Tag ring muscle up

So when I got home Friday evening Ali was on the phone.  It didn’t take me long to figure out she was on the phone with the woman that runs the cleaning business we have come out once every 4-8 weeks.  Evidently the woman told Ali earlier in the day the crew would show up around 4:30.  Well it was close to 6 pm when I arrived home.

Well of course Ali had to call the woman, nobody called Ali to say they weren’t coming.  Ali was frustrated, she went through the house and picked stuff up in anticipation of their arrival.  It was par for the course as far as our overall experience has been with the cleaning crew, frustration.

Yes when they are actually inside the house they overall do a nice job of cleaning the place, attending to details we normally wouldn’t do ourselves.  They also have done so with a rather rough touch, breaking/damaging a couple sets of venetian blinds, a screen and breaking a broom.

However the biggest frustration is the lack of organization.  Ali has asked repeatedly if it would be possible to schedule a set day for cleaning to occur, like for example, the second Friday of every month.  Well this appears impossible for the woman to do.  Each and every time Ali tries to schedule her it requires far too much effort to get it all coordinated.

When Ali told me that once again Vanessa’s crew didn’t follow through I told her it wasn’t a big deal, I’ll help Ali clean, we can knock it out in an hour and keep the money in our pocket.  I know Ali likes not having to clean but if we both do it together it really doesn’t require extraordinary amounts of time/effort.

So Saturday morning Ali and I pulled ourselves out of bed at 4:30 AM to go to the GCR club run.  Ali had talked about running with me since neither Michelle or Christy were going to be there.  She thought it would be good to see if she could keep up with the faster pace I generally prefer to run at. Well it turned out that Christy was able to make it so Ali decided to run with her instead.

I decided to push out solo with the intention of doing 10 miles at whatever pace I could manage.  Early on I passed a number of people.  I then came up upon a group with Matt, the trumpeteer/race director extraordinaire whom also is a strong runner.  He decided to break from the pack he was in and come with me.

Matt is great to run with, not only can he help push my pace, he is an accomplished talker whose conversations help the miles pass without much fuss at all.  By the time we completed the 10 mile run I CRUSHED my 10 mile best which I had only set a few weeks ago on Christmas Eve of roughly 90 minutes.  I covered the same distance in 1:26:59, knocking a full 3 minutes off my previous best.

My average pace of 8:42 was well under what I will need to break 2 hours in a half marathon.  The training run gave me a good shot of confidence that I could grit out those last 3 miles at a similar pace.

On the way back from the run we stopped at a local farmer’s market Ali and I both had heard about.  There were a ton of produce stands there, most of them organic in nature.  We figured this would be a great spot to grab juicing supplies.

As expected there was a great selection of fresh fruit and vegetables.  We filled up three reusable shopping bags with fruit and veggies.  We definitely will be stopping there more often.  You are getting fresher, local produce and in most cases paying less for it than you would at the grocery store.

When we got home Ali retreated for a nap.  I wanted to head outside and tend to the yard.  Ali originally said we could eat lunch after her nap.  Around 11:30 I was feeling weak and low on gas, probably from the 1000 or so calories I expended during the run.  Well Ali had only gone back to nap a little after 10:30 so I just went inside, ate a quick PB and headed back out.

I gave the yard the full treatment weed whacking and mowing it all.  I hadn’t run the whacker in probably close to two months.  All in all I spent close to 3 hours out there busting ass.  Well probably about a half hour before I was done Ali, whom I found out later had been up for about 45 minutes, came outside and asked if I wanted to eat.  I told her I did already.  Ali made a frustrated gesture and marched inside.

Well this pissed me off.  I decide to allow you to continue sleeping while I labor outside and you are going to be pissy with me? Uh no.  When I came inside Ali vocalized that she was annoyed because I should have left her a note or something telling her I ate.  She said how she was up for 45 minutes and was patiently waiting for me to tell her I was ready to eat.

I told her I thought it was pretty stupid to be giving me shit for busting ass outside while she napped and if she was that hungry she could have came out and asked me when she woke up.  So if I wasn’t tweaked enough already I became more tweaked when instead of starting on the cleaning when she woke up she was doing some other organizing around her desk.  I expressed it would be nice, since I was outside doing stuff if Ali had started on the cleaning so I didn’t have to spend as much time doing that as well.

Well as you can imagine it was a disagreement that was not going to have any solid resolution.  I wound up assisting on the interior cleaning, handling the dusting, counter cleaning and vacuuming portion of the project.  During the course of cleaning both of our resentment levels subsided.

Saturday evening we decided to use our two complimentary passes to Sweet Tomatoes.  We had a very nice meal as always there.  Ali just LOVES the place.  On the way home we made a stop at Target.  We wanted to pick up a decent inflatable bed.  We figured it could be an option for either Jeremy or Randall this upcoming weekend since they refuse to sleep together in the same bed for some odd reason.  It also would come in handy in a month or two when my brother Pat and his girlfriend potentially could be stopping by along with my dad and step mom.

We have two old blow up twin size air mattresses that don’t hold air very well and require manual inflation.  The new bed we got is a double high queen size bed with a built in inflator, a nice upgrade.

Saturday night I was up till 12:30 am finishing up season one of 24. The ending was pretty shocking.  So shocking that I forced myself to stay awake to watch part of episode 1 of season two to get an idea of what happens next.  I could honestly dive right into season two but instead I am going to digest the seasons of Dexter and Breaking Bad that Randall so kindly lent to me.

Originally Ali had talked about maybe going on a bike ride with me Sunday morning and then later in the day heading back to the swamp with the dogs for another hike.  Well she awoke Sunday morning proclaiming how she wanted Sunday to be a rest day since she has a hectic week on tap with her race going down this upcoming weekend.

I jabbed her a bit about it although I really didn’t care, my legs were quite sore from my run the day before anyway.  Well as I was waiting for the pool store to open I was browsing my phone and saw Ali decided to gripe on FB about my not jumping up for joy to embrace her day of rest.  That is her passive aggressive thing.  I decided to be the good troll and posted “Blah. Blah. Blah. Rest when you die.”

So when I got back we headed right back out to the swamp.  The dogs could hardly believe their good fortune.  First they get to go on a DD run and then right back out to the swamp??!!

When we arrived we were greeted once again by the huge gator out front. He was just sunning himself on the bank.  That sucker is massive.

It didn’t take long for the dogs to do what is becoming a traditional swamp dump.  Hell, Sadie was so excited she dumped twice.

We had a nice walk but we actually cut it a bit short compared to the week before.  Despite it being in the brisk 50’s early in the morning, by the time we hit the trail a few hours later it was heating up.  The dogs were definitely getting pooped.  So after eating lunch at the picnic table we headed back.

During the walk we came across another guy and his dog.  As we were talking he mentioned how he heard of some dummies that actually let their dogs off leash in the swamp.  He said he heard in some cases the dogs were actually killed by gators.

I had talked to my dad about going to the swamp with his dogs, the problem is he hates keeping the dogs leashed.  Well I will have to tell him if he doesn’t agree to keep them leashed in this situation we aren’t going.  A gator can take a dog down in a split second and you won’t even know it’s there.

Sunday afternoon I headed out for an extended session on my bar park.  I set up my gymnast rings as well.  I had a couple firsts during the session, my first back to back ring muscle ups and my first slow muscle up where I don’t use my forearm as a lever to pull myself up.  I broke the session into 4 different videos including my long awaited Muscle Ups for Dummies tutorial. Here are the links, slow muscle up, muscle ups for dummies, lever training, ring muscle ups.

I watched a portion of the two conference championship games.  Both games games were real nail biters.  The Ravens suffered a crushing loss when Billy Cundiff pulled a short field goal that would have tied the game, sending the Patriots to the Super Bowl. I commented to Ali that I can only imagine just how awful Cundiff must feel.  He just let the air out of a couple million Raven fans sails all at once.  I hope they have him on suicide watch.

I fell asleep at the end of regulation of the Niner/Giants game but read it was decided by a field goal in overtime, winning the game for the Giants.  It set up a rematch of the 2007/08 Super Bowl where the Giants shocked the world, ending the Patriots quest for a perfect season.  I guess it should make for an interesting game but of course since the Eagles aren’t involved my interest level will never be more than mild at best.

I was somewhat shocked to hear that Joe Paterno died.  But then when I thought about it some more I really wasn’t.  I always had the feeling that Joe lived to coach and if he ever stopped coaching his reason for living would be gone.  It’s sad that my thoughts turned out to be true but the real tragedy is what transpired in the few months preceding his death which will forever tarnish his 50 + years of accomplishments.

So when Ali is out of town I leave work an hour early so I can get home to let the dogs out.  Getting home early meant I had some extra daylight so I decided to put it to good use outside in my bar park.

I decided to dig out my rings, I wanted to give ring muscle ups a shot.

When I was on the long quest for the elusive muscle up I did some work trying to do the movement on rings since some people said that in some ways it is easier to get your first MU on them.  The thought process is when you do a muscle up on rings you don’t have a bar in the way of your chest blocking the transition.

This is definitely true however the ring MU (when done without massive kipping) is also more of a power movement than a swinging bar muscle up.  I never was able to do one in my training before, partially because I guess I lacked the necessary power.

Just like a bar muscle up, technique is an important aspect of doing the same movement on rings.  You have to grab the rings with a strong “false grip” which basically means rotating your grip so that your wrist is almost on top of the rings.  Doing this allows your wrist to be in the proper angle to do the top part of the movement.  In a swinging bar muscle up you can get away with not using a false grip because your momentum will naturally rotate your grip around the bar for you.

The actually pulling movement is dramatically different than a bar muscle up.  With a bar muscle up your elbows are far in front of your body and you are pulling on a stationary object.  With muscle ups on rings you start with your elbows forward and palms facing one another.  As you pull up you are also rotating your hands outward at the same time to get into position for the pushing part of the motion.  There are a lot of moving parts.

So anyway, I got my rings suspended from my high bar and after loosening up a bit , gave it a try.  My first 3 or 4 attempts I was close but I got stuck right at the transition point.  I was a bit disappointed, figuring if I can do 7 muscle ups on the bar I should be able to get at least one on rings.

So I took a breather and tried to visualize what I needed to do, strong pull and imagine getting my shoulders over my wrists.  I reapplied the chalk to my hands and gave it another shot.  I did it!  I was pysched and went inside to grab my Flip cam because of course if it isn’t on video, it didn’t happen.

I actually shot two attempts. After watching back the first one I realized that I did a little bit of a hop into it off the ground which makes the attempt less than 100% legitimate.  Well I couldn’t have that so I went again, this time making sure I had my feet off the ground before pulling up. I was able to pull that off as well, I was pysched.

I found that the ring muscle ups put a ton of torque on my elbows and forearms, I could really feel it afterwards.  Of course I need to use moderation on the rings, the last thing I want to do is go too hard too fast and hurt myself.

I am excited to have conquered another body weight movement that for a long time seemed so elusive. Next step will be stringing a few together.

Yesterday I started tracking my progress in my daily GUTS routine.  GUTS stands for the guts of the BBR’s which are dips, pull ups and push ups.  Everyday at the gym for the past couple weeks I have been starting my work outs by doing one set max’s of dips, pull ups and push ups back to back.  My plan is if I can get the guts up to BBR levels, the 5 MU’s on the front and back of it will more or less take care of themselves.  If you want to see where I am at you can always use this link.

Last night I dug into some more 24 episodes.  I think I am up to episode 4 or 5 of season 1.  Yea I can see why people liked the show.  I shouldn’t be hurting for TV content to watch for a long time.