Tuesday.

Well, this morning I woke up at 5:45 in Indian Wells. J and I drove there last night to do a little CrossFit demo and workout for some of Avia’s employees. They hooked us up with some shoes and put us up in a pretty sweet resort for the night. After taking a group of about 40-50 people through a team workout, J and I did “Grace” (30 clean and jerks for time). It was actually pretty sweet… they all circled around the two of us and cheered us on, then couldn’t stop giving us praise when we were done… very nice people. We had breakfast and then headed back. Not too shabby

Today was day two of a new program that I am following, called The Outlaw Way. I heard about it from a couple of people and there is more and more buzz about Coach Rudy and his program, as he has coached many individuals and teams through Regionals and on to the Games this year. He must be doing something right! Yesterday, I did a bunch of GHD sit-ups, which I rarely do and today I feel as though someone ripped my ab muscles apart. Feels real good. You don’t realize how much you use your abs until they hurt like hell with every single movement… even my warm-up row was uncomfortable. Anyway… enough whining! Since I’m lazy, I’m just posting a photo of today’s workout…

I felt pretty good, but I could tell that I haven’t done Jerk drills in a while, because my old habits started creeping back. My split was too narrow. I reminded myself to be mindful and it was better when I thought specifically about going wider with my feet. It’s hard to be mindful all the time… and there are certainly times when you should just go… move, but actually focusing on doing the movements correctly will be so beneficial in the long run. (Can apply to life situations too if you wanna go there). So, remember not to just go through the motions and think about what you’re doing and how you are moving. The strength portion of the workout felt heavy and I told myself over and over “shoulders up, hips through”. My knees caved in like crazy, which they normally don’t so much, but I think it was just hard today. I’m not beating myself up over it. The last piece of the workout was challenging for sure. I subbed down the power cleans to 120# and trust me, they were plenty hard. My goal was to not miss any of them… and out of the 57 reps, I only missed one. I’ll take it… along with my very red chest from catching too low. Shame shame.

Lastly, I will leave you with a quote from Linda Leipper… maybe you have met her around the gym. She’s a tiny little badass who competed at the SoCal Regional with me. She posted this on Facebook today and it had me tearing up a little bit. Thank you for your wisdom Linda…

“Success is determined not by whether or not you face obstacles, but by your reaction to them. And if you look at these obstacles as a containing fence, they become your excuse for failure. If you look at them as a hurdle, each one strengthens you for the next. Sometimes, struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If we were to go through our life without any obstacles, we would be crippled. We would not be as strong as what we could have been. Give every opportunity a chance, leave no room for regrets.”