QUICK ANNOUNCEMENTS: 
SATURDAYS AT 8AM added to class schedule starting this week.  More class schedule additions coming Monday.
Competitor Program meeting this FRIDAY AT 5PM.  More details posted tomorrow. 
Essay contest results will be announced soon.  You guys wrote a lot of words and we want to read every one.  Also, Nicole has cried reading almost every essay, so it’s taking awhile to get through them.  We apologize for the delay.

Press
3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3
on :45 seconds rest
then
Deadlift
3-3-3-3-3-3-3
2 min rest

A Better Rep.

As many of you know, I spent a good bit of time over the past two and a half months preparing myself for regionals.  Double sessions, going in before and after work, meticulously preparing my every meal (yes Eric, we can eat some different meals now), avoiding crap food and situations that would lead to a poor nights sleep, and working my weaknesses to a pulp was pretty much the norm.  Approaching this weekend I felt more confident and prepared than I have ever felt for a regional competition (and this would be my fourth).

Then came the first workout – Diane.  I had set myself on a 4:39 performance – sub 5:00 for sure.  One set into the 15s and I was fatigued almost to failure and doing sets of 2 & 3 handstand push-ups.  I stayed focused but knew the outcome would be somewhat tragic – 8:16 was my time.  Just two weeks earlier I had done the workout almost 2:00 minutes faster.  

As I walked off the floor and disappointment started to build-up inside, my coach looked at me and said, “You have 4:00 minutes to be disappointed – and then we move on.”  Sure I was disappointed but I didn’t know how to be upset, I had given everything I had in that workout and couldn’t make sense of any of it.  And what did that mean for how the rest of the weekend would go for me?

That’s when the Regionals Demons of 2011 entered my head…

In 2011 I started regionals in a similar situation – with a performance that was so far off the mark that it devastated me.  It devastated me to the point that I completely shut down for the rest of the weekend.  I was embarrassed, I felt like I had let so many people down, and I let it affect every ounce of the competitor inside me.  I reached the workout now known as the 100s and saw it as my ticket out of there as in my head there was no way I could move on to day 3.  As I sat there doing the overhead squats, I kept thinking to myself how much I didn’t want to be there.  I shut down – I quit.

That experience, my resulting performances during that weekend, and my reaction to the situation has stuck with me for an ENTIRE YEAR.  It’s one of those deep dark experiences that takes my breath away every time I think about it because I am so disappointed in myself.  It’s not how my parents taught me to react to a less than optimal experience, it’s not the person Eric loves, and it’s certainly not the person I wanted to be or wanted my athletes to be.

A little research into that weekend showed me that had I given just a little more in the 100s workout I would have made it to day 3 and who knows where I could have placed.  But I was so consumed with my poor performance and what I thought every other athlete could do that I counted myself out mentally before the show even got going.

Flash forward to 1:00 minute after Diane and I realized that I was in the same exact situation as last year…

Could this really be happening again?  Yes Nicole, it actually did happen again.  Am I just really not cut out for this? Am I a has been athlete who understands the intricacies of CrossFit and its method but just really can’t hang anymore?  Do I love my sport but my sport has passed me by?  Should I just stick to coaching?

I had to decide – I could let this first performance beat me down and let the flood of negative thoughts consume my brain or I could move on and make the most of the remainder of the weekend.

And that’s when I made the conscious decision to react differently this time.  I was going to make the absolute most of every workout and crawl myself back to the top ten.

The next workout was nothing but motivating.  Sitting on my erg and looking across the floor to a crew of Roots athletes there to cheer me on made the difference.  I would go for it and leave it all out there.  The weaknesses I worked to a pulp died a quick death as I hang power cleaned 135 pounds with (sort of) ease.  The dumbbell snatch workout that took me 15:00 on Tuesday but which I practiced those damn DB high pulls religiously every other day for the past two weeks – that came together nicely in 7:24.  My perception that “I’m not good at barbell complex stuff” disappeared when I took 4th in WOD4.

For many, our perception of CrossFit is that it will make us fit, but it will do so much more.  Greg Glassman, the founder of CrossFit, once said, “the greatest adaptation to CrossFit takes place between the ears.”  And it’s true.  My decision to learn from my past experience and create a different outcome this year was more than I can gain from any backsquat or muscle-up – but it is CrossFit and its community that creates the environment for this type of mental magic to take place.

A huge thank you to everyone who came out this weekend, sent emails, showed support, and gave me high fives and hugs.  

I love CrossFit, I love my athletes, and I love that everyday we have a chance to do a better rep than the day, or year, before.