Defiant Wellness

This is my third year participating in the CrossFit Open.

I always seem to make progress even though I do not possess the star power of Rich Froning & Jason Khalipa. It’s close, but I’m not quite there yet.

Every year I find an event, or movement, where I Crash & Burn, and every year I experience a personal victory over the five week period.

This year will be different in that I am not a six-day a week CrossFitter. I now do Olympic lifts two evenings a week, and attend a WOD or Open Gym on the weekend.

Yup, I spend only 4-5 hours working out every week. Guess what, I’m feeling better, and when I do a WOD, I am stronger. Yeah, I may be sucking more wind after a WOD (I hate metcons), but I’m not trashed and sore all week.

I love CrossFit. I enjoy the people and the workouts can be a lot of fun (and they can suck badly too, I hate metcons).

I made the change quite deliberately, because in my enthusiasm, I had abandoned my original goal of wellness, and got sucked into the CrossFit community. I drank the Kool-Aid (insert trademark here).

So I reset my goals and made CrossFit a fun addition to my health regimen, not the main focus.

With that said, I really didn’t know if I was going to do the Open this year. After all, it is easy to get drawn into the excitement. Then CrossFit Games had a reporter call me and ask to interview me about the 2013 Open. It seems that someone at CFHQ had read my blog. (I hope I don’t get sued for all those things I said about Dave Castro)

As my friends read the article, they all laughed and told me that I had to do the games now. I was featured as a success story on the Games page.

I am at a point in my my life where my mere survival is declared success.

Another thing that is different from previous years, is announcement night. Last year several of us would get together for dessert and watch the events unfold on a huge screen. We’d all moan in disgust when the WODs were announced. We’d second guess ourselves, we’d strategize. But mostly we all laughed and encouraged one another, and that always overflowed onto the gym floor on Saturday morning.

This year, though we keep in touch, work and family and relocations have disrupted our little team. So I was unable to meet my friends for whine and dessert. Also, I had been graciously offered a last minute ticket to attend the Open Announcement at Reebok One in Canton Thursday morning. But I had too many business commitments to extricate myself from, so I had to pass. I got out of work in time to make it to Barbell Club and watch the events unfold on the gym TV.

For the first time, I wasn’t rattled by the announcement. That does not mean I will smoke this event. But it does mean that I am confident that I am going into the WOD knowing I am capable of performing the movements at the prescribed weights for Masters Men 60+. Since this year I have a choice to do Rx or Scaled, I reviewed both WODs. I chose Rx, not because I am some kind of macho stud, but because I can do the moves. I don’t care if I only get one round, I can perform the movements as prescribed, so I will not sandbag.

Make no mistake, if I felt unsafe or inept at a movement, I would not be embarrassed to opt for Scaled. I suspect that I will be faced with that choice in the upcoming weeks.

After the announcement, my Android Tablet overheated as Facebook Forums ranted about the WOD and what played to who’s strengths or weaknesses. Questions flew about the issue of Rx vs. Scaled. And of course there were some people who wanted to gripe about Dave Castro. By noontime on Friday, a handful of Masters had begun reporting their results. Some rejoiced and some lamented.

For those of us taking note, we were being given nuggets of wisdom to implant into our personal strategies, thus arming us for success on Saturday morning.

So where do I expect to be on Saturday morning? Well, Toes-to-Bar is going to tax me greatly, since I cannot string them together. Last year, I was able to pull off 25 in just under 10 minutes. This year, I have only nine minutes, and I need to complete 30, plus the deadlifts and snatches, to complete 2 rounds. Having to mount the bar for every T2B (doing singles) will eat up the clock, and energy. My hands ripped last year, so I will tape them this year.

To pull off two complete rounds, doing singles T2B, I would have to do them at a rate of 5-6 per minute. That’s one complete cycle every 10-12 seconds. That would only leave three minutes for Deadlifts and Snatches, including transition time and failed reps. With these handicaps, 2 complete rounds in nine minutes would be a major accomplishment for this old man, but that is what I am aiming for.

For the second part of the WOD, max Clean and Jerk…

…I suck at Clean and Jerk, and my arms will be trashed. I will have six minutes, so I will take my time setting up the bar to allow some rest time to catch my breath. I’ll start at 65-70% to see what’s left in the tank. Then I’ll add from there. I’ll be shocked it I can get 95-105 overhead after the first part.

That’s what I’m forecasting for now, so if I get two full cycles on Part 1 that’s 60, and 100 on C&J…

If I can break 150 points I will be a happy camper and I will view my first outing of the 2015 Open a success.

My next post will be my post mortem. Well, hopefully not my post-mortem, but more specifically a post-mortem of my performance on 15.1. Good Luck to all the athletes performing this weekend.

Be Defiant! Be Well!