Adrianna Weir: A Gift To Myself

Two years ago, I was sick. I was told by my doctor that I could no longer run like I was (about 7 – 8 miles a day), so I went to the internet to find something to do at the gym. After putting “workouts” into google, crossfit.com came up. The workout was an AMRAP I was confident I could complete, but it totally left me gassed. Through doing Crossfit, eating paleo, and working with my health care team, I was able to pull out of my illness and get back into running. I continued to do Crossfit on my own at a commercial gym for two years when I wasn’t running for the cross country team, but after my second year of running, I decided to call it quits. It wasn’t a healthy activity for me, and I’ve been doing Crossfit ever since. I finally joined Catalyst as soon as I graduated, the membership and OnRamp was my graduation gift to myself.
My impression of Catalyst never really changed. As soon as I walked through the doors, everyone introduced themselves when they saw me, and made an effort to get to know me. I remember my third day on my own, someone said “Oh it’s you, the new girl!” It just stands out to me so much, because that’s basically Catalyst – everyone knows each other so well, and the community is so close, that new people are recognized immediately and everyone makes an effort to involve them. That was how I was greeted, and it hasn’t changed yet!
The cause of my greatest improvement was the attitude of the gym. The focus is not on appearance, or competition, or comparison, but on self-improvement. Your goal is respected, no matter what it is – a PR is a PR, be it 5 or 30 pounds. Every coach knows your goal, and they work hard to help you achieve it every time you step into the gym. Green Army has also been a huge help as well!
I’m working on body weight skills and gymnastics. I am a very clumsy and uncoordinated person, so it has been a unique challenge – and probably pretty entertaining to watch.
My favorite memory has to be Fight Gone Bad on the first Sunday morning after my OnRamp. Charity told me to come out and try it, and I jumped into the last heat. I loved the environment and the challenge – I kept the piece of paper Linda Clargo wrote my score on! A big second has to be every Summer League event – that has been awesome too!