Rest Day
Sorry for the very late post, it was a hectic weekend. The internet at our hotel was terribly slow. Imagine an entire hotel filled with CrossFitters checking the games site, downloading full length videos of the events, updating their blogs, getting on facebook, and yes unfortunately tweeting. Although I must say many of you seemed to be really well kept in the loop thanks to the twit thing.
The day started with the run from hell. It was a terrible 7.1k over rugged steep and in places completely ungroomed trails. Parts of the run were so steep competitors were bear crawling up the hills. I places 50th of the 74 athletes who competed. Then on the deadlift WOD right after the run I busted out a PR deadlift of 415 (previous max was 405). It was only enough to put me in 59th place of 74 competitors. Amazingly enough many of the athletes were able to complete the entire workout reaching the mark of 505! After the first two events the bottom 10 athletes were dropped from competition and unfortunately I was 6th from last. It was a bit disappointing even after getting a big PR in a situation were nobody expected to reach their 1 rep max. The run and the deadlift are the two biggest chinks in my armor and I got slapped with them right out of the gate. The most disappointing part was that the rest of the WODs that day were really awesome and I really wanted a chance to compete in them. But, I have no regrets and no excuses. That is just the way it goes in CrossFit. In CrossFit, eventually everyone's weaknesses will be exposed, and Saturday it was my turn to get the short end of the stick. There were many competitors along the road to the games that had a similar experience, and every year there will be more. Its hard to believe that a 415 deadlift is a weakness, but that's how it goes when you are competing against this years top 74 CrossFitters. I actually ran good too, its just amazing the level of athlete in attendance. A 44th place finish at the Games 2008, 3rd in the region this year and 68th in the Games 2009 is still more than most athletes in this sport can claim, and is just the start of the resume I plan to build. I am going to take a few days of to recover physically and mentally. Then its time to start working on my goats and continue preparing for future competitions.
2009 CrossFit Games, Event 1 – "The Run from Hell" – video [wmv] [mov]
