National Push Championships!
Brad and I spent the last week (9/11-9/19/10) out in Lake Placid for a team camp, combine testing, and the National Push Championships. This was for the National Team as well as for a group of pretty talented rookies that had been invited after successful combine testing throughout the summer at locations across the country.
On the first day, we did the camp combine testing. This is the ultra-marathon event consisting of sprints (15meter, 30m, 45m, 30m fly), a standing broad jump, a shot put forward throw, cleans, and squats. It was a rainy, miserable day so I didn't take any pictures, but testing went well anyway:
I also went a little lighter than last year on my clean and squat due to my back / glute issues, plus once you get to that level more weight isn't worth many more points. I.e. one girl squatted 110 kilos (242 lbs), which was almost 50 lbs more than me, but only got 5 more points. Diminishing returns so I think I'm done increasing weights for a while, especially since I am plenty strong and should work on the sprinting more instead.
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As for the push championships themselves, they were held on the Lake Placid pushtrack, since the ice isn't down on the track yet. We push a wheeled sled on rails, with rubber laid alongside to give us something for our spikes to push on.
After pushing down a hill designed to mimic the start of the ice track, the pushtrack then goes back uphill to slow us down.
And then, if you're going fast enough, the sled catches a wire and slingshots back. You ride the sled back down and up to the start.
Here's a video that someone took of one of my training pushes, and she filmed all the way down and back so you can see how it works. I was working on modifying my starting position, so there's some dead air time there, sorry. :)
They also do bobsled training on this track, but unfortunately they didn't train near our times, so I don't have any video or photos to show you.
One day we walked to the end of the pushtrack.
And found a surprising view.
So we had to pose.
Anyway, back to pushing. There are a variety of start and push options. The two handed push:
The one handed push:
The Thor's Hammer push (you can't tell here, but he threw the sled ahead of him):
The right side push:
I've been working on a new start, but for my race push, ended up going back to my two-to-one push (you'll see in the video below, right when I start), and was able to push a pushtrack PR (Personal Record) of 5.66 seconds. That's only 0.02 seconds slower than my ice PR and means I should be able to PR on the ice this season! Very very happy...
Heh, you can see I forgot to take my iPod off, so went down with it. Oops...nevertheless I ended up in second place, behind Annie who is an amazing pusher. On the first day, we did the camp combine testing. This is the ultra-marathon event consisting of sprints (15meter, 30m, 45m, 30m fly), a standing broad jump, a shot put forward throw, cleans, and squats. It was a rainy, miserable day so I didn't take any pictures, but testing went well anyway:
- 15m - 2.51 seconds (64 pts)
- 30m - 4.43 seconds (66 pts)
- 45m - 6.29 seconds (67 pts)
- 30 fly - 3.78 (81 pts)
- broad jump - 2.3 meters (73 pts)
- ball toss - 12.4 meters (96 pts)
- power clean - 70 kilos (154 lbs, 86 pts)
- squat - 87.5 kilos (192.5, 93 pts)
- total: 624 points
I also went a little lighter than last year on my clean and squat due to my back / glute issues, plus once you get to that level more weight isn't worth many more points. I.e. one girl squatted 110 kilos (242 lbs), which was almost 50 lbs more than me, but only got 5 more points. Diminishing returns so I think I'm done increasing weights for a while, especially since I am plenty strong and should work on the sprinting more instead.
___________________________________________________
As for the push championships themselves, they were held on the Lake Placid pushtrack, since the ice isn't down on the track yet. We push a wheeled sled on rails, with rubber laid alongside to give us something for our spikes to push on.
After pushing down a hill designed to mimic the start of the ice track, the pushtrack then goes back uphill to slow us down.
And then, if you're going fast enough, the sled catches a wire and slingshots back. You ride the sled back down and up to the start.
Here's a video that someone took of one of my training pushes, and she filmed all the way down and back so you can see how it works. I was working on modifying my starting position, so there's some dead air time there, sorry. :)
They also do bobsled training on this track, but unfortunately they didn't train near our times, so I don't have any video or photos to show you.
One day we walked to the end of the pushtrack.
And found a surprising view.
So we had to pose.
Anyway, back to pushing. There are a variety of start and push options. The two handed push:
The one handed push:
The Thor's Hammer push (you can't tell here, but he threw the sled ahead of him):
The right side push:
I've been working on a new start, but for my race push, ended up going back to my two-to-one push (you'll see in the video below, right when I start), and was able to push a pushtrack PR (Personal Record) of 5.66 seconds. That's only 0.02 seconds slower than my ice PR and means I should be able to PR on the ice this season! Very very happy...
I didn't get a video of Brad's race pushes, but here's one of his training runs.
In the race, he came in 8th out of 24, solidly in the mix with the other veteran sliders and saw improved push times all week. In fact, we both feel like we learned a lot this week, and made big strides in our pushing.
The group after photo:
Nice job to both the veterans and the rookies. Brad and I are both really happy with our results, and glad we went.
After the race, we went back to our rooms, and I laid down to stretch my back and read and relax for a bit. About a half hour later, Brad came by and stuck his head in...and found me like this, Kindle on the floor...I didn't make it very far:
I guess I was tired...but now we're home and back in the swing of things. You know what's crazy? We'll be back out there, on the ice, in less than a month. One month!
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