2016 Crossfit Open in Pictures

16.1

16.2

16.3

16.4

16.5

15.5

It's all over, red rover! I was terrified of this workout and I stupidly went and watched the throwdown between the Gladstone and Tannum crews which only made me more scared.  I even thought of giving it a miss but I wanted to finish on a high.

I decided to split my reps up into 9's for the 27 set but thought that may be a bit ambitious so did 3 sets of 5 and then 3 sets of 4.  I split the other rounds into sets of 3.  I tried to keep my row above 700 cals/hr.

As you can see above, my time was 17:25.  It is not a great time but considering the amount of exercise I've done in the last few months I'm not unhappy with it.  I was actually really pleased with how I went in this WOD, not once did I stop believing that I could do it ... I may have been slow but I tried to keep moving as much as I could.  I'm also really happy with how I have pulled up.  After each of the other Open WODs I have been barely able to walk or bend over, today I feel great.  There is some tightness there but it is not worse than it has been and after 72 thrusters and 72 calories on the row I would expect to have some muscle tightness.

15.4

I have been given the okay by the physio to get back into Crossfit more regularly although I'm not sure if he meant doing an Open workout but I chose to give it a crack and do what I could without being stupid.

The scaled version was:

10 push press (30kg)
10 cleans (35 kg)

I warmed up slowly and was comfortable with the push press but couldn't clean 35 kg.  When it came to the workout itself my body just gave up and I couldn't even clean the 30 kg required for the push press.  I then proceeded to spend nearly 8 minutes trying to build the weight up to get to 30 kg again.  It's like my muscles fatigue and I can't lift the weight anymore.

Anyway, I ended up with a score of 6 at 30 kg (I did a few rounds at a lighter weight).  In hindsight, I shouldn't have registered for the Open at all this year.  I've only been doing a few reps in the workouts so haven't been getting what I should out of the workouts ... I should be scaling further and getting more reps out.  I am looking forward to the Open being over and I can focus more on building my strength back up again.

Sigh ...

I have been feeling flat and a little lost.  I work with a bunch a people who are stressed and, well, negative which I cope alright with normally as I have the gym and home to balance it all out but without the gym I'm out of whack and I feel like I'm losing my mojo.  I have decided to go to the 4:30 class this afternoon and do my mobility there and cheer on the people who are doing the Open workout today ... I need to be surrounded by that positivity and the hopefully feed off the high from the people doing 15.3.

15.3

Maybe because I won't be doing this WOD I'm enjoying being a fly on the wall and watching people having a meltdown over this workout.  It may have been different if I was doing it.  I think it is a great way of separating the field as not everyone has muscle ups and a lot of people are complaining about having to scale with the scaling option eliminating the muscle ups and doing single unders instead of double unders.  Personally I find it hard to do singles now that I have learnt to doubles but that's part of the fun.

I'm Out

It's time to have a break.  No more Crossfit until my back is better.  No picking and choosing WODs because it seems every movement aggravates my back.  No Open because I have pushed a little too far both weeks and came out the other side of the workout in agony.  The positive is that it is muscular and with rest, rolling and stretching I'll recover and will recover quickly.  At the moment, I get to the point where I'm only a week off getting better and I hurt it again ... it is time to get it better, not nearly there but totally better and then work from there.

Ouch!

We had a throwdown yesterday for 15.2.  I initially wasn't going to do it but my name was put down by the coaches so I figured I may as well get it out of the way and at least by doing it in the afternoon I would be able to get a lot more mobility done.

I was incredibly nervous about doing the squat and I was worried that it was going to set me back, my recovery has been going well.  I warmed up and I wasn't feeling confident with the weight but I felt like it was too late to back out and I didn't want to let my teammates down (we have a little in-house competition going).

Once the workout started I managed to get a few squats out and then it went to shit.  I was in a bit of pain and I just couldn't get my final reps out ... and then I burst into tears.  I couldn't do it, it was hurting way too much.  I picked the weight up and got through the reps.  In the dying seconds I got the 6 pull ups out of the way.  12 reps, I was so disappointed.  I know that I did what I could but I'm frustrated that I can't do what I want to be able to do.

The worst part is that straight afterwards I was in a LOT of pain, even now I can barely get up from a seated position.  In hindsight it was pretty stupid to have done the workout at all.  I'm also thinking that after the Open I may cancel my membership for a little while and just give my body a break.

15.2 = 14.2

I currently have my sad face on ... 15.2 has just been announced and it is a repeat of 14.2, the WOD that I got a big, fat goose egg!  So much for going RX'd :'(

Scaled is 20kg OHS and chin ups which I think is a stretch for newbies.

I know what I'll be doing all weekend and that's plenty of mobility work!

RX'd or Scaled?

The Open this year has a scaled division which is fantastic for those of us who don't have some movements like muscle ups, handstand push ups etc.  My goal for the Open is to attempt RX'd until I can't do a movement and have to scale.  The scoring system is set up so RX'd will always be ranked higher than scaled; even if you only do 1 rep.  My 25 reps on Saturday ensured that I was above anyone doing the Open scaled and it has been quitegood for my overall ranking as a lot of people have decided to do scaled instead of attempting RX'd.

The thing I love about the Open is that I do movements that I don't normally do in a workout and toes to bar is one of them.  I was proud of doing 45 of them and all good reps, I didn't get 1 no-rep which is a vast improvement on last year.  I didn't do the WOD with the rest of the class so I don't know what the discussion were on the Monday when everyone else did the workout but I noticed the majority of the people who are around my level scaled the workout and a lot of them are capable of doing toes to bar so, like me, they would be able to register a score at RX'd.  They got massive numbers which is great but it kind of feels like it is just another workout, that they weren't pushed outside their comfort zone to attempt to achieve something they didn't believe they could.

Now I'm confused.  Which is better; to scale and get great numbers or to RX'd, get a low score but see what you are capable of (even if that means failing dismally)?  As I wasn't in the classes I can only assume that they were instructed to scale or did they make that choice themselves?  Will I be advised to scale in the future?

15.1

This is the Open WOD 15.1.  I was stoked when I saw it as I knew I could register a score even if it was just the toes-to-bar.  I had to do this one early as I was heading away for the weekend.  I have been ordered by the physio to not do any major lifts so my plan was to do the toes-to-bar, maybe do the deadlift and then change the workout from there.  I would then do the clean and jerk at a low weight.

I spoke to my coaches prior to the workout and came up with a plan.  I would do 1 round of t2b and deadlifts, change the snatches to push press from there I would continue with t2b, single leg deadlift with the kettlebell to work on my glutes and stabilizers and push press.  I was happy to get 83 reps all up with 25 of those as my registered score.

I then went onto my clean and jerk and finished with a weight of 32.5 kg.  I was in a lot of pain at the end.  I didn't realise how much toes to bar uses the hips and glutes, I guess I should as it uses the kipping motion.  The deadlifts hurt ... a lot and I was doing them in single.  The single leg ones were fine.  The clean and jerk was painful as well.  I was finding it hard to move afterwards.  The plan is to rest again for the rest of this week and only go in if the workout is okay.  I'll head in this afternoon as it is strict press and push press with Annie as a finisher.

	2015
	Individual		Masters 40 – 45
	World	Australian	World	Australian
Week 1	50883	3735	4610	376

The Day Before

The Open WOD 15.1 gets announced tomorrow.  I'm meant to be doing it at 6:30 pm as I will be away this weekend (heading to Brissy with the girls to see Wicked).  I haven't trained since Monday and only trained once last week (on Monday).  I've been ordered by the physio to pick and choose my workouts, I'm not to do much lifting and not high volume lifting ... I haven't gone into the gym because everyday it's something I can't do whether it be snatches, thrusters or wall balls.  I go back to the physio today and I may be able to slowly ease back into it.  I'm not sure if doing an Open workout will be easing back into it but I guess we'll see what the WOD is and go from there.

The pain in my back seems to have travelled down and now it's the L5 and glutes that are playing up.  It is possible that this was the root of all my problems from the start.  Every therapist (and I've seen a couple of massage therapists over the last couple of months as well as the physio) have been treating the middle back as that was the tightest spot but it was compensating for further down.  Now that that part has been fixed the real issue has presented itself.  The break has been good for it.  I have been walking and doing all my mobility work and glute activation stuff Tia has given me and it does feel better but not 100%.  I hope I can do the workout tomorrow.

Oops, I Did It Again!

Yes, I've registered for the Open.  I'm looking forward to this year as I feel some pressure has been taken off.  The reason for this?  We can scale workouts this year.  Of course, that means that it will affect our scores but we won't be taken off the leaderboard - from what I understand we will be given a score of less anyone doing RXD.  I'm happy with that.  It will be interesting to see what the workouts will be; does it mean more complex movements?  Quite possible, but again I'm okay with that.

Now to get those darn muscles in my back to play nice so I can be in tip-top shape for the first workout.

Here are the rest:

I picked up some calculation errors on 14.1, so here is the new and improved table:

14.1
	Average Reps Worldwide	Average Reps CFG	Total Reps	Total Number of Double Unders	Total Number of Snatches	Total Weight Lifted (kg)
Male	217	244	7305	5026	2279	79390
Female	180	203	7094	4902	2192	54800
Overall	203	222	14399	9928	4471	134190

14.2
	Average Reps Worldwide	Average Reps CFG	Total Reps	Total Number of OHS	Total Number of Pull Ups	Total Weight Lifted (kg)
Male	86	93	2777	1467	1310	60735
Female	44	34	1130	656	474	19680
Overall	66	62	3907	2123	1784	80415

14.3
	Average Reps Worldwide	Average Reps CFG	Total Reps	Total Number of Deadlifts
Male	110	111	3332	1861
Female	102	95	3121	1693
Overall		102	6453	3554

	Total Number of Box Jumps	Total Weight Lifted (kg)	Number of Inches Jumped
Male	1471	156000	31676
Female	1428	117975	28560
Overall	2899	273975	60236

14.4
	Average Reps Worldwide	Average Reps CFG	Total Reps	Total Calories Rowed	Total Number of T2B
Male	168	172	4299	1500	1236
Female	138	116	3937	2040	1211
Overall		140	8236	3540	2447

	Total Number of Wall Balls	Total Number of Cleans	Total Number of Muscle Ups	Total Weight of Wall Balls	Total Weight of Cleans
Male	942	549	72	8478	34081.5
Female	495	184	7	2970	8280
Overall	1437	733	79	11448	42361.5

14.5
	Average Reps Worldwide	Average Reps CFG	Total Time	Total Number of Thrusters	Total Number of Burpees	Total Weight Lifted (kg)
Male	19:34:00	18:57:00	379:15:00	1680	1680	74340
Female	20:56:00	26:37:00	915:33:00	2604	2604	78120
Overall	20:36:00	23:37:00	1294:48:00	4284	4284	152460

I think we did pretty well if you compare our results with the world averages.

More Fun With Numbers

What can I say ... I love playing around with spreadsheets and numbers!

I have done up some stats from the Open but this time with the CFG results.  The first one is just basic personal data which isn't entirely accurate as a lot of people  don't enter their height and weight.

	Number of Competitors	Age	Height	Weight
Female	36	27.8	167.3	62
Male	32	29.3	180.4	85.1
Overall	68	28.5	174.7	76.1

The following table was one of the easier ones as the weights and rep range remained the same throughout the whole workout:

14.1
	Average Reps	Total Reps	Total Number of Double Unders	Total Number of Snatches	Total Weight Lifted (kg)
Male	244	7305	4875	2430	85045
Female	203	7094	4739	2355	58875
Overall	222	14399	9614	4785	143920

Final Stats

Here are my final placings taken from the Custom Leaderboard feature which accounts for scores of 0:

	Individual Worldwide	Individual Australia	Masters 40-44 Worldwide	Masters Australia
Placing	58660	4622	5154	412

This is my overall ranking for each week:

I am also able to see where I placed for each workout.

I was pretty happy with how consistent I was throughout the 5 weeks with the exception of Week 2.  I'm also pleased that I'm not as bad as I think I am and while I came in the bottom 50 percentile I'm definitely not the worst athlete.

All Over Red Rover

That's it, the Open is done for another year.  I decided last night to go back to the box to cheer on a few of the other girls as they did 14.5.  I was asked to judge while I was there and feel blessed to be able to do so.  What I witnessed were 2 women who had to overcome self doubt and were so far from their comfort zone both mentally and physically.  There were tears and failed reps but they picked up the bar and they thrustered and burpeed until that final rep.  I had goosebumps each time they brought themselves back from the brink of giving up and one of the girls would give a warrior yell each time she pushed that weight overhead.  I hope they realise that what they did last night was incredibly inspirational. 

I Did It!!!!

I have to say that 14.5 nearly broke me but at the same time it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.  I didn't care about my time, what was important was getting through the reps and if that meant only doing a couple of reps at a time then so be it.

There were so many times I wanted to quit but I slowly chipped away at the reps.  As I was worried about jumping over the bar I actually stood to the side of the bar and jumped over the end.  It is such a mental thing for me and jumping over the bar in between the plates makes me feel trapped whereas jumping over the end, while it's higher it makes me feel safer.  I was stoked that I cleared the bar with plenty of room to spare.

During the WOD I felt like crying because I was hurting and struggling mentally, after the WOD I felt like crying because I was so proud that I pushed my way through such a tough workout.  How I'm feeling right at this moment is why I Crossfit ... I have such a sense of accomplishment that I have never experienced in the gym training by myself.  The fact that I had people cheering for me and encouraging me throughout the workout is why I keep going back.  My 6 am crew is like family to me ... we see each other at our best and worst and we always help each other during the toughest times.  Love this sport!

Nooooooo!

I'm currently in total meltdown mode.  For some reason before I registered for the Open I started practicing bar facing burpees at home because I felt like they would show up at some point ... I wasn't going to sign up until I could do them.  I then forgot about that and signed up anyway.

I should've listened to my gut and either practiced more or not registered because now they have come up AND this time I won't be cut off if I can't do something.  Here is the workout:

Workout 14.5

For time
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps of:
Thrusters, 95 / 65 lb.
Burpees

I thought about using the 2.5 kg weights to make up the 30 kg bar which would give me a smaller target to jump over but, alas, the standards say that the target needs to be 9.5" high.  The thing is I can jump that with room to spare but I have tripped in the past and I'm terrified to the point of crying.  What will happen when fatigue sets in?  What will happen if I freeze and my mind won't allow me to jump?  This is 1 WOD that I'm actually thinking of skipping so I don't make a fool out of myself.

Week 4 Stats

	2014
	Individual		Masters 40 – 45
	World	Australian	World	Australian
Week 1	44806	3899	3606	314
Week 2	60145	4990	5262	424
Week 3	58989	4760	5183	424
Week 4	58482	4650	5135	418
Overall	81024	6671	7741	636

Last year I was booted out in Week 4 and I didn't realise that I could still see my rankings via the Custom Leaderboard feature.  Unfortunately this means I have no statistics for Week 4 and 5 of last year's Open and can't compare against this year.  Instead I have graphed my rankings for this year.  It is such a shame that I had a crappy week 2 because all my other weeks have been fairly consistent.

I have to say that I have really enjoyed the Open this year.  There are more people around my level doing it this year as opposed to 'the guns' and 1 or 2 others.  Last year was great and I'm so incredibly proud of myself for doing it but there were times when I thought that I was out of my element.  This year has been fun and it has been a blast to judge and cheer everyone on.

For me, it is a big deal to sign up and have everyone see my score and how I compare to other people in my box as well as in Australia and the world.  I could have easily not registered and still attempt the WODs as RXD or even scaled ... there would have been less pressure but it has been good for me to move out of my comfort zone.

The funny thing for me is that my proudest moment in this Open has been Week 2.  It's odd that a WOD I got 0 reps for in 3 attempts is what I'm most proud of but it made me realise that when things are tough I don't give up even if it means failing over and over again.