Thanks to all the dancing queens who stopped by to join us Saturday night for some foolish dancing.  We hope we provided a bit of levity and a few chuckles for your weekend.

Next Saturday 5pm we’ll be hosting Empower Trivia Night.  If you have some quality CrossFit trivia, especially trivia related to Empower members, please send proposed trivia questions to WOD Father at [email protected].  Example: Which Empower member gave The Touch his CrossFit name?

Next event: Empower Cooking Club, 6:00pm Tuesday April 7th. After your evening WOD join us in the kitchen for WOD Father’s specialty: Garlic-ginger chicken.

Ingredients required:
1 package ground chicken
1 onion
12 medium mushrooms
1 carrot
1 celery stalk
Cooking oil (coconut oil is best)
Seasoning (to taste):
Ginger (raw or powder)
Garlic (raw, minced or powder)
Chili pepper (or chili pepper flakes)
Honey
Salt or Soy Sauce
Turmeric Powder, Paprika & Parsley Flakes (for colour)

Next Tuesday’s (April 14th) Empower Cooking Club will be hosted by Shine in her kitchen and the following week (April 21st) we’ll be hosted by Super Mario in his.  I’m excited to cook along with all of you.  Please let me know if you’d like to host us in your kitchen for a special dish.

Monday WOD: 20 min SLIPS and C&J
This workout found us back at Acadia beach doing SLIPS on the logs in the fresh air with a great view.  Then we had to hunt down stones heavy enough to be challenging but with the right shape so that we wouldn’t slip and drop them on our heads.  I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t frightening.  We certainly focussed less on locking out overhead and getting our head through, being more mindful of keeping a safe  escape route for our skulls in case that stone came crashing down.  I’m sure my stone was only about 30% of my one rep max C&J but because of its awkward shape rep three of every set felt near a risky one rep max effort and required a lot of recovery between sets.

Warm Up: SLIPS
4 minutes Stretching: We have been enjoying Tim Anderson’s Original Strength warm up but Yoga Flow is also a great option
4 minutes L-Sits: L-Sit holds are great but you can also play with L-Raises over a target
4 mins Inversions: You can practice handstand holds against a wall, with feet on a couch or even walking if you have a safe space in which to do so
4 min Plank Holds: There are  a lot of great plank hold variations available, this does not need to be monotonous
4 min Scales: Forward, backward, side we have been doing ours balancing on a log which adds to the fun, can you think of safe but challenging variations you can do in your home?

Tech: Clean & Jerk
We’re going to test out what the C&J looks like with different pieces of equipment and figure out the appropriate modifications for each of you.  Prioritize safety over load and then go as heavy as you safely can.  If you do not have an adjustable weight you will likely use the same object for all 5 sets of 3 as we did.

WOD: C&J 3-3-3-3-3
We are going to lift one at a time so that we can watch each other’s form each set.
We’ll set up a lifting order and work our way through each lifter.

Cool Down
Dragon Pose/Pigeon Pose
Hip Crossovers
Shoulder Pull Overs
Downward Dog
Child’s Pose

Sunday class’ least favourite gymnastics movements:
1 vote: pull-ups, shrimping, L-sits, plank, handstand walk (not being able to do them)
2 votes: MU, Handstand
4 votes v-sit ups