An Ode to Opens

No song lyrics - title misinterpretation.  I had no thoughts, no dreams, and no aspirations.  I just did it, just to do it.  A testament to myself and what I would be capable of.  Given that the last workout was the same as last year, it was the only true way of being able to test whether or not I had truly improved.


Interestingly enough, I got five reps more than last year, so yeah in a way I did.  Now don't get me wrong, I spent more time focusing on getting stronger than I have in a very long time.  This coming from a guy who has been "doing" CrossFit as a programming methodology for fitness for four years.  And to top it all off, I really didn't spend that much time hitting the "met-cons" and just focused on technique. 

Technique for a half a year, what a crazy thought.  Cleans, snatches, squats, presses, etc.  Nothing fancy, reps in the 3-5 scene, no fancy twenty rep maxes (although those can be quite fun).  So the last couple of days I did a personal assessment - what the heck do I want out of all of this?

Sure it's nice to look good on a beach, but that isn't why I do it - nor will it every be.  The thought of being stronger appealed to me and I thought that I had to address dire weaknesses that were in need of remediation.  First and foremost was technique - because in my humble opinion, I don't want to compromise my body position unless I am competing and secondly, I shouldn't be compromising my body position on weights that I was scaling.

Second, I needed, no I wanted, to get stronger!  Through research (including the CrossFit Olympic Lifting Cert), trial and error, 70s big.com and 1 meeting with a lifting coach (thank you Gary Valentine), I took the Wendler Program through 4 months, hit up the Russian Squat Program (6 weeks of back squats - phew!), and attempted very little CrossFit workouts all leading up to the opens.  Now interestingly enough, the weight was not a issue this time, it was the conditioning, that much was apparent on the first Opens WOD.  I was a heaving, blubbering mess by the end of it.

I can say with a very clean conscious that I am happy with where I am currently and where I placed in the CrossFit Opens, cause at the end of the day, I did it for me.

And there is an interesting thought - do it for yourself, not anyone else, or for what anyone else thinks.  Find a reason why you are doing all this.  It is your driver, your reason, and your way to stay on track.  Stay true to yourself, your intensity comes from within when you create that personal bond with your goal.

And in the end, if you gave it your best shot, well CrossFit has been known to do one thing at the end of majority of workouts:

Photo courtesy of http://ericgove.com/

A finished feeling and a sense of accomplishment for everything you just did.

- Coach Tony