Crossfit Brighton 150213

Are you signing up for the Crossfit Open?

Yes

What was your experience from last year's Open?

Last year I did not sign up but I was able to participate in 4 of the open wods. 14.5, the burpee/thruster wod scared the crap out of me to begin with. I set a goal to complete it in 20 mins... That didn't happen, I completed it in 22:46 and it was seriously one of the hardest wods I had ever done. I did it on a Fridaynight and there were only about 7 of us that were there for the wod that night, I was the last one to finish and once I got thru the the 12's I remember 'thinking no more breaks just keep moving'. Because I was last to finish everyone gathered around and cheered me on each rep, my judge Jim Connors keeping me accountable for each rep and telling me to keep moving and Jessica Chaplin reminded me to breath... that's all I remember, and that burpees get hard and monotonous when you do 84 of them. All the others were shouting out various forms of motivation to help me finish it up, that may be closest I have come to dying... Or well at least passing out. It was great!  

What did you gain or learn from participating?

I pushed myself hard on 14.5 and wanted to do well and finish strong even though I did not sign up. I learned that in my current physiological state of conditioning that I had so much more potential and as happy as I was to complete it with an average time, I wanted more, I wanted to do better, move faster, take less breaks and finish faster because the clock couldn't save me, it was do or die. 14.5 ignited a spark inside me to get on point. That's when I started to get more serious about my training and food to fuel my workouts.

Would you recommend others to sign up for this year's Open?

Yes, everyone should do it at least once. It's fun to do the open wods and casually see how you stack up in the box but I think this year because I signed up for the first time it will be exciting to see how I compare to other athletes regionally and nationally. I really like competing so it will be interesting to me to see how the dynamic changes and counts for something on the leaderboard.

If yes, what type of athlete (new, experienced, young, old) should participate?

This year with the addition of the scaled division there really is no excuse to not sign up regardless of where you are at age or skill level. I realize everyone has different goals however the atmosphere of doing an open wod is different then doing a normal wod. We all embrace the suck together and regardless of where you are at, we are all going through it and understand. So just spend the $20 and sign up.