Thursday, January 5, 2012

Put Yourself Out There

Remember that time you tried that really strange food, something you never thought you'd try?  Then once it hit your tongue you ended up loving it and now it's one of your favorite foods?

You would never have experienced that food without trying it.  You took a chance and it worked out.  No harm, no foul.  For me, this experience was sushi, I love it now.  I would eat it all 3 meals a day if I could.

That is Crossfit.  It is something you never thought you could do, but once you try it you find that it's your favorite thing to do.

There are people doing crossfit at my box that I would NEVER have thought I'd see lifting Olympic bars with weights on the end over their head.  Rather than call them all out specifically I'll just call out one.  My wife, digital mustard.  If you saw her walking down the street there is no chance you'd think she was able to do snatches, clean and jerks, sumo dead lift high pulls, etc.  It is AWESOME to see, I smile a little inside every time I see her putting herself out there in a workout.



There is a large group of people that have come in after picking up a groupon and although I'm not the best ambassador in person ( I'm kinda quiet and may seem like I'm ignoring you, but if you come up and talk to me about something I'll open up quickly), I hope to help them any way I can.  I respect anyone willing to put themselves into something they never thought they would do.  If any of the new guys and gals read this, I wish you the best of luck!


If you are thinking about trying crossfit here are some things to expect and why they shouldn't scare you.

1.  Lots of loud noises, grunting, heavy weights being picked up and just dropped.

Imagine the complete opposite of Planet Fitness.
You will not see this sign at Crossfit Boxes (still wipe down your abmat though)

Yes, it's loud.  Yes, there are people grunting.  But EVERYONE there is doing it.  It isn't one musclehead in the corner doing it to look big and tough.  It is the tiny 100lb girl lifting a 35lb bar grunting right next to the monster guy doing 225 lbs (sometimes it's the tiny 100lb girls lifting more than the monster guys).  Everyone is into it, which is comforting cause you won't be the weirdo in the group.

2. Shirtless sweaty dudes 
I think the fact that I hated Ice Man shaped my perception

I saw someone say on facebook that they tend to avoid these type of people at their gym.  I did too.  I used to think that they were douchebags just showing off to attract the ladies at the gym.  I can assure you that they ones doing it at Crossfit are not all douche bags (except for if you have anyone nicknamed fox, he can be a douche  :-P   jk jk).  To be honest, I thought for sure the first time I saw some of these guys that they are dicks who looked down on me cause I could do 1/4 of the weight they did.  I could not have been more wrong.  They all will help you through your crossfit journey.  Whether it be letting you know when you had bad form, help you clean up a bar, or just give you some encouraging words when you need them.  If you're a woman then just enjoy the view and go with it.

Note: Don't play dodgeball against a team of shirtless dudes...they cheat.

3.  The warehouse or garage like facilities. 

The first words out of my mouth when I went to CF610 the first time were "where the eff are we going?"  It was in some sketchy looking building with a truck port.   But that is the beauty of it, you don't need pristine facitilites with mirrors, tv's, and a smoothie bar.  You get a place that has what you need and that is all.  Weights, pull up bars, racks, rings, and rowers.  Simple.  It gets the job done.  To do the "minimum" you get in do a workout and get out.

My other crossfitters, what else should people new to the sport expect? What did you see that scared you the first time you went to CrossFit?

WOD

5 rounds
9 DL
6 Hang Power Snatch
3 OH Squats

Weight 95 lbs
Time: 10:54

I did horrible on this WOD.

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