I started CrossFit last year right before the Open and was not ready to sign up to test myself in many things I had never even heard of yet. This year I signed up on Day 1. Excited to be a part of the first step in the selection process to the fittest in the world. I have no illusions about being that person but it will be a fun ride.
15.1 & 15.1A
15.1 –
9 Min AMRAP
15 TTB
10 Deadlifts 115#
5 Snatch 115#
15.1A –
6 Min to establish a max Clean & Jerk
The scaned version for week one used hanging knee raises in place of TTB and lighter weight. I did it scaled first and got 188 reps and 140 Clean & Jerk. I was bummed that I didn’t go into it with a plan on how I wanted the C&J to progress in weights and I knew I could have gotten a better lift. My grip got complelty fried on this one. I’d never been to the point that I wasn’t sure if I could hang onto the bar. And the first C&J it was like I couldn’t feel the bar, wasn’t sure it was going to come off the ground.
Redid it on Sunday and did it Rx to see what I could do. I didn’t like any TTB but instead did singles so I could move along at a good pace. 115 snatch is relatively heavy for me and after chasing the first one around for a secone I did okay with the rest. 100 Reps.
The Clean and Jerk went much better and I hit 165, Just 10 shy of my max at that time. This is the score I went with and we will see where things go from here.
15.2
In 3 minutes do 10 OHS / 10 C2B / 10 OHS / 10C2B. If completed at 3 minutes, you have 3 more minutes to do 12’s. So on and so forth until you don’t finish a round.
Another fun Friday Night Lights at College Hill CrossFit tonight.
I thought about doing scaled when this workout came out but I pushed to to Rx. The 10 OHS weren’t too bad. Now, going into this workout I’d only recently learned I could do a Chest to Bar pull-up. I had done 4 total, EVER. In the workout I doubled that number and finished with 8. After 8 they just went and I couldn’t get another one. Progress is made and I know that I need to work on the kip for these to get more efficient with them. My score of 18 isn’t anything to write home about but it will help me track future progress with this workout and other Open tests as well. Seeing some of the competitors at the gym, especially the ladies put up such awesome results is really inspiring. These ladies put in the wrk late every night because they also have jobs and they continue to kick ass.
Bring on 15.3!
15.3
14 Min AMRAP
7 Muscle Ups
50 Wall Balls
100 Double Unders
Scaled Option is:
50 Wall Balls
200 Singles
Seems like this is a polarizing workout. Lots of people upset that Muscles Ups are in the beginning. The way I see it, maybe you don’t want to do “scaled” but if you went Rx in any competition you should expect to see Muscle Ups in it, at least in the finals. If the point of the open is to test the community as a whole, and get the very best athletes to regionals, then this workout will do it.
Last year Muscle Ups were only in the end of 14.4’s chipper. People could get there, get through those and get back to the start. People may have been able to motor through the other movements and get the MU’s but still be weak at them. There won’t be any hiding from weaknesses here.
All that being said, I am not really looking forward to this workout. It’s going to be A LOT of wallballs and jump rope. My calves are a little tender from the running and DU practice this week. I will be missing out on Friday night lights to cheer on UVA in the ACC Tournament Semi-Finals so I’ll hit the workout tomorrow and see what happens.
15.3 Workout
Saturday 3/14 was the day that I did 15.3. I was a little worried about the workout because of all the jump rope practice my calves were still a little sore and I just knew it was going to be a lot of wall balls. I honestly wasn’t really mentally ready to tackle this workout. After warming up the wall balls I almost decided to push the workout by a day and do it on Sunday but I wanted to get it done.
At 3-2-1 Go I grabbed the wall ball and had a plan of doing the wall balls in 10’s and the jump rope in 50’s. The plan went well for the entire first round and after 40 wall balls the 2nd time I did 2 sets of 5’s. The jump rope took a little bit longer on the second round. I started to feel my calves burning during the second round of wall balls and was a little worried but kept moving. I did the 3rd set of wall balls in sets of 5’s and it was getting tough. Had a couple of minutes left and went to 25’s on the single unders and broke a few times. It was really hard to get going again each time but thankfully I had some friends shouting at me nearby. I wasn’t fast but without them there and Mason, my judge, pushing me forward I wouldn’t have gotten as far as I did. I did 191 of the next 200 singles and finished with 741 reps.
I briefly thought about hitting the workout again to try and finish that round but decided that would be crazy. I’m pleased with my effort on this one and am ready to see what will be revealed with 15.4.
15.3 Other Thoughts –
I was really surprised to see a few things. First was the amazing amount of people who pushed themselves to get their first and next muscle ups. That was so awesome.
The bad part was how many people were so upset with the scaled options if they didn’t have muscle ups. The Open has many purposes as I eluded to earlier and one of those is to get the best athletes to regionals. Another will be to help give you new goals for the next year. Maybe more folks like myself will add a goal of getting some muslce ups in the next year. I’m glad that
15.4
8 Min AMRAP of Hand Stand Push Ups / Cleans
3/3
6/3
9/3
12/6
etc
Another one I’d be doing scaled. The scaled workout was still plenty tough.
10 Push Press at 95# / 10 Cleans at 115# – also 8 min AMRAP.
The Open show introduced a new standard for HSPU’s and that caught a lot of people by surprise.
For my workout I got 85 reps which I was okay with but not really happy. Didn’t want to redo it. After about half way i could feel my wrist with each clean. And while I know it isn’t going to get injured, it still hurts. And gets in my head. I need to keep working on it and move past that. It was also a workout that gassed me quicker than i thought it would. Those push presses were no fun!
Many in our box struggled with the HSPU’s and I’m certain that is something that a lot of people will continue to work on and turn it into a strengh over the next year.
My exciting news was that I got back into a Handstand position. First time since my injury. That was cool, I tried doing a push up but I can’t lower myself down that far. And I tried using dumbells so I wouldn’t be on my fingertips on my left hand but that hurt worse.
I’ll adapt, and keep working on it.
The best part of this open for me was seeing my friend Andy, PR his clean and get 185 done. He got 12 reps of this RX and that was awesome. A 20# PR and some funny stories to go with it. Like his chest looking like it was mauled by a tiger from the catch of the clean.
I’m ready to see what the final week of the open brings and see some more people astonish themselves with what they are capable of.
Hilled It 