For you guys and gals that came to class yesterday, you were able to finally meet (or re-meet) Nancy. Besides running “the hill” 5 times for the 400 m run, a total of 75 overhead squats were completed. That’s a lot of overhead squats, especially for you newbies who are foreign to the movement. An enormous amount of flexility, core stability, and strength go into these. If there are insufficiencies in any of these three, it will open up room for error. Lowering the weight, widening the stance and getting a wider grip on the bar will help but sometimes aren’t enough. It is more common than you would think, that when doing the overhead squat, for one’s arm to experience some numbness. This is usually due to some sort of peripheral nerve entrapment or just simply a pinched nerve. There are ways around this and as you progress in flexibility and strength, chances of this happening are less frequent. Here are a few things that will help in the future:

1. Posterior capsule stretch, sleeper stretch, external rotation stretch

2. Lats stretch, pec stretch, pec minor massage. You can use basketball or other ball andto lie on top of for pec rolling.

For pec major you can use corner stretch — arms abducted to 90, with hands pointing up. Face the concave corner of a wall, and let the elbows touch the side of the wall. Then, lunge forward and let it stretch out the anterior muscles of the shoulder.

3. Deep tissue massage all around the scapula; anterior, lateral and posterior shoulder; coracobrachialis, biceps brachii, and brachialis.

4. Nerve glides (google first link)

5. Band dislocates and wall slides

6. Foam roll thoracic spine (put 45s on your chest for deeper stretch). Also, roll side to side as you are rolling and try to arch your back

K-Star Says it best:

Watch this entire vid.

Episode 71: Overhead Squat/Snatch Prep | Mobility WODHello the MWoders, Today we are presenting the Mob-fest from the inside of a Danish church (also the home of Crossfit Copenhagen).Sick, I know. Test: Overhead Squat/Snatch Receiving PositionMwod: Two minuets opening up the hip and groin against the wall.

via Mobilitywod

This one gets good at around 3:15.

Episod 67: Ring Dip and Overhead Squat Prep | Mobility WODHey MWod Kids, Short video today about getting ready for ring dips and overhead squatting.This Mwod has a few versions of the horrible hip grinders for warm up.Heading to Norway and Denmark tomorrow so hang tough if the Mwod timing is a little off.

via Mobilitywod

Fast forward to about 3:25.

The 2012 Reebok CrossFit Games open has come to a close. The five grueling workouts that comprised this years competition have come and gone and have left us sore and hungry for more. So what’s next? The Regional round of the Games, that’s what! The top 60 men and women in our region (Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi) will be competing. This year’s Regional round of competition will be held in San Antonio, TX on the weekend of April 27-29th. Wanna get in on the action? Well a group of us from EDCF are traveling down that Friday to spectate through the weekend. Jen Hardi is in charge of looking into hotels. Tell Jen or I if you are interested in going by THIS FRIDAY. Hotels are booking fast and we need to get in on the action.

What: South Central Regionals 
When: April 27 – 29, 2012 from 8 am to 7 pm 
Where: Freeman Coliseum located at 3201 East Houston Street, San Antonio, Texas 78219

Tickets are only $10/day and can be purchased here. Hope you can make it!

Caballo Blanco, or “White Horse” in Spanish, is somewhat of an iconic figure in circles of minimalist and ultra runners. Micah True (his real name), was the outside world’s only connection into a unique tribe of ultrarunners called the Tarahumara who have been practicing the art of running minimally over hundreds of miles of rough terrain. True put all his effort into keeping this tribe’s tradition of “running free” alive by organizing the annual Copper Canyon Ultra Marathon where some of the best ultrarunners in the world would travel to a remote spot in Mexico to compete against the tribesmen. He is famed through Christopher McDougall’s book Born To Run which I highly recommend everyone read if they get chance. True was a man of principal who preached the art of running free and embracing the happiness of life. This passage from the book captures True’s philosophy:

“Don’t fight the trail. Take what it gives you … Think easy, light, smooth and fast. You start with easy because if that’s all you get, that’s not so bad. Then work on light. Make it effortless, like you don’t give a sh*t how high the hill is or how far you’ve got to go. When you’ve practiced that so long that you forget you’re practicing, you work on making it smooooooth. You won’t have to worry about the last one — you get those three, and you’ll be fast.”

Caballo went for his last run this past Friday when he left for a routine 12-miler and never returned. Reporters say that he was found Saturday on the trail beneath the trees as if he was merely taking a nap. He died doing what he loved most. True left an imprint on the world through his philosophies and teachings that will be felt by many.