Thud!

I have been brought back to reality with a thud.  We had a lovely few weeks in Thailand and while I'm glad to be home I'm also not ready to get back into day-to-day routine.  I enjoyed our couple of weeks and had some fantastic adventures with the highlights being riding the elephants, snorkelling at Phi Phi Island and bathing, feeding and playing with tiger cubs.  Here are a few pics:

Swimming in Phi Phi Lagoon

At the Phuket Fantasea Show

The girls and a tiger.  Can we keep it?

mmmm ... cocktails!

As it was a public holiday yesterday I had to do a workout at home.  I chose to do one of the WODs from last week which included strict pull ups and then a finisher of double unders, toes to bar (I did knee to chest) and walking lunges.  It was an horrendous workout.  I was barely able to do any pull ups nor could I string together double unders.  I was so disappointed in how my fitness has dropped,
granted I had a week and a half off prior to holidays so there hasn't been much training at all in the last month.

Today I fared a little better although I didn't reach my max for either of my push jerks or squats.  All good though, I expected much worse results.

I have been getting a little disheartened with CrossFit of late and it's largely due to hitting a plateau.  As I have said before, I notice people are overtaking me and it's a bitter pill to swallow but doing research on weightlifting it is common to get the best gains in the first year and then you have to dig deep and fight for any improvement.  I have to admit that there are times when I think I may as well give up because I'll never be as strong as the other girls at the box.  Luckily, I did CrossFit Total before I went on holidays which is where you find your 1RM for strict press, squat and deadlift and add them up to give your total number.  You then compare your bodyweight against the total and see where you sit with regard to strength.  For my weight I am in the intermediate lifting division which I'm pretty darn proud of.  I often forget that I'm smaller than a lot of people that I train with.

There is so much with regard to technique that I need to learn and I can get a little uncoordinated particularly when the weight gets heavy.  I'll continue to listen to my coaches and work on my form,  maybe talk to my coaches with regard to nutrition to ensure I'm feeding myself enough and, most importantly, not give up.