Session 7 of ASA's July MVP class
Today was yet another rough day at ASA Baseball's MVP training class. I don't know why I'm never quite able to do this class. I often feel I'm just completely, terribly and permanently out of shape. Either that, or I need to do more on the off days.
Started with the usual ladder drills. Now there's something I think I should probably start doing every day. Along with situps, pushups, chinups, stretching, hamstring exercises and having sex.
- LR RL LR RL ...
- L-in R-top L-in R-bottom
- Fast rotate R foot first (outside, straddling the ladder, rotate 90° putting L in box 1, R in box 2; rotate back to straddling, advance to put L in box 2, R in box 3; continue), followed by L foot first
- Straddle L-in straddle R-in
- Straddle L-in straddle R-in straddle together
- R-L traversals: R-L to the left side of the ladder, R-L inside a box, R-L to the right of the box - I can never get this one right.
- Might have been another one in there...
We worked with the big boxes to start the session. With three aligned in a row with a 24" space between them, jump over each quickly, then sprint at the end. I was totally psyched out, and kept pausing between the boxes. When I did manage to keep going, I was totally flailing.
Our next box exercise was jumping off one onto the floor, then immediately onto two stacked up. 2 sets of 10. Kris managed to leap onto three stacked up for his second set, though he missed one and scraped his shin really hard on the corner of the top box (leaving hair and flesh caught in the grain - ew!).
Because we were unable to complete the box jumps, we did mini-hurdle runs.
- Facing left, land each foot between two hurdles; repeat facing right.
- Both feet together, hop over each hurdle
- Facing left, feet together, hop over each hurdle; repeat facing right.
Next came 2 sets of 3 exercise rotation: sumo walks, side to sides with sprints, toe touches on the box. The sumo walks were walk the length of the room crouched down, back at a 45° angle, feet in a wide-wide stance, pushing a weighted ball. For extra goodness, we had to hold a rubber tubing loop apart with our feet.
Side to sides were the standard ice-skater like movements, followed by a sprint at the end. We did two for each set. I thought the point of this exercise was to drop deep into the stance. I was mistaken: quickness is the way to go. So, I did much better on the second set.
I also need to work on keeping my arms in when I sprint. My elbows go out, and my arms will cross over my chest to get going fast. Better to keep the elbows in and move them directly straight back & forth.
The toe touches weren't difficult. The usual. At some point, however, during these sets of three exercises, I stood up quickly and had a head rush. It lasted longer than normal (I'd say, 15 seconds, which is 12 seconds longer than my head rushes normally last), which was strange and a bit disturbing.
The abs workout was different. More ball work than usual. Our first exercise involved sitting next to each other, about six feet apart, and tossing the 8# ball across the body at the other person. After, eh, about 20 passes, we rotated 180° and threw at each other again, working the other side.
Next we put our feet together, facing each other (still sitting on the floor), and did chest pass situps to each other. G had to hold our feet down for a while.
Next were back-to-back ball passes. I passed down each time, Kris passed up. The first was Kris' left shoulder to my left hip. Then we switched to his right shoulder down to my right hip. Unfortunately, I moved into his shoulder as he passed the ball, and was smacked right in the nose with the ball. It hurt a lot. Stood back up and continued, though.
Next we did standing ball tosses, from the hips, push out at the person standing about 12 feet away. The 8# ball was a little too much for me, so G and Kris did the first set, and I did a second set with G and the 6# ball.
Regular abs after that. Bicycle, Russian crunches, V ups, lower back, regular crunches, stretch.