Not only is the PNC a great time to focus on your diet/nutrition, it is also the perfect time to pay attention to your sleep habits in order to help facilitate quicker recovery. I recommend everyone read T.S. Wiley’s Lights Out: Sleep, Sugar, and Survival. In it he outlines proper sleep conditions coinciding with seasonal exposure to daylight. He explains that it has only been the last 80 years that our culture has had the luxury of electricity, light bulbs, tv’s, and other gadgetry. These things keep us up after the sun goes down, distracting us from the rest our bodies require. You see, while we are in deep slumber the internal systems of our bodies are hard at work producing hormones that are critical to repairing the exhaustion that has occurred throughout the day. Our hormones are the most powerful substances we possess, so we need to make sure we are taking full advantage of them.

Here’s a simple of run down of Wiley’s recommendations:
Get more sleep.

• Go to bed earlier, incrementally.
• Turn off the TV after 9PM.
• Better yet, take it out of the bedroom.
• Sleep as many hours as you can without getting fired or divorced.
• Always get up as close to dawn as possible.

Get quality sleep.

• Keep the lights in the house at low levels of intensity after dark.
• Be sure you sleep in utter darkness in a very cool room. Think cave.
• Put tape over lit-up digital gadgets (ie. alarm clocks, Voltron night lights, etc.)

Sounds simple enough, right? You’ve all ready committed to eliminating sugars and other processed carbohydrates from you daily eating. And, you’re eating more lean protein and healthy fats, correct? This is sure to help you feel better throughout the day, and both during and after WODs. Why stop there?! Now commit to going to bed 15 minutes earlier each night and see how you feel. Feel better, look better, perform better… now’s the time to make the changes to make these things happen.

Bottom line, improving your diet/nutrition will have huge impacts on your CFRVA performance, but on top of that, adding high quality sleep patterns for extended periods of time will make you a CFRVA rock star.

Today’s WOD:

Power Clean
Work up to a heavy double, then 5×2 @ 90% of that double.

then

3 Rounds:
50 Double Unders
25 Push-Ups

Today’s WOD:

5x500M Rows with 2 minute recoveries between efforts

For those of you who are PNC 2ing, I want you to be aware of some things. When you switch off of a high carb diet, it takes your body at least a week and a half (really, this is closer to two weeks) to adjust to the new ratio of macronutrients. For us, this typically this means shifting to using fat as a primary energy source. This is not an overnight process; don’t expect it to be. Stay strong and grind it out. We’ll be posting more recipes and meal ideas to help you guys, but let those creative juices flow with your cooking!

I stumbled on this site on Tuesday and this link is a great start to setting yourself up to be successful in a paleo kitchen. Maybe your weekend homework should be to get some of these items.

Today’s WOD:

Press
MEx5

then

AMRAP 9:
2 Handstand Push-Ups
10 Squats
12 Sit-Ups

Welcome to September.

Today’s WOD:

Grace
30 Clean & Jerks (135#/95#)

Last completed on 12/01/09.

This workout is better described as 30 ground to overheads with the bar going through the rack position. One of my faves.

Today’s WOD:

800M Run
70 Push-Ups
60 Box Jumps
50 Pull-Ups
40 Wall Balls
30 Burpees
20 Sandbag Get Ups
10 Sumo Deadlift High Pulls

For those of you participating in PNC 2, welcome to nutrition town. I won’t lie to you, you’ve got a couple of tough weeks ahead of you, but if you make it through the initial wall, you’ll be better for it. For those of you that are apprehensive (stealing from John), it’s 8 freaking weeks of your life. Suck it up. We’ll be posting recipes and encouraging words along the way, but take advantage of your greatest asset: all those great people in our community participating in PNC 2 with you. Get active on the message board and post things that are working for you and things that aren’t. Be like a hive mind.

Today’s WOD is the benchmark for our challenge, so don’t sandbag it. We expect maximum output today (and every day). If we suspect that you are sandbagging your workout, you will forfeit your money and be removed from the challenge.

See you out there, nutritionistas!

Today’s WOD:

Front Squat
5×5 @ 70%

then

15-12-9
Handstand Push-Ups
Dumbbell Squat Cleans

So you guys are all doing the Performance Nutrition Challenge, right? No!? It really isn’t as difficult as it may sound, but it isn’t a walk in the park either.

Remember, you only have a few days left to sign up for the PNC part II. It costs $10, and the initial performance test is on Monday, August 30th. The prize is the entire pot, which right now is over $200. And if I think you’re sandbagging on Monday’s workout, I’m just going to kick you out of the Challenge. Pretty hardcore. E-mail me if you haven’t already, we can take cash or charge your card.

Below is a post Brian made for the last Challenge. Brian does a lot of talking about Paleo, and while this isn’t a Paleo challenge, he provides some great places to start.

Tomorrow, be on the lookout for some solid recipes and meal ideas!

What do I eat?
Directly from CrossFit.com, “base your diet on garden vegetables, especially greens, lean meats, nuts and seeds, little starch, and no sugar.” What CrossFit HQ says, and what we agree with, is eat things that are natural. No processed goods, canned foods, chips, oreos, etc. We know that eating healthy isn’t easy and it is undoubtedly difficult to avoid delicious things like ice cream, bread, pasta, and alcoholic beverages. Heck, it’s downright hard to eat healthy when so many of our every day meal choices at restaurants include some type of processed carbohydrate and a large soda on the side. What we would like to propose is slowly weening yourself off of the bread, pasta, rice, and pre-packaged foods. We don’t expect you to go cold turkey on it, a few carbs won’t kill you. However, by reducing your processed food intake, you’ll be rewarded with more energy, better recovery, and better workouts.

Eat like a caveman, live better.
The Paleo diet recommends eating meat, vegetables, nuts, seeds, some fruit, little starch, and definitely NO SUGAR. You don’t eat processed carbohydrates. You eat like a caveman. Paleo is the name that embodies the nutritional content we are giving you.

Why would you want to eat like a caveman? Well, I promise you, our bodies aren’t designed to digest soda and high fructose corn syrup on a daily basis. The Paleo diet encourages eating foods that your body is SUPPOSED to digest. That means none of the crazy, refined, manufactured sugar foodstuff. Most importantly, it works. People are rewarded with more energy, increased athletic performance, and feel better about life in general. That last point is kind of a stretch, but you’d be surprised at how much of a difference quality food makes in your quality of life.

Shopping and Eating Healthy (or Paleo)
So you know a little something about eating healthy. You know that I like the Paleo Diet because of the performance and energy benefits. You know the theory, but not the method. So how do you eat like a caveman without living in a cave?

Step 1: Cut a hole in the box. Just kidding. The real first step is to get rid of all that bad food that you’ve got around the house. I’m talking about the twinkies, the cookies, the chips, and all the pasta, bread, and rice. We as Americans are eating ourselves to death because we keep preservative and HFCS-laden snacks around us 24/7. The more you are around bad food, the more likely you are to eat it. Me? If you give me a big bag of sour cream and onion chips I’ll sit down in front of the TV and crush it all in one sitting without a second thought. That’s how I’ve always been and probably always will be. I, like most people, am a junk food junkie. I can’t eat just one. The only effective way I can keep myself from eating snacks and chips is to keep them away altogether. That means that I throw it away if it’s around and I don’t buy it when I’m out at the grocery store.

Step 2: You’re not allowed to buy junk food and snacks now, so what do you buy? Perhaps a better solution to consider is how you buy healthy foods. Imagine your favorite neighborhood grocery store. Got it? Good. I’m going to set guidelines on where you’re allowed to go. You’re only allowed to walk around and buy things from the perimeter of the store. That’s it, you’re good to go. You will undoubtedly discover that you are only exposing yourself to the fruits and vegetables, the meats, and the seeds and nuts. Of course, there are exceptions to the rule, but you know to avoid the pastries, bread, and frozen food sections now, right?

Step 3: There isn’t really a step 3, all you have to do now is eat and I don’t think you need any coaching as far as that’s concerned.

Eating healthy requires planning on your part. You will probably find yourself going to the grocery store a little more than once a week because you need to buy fresh vegetables and fruit fairly regularly. I encourage you to plan your meals out with pen and paper. This will help reinforce the method as well as helping to stave off your inevitable cravings for fast food.

There’s a lot more to your health than working out at the gym. Working out is not an excuse to eat an extra donut in the morning. Keep it simple by eating healthy and you will be rewarded with better performance in the gym.

Today’s WOD:

AMRAP 12:
7 Sumo Deadlift High Pulls (75#/55#)
7 Push Presses (75#/55#)

Jeff at his first Olympic lifting competition going for a 98 kg snatch… Success!

Our main man Brandon Roberson is heading off into the sunset after today. He was a integral part of our regionals run and has been Mr. Intensity from day one at the gym. We’ll miss you, Brandon. Best of luck with your new job and in everything you do!

Today’s WOD:

Thrusters
5×3

then

AMRAP 7:
2x100M Run with Plate (45#/25#)
10 Double Unders

Each athlete starts with 2 plates and a jump rope. Each plate is moved 100M, then the double unders are completed. Plates can only be moved one at a time.