Hi guys – Coach Ryan here with a bit of a brain dump after completing Open WOD 17.1… for the second time.
I don’t advocate for many people to re-do a CrossFit Open workout because of the increased intensity of the workouts (it means a little bit more), and also because of the quick recovery time required to complete that intense workout AGAIN, and FASTER.
I’d like to explain why I re-did the workout, and put it in terms so you can understand when it might be a good idea for you to do the same. There are three reasons I can think of to re-do an Open WOD:
1. Something went terribly wrong during the workout and affected your performance. Your jump rope broke during Double-unders (it happened to me a few years ago), or you had to make an unexpected bathroom break. You missed a bunch of light Squat Snatches that you usually can hit, or got “no-repped” multiple times because of a technical error. Easy call, do the workout again and make sure that stuff doesn’t happen this time!
2. You had a BAD PLAN going in, or NO PLAN at all. If the workout is Fran, your plan might be to do the whole workout unbroken. But if your all-time max set of Pull-ups is 21, and you try to do 21 straight during a workout, you might have a problem in a minute next time you get back on the bar. Then you watch someone else execute a much better plan, and decide “Easy call, do the workout again with a better plan, and stick to it!”
3. Your performance in the workout was not at all up to your expectations. This was my reason this week, with a little bit of reason #2 mixed in there too. This reason is apparent by that extra sting in your psyche after the pain of the workout has subsided, which is your true self saying to you, “You gave up”, or “What happened to the plan?” In summary, you could have done a lot better, and you know it. Easy call, do the workout again, but here is where it’s not so easy – actually doing better next time.
You probably know what you need to do better, but maybe not how. In short, this week for me came down to listening. If you’re doing a CrossFit Open workout, you hopefully have a coach that is judging and counting your reps, and maybe even other people watching and cheering for you. Guess what they are doing when they are cheering you on and encouraging you? They are saying positive things! Rather than just hearing them as background noise, LISTEN TO THEM and use that positive energy for your workout.
I also decided this time, using Coach Jason’s example when I judged him on Friday morning at 5am, to use a positive mantra. I asked Denee who was judging me to count my reps out loud so I didn’t have to worry about it and with every 5 dumbbell snatches I said quietly to myself “tough”, “focused”, “resilient”, “discipline”, “no regret”. You could use any mantra that means something to you, these are words that I carried away from my SEALFIT experience. Jason’s version during his burpees, another personal favorite, was “not dead”, “can’t quit”. Whatever it is, say it during the toughest part of your workout, mean it, and listen to it. It will keep your head up and keep you moving when that previous version of your workout got weak.
I hope everyone recovers well from 17.1, take care of yourself, and let’s hit this week hard and get ready for 17.2!
Previous Post:
Next Post: