Power Clean 3-3-3-3-3-3
Then: 100 Pullups for time.
BELOW: a terrific article submission by Mel Rose!
Finding my Own Crossfit Voice
After a summer of training at
Catalyst, I moved back to Kuwait to continue my teaching job. I also
took on the task of continuing Crossfit solo. The gym I go to here
isn’t anything like a crossfit gym at ALL, so I’ve had to make some
sacrifices and get creative. I don’t have Metallica blasting in the gym
every workout, and I don’t have someone there to tell me that my squats
aren’t low enough, and I don’t have someone to push mto do one more
round, one more rep. I have to imagine what someone else would be
telling me.
I’m playing rugby again, and I have the luxury of
having a coach at practices, leading the team through drills, fitness,
and offering advice and tips. But I still have a few other voices in
the back of my head.
In all the laps of the field, a voice in my
head yelled “don’t cut the corners!”; during the last thrusters of
Fran, a voice in my head yelled “come on, get it up there!”; during the
last few laps to finish off Murph, a voice yelled “keep going! Don’t
stop now!”; in the last 50 meters of the 500m row, a voice told me to
“push with your legs, PUSH!!”; and during the max deadlifts, a voice
was yelling “QUICK UP!!” at me. For the first 2 months of being here
and tackling Crossfit WODs on my own, that voice sounded a lot like the
voices that would yell at me at Catalyst: Chris, Ty, Michelle, Carolle,
anyone else that happened to be yelling at me.
Today was a
little bit different. I started Annie with the 50 double unders. Chris
was yelling at me in my head as I was imagining the other crossfitters
linking double under after double under and I was in a race against
them. Chris was yelling at me as I took my time getting to the mat for
sit ups. He continued to yell at me as I struggled through the 40
double unders and took a few seconds to breath during the 40 situps. He
took a break from during the 30 double unders and 30 sit ups because
they were decent enough I suppose.
But as I linked all 20
double unders, flew through 20 sit ups, then linked the last 10 double
unders and hammered out the final 10 sit ups during the last couple
rounds of Annie, that voice in my head started to sound a little like
my own. As I wandered over to the pull up bar to continue to fight my
battle with pull ups, that voice in my head started to sound a lot like
my own.
I discovered my own Crossfit voice. The voice that I
hear every day as I teach and encourage my students was now talking to
me. Don’t get me wrong, I need the motivation of the others to push
through, to get to that point where I’m down to the basics and only I
can help myself. The only way I am going to go faster is if I make
myself go faster. The others will keep cheering on the side, but it’s
my own legs that will keep skipping that rope, my own abs that will
pull myself off the floor; my own arms that will pull my body up to
that damn bar; and my own voice in my head that will bring me through
to the finish.