Barbell Shrugged - Easy Paleo Cooking With Sexy CrossFit Ladies Ashley, Amanda and Laura! - Episode 35

Episode Date: November 21, 2012

http://www.FITR.tv  Is CrossFit for women? Training, Cooking, Converting Kids to Paleo and more on this episode of the Barbell Shrugged Podcast!

this week on barbell shrugged mike's out of town so the ladies take over uh we are going to be talking about the female training and fun stuff cooking and how we train and roll and get strong what's up guys it's ctp and you're listening to barbell shrug make sure you check out our video versions of all these podcasts on our website fitter.tv and all of our video versions we include a technique wad which is our series of technique instruction videos for crossfitters free previews of some of the seminars we put out and then sometimes come out of the studio and have special video segments such as cooking in the kitchen with brandy that one time and out in the pool with Lucas and who knows what the next thing will do.

So make sure you check out our website, fitter.tv, and watch the videos as well. All right, welcome back to Barbells Shrugged. Mike is out of town, so I rounded up all the ladies today. So we're going to talk about CrossFit and paleo with Ashley, Amanda, and Laura. First, we'll go around the circle real quick. And I was told not to start with you. So we're going to start with Ashley. Tell us a little bit about yourself and kind of about your CrossFit journey and your experiences kind of getting into this world. Whose wife are you? Mike Bledsoe. Should I claim that? Um, about four years ago, I guess is when I got started into CrossFit, um, and was doing it out of the garage. And then,

um, yeah, so that's kind of how I got into CrossFit was kind of dating Michael. Um, it's hard being on Mike the very first time tell your story about how how the very first workout was for you let's see my first workout i will never, actually, it was in the garage. And I had been out of practice as far as training goes for a few months because I broke my wrist. First experience was kettlebell swings and running in push-ups. And I remember I was trying to impress Mike. And so anytime I would get around the house and he couldn't see me running,

I would stop and walk across the yard. And then as soon as I got back in vision again, I would start jogging like it was no problem. And then, yeah, so it was a good time. It was three rounds, a run around the block. I think it was 10 kettlebell swings and 10 push-ups. And I could barely do a push-up. And in comparison to now, that probably seems like,

like a really easy workout. And it just killed you the very first time you did it. And now you look back and you're like, run around the block, do 10 pushups and 10 swings. You probably do it in a couple of minutes and it probably wouldn't wreck you at all. You probably do that four times a day and not even be sore.

Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that was your very first workout. And then where'd you go from there? Um, let. Okay, so that was your very first workout. And then where did you go from there? Let's see. I guess from the garage we opened up the gym

and just kind of been competing and training. I went to a regionals event in Ohio. It was kind of my first competition. And then, yeah, just kind of been competing and having fun. And now I work at the gym so yeah yep Ashley's our manager here at Faction in Memphis and Amanda is also one of our coaches tell tell your story kind of where you started and where you've come from there um when I played uh college volleyball I was introduced into Olympic lifting sort of back then um and then one of my strength coaches there actually got um wind of

crossfit and so he kind of introduced it to us but back then if anything was hard like a pull-up or anything i just skipped it like there's no way i was gonna do it like ever so anything that was easy and i was good at i did quite often um that was my version of CrossFit until I walked into your gym back in 2009. And I think I came for fight gone bad the first day. And it kicked my butt because I remember I rode really, really hard on the rower. I got to the 12 inch box jump and I fell face forward. And I was completely embarrassed because I saw all you other girls like doing heavier weights and I was like man I'm a college athlete this is after college but I was like I am so weak I thought I was strong and so I think I came back the next day and signed the membership so um yeah

so that was back in 2009 and started training and loving CrossFit more and more. And then I guess it was a little over a year ago, I started coaching Saturdays for you guys and got comfortable coaching and then was hired on in February of this year. So I've been coaching for almost a year. Very cool. All right, Laura, what about you? How'd you get into CrossFit? I heard about CrossFit on Facebook, actually.

And I had some friends of a friend that was friends with your husband. So I gave the gym a call. And actually, your husband's who answered and said, well, come on in and I'll walk you through it. So I came in on a Saturday morning. And it was in the middle of July. And there was no air conditioning in your gym. And everybody was in the middle of a wad. no air conditioning in your gym and um everybody

was in the middle of a wad and so I had never seen anything like it I mean I was like oh my gosh what am I walking into and so I went into the office and he's like no no you're gonna be fine you're gonna really love it you had a background in competitive gymnastics and he's like you're gonna fit right in here and I was like i have never touched a barbell in my life i don't know what you're thinking and the first workout i did was fran and it was terrible you remember what weight you used and what time you got um it was well over 15 minutes i know that and i do not know i think i used prescribed weight so it's what 65 pounds. I remember Coach Rob made me take my shoes off. He said that thrusters would be easier barefoot. I lost my big toenail in the workout.

On your first day? On my first day. Totally bleeding all over the place. I was jumping off of a box to do pull-ups. I clipped the box with my foot. My toenail just flew off. I was like, oh my gosh. And he's like, you need to keep going.

I was like, what? I'm like dying. And I kept going. But it took like nine and a half months for that toenail to grow back. Oh, nice. But I signed the membership that day. That's not like something Rob would do. For the record, Rob's in the Special Forces,

so he probably didn't see that as like a big injury. He's like, whatever, suck it up. Yeah, he probably just told you to tough it out. I swore never to take my shoes off in the gym again. I learned my lesson on that one. That's funny. Okay. Good stuff.

So that was your very first workout? It was my very first workout. So we didn't have very much of a fundamentals back then. So I did like a week of like intro movements, I guess. It wasn't much of a fundamentals back then so I did like a week of like intro movements I guess it wasn't much of anything and then um and that was like two and a half years ago yeah we used to just kind of throw people into the fire we didn't have fun yeah I just got thrown in there and it was I kind of learned as I went Amanda and I used to be in the six o'clock class and we toughed it out with our little, too. Yeah, Marcy, too. We were our little five people.

So now I compete, and we went to regionals last year, and it was a lot of fun. How'd you do at regionals? Did you feel like you performed well, or did you walk out of there thinking, like, oh, man, I really need to work on this or that? What was kind of your big strength and your big weakness at regionals? Event four was my big weakness. Yeah? What event was that?

It was, God, it was so long. What was it? It was 75 squats and 50 pull-ups and 1,000 push press. Yeah. Overhead squats and front squats. It was overhead squats and front squats and back squats and pull-ups. And it was a lot of rounds. I can't remember how many rounds it was.

So that was the super high volume WOD was the one that got you? Mm-hmm. I think I wasn't prepared to be as sore as I was. We had practiced the WODs a lot, but I don't think I was ready to be that sore. Like going into the workout, you were very sore? We'd already done event one and two. I was in both of those events. And the second day, I was like, oh, I could barely move.

But it was a lot of fun. I mean, it was so much fun. It was such a good learning experience of how to recover and how to learn to be less sore, you know, go in and train yourself to expect those things. So I'm probably just rambling. I have no idea what I'm saying anymore. Okay, well. It was a lot of fun.

Okay, good. Well, on that note, we'll jump into some of the questions that we've gotten from our audience members. It's getting hot in here. You still look good. Thanks, champ. No problem. All right, so one of the biggest questions that we get from people that have never done crossfit before especially ladies is that they're worried about you know lifting weights and getting bulky and putting on too much muscle mass and then turning into a bodybuilder like almost by accident and overnight right so what has been your guys's

experience with that have you guys put on a lot of muscle mass and gained a lot of strength? And were you worried about that initially? And was there ever a point where you're like, man, I think I'm getting too big. I need to stop lifting weights or just kind of talk about that transition for you. That is really a common question actually that we get. A lot of times when people are like ladies ask me, I don't want to get bulky. I kind of be like, well, do you think I'm bulky? And they're like, uh.

So it's kind of fun to see what their reaction is going to be. And I kind of say, I'm probably one of the bulkiest girls here. And I'm not that bulky. I have muscle. And that's kind of what I want. How has your body changed since you started crossfitting? Were you always roughly the same body type or how has it been a dramatic change from where you used to be? Um, I'm a lot leaner.

I feel like, um, and then I like, I'm for the most part, I've always had the same body, just I'm shaped a little bit better. Um, my butt's a lot bigger I'm down to one pair of jeans we all are just wear a lululemon every day now but uh yeah so um yeah that's probably the most is just getting a little more muscular and having to figure out how to get things to fit because we have traps and all kinds of stuff. So, yeah, shirts are feeling a little tighter. But I feel like I look better, though, than I've ever looked.

So you have a little bit more muscle mass. Not a lot more muscle mass, but a little bit more muscle mass just because you do strength training on a regular basis. But all your clothes fit better and you're leaner. So you're not skinny fat. Nope. That's good news. It's a disease. What about you, Amanda? Um, I, I would say the biggest changes I've had is mainly in my upper body strength because I squatted a lot just from being an athlete.

Um, so I've always had a, I have long levers, but I have, I have usually a really strong base in my lower body. So my upper body, when I came to CrossFit, was lacking completely everything. So I think that's probably the biggest change I've seen. And I've also gotten a lot leaner. But I think that has to do with the combination of the diet, too, or paleo diet. So getting leaner, again, not having jeans that fit, you know, have to buy new jeans every year, but I don't see that as a bad thing. I see that as, you know, I'm enjoying the way I look. So it doesn't matter if I have to buy a new pair of jeans over here because the

butt gets bigger, but yeah. Okay. So yeah, you just mentioned the diet. We're going to talk about that here in just a minute after we talk to Laura. But what has been the biggest change for you for your diet? What made you kind of shift to the paleo world? Were you always pretty conscious about what you ate? I mean, I thought I was back in the day. But I was very – I was not educated well, at least, you know, I had the American Standard Diet, you know, I thought, you know, eating whole grains and all I, I started, we did like, we did faction games. That was my first competition. I did the beginners division and, um, it was like a, maybe a month

before that I was like, I'm going to, I'm just going to really start eating paleo. And back then it was still probably like 50, 50. I was still kind of drinking milk every now and then eating the sandwich every now and then, but still called it paleo. Um, and then when I, after I did the competition, you know, everybody gets pretty amped up and they're like, Oh, I like competing and it every now and then but still called it paleo um and then when i after i did the competition you know everybody gets pretty amped up and they're like oh i like competing and it motivates you so i was a little bit more motivated after the competition to actually stick to paleo and then once i once i actually did consistently and started cooking um i could see a big difference yeah i was kind of the same way i used to think sub sandwiches were like really really good for

me and i used to eat them all the time yeah subway that was a big thing definitely yeah i thought i thought if i went to subway then i it wasn't cheating me on that that was like i was doing really good i was eating out but i was eating clean yeah jared loses weight so why not that's right i had taco bell all the time taco bell oh man yeah you've probably made one of the biggest transitions from eating fast food multiple times a day if not a week

every meal breakfast, lunch, and dinner oh yeah, I hardly ever cooked really? I was a decent cook but I wasn't really good this was high school, college, college. Yeah. I mean, I would even say, I mean, four, I mean, three years ago with that, like I was still probably not eating

real paleo. Um, I've just started, I would say really being more 80, 20, um, you know, like two and a half, three years ago. So, wow. Okay. Actually, I do want to talk about paleo and about cooking for yourself and for the rest of your family and also maybe even about how to incorporate into the lives of your children if you have children. But we're going to take a quick break and when we come back, we're going to talk about

recipes and all about paleo. Yay. Cool. Yay. quick break and when we come back we're gonna talk about recipes and all about paleo all right welcome back to barbell shrugged again we're here with ashley amanda and laura we're trying to get her to snort oh did she do it no are we still counting she's only up to was it five i'm on five yeah i thought it was three we're gonna go with five okay we can go with four and call it an ad all right so i want to talk a little bit about um about cooking and and eating paleo and about the the easiest way you guys have found to very consistently eat well and eat paleo so you do most of the cooking for you and Mike.

Mike's a goddamn disaster without you anymore because he never cooks, and you do all the cooking. So talk about kind of the most common things that you guys make throughout the week. It's so true. It is. He calls her when she's not at home, and he's like, what do I eat? He's like, what do I do? There's food in the fridge. And he's like, well, what kind of food?

There's vegetables in the Tu and he's like well what what kind of food like there's vegetables in the tub where you heat that up two minutes you have to teach mike how to microwave stuff over the phone it's okay honey the button calm down start push it close the door. Push the button. All right. So what's your most common meals? We do. Well, we have bacon and eggs for breakfast and like a juice in the morning. That's probably like our every morning traditional thing. But our most common thing that we cook or I cook actually is probably like a stir fry. I'll do some ground beef and uh that's fine sorry um i'll do like a ground beef and then i'll just kind of pick some veggies

um i like to i've kind of gotten where i cook the meat separate from the veggies now um just because i like to proportion it where i'm eating a little more because i have a tendency to eat more protein than i do veggies if i mix it all together so by having it separate i kind of can keep it a good little even thing um but yeah so i'll do stir fry and i'll pick some sort of veggie lately i've been on a brussels sprout and um like cabbage kick so i'll kind of do that and put some kale in there i try to do a different color of veggie on something. Mix it all up so I have different colors.

All you do is just take a big old thing of ground beef, cook that separately, and then cook a bunch of veggies. Then when you want to have your meal, you just scoop a little bit of both into a bowl and mix it up and eat it. That sounds super easy. It's super easy. What do you usually flavor that with? It depends on my mood um yeah sunny salt is that what it's yeah sunny salt's good stuff yeah i'll do sunny

salt um sometimes i'll do like uh some basil oregano i don't know i just grab stuff and season like you don't overthink it you just you just throw a bunch of spices on there and if it tastes good we are one in the same. We do the same thing. I'm like, what do I have in my cabinet? A million different kind of spices. So garlic, I normally do some sort of garlic powder or salt and then a little salt and pepper and then, like I said, sunny salt or I'll do a basil or oregano. So yeah.

It sounds like a relatively cheap meal too. Like it wouldn't cost a whole lot of money. No, it doesn't. You can make a ton of it at once. So you can eat it for three or four days. Yeah, I cook like four pounds of meat at a time because Mike eats a lot. That's perfect. A lot of people don't cook in bulk like that and then they end up having to cook way too

frequently and then inevitably they get home and they're tired and they're like, I don't want to cook right now. And so I'll just eat out or I'll just eat whatever's the fastest thing that they have in their kitchen that they can just heat right up. And they end up eating a bunch of junk. Yeah, yeah. What about you, Amanda? What's your most common meal that you make during the week? I am very similar to Ashley.

I eat bacon and eggs every morning. If I don't juice in the morning, I'll juice at lunch. Started that about a month ago. I'm really enjoying it so far. It took me a while, but I am. I am enjoying it now. But I do a lot of stir fries. When I first started Paleo, I did a lot of just hardcore recipes because I was super excited. And lately I've gotten a little lazy. So stir fries are my go-to. What's a hardcore recipe? What's that mean? One that takes a lot of effort.

Like I actually have to look it up and I have to make sure I have all the ingredients for it and then actually pay attention. I'm not one to really pay attention to recipes. I think that's why I'm not a good baker. She would know something about that. But yeah, so I kind of like to make things up as i go you know i i enjoy cooking so i kind of just flavor things differently all the time so yeah stir fries are my go-to definitely and changing the flavor up almost changes the the meal yeah so you know a lot of people will be like oh you have to eat the same thing over

and over again well you change the flavor of it. Change the vegetables. It's not the same thing. Yeah. Change the veggies. So. Yeah. A lot of people don't eat payload because they don't think it tastes good.

They don't know how to make vegetables taste good. Yeah. Yeah. Everything I eat, everything I've ever had at your place, like it all tastes fantastic. So once you get good at it, it all is going to taste great. But I'm sure there's a little bit of a learning curve about how to make vegetables taste good and you have to mix and match and experiment a little bit but eating paleo doesn't mean it has to be bland and boring at all yeah all right laura what about you what's your most

common meal that you make throughout the week especially things that you would make in bulk kind of like they're talking about well things that i would make in bulk would be more like chili like paleo chili i like that's a good one on sundays just to make like you know four pounds of just like a ton of chili because my fiance eats a lot too and i have a five-year-old who has to eat paleo as well which just makes it a little more interesting so i have to keep things mixed up in my household a lot because she'll get bored he gets really bored he's new to the paleo world so like you said i've had to mix it up a lot to get him to think,

oh yeah, it is pretty good. It's not just weird, bland, boring food. I like paleo shepherd's pie. That's a good one. And that lasts probably three or four days. So that's a good one. That's not something I've ever made before. How do you make that? I use ground's um i use ground turkey meat you can use ground beef i just

stick to turkey meat because i like to taste better okay um you brown it with some onions and some i put peas and green beans and carrots and some oatmeal and i'm stuttering so i'm sorry and um uh you mix you you saute all that up and then you pour it all in a casserole dish, and you cover it with cauliflower mash. Okay. My fiancé likes cheese sprinkled on his, so I put cheese on one half. I don't eat cheese on it. And you stick it in the oven and bake it for 30 minutes,

and it's a huge casserole in layers, and it's awesome. It sounds awesome, yeah. I made it. Have you had it? I haven't had it. I've had yours. Yeah, it's a huge casserole in layers and it's awesome sounds awesome yeah i mean have you had it i haven't had it i have yours yeah it's really good it's one of my go-tos i love it and it lasts you know several days it's something you can just reheat and it it tastes really good reheated so okay it's a good one rotisserie chicken that's super easy with some frozen vegetables it doesn't get any easier than that. Yeah, seriously. And I'm one that cooks every night. Like I said, my family tends to get bored if I do too many leftovers. So rotisserie chicken with frozen vegetables is like champ meal.

We do breakfast for dinner a lot because we are really busy in the mornings. So we don't do eggs and bacon for breakfast. So that's a good dinner if people are busy and they can't cook in the morning. There's a ton. um if people are busy you know and they can't cook in the morning um there's there's a ton i could i mean i could keep going that's actually one of the things that i recommended on the the faction foods nutrition course was when people are traveling to just go grab a rotisserie chicken and it's already cooked and tastes fantastic and then just just buy one of the little veggie trays where all the vegetables are already all cut up and they're all single servings. They're all ready to go.

Yeah. Like that's easy travel food. Exactly. You can just tear off a wing and grab some veggies. You're good to go. And you don't have to cook anything. It's all done and it's not that expensive. It's super cheap.

It is. That's a really good idea. Even you could go as far as that Kroger, they have the vegetable soup. As far as I know, it's paleo. It's just broth with vegetables in it. Yeah. You could even get rotisserie chicken and some veggie soup and you're good to go. I mean, it's paleo. It's just broth with vegetables in it. You could even get rotisserie chicken and some veggie soup, and you're good to go. I mean, it's super easy.

Yeah. I think people tend to think about it too much. I think people tend to think about it too much. The thickeners are in there or something like that. But it's minor stuff. It's minor stuff that's not going to kill you. Mostly good stuff. It's going to be okay.

Just keep it simple, I think, with the paleo. Start small. Keep it simple. I think that's the best way to go about it. Ashley's joking. Can we get a snort? I think I should probably write when you say that. you know start small keep it simple i think that's the best way to go about it actually that was ctp's fault just saying ctp has hit two people with the microphones now that's right when he was setting up he smacked a man right in the face i'm okay though that's right yeah one thing though i've learned i've

never thought that it would be like is um being excited about eating meat like i love like i love i love i crave meat like ribs i think about it every yeah every meal. It's like you just train your body to like it. Did you guys ever go through like a, I think I'm going to be a vegetarian phase? No. No? Heck no. I never thought that was a wise choice. I never did either.

I like bacon too much. Yeah. I like meat. Even back when you were like a teenager? No. Oh, really? Okay. I did go through the whole like, I want to be skinny, so I'm not going to eat phase.

Oh, yeah? I went through that, too. You just would eat one meal a day or something. You just drink water all day. Just one Taco Bell meal a day. You'll get skinny. Dude, I knew where the specials were at every fast food place. Oh, my goodness.

You still remember it all? Yeah, the dollar values were like, you know, on Mondays we're at Burger King or something like that and Tuesday I would go to... You had like a weekly routine? I did. Every Wednesday I went to Taco Bell because they had like a dollar taco

or something like that and I'd get the soft tacos. That's awesome. And I would eat them. I haven't had taco bell in like five years i can't even remember the last time i talked about well yeah i could see that like i used to live in tucson and we did that with the bars like every bar had like their special and we had a seven day rotation all around the city and the funny part about it was we started doing it and we started noticing that a whole lot of people

had the same exact rotation. We would see them at different bars every Wednesday. Hey, we know you. Exactly. Did you notice that with the fast food?

I did not. Fast food, you friends. Like, hey, I'm getting the burger today. What are you getting? What are you getting? Oh, gosh. All right.

So obviously all women in society, they want to be beautiful and they want to be thin. And when people start doing crossfit or just start working out in general, usually that's what they want to do. They want to get in shape so they can look better, look good naked and all that. So how, how have your, um, goals changed over the years from, from more than likely being mostly aesthetic driven to now a big part of it is being performance driven. Like you have, I want to front squat this and I want to back squat that and I want to get a good time on this and not just, I want to get rid of this. Yeah. Not that that's not important. I want to be thin and lean also guys and girls, but, but is that something that has changed over has changed over the years where you now care more about your performance and you're not only concerned about how you look? Yes, definitely.

I would say, especially in the last two years for me, when I started eating better, that's when I noticed the difference. And then I just started feeling better. And then you kind of compete and you have some goals and it's not necessarily how i look but it's more of like i want to get that 300 pound squat which i really do want to get so yeah what are you up to right now i did 245 pretty easy the other day a couple weeks ago for back squat so i girl yeah well what did you start off doing? do you remember hitting a max years ago? I could probably barely squat the bar like two years ago I was weak

I was strong yeah I was weak the fast food the fast food doesn't help you squat do you remember the first time you did a crossfit total? like a squat, overhead press, deadlift? Do you remember what your maxes were? Like I think – actually, before I did my first competition, I did a deadlift.

And the competition had 185-pound deadlift. And like the week before, my one rep max for deadlift was like 180 pounds. Oh, yeah? Crap. I was like – so I did one rep max a lot on that day yeah but yeah so my deadlift was like 180 four years ago yeah and do you know what your deadlift is up to now we don't develop i don't really did the last time i deadlifted i did 275 for five okay that's a huge gain a huge progress that's crazy a lot of weight yeah i think it

wasn't 270 i feel like it was no i don't remember maybe it was yeah it was 275 yeah a girl yeah all right what about y'all how have your how have your maxes improved over the years you remember what you were squatting when you first showed up? Like 65 pounds. 65 pounds. I remember doing the very first back squat and I was like, I was like shaking. And I was like,

I don't think I can do this. I don't think I can do this. And now it's exponentially better. Oh yeah. What are you up to now for your front and back squat? My back squat is 275 and my front squat is 230.

225. 225. 225. 225. Excuse me. Yeah. I'm aiming for that 230 real hard though. I really want it. Do you want to say what you weigh on the show?

I weigh 108. 108 and you squat 275? I just did. There's not many girls out there that squat, that front squat over double body weight. Well, i think it has to do with a lot that i'm i have excellent coaches first of all who um really do well and then that i'm really short because i have like you know good you have fantastic squatting leverage absolutely i think i do so it does help it definitely helps but you're also just really fucking strong that helps too too. Thanks, Doug.

Yeah. It's the end of the day. You can justify leverages and body types all day long, but at the end of the day, you're just really strong for how big you are. That's pretty cool. I think an interesting thing for me was when I started competing is when I really started pushing. Because when you get into a competition, you're like,

I can't do that. And then you do it. And it's amazing. And you're like, holy crap. Like and then you do it and it's amazing and you're like holy crap like faction games like a year ago when was last actually i can't remember but anyway like weights that now would be no problem but then i was like i would never dream of clean squat cleaning you know 20 times like 100 and i don't even remember but competition pushes you in such a way that you wouldn't think to push yourself. So I think starting to compete really pushes you through those walls that you're like,

I can't ever do that. Are you kidding? And then you do it and you're like, wow, that was amazing. Yeah. So do you feel like similar to Ashley, like most of your goals now are more performance driven and less aesthetic driven? Yeah, definitely. Yeah.

What's, what's your, what's your biggest goal right now? You're trying to hit, I really want 300 on that back squat. Oh yeah. You guys are both racing for the same thing. Yeah. It's a big one. I really want that. We can get it to you. Ashley and I can get it. I really want that sucker, man. You know, I started actually high bar, uh, back squatting. Um, I ha I have been low bar back squatting. I have been low bar back squatting due to some ankle mobility. But my mobility has gotten a little bit better. In my mind, it's gotten a lot better, but it still has a lot to gain. It has gotten quite a bit better. You used to have very tight ankles and they've cleared

up over time, but still you could use a little bit more range of motion to do a high bar back squat, full depth. You probably don't have more range of motion to do a high bar back squat, full depth. You probably don't have the range of motion you would need for that. So low bar back squats for you, since you can keep more of a vertical shin, you don't need as much ankle mobility for it, have been a better choice for the last forever, basically. But as your ankle mobility improves, I think switching over to high bar, you can get a little bit of benefit from that.

Yeah. It's working. I like it. I was actually really impressed the other day when we tested your ankles and they had... Yay!

I went from like a one to a two. They cleared up quite a bit. Yeah. What are your goals, Ashley? Amanda, excuse me. Well, I think just getting stronger overall, getting a muscle up would be nice. Been working hard for that one.

Are you pretty close to that? Yeah. I don't know. You're really close. I feel like I am, but it's just that transition. It's just getting me every time, so I just need more practice, obviously. Going from the top of the pull-up to the bottom of the dip? Yeah, basically.

Just getting through that transition phase is the hard part for you? Pushing the head through and getting to the bottom of that ring dip yeah because i'm kipping hard enough it's just yeah not clicking yet so that's a big goal um just getting stronger in my back because i i had a really significant back injury this time last year um that i didn't really wait properly to heal long enough so i took like a month and a half off um and then did a lot of split squats got um got a lot stronger doing that but then i went back and i was because the open comes around back in february and i started training too early and i did a front squat that re-injured it all over again. So since February, I've kind of just been taking a very long road to recovery for my back. And just now up to a point where I can make PRs again, which is nice.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm still very cautious because I've never had an injury like that before. And when you hurt your back, it just changes your whole mind Like I've hurt my shoulder, I've hurt my knee in college, but nothing like your back. Um, so yeah, that was the most debilitating out of all of them. Yeah. Yeah. Like when I could not bend over to put a dish into the dishwasher, I was like, man, this has got to get better. Great coaching with an ice pack on all night. Yeah, that was, that was fun. Um, so you said that you did a lot of split squats while you were rehabbing your back.

So you were still able to, you know, to train your legs without hurting your back. Can you talk a little bit about that? Like some of the adjustments that you made to still stay in shape? Yeah. I mean, when I was, well, the first time I didn't do as good as I did the second time. So after I re injured it back in February, I didn't deadlift any kind of bar, I didn't do any kind of Olympic lifting, because just picking something off the ground was probably the worst pain that I had. Of course, it got better over time, but I just avoided anything that would hurt it in that way. So I did a lot of single leg work. I did a lot of core work. It was a good opportunity to work on my handstand pushups, which I was slowly getting better at too. So I basically avoided everything that hurt and did a lot of single leg stuff. I think that helped strengthen my glutes and which therefore helps strengthen my back along with the core work so um anytime somebody hurts their back i'm like well this is what i did and it worked for me granted i didn't do it right the first time but

um you know you learn your lessons and i know i know what fixes it now like um anytime i get any kind of tweak i'm like okay i know what i need to do um granted it can be different but so far it's been the same side every single time so um but now you know how to handle it split squats are awesome they really are you actually show me how to properly do them and i was up to like doing 140 pounds on one leg like and i thought awesome for the rear for elevated split squats yeah and with the safety bar yeah yeah that's my favorite way to do split squats by far it's the hardest way to do yeah but yeah i you know learn my lesson and so why did you use a safety bar versus just

the regular bar and and like what what what is the safety bar the safety bar i think weighs 65 pounds is that how much it weighs um and it has almost like a front rack position so it goes around your neck um and it works a lot of your upper body as well like it makes you keep a good thoracic extension and it helps um um it makes it a little bit harder to squat um in my personal opinion i don't know, um, granted the bar is heavier too. So having a weak upper body as well, I thought that would be my best bet to use that kind of bar. Um, I haven't done it in a long time though, cause I've been injury free. So I don't know what it would look like now, but squatting and overall in general has gotten better. The safety bar is one of my favorite bars.

The weight kind of sticks forward a little bit, which makes the bar kind of roll into you, which makes you want to fold forward, and you have to resist that by getting more thoracic extension like you were just talking about. If I do a lot of heavy safety bar work, I can feel the next day like my mid-upper back is super sore. It feels fantastic. They really like the safety bar. Yeah fantastic. They really like the safety bar.

Sore in all the right places. Yeah, the dogs really like the safety bar. I keep on thinking, I wonder what Izzy's destroying down there. I'm like, what are they like? All right, guys, we're going to keep this episode pretty short. If anyone has anything to plug, I don't know if anybody has any websites or anything or any blogs that they contribute to. We contribute a little bit to the Faction Training blog.

If anyone wants to see any articles written by Ashley or Amanda, if you go to factionsc.com and you, I think, is the tab blog? I think so. The tab is blog and then look on training articles. We have a rotation where each coach once a week will put a different article up there. So, uh, one, one week it'll be me, one week we could be Ashley. Uh, so each coach has an article up there roughly once a month. So if you want to check out some of Ashley or Amanda's training articles, you can go

to faction sc.com and click on, on the blog. Uh, so, uh, thank you to each one of you for kind of sharing your thoughts on, on paleo and, uh, and on your training history. Girls train too. Yay. That's right. If anyone has any questions for any of the ladies, you can go to the Ask a Question tab on the webpage for fitter.tv and put your questions in there and I can relay the questions to them.

Maybe we can answer them on a future show. So thanks for watching today, guys. Yay! That was fun.