Topic: Chris Salvato's Log

[Chris Salvato]

I am going to preface this log with one thing.  This log was created for myself as a method to track my daily thoughts on my progress in conditioning, mental state, diet and parkour style, technique and flow.  I am, however, honored to have anyone be interested enough to read my progress and do not discourage that at all.

I have been training my body seriously since 2005 but had not settled in on a discipline until i found parkour.  For the past 5 months, since I started on September 4, 2004, I feel like Parkour has become my sport.  I feel the need to preface this log with my current state of mind on my training and way of life.

I believe in the seperation and integration of Mind, Body and Soul.  I am constantly expanding my mind and feel my mind has been strengthened and conditioned through lots of reading and engineering/problem solving work I have done in the past.  My body is in a constant state of improvement as I tamper with my nutrition and dedicated myself to a CrossFit conditioning program and Parkour technique program.  My soul is always engrossed in acheiving a heightened sense of self, transcendance and constant state of growth in all aspects of my life.

Right now, I am currently unemployed but will be starting a new job on Februray 4th, 2008 and I am eager to see how it influences my training.  I hope to continue training at least 6 days a week no matter where I am, whether it be in parkour or crossfit.  Right now I train at least 6 days a week in either parkour or crossfit, mostly parkour for now since I lost access to much gym equipment and wanted to get the basic movements of parkour down before conditioning further.  When I move to Colorado and get settled in in 02/08 I plan on focusing back on more CrossFit conditioning on a 3 day on, 1 day off cycle.  At least, every other 1 day off will be a parkour dedicated day.

I will begin this log by describing a Jam at philly that took place yesterday, 01/12/2008 because today (01/13/2008) I had mostly entertained guests at home for a going away party for myself since I am moving soon.

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Quick summation of paragraphs below:
Need to put foot higher on wall runs.  As high as I can no matter what the wall's height is.
Need to work on QM.  I lack the endurance for it that others have.  Should do it every day as a warmup.
Need to work on underbars over all.  Much improvement was made with static underbars and I need to master Nikkie's underbar leg drill and work on fluidity.
Need to work on balance.  This will help, i think, in situations like running on small pillars and rails.
Work on left tic tacs.  Right tic tacs are much more dominant and it needs to balance out before i progress.
I want to find my max crane moonstep.  I can comfortably do a right kick to left landing on 5 foot walls and would like to test my max on both left and right kickup.
Continue to work on precisions.  I can do a 7 foot precision but inconsistently stick it.  I think that keeping my legs closer (at shoulder width) and changing my foot placement to a more forward directed toe position will help this and my balance very much.



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We arrived at philly at around 10:30 AM.  We trained outside the Philly Museum of art which had a lot of good placed to try climbups.  Before climbups and wall runs we warmed up with QM up and down the stairs, forwards and backwards.  It made me realize that I really need to work on my QM since I did it a lot slower than the other guys and I had to take a few more breaks. 

The first area in which I grew today was training high climbups.  I was trying to reach the top of a 12-13 foot wall but came only a few inches short, so switched to 11-12 foot climbups (estimations of wall height obviously).  I was very close to the higher wall.  When I switched to the shorter wall, I came up the same distance short, which makes no sense.  I concluded that this was a mental block.  V3rt1cal and Arfel from NYPK told me that i was planting my foot too low on the wall.  Surely, I planted my foot higher up and reached it much easier.  It took a few trys, but I got it.  It took much more coordination and speed to get up from a one handed hang down....taking it slow is not an option.  In the future, I need to remember that I am shooting to get ABOVE the wall, not just grab the ledge.  Planting my foot higher is necessary (and not that difficult).  I look forwrd to training this again because my vertical wall run is quite high but even smaller walls give me problems because I lack committment on several jumps.

While still at the PMOA, there are several very short (1 foot or so) pillars that have a rounded top.  First, I did 2 foot precisions on these with ease since the distance between them was no more than 3 or 4 feet.  Then, I tried running along them to see how far I could get, sinc ethere were maybe 20-30 in a row.  I found that I could usually run maybe 3-7 in a row, which disappointed me.  I would get into a good flow but sometimes veer off to one side.  I fear maybe I was not forward directed enough and losing momentum.  I tried a few different techniques and found that faster was actually better.  I think this stems back to my balance -- i feel that if I improve my balance this will get better so I am optimistic...but I wish I could try this again to really work on it.  I stopped doing it after a while because i would slip off of the pillars and would jam my toes...plus i got bored of it.

After training wall runs and climbups for a bit (not to mention QM'ing up and down the philly MOA stairs backwars and forwards) I was pretty fatigued.  We worked in some rock climbing while we moved to our next spot, which gave the forearms a good pump, as climbing always does.  Then we hit up a spot with some underbars and nikkie showed me a few things...

Firstly, my underbars are just OK for my skill level, they do need a lot of improvement.  Since i moved back to NYC, this is one area of my training that has been sorely lacking since there are no spots that we hit up very often that have many underbars so I am going to definitely need to work on this more.  Nikkie showed me an underbar drill she runs that no one else was able to do -- which means I now need to train to be able to do it .  She would mantle on the bar and swing her legs through and then back -- both to the left and to the right.  Also, she showed me some cool moves on how to get through the bars.  We did very little forward momentum underbars but did a lot of underbars to weave through, which really helped my techniques...and made me realize how much more i need to do on them.  Her little drill will help me a lot, I believe.

Some other notes from the day include being scared to tic tac with my left but having no fear with my right.  This means I need to tic tac on my left more.  Also, we did some crane moonstep work, and I can easily crane moonstep a 5 foot wall and I am unsure of my max.  I would like to get this up to a 10 foot wall, though...which means I need to find some progressive wall i can work this on.  An important note is that I find I kick off with my right and land the moonstep with my left.  I find that my turn vaults are getting very good and i dont need much clearance on the other side of the wall to execute a good turn vault but i DO still have fear when there is little clearance, especially at a height.

The final thing I have to talk about is balancing and precisioning.  Firstly, my balance has gotten a lot better in 5 months, but is still mybiggest weakness.  I still try to stay on for only 5 steps at a time on most rails, and I do this MUCH more slowly than others.  I was able to get up on a chain a few times, which is a good acheivement for me, but was not able to move when I was on the chain.  I would like to slackline again.  My main experiment right now is eye placement.  Jesse was persuading me to focus about 3 feet in front of me.  Every other school of thought on balance, however, tells me to look straight at the horizon at a non moving object.  I will continue to experiment with both, but looking straight ahead seems to give ME better control.

My precisions have come a long way.  I did a 7 foot precision from one rail to another (train tracks) in philly.  This precision taught me that I do better at going for the long precision when I look just BEYOND where I am going to jump to before i take off and when I am in the air, look exactly where I want to place my feet.  As I get closer, look back just beyond the object as I regain balance.  Arfel and J-skills told me my foot placement was wrong and that I should have my feet forward facing and not toed out.  I thought about it, and still thought I should be toed out.  After posting on APK and got a response from Steve Low, i was convinced otherwise.  My feet were too far apart and I should keep them at shoulder width so that my toes can point forward and my knees will trace over them.  I am eager to see how this improves my precisioning ability.

I did some running precisions to a curb, too.  My skill here lacks sorely, and i want to improve it.

[Chris Salvato]

Today I went to Marine Park and did a crossfit workout and warmup.  Pre workout meal was a terrible tasting protein bar with a bottle of water.

Warmup:
3 rounds of:
Sampson Stretch (5 sec each side)
15 air squats
10 dips
10 butterfly situps
1 lap of QM (was about 100 feet per lap) -- first round frontwards, 2nd round backwards

The last round I did about 300 feet QM, first 100 feet backwards, last 100 feet forwards.  It was a decent warmup.  Felt my body get the most warm after all the QM sets.  I feel I still need to improve my dips as I sometimes still struggle to bang out 10 in a row.


I did the crossfit WOD from 01/13/2008 (1 day late) which was:

With a continuously running clock do one pull-up the first minute, two pull-ups the second minute, three pull-ups the third minute... continuing as long as you are able.

Use as many sets each minute as needed.

Post number of minutes completed to comments.

I did 12 minutes + 9 pullups.  87 total pullups in 13 minutes.  That is a 2 minute completion improvement from my previous 10 minutes + 10 pullups in November.  I felt that my grip was the reason I could not continue on.  My forearms got a major pump but the rest of my body was OK -- as usual, I was feeling at my limit, felt some loss of fine motor skills as I tried to balance on a curb.

Once I cooled down I spent about an hour working on balance on rails.  The rail was maybe an inch in diameter, about 1.5 feet off the floor.  I worked on stepping on with the left and right and making it as far as I could.  Making it more than 10 feet was an acheivement and after about 45 minutes I was pretty frustrated with it, but continued it for about an hour.  I would have liked to have worked on precisions and vaults but it had just rained and I did not want to risk injury on the slick surfaces.

I am about to eat a post workout meal including roast beef, peas, mushrooms and apple sauce.  After which I will work on handstands and stretching while watching TV.

[Chris Salvato]

Day In a Nutshell:  Woke up with good sleep (9 Hours - 1:30 AM to 10:30 AM).  Decent diet throughout the day.  Good training where I learned a few things about my form.  Happy with overall performance.

Nikkie and I got together at about 11:15 and trained all day together until about 5:15.  It was about 6 hours training, though we did take an hour for lunch and about 30 minutes total travel time.

All day we didnt really focus on anything in particular.  The main areas that I worked on were precision jumps, some underbar work and front flip work at the gym.

My hanging muscle ups on a bar are getting better, but i still use a massive kip to execute the bar muscle up.  I would like to really lessen the effect of my kip but I don't really know how to do that.  I think I need more long term exposure to a bar so that I can try MU's over and over again throughout the day since muscle ups sorely fatigue me.

My precisions were really good today, I felt.  I still have fear of going from things at a height (like a one bench to another)...but that is fading.  The technique I tried in philly (looking beyond the target landing point as opposed to AT the target landing point) has helped me dramatically.  I execute 5-6 foot low precisions fairly consistently now.  7 feet I am finding to be more consistent too.

A main problem that I identified are my landings.  Sometimes they are soft, but usually I default them back to hard landings.  I find my landings are most hard when completing a vault.  My precision landings are very hard as well...but I seem to be able to control these better since I am paying so much attention to my precision mechanics.  Overall i REALLY need to quiet my landings down.

With regards ot my front flip -- I am definitely more comfortable front flipping now in the gym.  It takes me only a minute or two, and a couple of failed jumps from the Tumble Trax to get into the groove of flipping again, even after not flipping for over a week (maybe even two weeks now!)  I found that I have 2 major problems (aside from the fact that I don't maximize height enough).  1) I am not tucking hard enough. 2) I am tucking for too long.  I found that I was executing front flips both from a run into mats and from a height onto mats (the vault in the gym down to a mat) much better when I focused on tucking harder for a shorter period of time.  I less visualized myself floating and flipping and more visualized a jump up with a QUICK HARD ROTATION then a solid extension.  I think that if i get this down, my extension will be sooner and my landings will be softer.  I feel as though this visualizationalso gave me more of a vertical jump.  Without a question though, I was landing front flips from a 1-2 feet down onto the ground (a mat) and into a run much higher than i had ever done before.

I also did some back tucking off of the vault into the foam pit.  I found that applying this same "hard fast tuck" technique worked really well there as I got around very quickly when i focused on tucking much harder.  I think it has really brought me closer to doing the back tucks on the ground now.

As a side note, I think the hard tucking problem arose fro mme learning on the Tumble Trax.  I was getting much more height than it is possible to get on my own, so was able to tuck slower and more "lazily".  This also meant that after a while I would not be able to fron ttuck because I lacked intensity.  I learned much about proper tucking techniques in flipping today.

[Steven Low]

My hanging muscle ups on a bar are getting better, but i still use a massive kip to execute the bar muscle up.  I would like to really lessen the effect of my kip but I don't really know how to do that.  I think I need more long term exposure to a bar so that I can try MU's over and over again throughout the day since muscle ups sorely fatigue me.

False grip is key. Get the hands over the bar (I bent inwards to grab it) so the wrist on the pinky side is in contact with the bar. From there L-MU is probably the easiest way to get it if you're strong enough to deadhang with the false grip.

[Chris Salvato]

I know the false grip is essential, but there are several problems that I have with the false grip & slower muscle up...

Firstly, I am strong enough to dead hang in a false grip just as long as I can dead hang in a regular or hook grip.  My ring work is a LOT better than my bar work though.  I can actually execute a pretty slow, minimal kip muscle up on the rings (but it takes a LOT of effort).  However, on the bar I usually feel a sharp pain on the medial portion of my wrist -- around where the ulna meets the carpal bones.  I avoid sharp pains as much as possible.

I don't know if I am impinging on a nerve, but its usually only my left wrist that has that problem, and usually on thinner bars.  I think maybe I am abducting my hand....should I avoid abduction at the wrist?  or encourage it?  Keep the wrist neutral?  I have been abducting to get my thumb around the bar....maybe thats not necessary?

thanks steve

[Steven Low]

Hmm, the pain is not normal. Had any traumatic wrist injuries before? Stretch out your wrists a lot as well.

False grip on a bar does involve some slight abduction of the wrist so if that's painful you just gotta stay away from it until you can figure out what's wrong. It might be impinging of a nerve.

As for the thumb it's not necessary but I usually do it (but can without it).

[Chris Salvato]

No problems with my wrists in any other movements.  Can hold a handstand for around 20-30 sec with no problem when I'm in the groove.  Can repeatedly try handstands no problem too.  Shoulder Press, Push Press and Push jerk give me no problems with wrists, neither does elbows out, pronated front squat position.  This is the only exercise where I experience wrist pain...and only when I pull up on the bar.

I'll try without the thumb and with the thumb again, and experiment with different wrist positions.  I think I may need to dedicate a whole day to focusing on my MU -- rings and bar -- to work on working out the basic kinks with my form and get away from using a massive kip.

[Chris Salvato]

Day In A Nutshell:  Good sleep (1:30 AM to 11 AM).  Woke up refreshed but irritable and stressed.  Stress got worse throughout the day.  Felt 0 drive to move around after packing, so a Rest Day, of sorts...unless I change my mind.

A small side note -- while I was packing throughout the day I have been doing handstands.  I get up into a long duration hand stand much more easily nowadays but I am starting to notice a soreness on the medial sides of my wrist and the area around my distal ulna.  I am unsure as to why this is occurring but my gut feeling is telling me that getting into handstands quicker and more efficiently is more straining on the forearm muscles responsible for wrist flexion, since I use these much more now to stabilize my body.  If this is true the soreness should go away within a day or two and not return so long as I keep doing handstands in this manner.

[Chris Salvato]

Day In a Nutshell: Good Sleep (2:00 AM to 11:00 AM).  Woke up refreshed, but still overwhelmed with things to do for the move.  Stress got worse throughout the day but then settled down.  Took another day of rest to pack more stuff.  Probably should have worked out, but felt no drive with all the things i need to get done.

Some things to note about the day.  My wrists hurt more than they ever have before.  I feel that this is because of handstanding, and maybe because I have been gripping tightly to build up strength in a few spare moments I have had...but I dont think i have been "Iron Claw"ing enough to have this kind of pain cause.  The pain feels like a soreness, so I am going to assume its strengthening me, but going to try to stay away from it for a bit longer. 

I have been balancing intermittantly on a parallette (1.5 inch diameter) throughout the day and noticed that I am getting a lot better at balancing perpendicular on the rail (balls of feet parallel) but they are starting to feet pain in barefoot balancing -- must condition to continue barefoot.

I want to work out, but just don't feel up to it.  Tommorrow we are jamming in the gym so this should definitely motivate me -- maybe I should take from now until i get settled into Colorado as a rest period -- I think my body may need one, anyway...

EDIT: Wanted to also mention that i bought new trainers today -- New Balance 550's for $59.99.  I want to track how these guys feel on my feet over the next couple of months, too.

[Leon Mederos]

Congrats on the progress!!

IF you're wrists are hurting and you can't remember any serious impact, it's probably overtraining. The same happened to me when I went hardcore with handstands. Make sure to get at least 1 week of rest - no handstands at ALL. Focus on lowerbody and core work for that week and you'll be fine.

good luck!

[Chris Salvato]

Thanks LeoNn!  Means much.

My wrists suddenly snapped out of it today and feel fine.  For about 2 hours last night I was feverish with muscle aches and nausea, so I am thinking that I had somethign going on that was causing lathargy and pain.  Luckily I think this means I can keep overdosing on handstands...did some today with no pain!  Ill post more in my post about the day, just wanted to answer you up front about that

[Chris Salvato]

Day In a Nutshell:  Good sleep (as usual, since I am still unemployed) (2:00 AM to 10:00 AM).  Felt great in the gym today working out.  Happy with my overall performance and first realized I need to reevaluate my goals since I reached most of my previous ones that were parkour related.

Before I break down my day, i want to note that my new shoes have great grip.  However, I feel that the left one is too tight and may be causing pain, sadly.  I still need more time to feel them out.

Firstly, let me outline my day.  The training went from 4 PM to 10 PM so theres much to say...

We planned a gym jam for 4 PM.  At about 4:30 most people were at the gym and we began training.  I immediately went for the tumble trax because I came in wanting to work on front flips.  I noticed that I still eat shit when I first start on the tumble trax.  I over rotate almost EVERY time I get on the trax for the first time.  It used to be that it would take me 20 flips to get in the groove though -- today it was only 3 before I was feeling it again.  After that, I was about 95% consistent on the tumble trax for front flipping.  My running front flips after I get warmed up on the tumble trax is about 90% consistent.  There are still some times where I over rotate or don't rotate enough, but ever something too epic.  I think that I am ready to never use a mat again on the running fronts once I am warmed up (within a gym or on soft ground).  My main fear is that warmup period.  I consistently screw up the first few jumps, and that leaves me with fear on bringing the flip outside to the parks.  I think I need to stop warming up on the tumble trax and just start with front flips on the ground.  Goal: To get 100% consistency on front flips, without an exclusive front flip warmup period.

After working on these for about 30 minutes, Nikkie checked her bag -- and a lot of stuff was stolen from it.  Pyro also had stuff stolen.  This killed about 20 minutes of our remaining 30 as we thought about what to do and lamented about the situation.  I still feel really bad about that.  We spent the last 10-20 minutes of our time training vaults, and of course I was front flipping every 30 seconds and threw in some front hand spring attempts, which I am also remarkably close to getting with 100% consistency.  That's at about 70% right now.  Additionally, I threw in some back tucks into the foam pit.  I get around 100% of the time into the foam pit and sitll have a really harsh overcomming of fear when I first get on the platform.  The [backtuck] fear goes away much quicker now, though, and I am able to give it more attempts without having to stomp out my fear before each attempt.  My main fear is that I don't think a real backtuck will get me around in time for a landing on the ground.  I think I need to maybe do tramp work or get a good spotter in there -- but even with a spotter I think I would be scared to tuck up... Goal: Get a backtuck down and land on feet over a mat or on a tramp

After our hour of training was up we were going to buy another hour of time but a fight broke out between 2 moms at the gym and one of them kicked the other in the chest and was taking her DOWN.  She was wailing on this woman like there was no tomorrow!  Only in Brooklyn, I tell ya...

We decided to cut the tricking/gym session short because of the fight and stolen stuff, so we went to a playground.  We messed around with some precisions, underbars and other random crap.  My underbars definitely need some more work...but my gate vaults are getting really comfortable!  Arfel pointed out a problem with my turn vaults.  When I turn vault, I come in from the side too much when I turn, and don't come straight down on the other side which means I have a hard time catting and landing where there is very little room.   I need to work this kink out of my form to make sure that I can cat anything from a turn vault, even vertical bars like arfel was doing.

We then went to the bocce courts where I train regularly.  Nothing major, but showed them my 5 foot kong to precision where they warned me that this is just one jump and this doesnt mean I can 5 foot kong to precision anything -- which is what I knew, anyway...but it was nice to hear it from others haha.

Aside from that, nothing major.  It did occur to me though, at some point through the day, that I must really analyze my techniques and re-evaluate some of my goals to make sure that I keep progressing...here is a list that I am comming up with now.  Like Muse_of_Fire I am going to keep this list updated at the top of every page.  I hope that it will help me identify my goals and keep me progressing steadily!  Also, following Demon's lead, I am going to outline accomplishments I made in the day that correspond somewhat to my goals or my progress towards reaching my goals.

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ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
Strength
-   47 Pushup Max on 1/15/2008 with good form.
-   44 Pushup Max on 1/18/2008 with perfect and very strict form.
-   Over 7 clapping pushups (in front of face) but max is probably much higher.
-   4 HSPU against the wall.  6 short of the goal.
-   15 Second L-sit on 1/16/2008.

Metabolic Conditioning/Endurance
-   Around a 10 minute Fran.
-   18 Rounds + 4 pullups Cindy
-   [had my running times recorded, but i can't remember them...]

Parkour
-   Getting a LOT of compliments on the soft volume of my landing into a roll.
-   Landings are quiet about 50% of the time in precision jumping.

Other
-   Successfully backtucking and "landing on feet" in the foam pit from a drop.  
-   Successfully front flipping 90% of the time.
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GOALS:
Strength
-   8.5 ft. broad jump
-   1 Muscle up without massive kip on bar.
-   1 Muscle up without massive kip on rings.
-   30 sec. L-Sit
-   90 sec. handstand, no wall
-   10 HSPU, wall
-   1 HSPU, no wall
-   70 Pushup Max
-   1.5x BW squat (250 lbs.)
-   2.0x BW deadlift (340 lbs.)
-   1x BW squat clean (165 lbs.)
-   .75x BW power clean (125 lbs.)
-   50 Kipping Pullups Max
-   10 Consecutive Pistols, each leg

Metabolic Conditioning/Endurance
-   Sub 6 Minute Fran
-   20 Rounds of Cindy
-   5:00 Mile
-   22:00 5K
-   50:00 10K

Parkour
-   Improve balance
    - Execute 5 consecutive squats-to-hold on a rail
    - Walk 5 steps of cat balance on a rail
    - Execute a successful half pivot
    - Execute a successful full pivot
    - [Outline a specific distance to cover in a specified duration on a rail here, once I know my CO training area]
-   Learn proper turn vault technique so that I can cat anything, no matter what the amount of platform room is on the other side of the rail.
-   Improve Underbars
    - Execute 5 full reps of nikkie's underbag leg drill.
-   Execute landings that don't go BOOM all the effin time!

Other
-   Retrain flexibility...
     - Obtain Super-Side Split, beyond 180 degrees
     - Re-obtain full front split, both sides, 180 degrees
     - Hold bridge for 45 seconds
-   Wallspins outside
-   100% Front Flip consistency in gym and outside
-   Backtuck on tramp or with spotter -- away from foam pit.
-   Learn the Wallflip

[Chris Salvato]

Day In a Nutshell:   Good sleep (as usual, since I am still unemployed) (1:30 AM to 9:30 AM).  Involuntary rest day -- spent most of the day packing.

Did some light balance work when I was done packing.  Worked a bit on Half Turns and actually stuck a few.  I notice that my calves start to ache if i hold a perpendicular balance for a while -- isometric contraction and all.  I have a much greater body awareness in this position now, too.

Did some light stretching while playing COD4.  Want to get my full split back and I am being reminded how much improving flexibility hurts

[Chris Salvato]

NOTE:  This reply is for the date 01/20/2008, posted 1 day overdue

Day In A Nutshell: Good Sleep, again (2:00-9:30)  Slightly less than normal.  Woke up with nausea at around 9:30 and slept through it until 11:30 and woke up fine.  Felt nausea in waves throughout the day.  Trained from 1:00PM  to 8:00 PM (7 hours) in the cold (15-30 degrees F).

Day started out with the park in Fort Lee.  Small park with a few good spots to try.  Later, we hit up Newark to work on some stuff at their spots.  I worked on Precisions at Fort Lee and some other random crap.  In newark I worked on pop vaults, dash vaults and kongs (high to low), QMing rails, quieter landings and crane moonsteps.

Nothing really worth mentioning in Fort Lee.  I was able to do a 7 foot precision between 2 concrete barriers that were 2-3 feet tall and about level with one another.  The height of the obstacles off the ground is usually what discouraged me.  It took some fear conquering, but I did it, and afterwards I was fine doing it over and over again.  I need to practice properly landing on the edge of the obstacle a bit more, quieting my landings down, and keeping my feet straight as opposed to toed out -- but definitely some little improvements in technique were noticed today.

In newark, I learned the pop vault over a 6 foot wall.  It took 2-3 attempts, then I got 100% consistency.  I like to pop vault.  I will continue to practice it and improve the technique.  I want to overcome the top of the obstacle with different maneuvers other than a side vault style -- but right now my side vaulting pop vault is pretty effective, considering I started it today.

Vaulting from high to low needs improvement.  It takes me a bit to overcome the fear of a drop on the other side, and my landings have a tendency to be loud more often than not on the other side.  I think this has to do with me overcomming fear AS I am doing the vault/landing, and may improve drastically with just a small bit more practice.  Dash vaulting obviously took more courage, and my kash was the softest landing, probably because its so much slower than dash and kong. 

I made HUGE progress today in QM'ing rails.  Before today, this was something I could not do at all.  I would just sit there idle as I tried to move my body.  Today M1L3S and Jesse (HCT) showed me a great techniqu eto get started by using opposing limbs (others told it should be same limb on the bars -- did NOT work for me at all).  M1L3S showed me how to go slowly on the bar by removing the opposing arm and leg from the bar and balancing with the 2 other opposing limbs.  This helped GREATLY and later that night in Newark I was able to QM a flat rail for the first time with some speed.  I was very pleased.

I need to work on quieter landings now exclusively.  It is effecting my other techniques since I land loudly from vaults, precisions, drops, etc.  I need to practice jumping and landing quietly.  Xavier told me to concentrate more on receiving my body, and I think I will attempt to learn to land silently barefoot, when possible (too cold outside to be running on concrete barefoot).  My landings are becomming more of an apparent (and solid) weakness that I need to work out of.

I worked on some crane moonsteps on a 6 foot wall today.  It was JUST beyond my reach for the technique.  I am able to get my second foot up there and planted by the momentum backwards always pulls me down.  I need to lean forward a bit more (without falling forward) to get this tech down.  Xavier suggested using my hands just to brace myself and get used to the tech.  I was also thinking of spreading my arms out to help balance when I lean forward.  I am happy with my progression with crane moonsteps and feel that this will be a strength of mine once I get the tech down a bit better.

EDIT:  I forgot a tech that xavier showed me for building speed to get into a run from stationary.  If you lean forward a bit and let your body fall you build forward momentum.  Just when you are about to fall over, start running and this starts your run with more forward momentum than if you started running from a dead stop.  This will take a bit of training but has proven useful.

[Chris Salvato]

NOTE: This post is a day late and is for training on 01/21/2008

Day In A Nutshell:  Good sleep (about 2:00 AM to 11:00 AM).  Did no real "training" today.  Took a rest day but did work on balance, handstands and did about 1.5 hours of stretching to get back into the stretching grind.

I want to get my full splits back to 180 effortlessly.  Right now I am at about 170 effortlessly and need to push through for that 180 and it's painful (in that good stretching pain kinda way).  My front splits are at about 150 and need some work again.  Trying to refresh myself on how to stretch, and keeping it up through the day.  This is going to have to become a major part of my routine again.

Handstands still produce that pain -- i am going to have to figure out a way to NOT do them in the next week.  I love working on them, but it definitely needs a break for my wrists' sake.

My balance is getting much better.  On my parallette barefoot I was able to do 3 consecutive rail squats down to hold the bar.

All in all a pretty restful day tho as I still prep for the move.  Going to be light workouts until then, save for one day when I plan to hit up our open gym for one last time.

[ZacharyCohn]

Talk to Charlie about your wrist pain. He had that for a lot of wrist pain earlier this year when he was working almost constantly on handstands. He might have some advice.

[ZacharyCohn]

Also: I can't tell you how envious I am of these all day things you seem to do every day. School is seriously getting in the way of my education.

[Chris Salvato]

the good thing about the nypk crew is that no one wants to be the bitch that goes home first   Sometimes we jam straight through the day, as you can see in my logs!

It must be 10x better to train in the summer though...since lots of people are discouraged by the cold and dont want to be outside too long

But yeh, this will likely come to an end once i move to CO.  I am still planning on having all day PK days on the weekends though, much like I do now.

[Chris Salvato]

Day In A Nutshell:Good sleep, as usual (2:00 AM to 11:30 AM..<pleasant yawn> ).  I was a TOTAL waste today.  No real workout, but i think i really do need this rest period -- or I will keep saying that until I believe it.

Today I mostly ran errands.  I ate tons of pistachios and meat, with a big hunk of riccotta salata out of respect for my grandfather (it's an italian thing -- u can't refuse food from your grandfather no matter how unhealthy you feel it is, especially if you are moving 2000 miles away in 3 days).  I noticed that lately I have been eating small meals throughout the day somewhat constantly with a HUGE meal at night.  This is kind of accidentally following the warrior diet -- a diet that I concluded has no place in my lifestyle.

I am falling into somewhat of a funk with so much uncertainty in the next week or so. I will continue to work on the basic skills at home and while I am on the road next week.  This includes things like balancing, handstands and flexibility training.  The more intense stuff will likely have to wait, though, until i join maxcrossfit in colorado springs and start jamming with the Colorado Springs crew on thursdays...

I miss metconning without feeling like I am freezing my ass off on the outside with a roasting core on the inside.  I also miss lifting big, heavy things (barbells and tires!!) and can't wait to get back to it, so I am not scared at all about keeping my motivation to train up in Colorado.  I am mostly scared that I will lose some ground in the next 2 weeks of relative dormancy and gorging on eating out during the moving process.

After I post this, I will likely stretch while watching TV for about 1.5 hours.  I want my splits back more than you can imagine.  I have a new freerunning move that I haven't seen anyone do that is going to require a full effortless split   Hopefully I can do it.

-----EDIT-----
After I posted this, I DID in fact stretch for 2 hours.  After about an hour of stretching I definitely (but barely..) exceeded 180 in my side split (toes to sky) and had a higher degree of comfort at 180 degrees.  My front splits seem to be easier with my right leg forward.  I definitely feel the stretch in my front splits more.  After only 2 days of regression training in flexibility, I am noticing a difference in comfort.  I regain much flexibility WITHIN a single training session which is pleasantly surprising.  I am able to go from just under 180 in side splits to just over 180 in side splits within an hour of warmups/stretches. I am remembering more and more that stretching works up a great sweat when you do it correctly.

Also, I worked on some pistols, too.  I am getting really comfortable doing pistols on my right leg and can even do around 5-7 in series, depending on how I feel.  I am not so good on my left leg though, as I get to a certain point and lose balance.  I will continue to work on them, but it is a bit discouraging.

[Chris Salvato]

Day In A Nutshell:Good sleep, as usual (1:00 AM to 12:00 PM ).  I was a TOTAL waste today, AGAIN.  No real workout...it will be this way for about a week or 2 more until i get settled into Colorado.

Right now, I am making my rounds every day, seeing family and eating big, horrible meals to wish me off well.  Things covered with cheeses and breads that I can't refuse out of respect are going to fill the next few days.  I'll just have to man up (or maybe man down?) and do it.

Family right now is more important to me than training.  I am going to try and hit up the gym tomorrow for one last time before I go to bang out more front flips and maybe some flashy senseless vaults.

I will probably have one bad meal a day for the next few days as part of the well-wishing-off that I am getting from everyone.  Aside from that, i have been eating pretty well.

Stretching has been making a difference.  When cold, I can get to only about 150 degrees in my front split.  When warm/stretched, I can get down to the full 180 with a bit of a push.

Not much more to say right now.