WOD Blog

8/1 Saturday Track Workout

7/31/2020

Meet Coach Kendra at the MSU Track Saturday at 9.
No attendance limit, all are welcome....that's right, bring your kids, significant other, neighbor...
We'll work together to make our running and hiking more efficient. Don't be scared, we'll have less than a mile of actual work!

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7/31 Foodie Friday!

7/30/2020

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Bethanie gets to use her new toes to bar skills today!

Can you believe it's the last day of July? Where has the summer gone? It seems like it just started.
Summer is in full swing in my garden and I have been eating my body weight in kale, Swiss chard, beets, carrots and all the other delicious early season crops. This week I ordered local fennel, cherries and other things that I'm not growing from Root Cellar Foods. My custom farm box will be delivered to my house today and I can't wait to make this AMAZING warm salad from Dishing Up the Dirt tonight for dinner.
Click on the image for the recipe. Happy Eating!

WARM BEET, FENNEL & WHITE BEAN SALAD WITH BEET GREENS CHIMICHURRI (Click on the image for the recipe.)

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7/30 Thursday - Homegrown Paleo

7/29/2020

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Sow Swiss chard seeds now through the middle of August for a fall crop.

Homegrown Paleo
The Garden's Second Season

I love summer, but the bounty of summer fruits and vegetables never lasts quite long enough. If you also bemoan the end of the summer garden, now is the time to plant seeds for a second-season garden. Many spring-planted cool-season crops, such as leafy greens, carrots, beets, and radishes, can be sown now for fall harvest.
It may seem strange to be thinking about planting cool-season crops at the height of summer veggie production. But, with a little effort now, you will be rewarded with green salads and savory root veggies well into fall. You also won’t have to deal with the onslaught of annual weeds, insects, and environmental stresses that tax us all earlier in the year.
Before you sow any seeds, however, you should revitalize your garden soil. It can dry out and get crusty in the late summer sun, impeding seed germination. Break up soil crusts with a hoe or hand cultivator and work in a few inches of compost, being careful not to disturb any other plants that may already be growing in the garden. Vegetables like rich garden soil that is high in organic matter and holds moisture.
Freshly sown seeds need a moist seedbed and cool soil temperatures to germinate. They also need to be protected from the intense summer sun. Directly sowing seeds in the dappled shade of your summer veggies protects them so that they can germinate. Starting these seeds now, in the protection of summer veggies, will ensure that they have a good root system established before the first frost occurs.
You can also start seeds indoors or on a shaded patio. If your only option is to sow seeds in the direct sun, be sure to provide shade until the daytime temperatures average in the low 80s. Sow the seeds in the evening, in moist soil, so that they have an entire night to adjust to being outdoors. Press them into the soil and cover them so that they are at a depth of about three times the diameter of the seed.
Make sure your seedbed stays evenly moist until your seeds germinate. If you’re sowing into an existing bed that isn’t irrigated every day, you will need to provide supplemental water. Mist or lightly spray the area to avoid disturbing the seeds.
Finally, mulch your plants to help regulate soil temperatures and provide additional protection after the first frost. Root crops, such as carrots, beets, turnips, and onions, benefit from mulching before a hard frost. If we have a mild winter, root crops that are heavily mulched can continue to be harvested.
Here is a list of cool-season crops that you can plant now for a second-season harvest in the Gallatin Valley.
Beets
Radish
Kale
Lettuce
Bitter greens
Parsley
Cilantro
This is a reprint of an article I wrote when I was the commercial horticulture program coordinator for the western area of University of Nevada Cooperative Extension. For more specific gardening and horticulture advice be sure to visit your local Cooperative Extension office.

MSU Extension Planting Guide

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7/29 Whoop! Wednesday

7/28/2020

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Join our Whoop Group and let's track our fitness together!

I started wearing my Whoop strap on July 1st and have been blogging about my experience. The Whoop strap is a wearable performance monitor that measures your strain (workout intensity), recovery and sleep. Since my Sleep Number bed monitors my sleep, I am most interested in Whoop's ability to measure my recovery and strain.
My last Whoop! Wednesday post focused on recovery and specifically how Whoop uses HRV (heart rate variability) in conjunction with resting heart rate and sleep performance to calculate recovery.
This week I'm diving into how Whoop measures strain or workout intensity.
Intensity is central to CrossFit. It's in our definition: Constantly varied high intensity functional movement. Therefore I thought that my strain would be very high on my CrossFit training days (which are usually Mon/Tue/Wed & Fri with an occasional Saturday. Thursdays and Sunday are my dedicated rest days.)
It takes 3 days of continual wear to unlock the Strain Coach feature. These first 3 days are when Whoop calculates your baseline biometric data and calibrates to your heart and respiratory rates.
On the 4th day of wear you can begin to tell Whoop when you're working out. While Whoop will automatically track your heart rate info when you workout, you can tap into the Strain Coach feature through the app to get more personalized analytics.

You can choose from over 60 specific activities in the Whoop app. Functional Fitness, Weightlifting (I assume Olympic Weightlifting), Powerlifting, Rowing and Running are the most common activities for CrossFit. I also choose Coaching to track my Coaching intensity.

My Strain Coach for this day told me based on my recovery I could build to 11.9 strain. Strain is measured from 0 - 21.
My first week of using the Strain Coach I didn't even come close to the recommended strain. I WAS SO SURPRISED! I workout hard and at the end of each session my strain coach asked my for my perceived rate of exertion and it was always in the teens, but my strain value was nowhere near double digits.
The next week I scaled everything so that I could go faster and harder on all of my workouts. I thought for sure my strain would raise. It did, but it wasn't significant.
WHAT GIVES?
WHOOP measures strain based on cardiovascular output and time spent in various heart rate zones. The longer you're above 70% of your max heart rate the higher your strain score. Whoop does best when workouts are 15 mins or longer. So for our classic short and intense workouts your strain may not get very high. That doesn't mean you're not working hard and gaining fitness. It just won't be reflected in the strain score, but it will be reflected in your recovery score. More on that later.
What about lifting days? Here's how Whoop handles those training sessions:

If you’re doing a strength-based workout with minimal reps and periods of rest (such as Olympic weightlifting), you will have a lower strain if your heart rate is not elevated for extended periods of time. Many WHOOP members have wondered how their data will reflect a strenuous strength session, so here’s the breakdown:

Increasing weight and adding new strength exercises to your routine will likely cause soreness and muscle fatigue, otherwise known as delayed onset of muscle soreness (DOMS). This microtrauma from eccentric lengthening of the muscle fibers typically causes a reduction of HRV the following morning, especially if your body is not used to this kind of stressor.
Fatigued muscles often result in a higher strain the next day, because your body is working harder to recover as it responds to disturbances of your homeostatic state.

Since all of our CrossFit workouts, both long and short, and our heavy days place some level of strain on our cardiovascular and neuroendocrine system our bodies must recover from the work. That is where Whoop really shines.
No matter your strain value for a specific workout, your recovery metrics are based on your personal biology (HRV, resting heart rate and respiratory rate) and those will absolutely be affected by the intensity of your workouts and the types of recovery practices you implement (hydration, nutrition, stress management, sleep, etc.).
I have used my recovery values and the Strain Coach feature to guide the intensity of my training sessions. If my recovery value is low, then I will adjust the volume or load of my workout. If my recovery value is high then I know I can set my hair on fire and red line a workout.
Interestingly, I finally achieved a double digit strain value. It was on Saturday when I ran the Godfrey Saunders 5k for social justice. It was the perfect Whoop storm of high heart rate and long workout. Here's what it looked like.

My 5k run time was 35 mins, but I wanted to get the highest strain value possible so I let it continue to measure my workout after I was done running. I stopped it once my heart rate recovered to below 100BPM.

Long runs, long hikes, long bike rides and other long slow distance activities have their place in a well rounded fitness routine and now I have the data to show it.
Don't worry, I will still be setting my hair on fire and red lining all the CrossFit workouts I can. I will just rely on my weekend hikes for my high strain scores.
If you are interested in joining me on a Whoop journey, use my link to get your first month free. If you're already a Whoop user, join our True Spirit Whoop Group with the team code: COMM-AD6416.
Stay tuned for my next Whoop! Wednesday post as I explore the weekly and monthly performance assessments.

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