Team Survivor Fitness Class, part 6

Last week (the 7th) Dave wanted to have the women warm up with unweighted squats in order to fine-tune their technique. I mentioned I've been working with "goblet squats," where you hold a light-ish dumbbell or kettlebell up around your collarbones/under your chin as a counterbalance, enabling you to keep the weight back on the heels and reach back with the rear without toppling over backwards. So Dave let me show them that. It really makes a difference—I hope over time it will improve my squat posture without holding the "goblet"—that's the idea. Then Dave gave them a short talk on intensity, the favorite CrossFit concept. "You often read that you should do moderate exercise for 30 to 60 minutes a day to get in shape—well I don't believe that. Greater intensity is the key to making progress. Of course, more intensity means you can't do something for as long. You may have noticed most of our workouts take 10 to 15 minutes, and that's because of high intensity." He explained the Tabata concept of doing something as hard as you can for 20 seconds several times with a rest of 10 seconds between sets, with the idea being that the rest is just long enough to enable you to do the 20 seconds of intensity again. Their first workout was modified Tabata squats, with the intervals being (I think) 30 seconds on, 30 seconds off. Then they had a similar workout of sit-ups. Next they did some rowing-style pullups underneath some racked barbells, then presses/push-presses, and finally finished with some more squats to work on technique one more time. I'm working on a handout for the women to help them remember the coaching cues for each of the exercises.