Well guys, 19.5 came down hard on us all like a ton of bricks, and we did what we could to manage a massive amount of thrusters and pull-ups. Some of our hands might never recover, and I’m sure there’s psychological damage from that many thrusters — everyone’s most hated exercise!
What’s great about the Open is it allows us to get into competition mode on an annual basis, if only with ourselves. We get to see what we can do when we feel like the workout really counts for something, and practice turning that intensity knob up a little bit more than we do on a “regular Friday” in the gym.
Maybe more importantly, we get to see what we did relatively well at, and what we kind of sucked at, compared to our peers. We all have a sense for this already, but the Open has a way of exposing the holes in our CrossFit game, which is to say our fitness.
I, specifically, did well with strict gymnastics and upper-body pulling movements (pull-ups, muscle-ups), and not as well with lower-body stamina work like weighted step-ups and… what did we do last week? Oh yeah, 105 thrusters! In the first workout with wallballs and rowing, I felt very comfortable on the rower and eventually VERY uncomfortable with the high-rep wallballs adding up.
My gameplan to develop more lower-body (and core) stamina is to do CrossFit. However, rather than leaning in with intensity on the workouts that I feel that I can do very well on though, I am going to turn up my “get after it” meter on the suck-fest workouts that involve high-rep squats, weighted carries, lunges, all the good stuff that usually slows me down during a long workout. My next personal challenge is a 50-mile ruck around DC in May, so 2 times per week I am also going to ruck (currently Wednesday and Saturday/Sunday), which will replace my workout those days so that I can concentrate on training for the event.
Hopefully those of you that competed in the Open (or even if you just did the workouts in class) can honestly look back and make an assessment of your performance. Great job on your strengths! Now let’s get back to work on our weaknesses. What’s your plan to address your weaknesses? How can you incorporate a regular CrossFit regimen into your plan, perhaps with a specific focus toward certain workouts or types of movements? Is there a challenge looming out there that you could train for to stay motivated in working on your weakness, and turn it into a strength?
I hope everyone had a great time with the CrossFit Open this year. It is always an exciting, even emotional time for all of us because we know that we’re going to be put to the test. Let’s all rededicate ourselves to training those weaknesses so that when the time comes again, we’re ready!
Ryan
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