom position of the squat, unsupported and without a counterweight. I'm really itching to get to level 6 in all four of the exercises so that I can add in the bridging and handstand work. Ultimately though, my strength is improving on this program, which is what matters.

Later this afternoon I met up with a friend and went for a 2 hour nature hike in the Oakland hills. One of the things that makes this area such a great place to live is that with just a 15 minute drive I have an amazing view of the bay, and then with just a few minutes more of hiking find myself in the middle of a redwood forest. Getting out in nature has this incredible way of instantly putting me at ease, while invigorating and restoring balance. Hiking in the Vibram Five Fingers made me much more aware of foot placement and used a lot more muscles than hiking in my wildland boots. It will be interesting to see the effects hiking in these while wearing a weight vest will have on my athletic performance.

Right after the hike I gathered my gear and scooted out to rugby 7s practice. I arrived at the pitch a bit earlier than most so began jogging around the field to warm up. My stamina was noticeably improved, which is nice. This has long been the hardest area for me to make improvements. I've been taking iron and chlorophyll supplements to increase the amount of oxygen my blood cells can deliver to body. It's been about a week and a half, but so far it seems to be working.

July 20, 2010 Active Recovery, Bike, and Structure Fire

Yesterday at work, I performed two rounds of my active recovery routine, getting 12 dynamic crescent swings the first round and 11 the second. My goal is 12 of these each work set. Once I accomplish that I'll add in another minute, progressing in this fashion until I get to 3 sets of 10. Afterwards I hopped on the exercise bike and rode a random hill program at level 10 for 20 minutes. It got a decent sweat going. I'm working on finding the right balance between getting in the workout and staying ready for the tournament this weekend.

Later that evening, right before dinner time we were dispatched to a structure fire in a neighboring station's first due. As we were responding, we heard an initial report of "nothing showing" meaning that everything appeared normal from the outside. We reduced from code 3 response to code 2 response, shutting down our lights and sirens. Next thing we know, the next report that we get is that the engine has a supply line to a hydrant and extended an attack line into the structure. That was unexpected. We upgraded back to code 3 and continued up the hill. My Captain assigned the other firefighter and I to open up all the windows in the structure for ventilation. This was a 3 story structure of lightweight construction, with a garage underneath, set in a complex with about 5' of space between units. As we entered the structure we had close to zero visibility throughout the entire structure. We completed a primary search ensuring that all occupants and pets were out of the house, as we opened up the windows.

One of the main lessons learned here was the need to sound the floor as going through the structure. As the engine from my station made entry, one of the engineers noticed a soft spot in the floor. He dug into it with his axe and had fire erupt out of the hole. The fire was running in the void spaces between the first floor and the garage, in the walls and above us between the first floor and the second floor. The main floor support below us, the glue-lam, was charred more than half way through, and the wooden I-beam was burned almost completely through. New construction is very light and strong, which is great for builders. It uses less materials which cuts their costs. Unfortunately for us, lighter structural members that are full of glue and adhesives mean they burn that much more easily and fail that much quicker. I initially didn't think of sounding the floor because we entered to structure at street level on the first floor. What I didn't see until a bit later was that the garage was below us entered from an alleyway on the backside of the structure. I'm used to sounding rooftops for structural stability and anytime when operating above a fire. After this fire I see how this is just a good habit in general, especially in lightweight construction.

On a side note, the station who was first due to this fire is scheduled to be closed next week. We already have one of the lowest ratios of firefighters to citizen population at 0.7 firefighters per 1000 people. Despite this, the city is chomping at the bit to close 3 fire stations, eliminate 5 engines and 1 truck company and layoff close to 80 firefighters. The city is claiming this is a cost savings measure, but many of the the firefighters they are proposing to lay off will be two days away from getting off of probation and gaining permanent status. This would mean that we would be able to hire them back later down the line without having to put them through all of the training all over again. Training is expensive, and as people promote and retire we will have to hire new people to fill these spots. We could ideally keep these folks on the line that have already passed the training and proven that they are capable. If not, then we should at least let them work the two days so we can hire them back and save that cost farther down the line. Even then, we're still risking losing them to other departments that are more than happy to snatch up candidates that are already trained and save their cities money. There's a lot here that just doesn't quite add up. If you are a resident of San Jose or just want more information, please click on the link on the right for San Jose Fire Facts. Thanks in advance for checking it out.

July 17, 2010 Transamerica Stair Climb

I got off work feeling surprisingly good. We had a pretty easy night with one call around 1:30 am. My legs felt limber and springy even after the wildland fire the day before. I grabbed my gear and drove up to the Transamerica building in San Francisco. One of my biggest supporters, my dad, met me there. That's always going to put a little pep in my step.

My goals for this climb were to break 20 minutes and for my air bottle to last all the way to the top. I didn't train nearly as much as planned for this one, but easily accomplished both of those goals. I made it to the top of the 48 floors in 17:05 with 1000 psi of air left in my bottle. In addition to this, I recovered almost instantly and had enough energy to go bounding back down the stairs and encourage others as they were on their way up. Here's a link to an article the San Francisco Chronicle ran on the climb. I was super impressed by the National Guardsman that ran it in full kit including gas mask.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2010/07/18/BAFM1EG20R.DTL&object=%2Fc%2Fpictures%2F2010%2F07%2F17%2Fba-stairclimb18_0501979305.jpg


Still though, that little competitive bug is kicking in and the next time I'd like to finish in the 15 minute range, ultimately finishing in 10 minutes. To do this, the main thing I need to do is climb stairs and figure out my pace. I didn't spend any training time under load preparing for this event. I was mainly curious to see the carryover effects my minimalist training routine would have during the climb. The weight felt fine. I didn't notice any aches and pains or discomfort from the gear, which is always a good thing. For the next time I'll spend time with my weight vest on the step mill, the steps at Joaquin Miller Park, and hiking on trails. I can't wait for the next one.

July 19, 2010 Viking Warrior, CC and 50/50 GTG

Viking Warrior 36:36 snatch protocol 12 kg bell, 7 work sets. This one is still burning out my grip and forearms more than anything else. Thinking about rugby and conditioning today, I'm going try a little experiment, going back to the 15:15 protocol and adding in active rest to the Viking and see what happens. I'll have to play around with it and see what works best. For starters I'll use the same bell and do two hand swings during the rest sets.



CC for this day was as follows

Inlcine pushups 3x40

Knee tucks 3x40

The release of the new Kettlebell TRX video got me thinking.

http://www.dragondoor.com/dv068.html

I've long loved combining kettlebells with the TRX system, usually doing a set of 15-25 two handed swings in between exercises to keep my heart rate up. It's been a while though, since I've used the system with any regularity, focusing mainly on Viking Warrior and Convict Conditioning. The release of this DVD provided the perfect incentive to get back into using it again. While waiting for the DVD to arrive, I remembered the 40/40 challenge on the TRX website. Since I like a good challenge, I figured I'd start training for it.

http://www.fitnessanywhere.com/40_40_challenge/

I started out with 5 easy GTG sets done on the hour, 5 reps each of atomic push ups and rows, with a minute break between the two sets. Once I complete 12 sets of this for total of 60 reps of each exercise I'll bump it up to 10 reps per set.

July 15, 2010 Fire Olympics, Rugby Day

I came in last, but am completely happy with that. First off, there were only two of us competing in the women's category, my coworker Vivian and I. Vivian is an incredible climber and pound for pound one of the strongest people I know. Now, on to the competition.

The comps are set up so that each climb is given a point value according to its difficulty. A competitor is given 5 attempts to complete a climb, with the point value decreasing for every attempt over one attempt. The competitor's top 5 highest scoring climbs are then totaled up. I onsited (climbed first attempt) my first four climbs, a V0, V1, V2 and V3. I picked the top climbs in each of the category. Encouraged by this I attempted the first V4 and climbed it after only two attempts. I completed another V4 on my 5th attempt. I emboldened by my success, I attempted a V5, but found it to still be a bit beyond my reach. I climbed a few more V3s to round out my score. At the end of the day I climbed two grades higher than I had been climbing for the past few months and higher than I've climbed in years. My main limiting factor was technique, which was very encouraging to see. My core, grip and forearm strength all felt surprisingly good. All in all it was a great day of climbing.

July 14, 2010 Indian Clubs Recovery Day

Tomorrow is the climbing competition so I took it easy today, mainly practicing and learning Indian Club Drills from the DVD. I finally learned the forward figure 8 pattern, which reminded me how exhilarating it is to learn a new skill. This just serves as a reminder of the importance of continual growth and learning.

July 12, 2010 CC and Climbing

Today's workout

CC
Incline Pushups 3x40
Knee Tucks 3x40

Climbing
1 v0, 3 V1s, 2V2s

Fire Daily Journal July 11, 2010

Today we started out the shift helping with some training for the life guards at a local pool. We ran two scenario stations. One was a trauma station where we simulated a person unconscious in the pool after a diving accident. This was a learning experience for both of us. We were able to see their methods for removing an unconscious person from a pool. This way we have an idea of what to expect when we arrive on scene and transition into our treatment protocols that much more smoothly. Firstly we trained them to be authoritative and loud. Next up was the need for efficiency, knowing where all of their equipment is, right off the bat, designated roles and team leader, and thinking ahead to anticipate needs. I got to role play as a hysterical distraught mom and pretty much caused havoc throughout the scenario. After a bit they started to get the hang of shepherding me away from the rescuers and putting me to work giving information about the patient.

The second station we gave them a medical scenario ranging from allergic reactions to bee stings, to strokes. The main lessons for them here centered around asking questions, using all of their available resources such as bystanders and family to gather information about the patient, and how to effectively organize that information into a well ordered turnover report. In the end we gave them a lot of information, but they were very receptive and eager to learn and implement what we had taught them.

July 9, 2010 CC

CC for the day

Horizontal Pulls 3x20

Close Squats 2x20

July 8, 2010 Viking Warrior and Bouldering

Today's workout

Viking Push Press 12 kg, 10 minutes, 15:15 protocol, 8 reps per work set

Afterwards I climbed 1 V0, 4 V1s and 1 V2. The climbing felt good. I onsited (climbed first attempt without prior information of the climb) all of the climbs.

July 7, 2010 CC and Active Recovery

CC sets and reps

Incline pushups 3x40

Knee tucks 3x40


While I'm meeting the progression standard, the sets still aren't feeling as easy as I'd like. I'll stay here a bit longer and will probably start working in a few GTG sets throughout the week.

I also started testing out my active recovery routine. 20 seconds of dynamic crescent swings coupled with 40 seconds of 2 hand swings using a 12 kg bell, performed 3 times with a 1 minute break in between sets. This felt quite good. I managed 12 crescent swings each set, which is where I'd like to be for my eventual goal of 3x10.

July 6, 2010 CC

My reps the CC workout of the day are as follows

Horizontal pulls 20, 30, 30

Close squats 2x30


The horizontal pulls were performed in sets of 5 due to my hands sliding off of the dining room table, but my arms felt great. This is the first time I've felt a significant sense of improvement with this exercise. The close squats felt really good and did an excellent job of mobilizing my talus.

July 5, 2010 Bouldering and Z-Health

For this workout I climbed 1 V0 and 5 V1s. The climbs felt very good and fluid. My forearm strength and endurance are both improving. My core strength felt solid as well.

Afterwards I practiced a few Z-Health eye drills. My results are as follows.

saccadic 102
near/far 55
hand/eye 105
foot/eye 90

Near/far is definitely the toughest one for me, but I will continue to work on and improve this one. This one seems to offer the best results as far as increasing my filed of vision and night vision.

July 16, 2010 CC, Stair Climb Prep, Indian Clubs, Rugby Drills, Wildland Fire

Today is the day before the Transamerica building stair climb. We'll be hiking up 48 floors with full firefighting gear, weighing approximately 75 lbs., while breathing air from an SCBA bottle. Last March we climbed the Bank of America buidling in SF. It was 52 stories and took me 20 minutes to complete. My main goal that day was for my air bottle to last all the way to the top, which it did. My goal for tomorrow is to break 20 minutes.

To prepare for it today I have mainly been hydrating, going light with the workout, and eating as healthy and warrior like as possible at the station today. This includes having my willpower sorely tested by the Costco 7 lb. All-American chocolate cake and the tray of cupcakes that greeted me in the station kitchen this morning.

This is the best I've done with hydration in a while, managing to guzzle down 5 quarts of water today. My workout began with a Super Joints/Z-health warm-up, and then the following reps/sets of CC.

Vertical Pulls 3x20
Close Squats 2x20

The vertical pulls are progressing, but very slowly. I'm tempted to start adding in a few GTG sets per week on this exercise. The close squats feel great. My ankle is continuing to gain mobility through them.

Afterwards I did a few Indian Club exercises to help loosen up my shoulders, thoracic spine and rib cage in preparation for being under load tomorrow. I finished up with a few rugby footwork and passing drills, to keep things short and light and save my legs for tomorrow.

The best laid plans. From about 6 pm to 10 pm, my crew and I were hiking all over the hills of San Jose fighting a wildland fire. (Yes, I realize I'm a trucker, but that's a story for a different post.) I'm sure I sweated out at least half the water I drank today working and hiking up and down the hills. Ain't it just a shame when work gets in the way of play? But, this adds a bit more of a challenge and makes it all that much more fun. On the bright side, my stamina and muscular endurance both felt great at the fire. My legs didn't start to burn until towards the end of the incident when I grabbed another company's hose pack weighing approximately 60 lbs., and hiked it back up the hill to the rigs for them. My legs and traps are a little sore right now, but overall everything feels pretty good. Now since it's almost midnight, i've gotta drink some more water and get some shut-eye for tomorrow, and hopefully find that delicate balance between adequate hydration and having to get up to pee all night.

July 13, 2010 Climbing Rugby Day

Yesterday I went to the gym and climbed 1 V0, 2 V1s, and 3 v2s. Since today is a rest and recovery day, this will be my last climbing session before the Fire Olympics climbing comp tomorrow. I didn't realize until after I signed up that the open category was for V4 and above. I haven't climbed a V4 in quite a while and currently consider myself to be a strong V2-3 climber. Yesterday I did onsite (complete the climb on the first attempt without any prior knowledge of the climb) all of my climbs except for one V2. That one took 3 attempts and it was more of a problem solving and footwork issue than anything else. My grip, core and forearms all felt strong. My goal for the comp tomorrow is to complete one V4 to justify my open category registration. We'll see how it goes.

Afterwards I met up with a teammate and we did rugby/kettlebell knowledge swap. She gave me pointers and drills to help with passing and I put her through my intro KB session. Both learning and teaching back to back like this made for a fun and relaxed format. Hopefully we can get in another session this weekend.

Saturday July 10, 2010 is a Rugby Sevens Day

The next morning I skipped my usual Viking Warrior workout because I didn't want to work out then have my muscles cool down in the car during the half hour drive to the rugby pitch. Still feeling full from the day before, I had two small plums and a quart of water for breakfast. I arrived at the pitch around 8:50 to find out that of course, we were up first to play at 9 am against the Sequoias. I went through a quick neural warm-up/super joints combo warm-up and got ready to play.

The coach put me in for a few minutes in the second half. I still get butterflies and pre-game jitters, but they all disappear after the first few tackles. Then it all just becomes really fun. The game is mostly a blur except for a few tackles and sidestepping around a defender, but having it called back being ruled a forward pass. Here I have to remember to stay steeper behind my teammates to ensure that the ball is passed behind and that I can run onto the ball full speed onto the ball. Sort of like a game of Red Rover - I'll have a better chance of breaking through their line if I'm running full speed.

The second game we played against the Sacramento Amazons. Last time we stuck to the game plan, passed it wide back and forth until we found a hole and ran it up the field. This time they stuck more to that game plan and we ran straight up the field and into contact. I had a much tougher time making effective tackles. One of my teammates, Erin commented that it seemed like I was thinking too much. I had a banana for lunch and got ready for the next game.

Next up was the East Palo Alto Razorbacks. Game face - check. Pissed off about the last game and looking to level a team - check. To start the game, the razorbacks kicked the ball off to us. For some reason in the past kickoffs have never come anywhere close to my general direction. As the ball sailed right towards me this time I couldn't help but think "Really, you just kicked it to me? Alright, game on." The ball continued to sail right over my head and into our try zone. I picked the ball up and ran it out, saw a hole cut to the right, saw another hole, cut to the left, was into open space, outran the other teams sweeper and touched the ball down right between the goal posts. This was the first time the game has felt instinctual and fluid for me. It felt like a game of touch, but with the realization that if I was at or just beyond their fingertips, they weren't going to be able to make the tackle. Now the challenge is to be able to access this feeling on a more consistent basis, and to have it with all other skills including passing, tackling and kicking. With the momentum on our side we went on to win this game pretty decisively.

The third game we played the Berkeley All Blues. We beat them in a close game the last tournament, but they ended up with the win this time. Both teams went scoreless the first half, but Berkeley managed three tries in the second. Again, it seemed like we resorted to 15s style play. For me, my try the game before might have gone to my head a bit. I ended up running into contact when I should have been looking to pass earlier and get the ball wide. Conditioning was also a factor here. I had 3 quarts of water during the day and probably could have used at least another one to two quarts. When I stood up before the match, my head started throbbing, a sign of dehydration. I did feel better out there than the last tournament only having 2 quarts of water, but not to the level I wanted to be at. My goal is to go as hard and as fast as I want for full time, and to not even have to think about my conditioning on the field. Luckily, all the info I've been learning over the past few years since becoming a part of the RKC community has given me the tools to make this a reality. My conditioning level has definitely improved over the past few months, and with a liberal application of hard work will continue to improve

B2D article with Dan John and the relationship between fitness and injury prevention

I just came across this post by MC on her blog begin2dig. In it she interviews Dan John and discuss a template for pressing power and references one of my training regimens.

Pressing Matters Part II - Dan John

In part one of this article MC and Dan discuss the relationship between physical fitness and injury proofing. Here's a quick excerpt.

"Training colleague Kira Clarke recently suggested that a coaching colleague has seen a correlation between strength and persistent well being. This is worth repeating so let me post it here, from Kira:
'My coach friend (Will Heffernan) has a simple test (and benchmarks) he uses regularly on his athletes (he adjusts them for different types of athletes, but these are his general guidelines)
Squat or deadlift: 2 x bodyweight
Inverted rows in 1 minute: 30+
Pushups in 1 minute: 50+
Pullups in 1 set: 10+
Bench press: 1.5 x bodyweight

In his experience, once his athletes hit these numbers (and ratios) their injuries drop significantly. And as they surpass them, he still likes to see lower/upper body strength numbers increase together, and the bodyweight numbers increase maintaining the ratio of approximately 5:3:1.'
[...]
He recommends the following for female athletes ...
deadlift: 2 x bodyweight...
pullups: 8+
pushups: 50+
inverted rows: 30+
bench press: 1-1.25 x bodyweight
(It's basically the same benchmarks he uses for 100kg+ male athletes)

He also shared the following snarky remark ...

'The biggest problem that female athletes suffer from is the low expectations of male coaches"


In college I often felt that my muscles were what held my body together through all of the wear and tear of playing volleyball. At the beginning of the season during triple days, we would practice 43 hours a week with 3 hours of lifting a week thrown in on top of that. With a 33" vertical, that much jumping and landing put a beating on my joints. My knees ached like crazy pretty much from September to June, but through it all, all of my tendons and ligaments stayed strong and intact.

College was the first time I had ever really lifted weights or been on any type of auxiliary fitness program. What I did have growing up, was playing outside. I skateboarded and rode my bike everywhere from the time I got up to the time the street lights came on. Every push off with the skateboard is basically a mini one-legged squat with one leg and mini lunge with the other. It also developed balance and muscular endurance.

Once in college, I fell in love with the muscle burn and the strength development gained through weight lifting. At our first max test session, my leg press max came out somewhere around 350 lbs. During one of our lifting sessions a month or so into the season one of my teammates noticed my relatively light weight and remarked half jokingly that I was "sandbagging it" or not giving it my all. This rankled me a bit. I went rogue and began piling on the weight. By the end of the season max test in May, my leg press max was calculated out to be 1280 lbs. I say calculated because they ran out of room to put weight on the machine, even after piling weights on top of it. My squat max went from around 150 to 400. I never truly lifted heavy in the squat because it felt like it was compressing the hell out of my back.

A test of my leg strength came later that year when a few friends and I were driving back along a pretty desolate portion of I-5 in the middle of the night. We took a wrong turn off the highway and ended up high centering the car on a mound of dirt. This was a time long ago, before cell phones were common, so we were on our own. It was a late '80s four door honda civic, not that big of a car. There was enough room, so I wedged myself under the front of the car with my back on the ground and feet on the bottom of the bumper, and after a bit of time was able to push the car off of the mound. I'm 5'10" and at the time weighed around 165 lbs.

This level of strength correlates with the standards mentioned in the article. My knees never felt unstable during any movement through five years of volleyball. Another factor that helped my leg strength and knee stability was my summer job. During the summers in college, I worked for the US Forest Service as a wildland firefighter. Every morning we would alternate between a 3-5 mile run or a 1-3 hour hike with a 40 pound pack. Hiking on the trails with a pack forced my legs to develop strength through different and varying angles and foot positions. Every once in a while my Captain would get this little smirk and a maniacal twinkle in his eye and billy goat it right up the side of the hill. His reasoning was that wildland fires rarely happen right along a trail side. We'd all fall in line behind him clawing and climbing our way to the top. In addition to this, we'd also practice 1-2 500' hoselays a day. A hoselay is where we extend lengths of hose off of the engine, one 100' section at a time, fighting fire as we go, in an effort to catch and cut off the most active edge of the fire. For this we would have an additional 60 lbs on our backs for 100 lbs total, and the Captain would usually find something so steep that we'd have to sprawl out across the hillside and/or hang on to the base of shrubs as we fought our way to the top, if we didn't want to go tumbling over backwards down the hill. All this while dragging a charged hoseline. All in all, a great way to develop a whole lot of usable and functional leg strength. I highly recommend it for any athlete.

So, where does this leave me now? When I started playing rugby a few months ago and found out I'd be a forward in the scrums, my first instinct was to go running for my beloved leg press and hack squat machines. My livelihood as a firefighter depends on my staying healthy, despite any bumps and bruises I might take through rugby, firefighting or anything else. I want my legs and whole body for that matter, as strong as I can get them. But then, as I began to think about it, since working out with kettlebells and following "Convict Conditioning" and Pavel's program in "The Naked Warrior," I am much stronger through a full range of motion. With the leg press and squats my thighs were only going to parallel. With the pistol my body descends all the way down butt to heel. Plus, this also trains balance, functional movement, and body awareness, especially when performed with eyes closed. After using Viking Warrior snatch and push press protocols, I noticed that my body felt much more stable under load during a 52 story full gear stair climb. So, for now, staying the course, and continuing to work my way through these programs. Although, after getting all nostalgic writing this, you just might see me sporting a weight vest hiking and traipsing about trails of the Oakland and Berkeley Hills.

Rugby Sevens Tournament Prep

Friday morning as I headed off to work I was looking forward to playing beach touch rugby Saturday morning. I packed up my sand socks from beach volleyball, a change of clothes and for some odd reason grabbed my rugby cleats as well. I guess having them in my truck makes me happy. I'm very glad I did grab them. Once I arrived in San Jose, a quick check of my facebook page showed one of my teammates inviting everyone to come out and support the women's team on Saturday in Palo Alto. Last I had heard from the practice the week before was that the tournament was in Santa Barbara, meaning I would have had to take two full days off from work on short notice. I contacted one of my teammates and found out that the tournament was indeed on the Stanford campus again. Then began the scramble.

In the afternoon, in between calls, my crew was nice enough to make a quick run to a local sporting goods shop to pick up a mouth guard, socks, compression shorts and a sports bra. That took care of the basics gear wise, diet wise I chose to do a modified warrior diet. In the past, when I've done the warrior diet at work, it became very difficult when the evening meal was delayed due to calls. So instead, on Friday I pretty much carbo-loaded the whole day to prepare for Saturday. My meals were as follows:

Breakfast - Bowl of oatmeal with cranberries, honey, and a little bit of butter and salt

Lunch - 3 vegetarian chili dogs and a big bowl of fruit salad with yogurt

Dinner - Salad, big plate of spaghetti with marinara sauce and veggie patties

Desert - Small bowl of peach crisp cobbler with vanilla ice cream.


At dinner I was still full from lunch, but knew that I was going to be playing a full day on Saturday so I packed in as much as I reasonably could. The desert wasn't truly part of the diet, but my chief made it from peaches that my Captain brought in from his trees, and well to refuse would've just been downright rude.

I skipped my planned workout and only did CC to give my muscles a chance to be rested and fresh the next day. Also,I drank 3 quarts of water and that night I took vitamin D and magnesium in an effort to make whatever sleep I would get that night to be as restful as possible, and vitamin C to help my body use iron more efficiently and allow my red blood cells to carry more oxygen to my muscles.

I tried a little experiment as well. The Feb/Mar issue of "Fighting Fit" magazine just happened to be in my bag, so I gave it another quick read through. One of their articles mentioned a study where boxers were given a spoonful of baking soda dissolved in water prior to exercise. They found that the boxers landed more punches per round during sparring than when given a placebo. The theory behind this is that the body uses sodium bicarbonate to neutralize acidity including lactic acid build up. When lactic acid accumulates in our muscles, it causes us to feel fatigued. Therefore, preloading the body with bicarb should allow us to exercise longer before feeling fatigued. I had first thought of this years ago during the fire academy. Before our morning runs I'd take 2-4 Tums tablets in an effort to increase my body's alkalinity. I can't honestly tell if it helped or not. Same thing with Friday. I drank 1 tbsp of baking soda dissolved in a glass of water that evening. I'll have to set up a series of controlled tests to see if this has any effect on my conditioning and rugby performance.

July 1, 2010 Viking Warrior, Kettlebell Partner Passing, Indian Clubs, Bouldering, Rugby Day

Thursday proved to be a very full, very fun day. I started off the day getting off shift with Viking Warrior 36:36 snatch protocol, 12 kg, 20 reps, for 10 work sets, wearing my SCBA mask.

Next I met up with Mike again to practice some diagonal crossing patterns and Indian club work. I had previously only thought of Indian clubs as a great tool for shoulder mobility, but Mike showed me several drills for wrist and hand mobility. Mike's 1 lb clubs felt much more fluid than my 2 lb clubs. I found an antique set of 1 lb Wilson clubs on ebay and can't wait to try them out when they arrive.

Once we had worked out, it was time to go play. We drove to Castlerock state park to do some bouldering. Climbing outside felt very good, regardless of the mosquitoes. Something about getting out in nature instantly has a very good effect on me. Sometimes I have to make more of an effort to remember the the climbing gym is a tool to get outside more. We spent the afternoon working a problem in the Magoo's section of the boulders. This is one of my favorite things about bouldering; hanging out with friends and figuring out different possible ways of climbing a problem. Hopefully we'll get to climb together again soon.

Afterwards, around 5 pm, I drove back up to Oakland. Something about that drive has a way of sapping the energy right out of me (yes, the drive, not the 9 hours of working and playing before hand). We had a few runs after midnight the night before and it was starting to catch up to me by the time I got home. After going back and forth a bit on whether I should go to rugby practice, I asked myself what I'd do if this was my very last day on earth. The answer became very clear. Besides, I had to test out my new go-fast cleats. I took a 20 minute nap and headed out to practice, and was very glad I did. It was good to be with the team again. We practiced passing patterns, defense and then put it all together in a few games of touch.

All in all this turned out to be a great day.

June 30, 2010 3 Minute Workout

The day before, as a precursor to the freestyle partner passing, Mike taught me a 180 crescent swing. He then taught me a more dynamic plyometric version of this swing. It got my heart rate up in a hurry and got me thinking of a new workout plan. For a while I've been trying to develop a good program to meet the conditioning demands of rugby 7s. The exercise demands this exercise placed on me felt very similar to the sprint conditioning test from the Grizzlies tryout. Therefore I decided to incorporate this into a similar template to train my active recovery.

I used a 12 kg bell and performed 20 seconds of plyometric crescent swings immediately followed by 40 of regular two handed swings. I did this for three rounds with no break in between for a total of three minutes. This proved to be a pretty challenging workout. The three minutes felt even tougher than the 4 1/2 minutes I made it through for the Grizzlies test. This makes me happy. My ultimate goal with this plan is to work up to 3 sets of 10 minutes with a 1 minute break in between. This should cover a 7s championship match with two overtime periods.

Workout June 29, 2010 Viking Warrior and Kettlebell Partner Passing

Tuesday as I was getting off shift I got in 17 rounds of 15:15, 8 reps w/ the 12 kg bell. I added in my SCBA mask to help prepare for the Trans-America building full gear stair climb coming up on the 19th of this month.

Afterwards I met up with Mike Castrogiovanni for another session of kettlebell partner passing, a video of which can be seen here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6U4qDodptM

We reviewed some of the techniques from previous sessions such as the basic two handed pass with a flip, and then one and two bell progressions. Afterwards we progressed into the freestyle techniques. The applications that this has for sports are almost limitless. In one session, we trained strength, cardio, redirecting forces, situational awareness, reading body language, agility and balance. I'm very excited to see how this affects my rugby game, and am very eager to train up a few teammates to have a few practice partners.

Acting Captain Lessons Learned

I was Acting Captain all three shifts of last tour. Captaining is something that I'm called upon to do periodically. It's something that is definitely outside my comfort zone, but it's something that I'm required to do, so I will figure out a way to do it to the best of my ability. The main part about Acting as Captain that makes it seem overwhelming is there seems to be an incredible amount of information to learn, absorb and be able to quickly use to form a plan of action. As with other things though, that might initially seem overwhelming, the best way I've found to tackle them is just to get a foothold somewhere, break it down into bite size chunks and start methodically accomplishing it bit by bit.

This was the first time I've been called upon to act as Captain for three shifts in a row. While it was a bit daunting, it proved to be preferable to be randomly being called upon for a few hours here and there. Having more consecutive time in the seat gave me the opportunity to implement the lessons I was learning quicker, and thereby reinforce the learning process.

One responsibility of Acting Captain is navigating to the call. This is especially important because getting to the call can often set the tone for the whole call. To help learn the area I have been hopping up and figuring out the route anytime one of the rigs in the station gets a call, as well as driving the neighborhood when getting off work. Other things that have helped as well are learning to use all of my resources. I am a big fan of the printed maps that we have in the rigs. I like to be able to see the big picture of where we are going. We have GPS devices in the rigs, but they can be a bit temperamental and only show one turn at a time. When using the maps I also have to be aware that sometimes water stains or scratched areas on the map might obscure an address or street, some of the lettering is ridiculously tiny, all of the lettering seems tinier and blurry when driving en route to the call, especially at night, and once a little bit of adrenalin and tunnel vision kick in, it makes it all that much harder to navigate. The key here is to use all of my resources. Grab a run card from the file that shows the route from the station to the call's street. Find the location on the big wall map in the station before leaving. Show the engineers the route before heading out. Use members of the crew that are familiar with the area if there is any doubt to the exact location of the call. This last one is important for me to remember, because while I am ultimately charged with determining the route, it's still okay for me to ask for input from the crew.

Another lesson learned dealt with nutrition. My ipod was on shuffle the day before when an audio track from Dr. Mark Hyman's UltraMind book began to play. This track mentioned the importance of magnesium. He stated that the body uses magnesium to help it cope with stress. When the body is stressed, it depletes its stores of magnesium and they need to be replenished. Captaining is shall we say, a bit stressful for me. The first shift I increased my intake of magnesium and noticed feeling more relaxed and resilient. I'll have to research and play around with this further.

Call wise, there was a ton of learning that took place. We responded to 3 different type fires in 3 shifts. The first shift was the previously mentioned wildland fire. Lessons learned here mainly dealt with need to remain hands off, keep me head on a swivel, direct, and keep up constant communication with my crew. With my background in wildland, I'm very eager to jump in and help work. That's great as a firefighter, but can be a little counterproductive as a Captain. Communication, as always on the fireground as key. When we arrived on scene initially, several different members of the command staff were trying all give me different assignments on different radio frequencies, all at the same time. Here communicating to each of them my current assignment and the requests from the other officers on scene, and being patient while they figured it out among themselves seemed to be the best plan of action. At another point Division Alpha requested I walk the perimeter with him to get another set of eyeballs on the fire and our containment efforts. Next time in this situation, I will communicate better with my crew to make sure the know my assignment as well. Another item that will help with communication is my helmet. Captains' structure helmets have red reflectors on them, and the wildland helmets are completely red, while yellow denotes all ranks below Captain. I grabbed one of the other Captain's structure helmets at the beginning of the shift, but didn't grab his wildland helmet as well. This would have made it easier for the Chief's and overhead to pick me out on the hillside. Additionally, one other minor lesson learned was as I was hopping out of the rig making sure that I had both radios, they were tuned to the correct channels, and communicating with overhead, that I initially forgot to grab my gloves from structure gear and transfer them over to my wildland gear. This is a simple fix; I'll just have to get another set of gloves to keep with my wildland gear.

The second fire was a car fire in the parking lot of a mall. This is something that we had pre-planned and practiced just a few weeks ago. As we pulled up, the car was completely obscured by the thick dark smoke. One of the engines that responded with us and was first on scene, runs with a smaller wildland engine called a patrol. The patrol pulled into the garage in an attempt to quickly extinguish the fire. The lesson learned here was that the smoke was so thick that it actually caused the patrol's engine to stall from lack of oxygen. We extinguished the fire by laying a pre-connected hose from the other engine, and then extending off of it with one of our hose packs to reach the vehicle. If the fire had been on one of the upper levels, we would have had to extend a hoseline off of the tip of the truck's aerial ladder.

This reminded me of another call where I was higher classing a month or so prior. We got a rescue response call early in the morning for a vehicle rollover. We arrived to find an older model toyota pick up truck on it's side, with the engine running and a small fire sparking from the catalytic converter. The driver had fled the scene long before we got there. My quick thinking engineer grabbed a CO2 fire extinguisher and sprayed it into the undercarriage. The CO2 displaced the oxygen around the engine and effectively shut it off. Here was an instance where we were able to use the same principle to our advantage.

The third fire on the last shift also had quite a few valuable lessons. The beginning of this post discussed lessons learned navigating to the call, which in large part came from this call. In addition to this, once on scene after the fire as knocked down, the homeowner came barreling into the apartment complex, through the cones we laid down to block off the road, driving over our 5" hose and almost running over a few firefighters. Again, I've got to stay completely aware of my surroundings even with the simplest of tasks and when everything appears to be calm.

Three Legged Squirrel

Recently while visiting my grandma's house I noticed a squirrel running across the street. The first thing that caught my attention was that the squirrel only had half of it's tail. It wasn't until later that I realized that it was also missing one of its rear legs. This amazed me in that this animal was able to compensate and still move naturally and gracefully enough that I didn't even notice it's missing leg.

When I have any injury or a bit of stiffness in my joints, my body mechanics tend to change and become more rigid and less graceful. This opened my eyes a bit that I could make more of a conscious effort to move more fluidly in my daily life, concentrating on the areas that felt good, instead of the ones that ached or were stiff. I had been doing this for a bit during the conditioning portion of rugby practice, and noticed my body warmed up much faster.

This led me to think of the role of grace in athletics and longevity. When I was younger, I was bristling with energy. I was driven to push myself and run, jump, play and frolic as much as possible. It seemed though, that society at the time wanted me planted firmly on the sidelines, to be the cheerleader instead of the athlete on the playing field. The first time I can remember noticing this was when it came to wearing skirts and dresses to school in first grade. Initially I had no problem wearing skirts, not until I was told that I couldn't hang upside down on the monkey bars like the other kids, for fear of flashing my little bloomers to the whole school yard. In later years it began to seem that women's clothing prized form over function to the point where it was almost a conspiracy to hobble and hamstring function. The clothes were made out of lightweight, delicate frilly fabrics that couldn't stand up to the lightest bit of use. Heaven forbid that women's winter clothing would have enough fabric to actually keep a person warm, that would ruin the cute little cut of the garment. I tolerated the ballet lessons my parents enrolled me in so that I could take the more fun tap lessons. Then of course, there was the worse offender of all, the high heel. Here was something that was unstable, would use the person's body weight to force their toes into a painful little point at the end of the shoe, not to mention would lead to foot, hip and back problems later in life. None of that seemed like a good trade off, yet this is what society expected of me. That didn't sit too well with me. I began to focus solely on function, seeing any effort put into form and thereby gracefulness, as a waste of energy that could have been put into strength and speed.

Now, later in life, I'm seeing how form and function don't have to detract from each other, but can actually work together to create an incredible synergy. Grace is smooth, coordinated movement, which is inherently faster, stronger and beautiful. The book and DVD series "Kettlebells from the Ground Up" explained that the word calisthenics is derived from the Greek "Kalos Sthenos," meaning "beautiful strength." The ancient Greeks, who were some of the fittest athletes around, realized the need for gracefulness in their practice. As I played volleyball, I eventually unintentionally found a level of grace through practicing and refining my function. Now I'm curious as I take up a new sport, rugby, how putting a strong emphasis on grace from the beginning will affect my game. In order to do this, I've incorporated work with kettlebells, in particular the ballistic swinging movements, as well as indian clubs. Another option would be to take up dance. In a Time.com interview, football player Lynn Swann stated that his years of dance lessons in tap, jazz, and ballet had greatly helped his sense of balance, body control, rhythm and timing. Who would have thought all those years ago that sporting a frilly little tutu might actually help with my rugby game.