CrossFit Total

The CrossFit Total is the sum of the best of three attempts at the squat, the press, and the deadlift. The first attempt would be a weight you know you can do for a heavy set of three. The second attempt would be a weight you know without any doubt that you could do for a single, having just done the first attempt. And the third attempt is the weight you want to do, based on your performance on the previous two attempts. -Mark Rippetoe

Basically, you max out your weight with the three movements mentioned above.

Shoulder press is my worst move, since my upper body is weaker than my lower body. My max today: 80#. PR’d 15#

Deadlift, deadlift, deadlift. I’ve been beating myself up lately about body weight deadlifts. One Saturday in the near past, I tried the prescribed weight (body weight) and got through 2 sets of 14 before I felt I should drop weight because my back felt tight. Ten pounds off and it was better. And I felt like a wimp. The WOD took me 10 minutes longer than everyone else, and I had to drop weight. When finished, I went to the bathroom and cried. Nice.

Deadlift max today: 205#. PR’d 40#

Without encouragement from my fellow Crossfitters I never would have even imagined I could’ve tried 205. Thank you Tonya, Ed, and Meri!

Back squat. Out of the three moves today, I feel this is my best. Again, with the weight. Once the numbers get above 150, I start to freak out. It’s all in my head, but I exponentially concerned with looking like a fool...or worse, hurting myself for being stupid. It was okay, no injuries.

BS max today: 170#. PR’d 45# (I think).

With 455# today and my body weight, I am between intermediate and advanced. Wahoo!! Thank you CrossFit Rio Rancho!

The Truth Is Out There

On the eve of 2010 I had a fearful symmetry with a group I loved and released myself from said group. I didn’t know myself and had become a scary monster. To end game the ghost in the machine, I wrote. Feeling closure, the fire left me as did the bad blood. All the signs and wonders in the beginning of 2011 made me face the grotesque details of the past year.

void

where once a heartbeat joined and sure;

one breath off, insecure.

where is the drum, once so loud?

yonder yet, beyond the bounds;

Behold! the heart in the mist!

left by wolves to loneliness

can it sustain life on it’s own?

without ears, does it drum?

this one heart, who’s left to hear?

whisper, whisper-- thundering ears!

cloaked by sorrow, life remains,

who remarks with kindness feigned?

Wait! I am solid, I feel the throb!

it is MY heart, is it not?

shadows move, the mist is lifting!

I remain. apart and drifting

where once my heart did beat alone

in tune with all, a blessed stone

left aside to be heard by none

what once was known is now undone.

(Written in Sept, 2009)

I now feel no shadows when darkness falls or am sleepless with revelations. I am the pusher of myself. I have shed my demons and the unusual suspects. I have detoured into life, the red and the black, and come out from underneath young at heart. Life is irresistible and within the existence of all things there are millions of sunshine days. Be your own first person shooter. Find your zero sum. Be the drive. There is no void.