Gooooooooooooooood Lillelørdag alle sammen!
Let's start with a short story: I coach the early classes on Tuesday mornings. For the first time in my career (I'm not 100% sure if it is the first time for Verftet), the class that starts at 06:45 was fully booked, with 14 athletes present. Even though the sun is up at this time of year, and this particular week was already shining bright and clear, people are still waking up and starting their day. So, to start the class, I usually look for something of a surprise to wake everybody up and get them as sharp as a knife.
To my surprise, one fine specimen of a man came to this workout with some DIY shorts. You know, these training pants that are made of synthetic fibers we all have in our closets. And then you do something to them that leaves a stain that will never come out, or you damage a zipper at the bottom of your leg, so what do you do?! You grab a pair of scissors, and you cut them into a pair of shorts, right? It's good to go for at least a few more years. We all have these shorts somewhere in our closet.
But then my brain linked two concepts: the shorts and the sjørøvers I have been reading bedtime stories about for weeks. It just clicked. Shiver me timbers, arrgh, walk the plank, sail the seven seas—that kind of stuff. Once again, a day later, I meet the closest thing to a sjørøver you find these days: Helene 🤣. Helene is finishing her Maritime Education and is about to set sail this summer. And like a true old-school sailor, she has tattoos. I don't know if there is an anchor somewhere, but there is something in bold lettering on her right thigh.
So I asked her for the story behind it, and she told me being at Verftet inspired her to get this tattoo. It didn't take long to admit that it did involve some adult beverages and a very late night (or early morning) trip to a tattoo shop in Australia. [great business model if you ask me, a tattoo shop that stays open throughout the night, guaranteed lifetime memories!]. But it was something that she decided on before that faithful night. The moral of the story: whether you dress like a pirate, ink your skin like a pirate, or only get on a boat when the sun is out, the reminder to work on something that gets you 1% better every day is a valuable one!
Saturday BAF
This weekend, we had another fun BAF with many people progressing on their rope climbs. Some of Oliver’s course participants did their mobility & flexibility together after the workout. At the end of the morning, Tuva went into Beast mode to redo the last semifinal workout and improved her score by as much as 3 minutes!!! The (unofficial) leaderboard standings at this time show the Bjerkeli sisters' hard work and how they rank up in their age groups (14-15 for Mia, 16-17 for Tuva) among the world's best.
If the leaderboards stay like this (and let's be honest, you can never be really sure...), Mia's road to the world title will end at the semifinals this year. Tuva would still be in the race and get invited to compete at the PIT Teens Throwdown, a.k.a. the Teen Games, from August 29th to September 1st in Michigan, USA. Absolutely stunning and jaw-dropping performance, Tuva! I guess this very fit teen is showing all of us how high we can really raise the bar. I know what goes through your head now: "How cool would it be to have some fans create a proper Verftet Heia—geng there!!" Tickets from Haugesund to Detroit are as cheap as a little over NOK 7000 now. Add some transport, accommodation, and drinks, and you get yourself one heck of a fitness trip this summer.
Monday: Shoulder Press & Goody Two Shoes
We revisited the Shoulder press in our Strength cycle to start the week. If you did this lift at 80% a few weeks ago, today was the day to add 2.5 kg and see if you could match the reps you did previously. If you haven't done shoulder press at 80% yet, today is the day to get it. The SugarWOD leaderboard counted 18 PRs at the end of the day, meaning we heard the 🔔 ring a few times and are pushing the limits of what we could do before!
During the workout, we worked a lot on the machines, with just a short break to do dumbbell hang power cleans and jerks. It was a solid 15 minutes of honest hard work that left most of us breathless for a few minutes afterward. Oliver had a class at 15:15 that was particularly booming; there was lots of energy in the room!
The seniors also did this workout but reserved enough time to plan their upcoming trip to Bergen together. What a great example of the value of this community, to have a great time together and plan to use their fitness outside of the gym. The teens worked on back squat strength with coach Sindre this day, followed by many hang power snatches and thrusters!
Tuesday: Barbara [Benchmark]
Barbara!! What a beauty—and what a beast! Some people repeated the scaling and reps they had done for this Benchmark in previous years to see if they could beat their time. Most people who had never done this workout before or did not finish within the time cap before could try some new scaling variations today. Ensuring to finish the first round of pull-ups and push-ups in about 2:30 sets you up for a successful workout that you could probably finish while moving well. We saw some fantastic personal records and the full range of motion. Oliver made it look super easy. Maybe he practices this on the weekend nights?
Thomas mostly enjoyed the 3-minute break. Kjell Arve was super happy to join a regular class again and crushed the pace on the sit-ups. Kjetil was rewarded for all his time practicing butterfly pull-ups. Åshild and Ida Helen were twinning and winning in black, green, and purple.
Last but not least, here is a little review of the newsletter we will be sending out about training during the summer months. Most people change their daily rhythms a bit during the summer vacation, and we would like to adapt with you so that fitness maintains a part of it!
Turn on the volume and listen to this bad boy: let's put our foot down and race towards the long weekend with celebrations
Bye Bye Butterfly!
= Thaddeus
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