14.1

THE OPEN IS HERE!

What is the Open you ask? (I imagine I still have about 6 pre-2013 readers who faithfully check my posts hoping I've given up CrossFit. Sorry, not happening, but I'm happy to explain anything and everything CrossFit to you.) The Open is a worldwide 5 week tournament for anyone who wants to pay $20 and get judged doing the weekly workout. The workouts are announced on Thursday nights via live feed on the CrossFit Games website and then we all have until Monday to complete the workout and submit our scores. Last night I got to catch the tail end of Garrett Fisher going head to head with Marcus Hendren at CrossFit North Atlanta. Garrett's hair never moved. It was beautiful.

Now I was thrilled when I saw that 14.1 was 30 double-unders and 15 power snatches at 55#. Double-unders have been my jam as of late and 55# power snatches are lighter than the 65# I handled at Frostbite. I went to bed last night dreaming of unbroken double-unders and made sure I got some rest before my 10 AM WOD.

The wonderful folks at CrossFit Steeltown told me I was welcome to do the Open workout at their facility. I hadn't planned on doing 14.1 in Pittsburgh and didn't have enough clean workout gear with me so I made a stop at Target on the way. I bought a skort, and although adorable, it was a pain in the ass and I ended up tucking it into my waistband. I looked super hot, believe me. I arrived and learned that Dylan would be my judge. Erica, a new member, was also there and she killed a scaled version of 14.1. I am really impressed by her. 

14.1

10 minute AMRAP

30 double-unders

15 power snatched @ 55#

The clock is set, 3-2-1 GO. And I choke on my double-unders. After a few missed starts, I start stringing them along. I do my first set of power snatches as 8 and 7. And then I choked on my double-unders again. SPOILER: This happened every damn round. I split my power snatches into 5 unbroken with a 20 second rest as I had planned and just tried to keep moving. I was audibly telling myself to stop choking on the du's and to get my head in the game. With less than a minute on the clock, I was back to power snatches and cranked out 7. I locked my arms out on that last rep literally with one second on the clock.

I got 172 reps, which comes out to 3 rounds, 30 double-unders, and 7 power snatches. I know that I should feel good about this, but I don't. I have decided not to make a second attempt because I need to rest for my 50K on Sunday and I doubt I will be able to jump after it.

Dylan was a great judge. Thank you so much for spending 14.1 with me!

CrossFit Steeltown

Today I flew to Pittsburgh for work. Once we landed, I picked up my rental car and drove to Target. Then I inhaled a French fry stuffed sandwich at Primanti Bros before heading over to the 4:30 PM WOD at CrossFit Steeltown. I had Googled them while sitting in the swanky Delta terminal at LGA, emailed them from Target, and Tommy, head coach and owner, emailed me back by the time I checked out with my bounty.

We all know I love dropping in at boxes when I am traveling. I get to meet great people and do something that I love with them. I used to like running in cities that I am visiting, but dropping in takes it to another level. And it's too cold to run outside in Pittsburgh right now. Actually, unless I go to CrossFit, I do not plan to leave my hotel until Friday because I am interviewing people in the hotel conference room's, there's a pretty good restaurant, and a legit by hotel standards gym.

Today's workout was 487 meters on the rower. I think they play some under or over game but I got to 509 once I stopped pulling so I guess I lost? Then we learned about external rotation and worked on push-ups. After Frostbite's 20 push-up buy-in and AMDAP's partner clapping push-ups, I am all push-upped out. However, for about 5 reps, I think I finally did push-ups correctly because they felt entirely different and I think that's what Tommy was talking about.