On December 20, 2011 I, along with the 2nd squad, did the Cindy WOD at CrossFit Lindy. In 20 minutes you do as many rounds as you can of 5 pulls ups, 10 push ups and 15 air squats.
So I decided to give cross fit a try and got a pretty good a$$ kicking on my intro night this past Tuesday. I don’t exactly believe it was a beginner WOD, workout of the day, as I went with my buddy Brad. I did the same workout he did and he’s been going for a month. It was 20 wall balls at 20 pounds, you squat down, push the ball up over a line on the wall and then repeat. After than it was 15 pullups, I needed the assist strap, and then 10 burpee box jumps, which are just plain sadistic. I finished in 35 minutes and change and was thoroughly annihilated and humbled. It probably also didn’t help that I took 3 weeks off after climbing in Mexico.
Well…I went back on Wednesday. This night was a bit easier. After getting some lifting lessons from Dan to work on form and refresh my brain on olympic lifts he put me through a 5 round WOD of 5 front squats at 95 pounds and then 15 push ups for time. Go as fast as you can. I think I banged it out in 10 minutes and some change. I was toast but felt much better than Tuesday. Finished the night off with a rowing race against Brad for 2000 meters and came in with a time of 7:42.
Thursday I was back at it. Got in a good warm up of 500 meter rowing and some good stretching. More lifting lessons and then WOD of 30 ground to overhead med balls at 20 pounds, 20 abmat situps finished with 10 ring rows. Do as many rounds as you can in 12 minutes. I got in 4 complete rounds and in the 5th round finished the med balls and 15 situps.
So, my impression of Cross Fit after three days is that I’m not as fit as I thought. I’ll be sticking with this for a while to come and the old gym membership is done. I’ll keep updating my progress. Pretty safe to say that I am sold on cross fit.
You can check out the Cross Fit gym by clicking here.
I am working on transcribing my journal from this trip. In the meantime, I put together this video of the trip and it captures the essence and fun we had during our climbing. Our group raised almost $38,000 for Big City Mountaineers, so the trip was a huge success. Thank you to everyone who donated.
Tonight is night two at 8,000 feet. Everything went well last night, so tonight and then tomorrow at 8,000 and then on to 9,000. I am slowly starting to taper my training and did about 4o minutes on the treadmill today at 8.5 % grade with my pack. Just trying to maintain my training, but lighten up so I end up in Mexico fresh and ready to go.
I’ve already started to lay out my gear and below is a picture of what is ready to go so far. I’ve put a list of items too.
Rain/Wind Gear (remove tag), Base layer shirt (remove tag), Duffel Bag 2 (remove tag), Hiking Poles (remove tag), Pants (remove tag), Fleece (remove tag), Sleeping Bag (remove tag), Sleeping bag (remove tag), Ascenders (remove tag), TP and wipes – 
(remove tag), Base Layers (remove tag), Headlamps x 2 (remove tag), Heavy Gloves (remove tag), GPS (remove tag), Mountain/Ice Axe (remove tag), Caribiners (remove tag), Mid weight gloves (remove tag), Sleeping pad (remove tag), Bowl and utensils (remove tag), Down and Synthetic Jacket (remove tag), Pillow (remove tag), Crampons (remove tag), Pack Cover (remove tag), Helmet (remove tag), Kanteen (remove tag), Duffel Bag 1 (remove tag), Hiking boots (remove tag), Balaclava (remove tag), Med Kit (remove tag), Leg Gaiters (remove tag), Gregory Baltoro Pack (remove tag), Socks and liners (remove tag), Mountain Boots (remove tag)
I still have more stuff to go. I’m about 90% there. Still have a few more items of gear left, regular clothes for travel and rest days and food items I want to bring. Plus cameras and other nick nacks. lol. Wowsers. I am getting so psyched for this trip. It can’t come soon enough.
-JP-
Night 4 in my altitude tent and I slept at 7,000 feet. I actually slept like a baby and only awoke to my alarm going off at 7 am. So far, I am very pleased with how my body is reacting to altitude and things are going well. Tonight I will be bumping up to 7,500 feet. I should be at 9,000 feet in about 4 more days and then will spend the rest of my time before my trip at that altitude. Everything is going well.
-JP-
Well, I got my altitude tent today and it’s all set up. The motor is humming right now bringing it up to about 6,000 feet for tonight’s first night. It’s about a 10 day period to get up to 9,000 feet and then I will spend the last 7 days before my trip to Mexico at 9,000 to get nice and acclimated. It’s definitely going to be a big help with going down there and will aid with me not having to worry about initial acclimatization. I’ll arrive in Mexico City all ready to go and should have a much easier time acclimating to the higher altitudes. Thanks to Hypoxico Inc. for the setup. Great guys and the main guy actually climbed the same two mountains I am going to do, so we chatted a bit about it and he gave me some great tips.
If you want to learn more click here.
What a great day. I was awoken at 5 am by my alarm and started the morning off by stubbing my toe on the chair in my hotel room. AWESOME!! The room was pitch black and I was trying to find the light switch. lol. I had a small breakfast of a bagel, protein shake and 8 ounces of water and then proceeded back to my bed for more sleep. Next alarm went off at 6:15. Getting ready for a half marathon is much easier than a tri. After a quick peek out the balcony door to verify that it was still cold, I was dressed and bundled up and rolling out the door by 6:30. My hotel was located about 3 miles from the race parking lot, but I wasn’t the only one thinking of getting to the lot around 7 am. The 3 mile drive took about 25 minutes with the parade of traffic all trying to make a left into a lot with a 5 second left turning light. Note to race, maybe get a cop at the intersection to help cars get in faster. Parked the car and then stripped down to bare running clothes and headed for the shuttle. After a 10 minute wait we were off to the run starting area. The ride was about 10 minutes and nothing like being 6’4” and crammed in a school bus. lol. I think i took up more than my fair share of the seat.
Once at the starting area, which is down by the shore I went over to the finish line area to spy the way in for the last .1 mile and then milled around. The last minutes prior to race time went pretty fast and nothing out of the ordinary. Around 8 am the gun cracked and we were off. The run begins with a rather short stretch of flat and then goes right into an uphill section. My legs were feeling good, but I held back. I know I was capable of running sub 10 minute per mile pace with the pack, but My goal was to run smart and run the whole thing. The first 6 miles went rather smooth. Everything felt fine. Mile 8 started a section with rolling hills, that I did not enjoy. It was during miles 8-10 that I started getting some people chatting with me which was very cool. I remember one lady specifically who ran next to me and said, “you know there was a bag check at the start,” to which I replied…”oh man.” haha. She just looked at me as I kept running. One guy was also rather funny. I was running by when he asked me…”so how much you got in there?” I said, “forty pounds.” He said…”f$*k.” haha. That was a great point and gave me a bit of a second wind…along with the 2 gu packets I sucked down.
Mile 10 began to hurt. My knee was aching a bit and it was there i decided to slow a bit and walk mile 11. This was a good decision. I walked mile 11 in less than 15 and it was mainly all up hill, so it took stress of my legs and when I hit mile 12 I was ready to go again. I think I ran the last 1.1 miles to the finish in less than 9:30. Being that close I could taste the finish and I was all about eating up the last mile. About 1/2 mile from the finish I teared up a bit as I thought back to being in the hospital last year and realizing the gift of life I have. Being able to run and being active is a huge part of my life; today was a testament to that. It was a moment to cherish. I crossed the finish line…gave a fist pump and hit the stop on the watch.
1942 2527 Jp Latkovic 32 855/977 M 266/310 M3039 BOHEMIA NY USA 2:22:06 2:20:24 10:43
2:20:24…not too bad with 40 pounds on my back. If I didn’t walk that mile, I might have made my goal of 2:15, but then again, I may have walked it home in 2:30. It’s been a great journey to this point and it’s just a small step towards the ultimate goal of standing on top of both the mountains in Mexico. Thanks to all my family, friends and doctors who have been their for me and helped me get back to where I am today.
You can still donate to the cause for Big City Mountaineers. It’s for the kids!! Visit, www.jpclimbs.com to go to my fund raising page and give what you can.
Challenge yourself and find out what you are capable of!!
-JP-
A not so busy day today. Slept in this morning and then went to the conference center to get my number. After a self guided tour of downtown Newport I was back in the room being restless. lol. I usually don’t spend weekends laying around and resting. Hopefully this works out well for me and the body during tomorrow’s run and I feel fresh. I’m all set for the run in the morning and just watching baseball. Calling it an early night. Can’t wait to run!
-JP-
What a day today. After waking up and doing a quick pack I was on the road to Rhode Island via the Orient Point ferry. Gotta love the ferry…took a nice nap during the ride. Made it to my hotel around 3 after a pit stop for lunch and then realized I had a 45 minute drive to the ABC 6 studio in Providence, RI. I made my way up there and after a few wrong turns found the office. I met with Ken Bell, the sports reporter and he immediately put me at ease and as a Coloradan with climbing experience we hit it off. We went over my story and he prepped me on how the interview would go. Let me tell you…unless you’ve experienced doing an interview, the prep didn’t matter. lol. It goes by so fast. The whole time I was thinking don’t mess up…speak clearly, what was the question??? haha….oy. I made it through and got the thumbs up from Ken and from Deb, one of the Marathon coordinators.
All in all it was a great day. I hope this interview brings some spotlight to my fund raising efforts and helps to raise more money for Big City Mountaineers. Tomorrow I am off to the expo to pick up my number. Can’t wait to run on Sunday…weather is looking great.
We collected a lot of items at the Cedar Beach Triathlon for our troops in Afghanistan. We have two boxes on the way today. Thanks to everyone who donated. I know they will appreciate everything in the boxes.
-JP-
