This year marks my third time doing the Crossfit Open. My first year was in 2014. I participated again in 2015 then took 2016 off and during the 2017 Open last year I had my son! I thought that signing up for this year's Open was a good way to keep myself accountable and also a good way to remember how far I've come since having him one year ago. When the Open Wod was announced last Thursday, my first thought was, "Wow. That's a really long Wod! It was 20 minutes long, which is the longest Open Wod that I can think of. I opted to do the scaled workout which included 8 knees above parallel, 10 dumbbell hang clean and jerks (20 lbs) and a 12 calorie row. 3...2...1.... GO! So when I started off this workout, I immediately screwed up some things. The first thing was that I didn't bring my dumbbell over to the rig so I could easily transition from the rig to the dumbbell. The second thing was that I didn't bother to sit on my rower beforehand and adjust the straps for my feet. I'm not sure what I was thinking, but I clearly let nerves get the best of me and forgot to do these two things. After having a hard time getting my feet into the rower, I felt a bit panicked. Then I remembered, 'Hey this is a twenty minute wod. Relax.' From there things got much better. I was able to string together my knees above parallel and the clean and jerk started feeling smoother. I had never done this movement with a dumbbell before so it felt a bit awkward and took me a few times to get in a groove. After what felt like it had been a while, I decided to take a look at the clock. It was just past 6 minutes. "6 minutes! I'm not even halfway!" I decided not to look at the clock again and just focus on my rowing. It also helped that Bobby was nearby holding our son, so that gave me something to focus on while trying to pull as many calories as possible. Around the halfway mark I decided to break up my knees above parallel into two sets of four. I could tell that my grip was starting to become weaker and I needed to save some of it because I still had a long way to go! For me, losing my grip was definitely the hardest part of the workout. Between being on the pull up bar, holding onto a dumbbell and pulling on the rower, my hands started to hurt! Towards the end, I had to start shaking out my hands as I transitioned from movement to movement. After what seemed like an eternity the clock finally hit 20 minutes! My judge handed me my score sheet to sign, but I could barely grip a pen. I had done 228 reps, which I was pretty pleased with. Bobby went in the heat after me and did an awesome job. Since my pregnancy and having our son, we haven't had many opportunities to work out together. It was great to be able to support each other and work out with each other again! After completing the first open wod of 2018 I felt really excited and happy about my performance. It feels like an accomplishment just to be out there with my fellow CrossFitters.
Last year towards the end of my pregnancy, I developed high blood pressure. The hope was that after I had my son, the high blood pressure would dissipate, but in my case it actually got worse after delivery. I had to go on medication to control my blood pressure. As someone who has never dealt with high blood pressure before this was a bit of a surprise. Needless to say I didn't 'bounce back' from pregnancy as over the course of the next few months I continued to have trouble regulating my blood pressure. During the summer I was able to stop taking medication, but still was experiencing spikes in my blood pressure. Eventually I discovered that I had become deficient in potassium. I started increasing my potassium intake last November and things have drastically been improving since then. With all that has happened in the past year, the open has taken on a lot more meaning for me. I am trying to become healthy again for my family and to also have fun and enjoy myself during the process. I'm looking forward to what the next four weeks of the open brings!
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Author: Sarah WarmanI like to run, take pictures and write. I've combined all three in this blog. Archives
June 2019
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