Sunday Story…Father’s Day

This one has been hard for me to write.

I am a Father. I am also a Grandfather. I am not always proud of the father I have been. I wish I would have been more like my father but I wasn’t. In 2011 I wrote this:
http://sunday-stories.blogspot.com/2011/06/sunday-storyhappy-fathers.html
about my dad. If you want to read it, please feel free.

I didn’t spend the kind of time I think, in retrospect, my children deserved and needed but that may just my perception now. In Brittany’s case I was a nonexistent entity. It is an ignominy I bear every day; shame on me that was inexcusable. No matter what I felt, or what happened between the two adults in her life I should have been better than that. I wasn’t and I can’t apologize enough.

My other 3 children had a Father who worked a lot…sometimes 18 hours a day and almost never took vacations. I was driven past the point of excess. It didn’t really serve any of us. On the other hand I still do that…drive myself toward goals and commitments that require unprecedented focus and determination. I just don’t have children living at home, or anyone else for that matter! Except for a cat that only cares if she doesn’t get fed.

Hopefully my children felt loved even though I was absent a lot. Hopefully they got the lessons I wanted to impart about the importance of hard work, doing a job well, service and kindness. Hopefully they learned what good things to do for their children and what mistakes to avoid on their own journeys to parenthood.

Unfortunately our children don’t come with an owner’s manual when they arrive (not that all of us would have read it anyway!) We can only do what we think is best at the time we are doing it, based on the examples we have from our families and the people around us. We learn as we go.

On this Father’s day I want to Thank all my children for turning out so well in spite of me and all my faults and miss-steps over the years. They are all grown up and out in the world doing great things with families of their own. And I want to Thank my father for being who he was as my father.

I love you all of you kids.
And
I love you Dad.

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevad.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
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Sunday Story…What (it took)

When I was coming up in high school wrestling there was a guy named Dan Gable out of Iowa who won the 1972 Olympic gold medal. Legend has it that he lived by this credo…”7 hours a day, 7 days a week, for 7 years. That’s what it took.” So what has it taken to get my 57 year old rear to the 2014 CrossFit Games?

Aside from the obvious dedication and commitment over the last year:
Workouts:
I have had workouts scheduled at least 5 of every 7 days and frequently 6 out of 7.
My workouts usually take over an hour and as much as 2 hours. This doesn’t include warm up or cool down.
I spend 3 or 4 hours a week on “mobility” work (and this isn’t enough!)
I have had dedicated Olympic lifting sessions once a week for the first 6 months and twice a week for the last 6 months.
My coach(es) have me doing specific stability and mobility exercises.

For recovery:
I visit an Active release doctor once a week.
I have been doing cryotherapy (go to http://www.cryousa.com/ for more info) once a week or so since February.
I try to sleep 7-9 hours every night…successfully most of the time.

Diet:
I eat real natural food 99% of the time. In the last 6 months or so I have added more potatoes and white rice than in the last 2 or 3 years. In some circles that would not be “paleo”. I do use whey protein from SFH (100% grassfed), fish oil (9 grams a day), branched chain amino acids (BCAA), as well as several other supplements from different natural products companies. These products come recommended to me by people I know and trust (Robb Wolf, Stephen Cherniske) and are designed to aid in recovery and avoid possible dietary deficiencies based on my out of sight activity level.

I have and continue to experience several injuries over the last year. None of them have been severe enough to stop me or slow my activity significantly. In this regard I have been very fortunate but I am skirting the edge of disaster on this one. That is why the mobility, ART, and other recovery practices are so important.

My social life is fairly non-existent. I eat, sleep, and train. I prepare all my food a week at a time. I think about my training or programming for the athletes I coach. This has been an all encompassing journey… a quest, if you will. There have been times I wondered if it was worth it. There have been times when I wanted to quit, to stop, to call CJ Martin and tell him I was out. There are still days when I wonder if I am good enough, that I am going to show up in Los Angeles in 6 weeks and get laughed out of the stadium. Then I get reminded of how far I have come…all the things I can do today…better, faster, longer…that I could not do just a few months ago.

I wouldn’t trade all of the pain and struggle of the last 12 months for anything. It has been a transformative and amazing metamorphosis. And I would do it again, even if I wasn’t going to the Games in a few weeks.

So, to all of you reading this and all the things I write, Thanks for your support both publically and privately, and expressed and implied. If you want to start your journey to personal excellence, your journey to extraordinary, drop me a line and we can start you down the path as well!

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevada.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
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Sunday Story…What (part 3)

Exercise

Many of you want to know exactly what I have done to get to the CrossFit Games. What exercise protocols did I follow? When and what did I do? And I am going to lay all of that out for you in next week’s issue. But this one’s for you. What do you need to do to be fit and healthy, because, honestly, what I have been doing has moved from optimum wellness to an edge that skirts over-training and an obsessive focus on a specialty fitness regimen.

Here are the 5 things you must do to begin the road to optimum health and fitness

#1 you have to move

It sounds simple, I know, but you really need to move. Walk up the stairs instead of the escalator, or walk on the people moving sidewalk, park further away from the store instead of looking for the closest spot, take a walk after dinner, or ride your bike once in a while. Just move and move often. It doesn’t count as exercise either by the way, it is basic human maintenance…you were made to move, not sit and rust.

#2 you have to pick up heavy stuff often

I want you to pick up heavy things every day. Learn how to do it safely and keep your ego in check but pick up a variety of heavy things in lots of different ways almost every day. Especially squats. This is one of the most critical movements you can do…pick up weight, put it on your back, squat down and stand up. Do it right (get instruction), do it often, and do it in lots of ways.

#3 you have to move really fast sometimes

When you were little you had races all the time, remember? Race you home! Race you to the pole! You were always racing to get somewhere. You need to race again. Go as fast as possible, stop, catch your breath and do it again. Sprint like this 2 or 3 times a week. Combine it with lifting heavy things.

#4 you have to challenge yourself with new stuff

Learning new things does not come easy to us as we age. Just like it is easier to not move it is easier to not do things differently or learn new skills. Learning new skills is critical to our brain health, and let’s get real…without a brain being strong is just dumb. Doing things that make us uncomfortable will serve you in the long run…especially the things that help us maintain balance and flexibility…like being upside down!

#5 you have to play

Just play. Throw a Frisbee, swim for fun, a little beach volleyball, maybe some badminton or croquet…just play. Remember all those games…hide and seek? Kick the can? Kick ball? Tag? Red light, green light? Ask your kids to re-teach you, they are still playing those games. Then just play with no outcome in mind, no winners no losers just play for the sake of playing.

If you do those things every week, you will be well on your way to improved health and fitness. It won’t take long, either, especially if you follow what parts 1 &2 talked about…Eat Real Food and Sleep!

Next week…the competitive construct or the life of the unpaid professional athlete!

Namaste

John Mariotti

www.crossfit-odyssey.com

www.martialartsnevada.com

www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com

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Sunday Story…What (cont’d)

The second part of our physical puzzle is rest. Rest as in sleep. Rest as in no activity. Rest as in, well, rest. Unfortunately, we live in a time and place where we value activity over rest. How many times have we bragged about only sleeping 4 hours a night, or pulled an all-nighter to get a project done, or study for a test?

When we sleep we rejuvenate. When we sleep deeply our blood pressure drops, breathing slows, muscles relax, blood supply to muscles increases, tissue growth and repair takes place, energy is restored, and hormones are released, especially growth hormone which is essential for growth and development. A cat nap is not going to do all that. All of those things will happen when you sleep 7-9 hours a night. Sleeping also helps the quality of our lives by contributing to a healthy immune system, controlling our appetites through the proper levels of the hormones ghrelin and leptin. When we don’t sleep enough we may feel the need to eat more, which can lead to weight gain.

So let’s see…sleep more and get stronger, get sick less, control my appetite, achieve the proper hormonal response. Or we can sleep less and get sick, get fat, and die sooner. That’s correct studies show that people sleeping less than 6 hours a night have a death rate as much as 30% higher than people who sleep between 6 – 9 hours.

Sleeping well takes planning and sticking to that plan. You need to have an established routine that you perform every night before retiring to bed. Here are my top 5 tips for a great night’s sleep:
1. Go to bed at the same time every night (and get up at the same time every morning)
2. Sleep in a cool room (68 degrees)
3. Sleep in complete darkness
4. Turn off all electronic devices or keep them in a different room. The bedroom is for sleep and well, you know, not watching TV, doing computer work or anything else.
5. Keep it as quiet as possible.

It really is that simple but you must decide you are going to sleep well every night. Learn to quiet your mind, use deep breathing techniques, keep it quiet, dark, and cool, and wake up in the morning rested, stronger and healthier. You can do this.

Sleep…it’s what you need as much as food!

Next week…exercise!

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevada.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com

Sunday Story…What

The why is simply this: to fulfill the mission of being as fit as humanly possible at whatever age I may be. But what does that really mean and what does it take to achieve that goal?

It means you must be aware of all aspects of your physical life. For our purposes today, that is what we are focused on. Should you be balanced and emotionally sound, intellectually stimulated, and relatively stress free? Of course you should. There are 3 parts of this physical puzzle that must fit together to fulfill the mission. Diet, Rest, Exercise…diet is first.

DIET aka Nutrition

“80% of your results in the gym are dictated by what you do in the kitchen.”

The food you eat is critical to being healthy. The food you eat is directly related to your ability to perform in the gym and perform throughout the day in your life. Your mental processes get inhibited when your brain isn’t fed right. Your physical abilities are diminished when your body isn’t fueled properly. We should all know this by now. You can figure it out for yourself if you don’t believe me…how well do you perform when you are hung-over? All that alcohol and the resultant sugars affect your brain and your body and not in a good way. So let’s extrapolate that data out a bit…other sugars may have a similar affect. Putting chemicals in your body (like alcohol) may have deleterious effects on your body. We just are not aware of all the other crap we are pouring into our bodies.

My stance on diet is simple: Eat Real Food. Food you can identify. Food that doesn’t require a label. Food that grew from the ground, food that was raised the way nature intended it to be raised. We have been fed (pun intended) a bunch of lies when it comes to food. Some of those lies were honest mistakes, made by people working off erroneous information. But many of those lies came from economic interests, and people who had a vested interest in making us consume a product.

One of the biggest lies is this: Eating Fat will make you fat. Eating a low fat diet will create a healthy body. Really? So in the last 40 years we have seen the American (and now the world) health picture improve? NOT! Diabetes and obesity are rampant and this is the first generation of children not expected to outlive their parents. You need fat, you need protein, and you need carbohydrates in your diet every day. How much of each should be determined by your activity level and other factors. Right now I eat a lot of natural carbohydrates…rice, potatoes (sweet and other), dates and other fruits. But right now my activity level is off the chart high.

Here is your Diet program (also known as the Stop Eating Crap Diet)…Eat meat and vegetables, healthy fats (olives, avocado, coconut), a little fruit, a little starch, some seeds and nuts in quantities to support activity but not to store fat. NO SUGAR. Avoid grains, dairy, and legumes. Grab your plate, put a portion of meat on it (about 4oz. or 30 grams of protein) and fill the rest of the plate with green stuff. Simple and easy. Repeat every time you eat. Some protein, some veggies do it for 30 days and call me. We will tweak it after that. Oh, and lay off the wine (or keep it to a glass a day and no, you don’t get to save them up for Saturday night!).

Next week…Rest!

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevada.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com

Sunday Story…Happy Mother’s Day

It is that day of the year to pause and reflect on all of the women wore bore you, raised you, parented you or all three. That person may be your mother, grandmother, step-mother, teacher, mentor, or aunt. They weren’t perfect. Neither are you. They did the best they could in the situation they were in and the tools they had available and did it with your best interests in mind. We can’t know what was going on for them, only what our experience was.

When you are a parent you get to make your own rules. You also get to break them. You get to say (stupidly sometimes) things like…”my child will never eat sugar” or “we won’t have a television in my house” or “I will never raise my voice to my children.” Parenting is an ongoing process of trial and error. None of my children came with an owner’s manual. And every one of them was different. What was effective for one was worthless on the next child. You didn’t come with a manual either and your mother did what she did in the hopes that you would turn out OK. Most of us do turn OK, often ignoring the best laid plans of our mothers.

She did what she thought was right. She did what she did to get you to adulthood so you could do what you are doing. It worked…here you are today, all grown up and out in the world.

All the best things I am I credit my Mother (and Father). All the rest is my fault. It’s that simple.

So say thanks, give your Momma a hug and a kiss (or a virtual one) or a prayer and be grateful for all the things she did and the sacrifices that were made for you to be who you are!

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevada.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com

Sunday Story…Why (part 2)

It is now official. My video was approved and I am registered and paid as a participant in the 2014 CrossFit Games. All that is left is to book some airline tickets and hotel reservations. So it is real…almost 3 years of work and the goal is within my grasp. The goal to go to the CrossFit Games.

Yet the question still remains…Why do you want to go to the games?

What Coach Fitzsimmons didn’t tell me that afternoon is what would happen when I took on this quest. You see, I took his advice and worked on the things he told me to work on. I got better, my skills improved, my strength improved. I finished #31 that year (2013). I was disappointed. I know I improved over 20% from the prior year but it wasn’t enough. I was missing several components to break into the coveted top 20. 2013 was the last year that just the top 20 got to go. 2014 has been proven to be different. Frankly, I was better but I wasn’t good enough.

What both Jim and my current coach, CJ Martin, didn’t tell about this quest was the price that would be paid. I knew there would be a lot of workouts. They didn’t tell me about the huge time commitment. They didn’t tell me about the pain I would need to endure on an almost daily basis…the pain of injury, the pain of growth, the pain of disappointments, the pain of missed social engagements.

It has been said that it isn’t a real quest unless you might lose your life. I have given up balance for a single minded goal. I have been willing to get up before dawn to work, and long after dark. I have spent hours turning into days in the gym working out and trying and failing. I have learned to love failing. I have learned to learn from every failure, every missed lift, and every failed time trial. I have lost the life that I had to become something and someone entirely new, like a caterpillar and a butterfly.

All my life I have never felt quite good enough. Good but not good enough. Smart but not smart enough. What this is really about is this: I have been measuring myself against the completion of the goal…whether the goal was X number of dollars in the bank, a certain placing in a contest, or an accomplishment at work (yes, there was a time when I worked for a living!) Since my going to the games and my placement in the contest does not define me (see part 1) why go through this much pain, injury, suffering, and angst to go to a contest that isn’t really going to change anything?

There are so many trite answers…because I can. Because I want to wear cool pants. Because I have something to prove. But, really, there is only one reason:

My mission in life is to be as fit in body, mind, and soul as humanly possible.

As part of my mission to be as fit in body as possible, the achievement of a trip to the Games represents an objective measurement of fitness. So, why do I want to go to the games? To prove to myself that I can stay with a plan and see it through to fruition. To know that my full effort is in fact full victory; that failure does not exist except as a teaching tool. To know what it really means to give an honest attempt to climb to the pinnacle in a field of talented and like minded individuals.

What’s your mission? What did you do today to move your mission forward? What will you do tomorrow? I am already looking forward to the 2015 games and increasing my fitness to an even higher level. Triple Unders, anyone?

Namaste

John Mariotti

www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevada.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com