WOD Magazine - Issue 1

Issue 1

WOD MAGAZINE Australia’s First CrossFit Magazine

Chad MAckAY:

The Importance of Strength in crossFit

Amanda Allen:

PERFOrMANCE & RECOVERY

2013 Reebok CrossFit Games: How did the Aussies stack up?

The Early Days of CrossFit In Australia Advice on Programming, scaling and nutrition What You Need To Know About Running Your Own Box Your CrossFit Stories, Box Directory, Gear Reviews and more...

6 | Obstacle Racing Magazine

MEMBER EXCLUSIVE!

25% off

Get plus FREE postage on any Polar monitor when you order via www.polarrevolution.com.au and enter andthe enter promotional the promotional code: CALORIES code:

OCRA2013

AALLLL W!!

NEEW N

PPeerfrfeecct tpprere raracceeOORRpprere trtraaininininggddririnnkk

Bounce Bounce 44 in in11Daily DailyShake Shake

Bounce BounceDaily DailySuperfood SuperfoodShot Shot

100% 100%Natural NaturalNutritional NutritionalShake Shake Grass Grassfed, fed,hormone hormonefree freeWhey WheyProtein Protein Super Supergreens greens//super superfruits fruits Pre Preand andProbiotics Probiotics Chia ChiaFibre Fibre

100% 100%Natural NaturalPre-exercise Pre-exerciseBlend Blend 33 33nutrient-dense nutrient-denseSuperfoods Superfoods Pea PeaProtein Protein Pre Preand andProbiotics Probiotics Chia ChiaFibre Fibre

2 | Obstacle Racing Magazine

Energise your your race race Energise

UNTS

AV

AI

F

R

Bounce Bounce4040ball balltub tub

Bounce 1212 ball box Bounce ball box

E

e:e: dd e ecoco lin nn lin OO O C 13 2R0 013 AA 2A RR CC RR OO % r ra a1515% fofo t!t! nn cocu ou isis O dd

BL

DI

CO

LA

S

Bounce BounceEnergy EnergyBalls Balls 100% 100%natural naturalgoodness goodnesstotorefuel refuel your yourbody, body,invigorate invigorateyour yourmind mind and andfeed feedyour yoursoul. soul.

M EMBERS

www.bouncefoods.com.au www.bouncefoods.com.au Ph: Ph:1300 1300303 303517 517 obstacleracingmagazine.com.au | 3

Own season one of the original TV series

AS SEEN ON

Available at www.search4hurt.com.au

SEARCH4HURT MAGAZINE

Training advice from the best Extreme endurance features Race and Gear Reviews

LAUNCHING MARCH 2014 LAUNCH ISSUE

MARCH 2014

s p i h s n o i p m a h C d l r o W ” e c a

“Spartan R

abs r g t t a M y o b Our and puts Aussie second he map OCR on t

Aussie CrossF oChadn the world it stage and Kara’s amazing journe world team selection and y to 2013 Cros

Stand Up and be Aussie dominat counted e Molokai crow ning multiple cham

pions

Trail running

sFit invitation

al.

OCR TRAINING TI PS HIGH PERFORM ANCE ATHLETES S4H LIVE EVENTS

Northfac Brendan Davies e100 record holder shares hi tips to a bett s training er trail race

SUBSCRIBE NOW AT WWW.SEARCH4HURT.COM.AU

Contents

CONTENTS 6

|

12

2013 Reebok CrossFit Games Feature

42 45 46

2013 Reebok CrossFit Invitational 2013 Reebok CrossFit Open - What to expect

2013 Champions - Rich Froning..........................................................................................................................22 2013 Champions - Samantha Briggs...................................................................................................................23 Interviews with 2013 Australian Games Athletes...............................................................................................24 Rob Forte’s 2013 CrossFit Games Experience.....................................................................................................38

The History of CrossFit in Australia

WOD MAGAZINE

Image by Frankie Lee Matthews Photography

Programming and Scaling......................................................................................................52 Performance and Recovery.....................................................................................................56 The Importance of Strength in CrossFit.................................................................................60 Putting the Pro in Regionals...................................................................................................62 Running Your Own Box.........................................................................................................66 Athlete Spotlight - Amanda Allen..........................................................................................68 CrossFit Nutrition Basics........................................................................................................72 This One Time, at CrossFit - Bonnie Sein..............................................................................78 My CrossFit Journey - Megan Drapalski................................................................................82 Finding New Strength - Virginia Vij.......................................................................................86 The CrossFit Experience of Robert Carlin..............................................................................78 Rising Up to the Challenge - Logan Poon...............................................................................90 CrossFit Southern Highlands kicks Crohn’s in the guts..........................................................92

Recipes.............................74 Challenge WOD..............83 International CrossFit....93 Reviews............................94 Box directory...................98

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

7

E N I Z A G A M D WO

Editor - Ben Quinney

ben@wodmagazine.com.au

Design - Natasha Quinney tash@wodmagazine.com.au

Media Sales - Adam McDonald adam@wodmagazine.com.au

Contributors Words images Adam Richardson Adam Stranecki Amanda Allen Ben Quinney Bonnie Sien Bronwyn Sparkes Chad Mackay Corrine Chalmers Ginny Gallegos Ian Seboa James Wilson Leigh Taylor Logan Poon Megan Drapalski Naomi Benedetti Rob Forte Virginia Vij

21 15 9 Clothing Adam Lesniak Adam Stranecki Bonnie Sein Bronwyn Sparkes Corrine Chalmers CrossFit Inc Frankie Lee Matthews Ginny Gallegos James Wilson Joel Vogler Logan Poon Matthew Townsend Megan Drapalski Naomi Benedetti Natasha Quinney Robert Carlin Sam Fitzpatrick Virginia Vij

Some opinions expressed in WOD Magazine are not necessarily those of its staff or contributing editors. Those opinions are reproduced with no guarantee of accuracy although WOD Magazine endeavours to ensure those opinions and comments are factual. Š WOD Magazine, 2013.

All rights reserved.

8

|

WOD MAGAZINE

From the

Editor

The global CrossFit community has a wonderful voice, we hear about amazing and truly inspirational stories every day through various social media outlets, print and video but most of these stories have a distinctly American focus.

The idea behind WOD Magazine was born from a personal desire to read, listen and watch more about Australian CrossFit whether it was highlighting the very best Aussie athletes as they compete locally and abroad or showcasing the life changing stories of CrossFit-ters from local boxes around the country.

With the magazine, it’s Facebook and Twitter pages and our website we hope to help build a unique community, to enable Australian CrossFit-ters to have a voice of their own. Through community involvement we plan to deliver Australian stories of triumph in their own words, opinion pieces from community members, training programming advice and mental insights from top level athletes.

In the coming issues for 2014 we will bring you advice on what to expect at your next competition, the CrossFit Open, what to look out for at the regionals in either a spectator or competitors perspective and what to expect at this years big show - The 2014 CrossFit Games.

If you feel like you have something to say, or are just interested in joining in the conversation shoot us an email at info@wodmagazine.com.au, follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and make sure to sign up to our newsletter on our website (www.wodmagazine.com.au) to make sure you are kept up to date with news from us or our sponsors.

2014 is going to be a huge year for Australian CrossFit and we look forward to being a part of it with you.

Cheers,

Front Cover: Chad Mackay by Sam Fitzpatrick Back Cover: Rich Froning by CrossFit, Inc

Ben Quinney

G GEIGERRIG

THE OFFICIAL HYDRATION PARTNER OF SPARTAN RACE AUSTRALIA

PRESSURISED HYDRATION SYSTEM Drinking from a hydration pack should be easy and continuous, not hurried and gluttonous. With GEIGERRIG Hydration Packs, all that you need to do is lightly bite down. The GEIGERRIG pressurised system does the rest – continuous, easy, comfortable hydration without disruption or inconvenient sucking. Spray your face and hands, share your water, the options are endless. www.wodmagazine.com.au

For more information visit geigerrig.com, drop in to your local outdoor store, or call (02) 8878 3600 for stockists.

|

9

wodmag

Feature

2013

Reebok CrossFit

12

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Compete [kuh m-peet]

early 17th century: from Latin competere, in its late sense ‘strive or contend for (something)’, from com- ‘together’ + petere ‘aim at, seek’

Games

(Oxford Dictionary)

Event sumary and results compilation based on CrossFit.com oinline archive by Ben Quinney Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

13

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

Event 12 The Cinco 2

Event 10 Event 11 Sprint The Cinco 1 Chipper

Event 8 Event 7 Event 5 Event 9 Clean & Jerk Naughty Event 6 ZigZag Event 4 Event 2 & 3 Event 1 2007 Ladder Nancy Legless Sprint Burden Run Row 1 & 2 The Pool

Workouts

14

|

Ten rounds for time of: Swim 25 yards 3 Bar muscle-ups Swim 25 yards For time: Row 21,097 meters Row 1 is time at 2,000 meter checkpoint Row 2 is time for entire 21,097 meters For time: Run 2.1 miles Flip the PiG 100 yards 600 yard log carry Drag the Iditarod 66 yards 50 yard Sprint with 4 obstacles 4-round bracket style tournament For time: 27, 21, 15, 9 Thrusters (43/29.5kg) 4, 3, 2, 1 Legless rope climbs Four rounds for time of: Run 600 meters up and over berm 25 Overhead squats (63.5/43kg) 1-rep Clean and Jerk every 90 seconds with progressively heavier barbells) For time: 1000 meter Row then, fIve rounds of: 25 Pull-ups 7 Push jerks (61/38.5kg) For time: 21 MedBall GHD Sit-ups 15 Snatch (75/45kg) 9 Wall burpees Three rounds for time of: 5 Deadlifts (184/120kg) 5 weighted One-legged squats, l (24/16kg) 5 weighted One-legged squats, r (24/16kg) Then 24 metres Handstand walk Final 2 begins one minute after Final 1 Three rounds for time of: 5 Muscle-ups 5 DefIcit handstand push-ups Then 27.5 metres Overhead walking lunge (72.5/45kg axle bar)

WOD MAGAZINE

Games results

Overall placings:

Men WoMen

Chad Mackay 11th 12th Kara Webb Rob Forte 33rd 15th Ruth Anderson Horrell Brandon Swan 45th 36th Pip Malone The Pool

Row 1

Row 2

Chad Mackay

7th

5th

11th

Rob Forte

19th

39th

8th

Brandon Swan

8

th

29

34th

Kara Webb

2nd

15th

27th

Ruth Anderson Horrell

th

37

7T

3rd

Pip Malone

29th

41st

20th

Day 1 – Wednesday 24/7/2013

Day 2 – Friday 26/7/2013

th

Burden Run ZigZag Sprint

Legless

Chad Mackay

23rd

33T

17th

Rob Forte

6th

42nd

34T

Brandon Swan

43rd

22T

45th

Kara Webb

9th

8th

25T

Ruth Anderson Horrell

2

33T

34T

Pip Malone

32T

38T

39T

Naughty Nancy

C & J Ladder

2007

Chad Mackay

35T

7T

36th

Rob Forte

19T

38T

25th

Brandon Swan

WD

WD

WD

Kara Webb

18th

4th

33rd

Ruth Anderson Horrell

5th

8th

30th

Pip Malone

9th

15T

37th

Day 3 – Saturday 27/7/2013

Day 4 – Sunday 28/7/2013

nd

Sprint Chipper

The Cinco 1 The Cinco 2

Chad Mackay

6th

21T

7T

Rob Forte

31

CUT

CUT

Brandon Swan

WD

WD

WD

Kara Webb

11th

19th

19th

Ruth Anderson Horrell

15th

14th

24T

Pip Malone

37th

CUT

CUT

st

T = tied, WD = Withdrawn, CUT = Athlete didn’y advance to next workout

t games

How did the Aussie's stack up...

SUMMARY

Event 1: Swim & Muscle Up

The 2013 CrossFit Games started off well for our Aussie athletes on Wednesday morning with the first pool event ever seen in the games. As Aussies we have a reputation for being good in the water and Kara Webb proved herself more than capable as she held her own in the 3rd and final heat as she finished in 2nd, just in front of Sam Briggs and only 36 seconds behind the winner Michele Letendre.

The NSW central coast local and self described surfer Chad Mackay put in a very solid performance in the 3rd and final heat coming in 4th in the heat and 7th overall in the pool while Queensland’s Brandon Swan came in 2nd in his heat to finish 11 seconds behind Chad taking out 8th place. While the Australians all looked comfortable in the water the big upset of the event was watching Rich Froning Jnr struggle through his 10 rounds to finish in 30th, his worst placing in any event in his CrossFit games history.

Event 2 & 3: 2k and Marathon Row

Later that same day Chad Mackay would again show the world he was a force to be reckoned with after coming 5th in the 2k and then 11th in the marathon row while Rob Forte was methodical throughout the row coming in 39th in the 2k but held his pace to finish 8th in the 21km. After suffering a little in the pool earlier in the day Jason Khalipa put on a show taking 1st in both events, finishing his 2k in 6:21 – 13 seconds in front of Rich Froning and grinding out 21km on the concept 2 in just 1 hour and 18 minutes.

For the ladies NZ’s Ruth Anderson Horrell tied for 7th place with Talayna Fortunato in the 2k but put in an amazing performance to finish 3rd in the 21km only a minute and a half behind the winner Sam Briggs.

Event 4: Burden Run

After a day of rest on the Thursday the Aussies faced the “Burden Run” Friday mornuing. While Garret Fisher dominated the running portion Rob Forte held pace with the front pack of athletes.

Once the athletes hit “The Pig” Garret Fisher’s lead disappeared while the more powerful athletes made up ground. Jason Khalipa was the first to finish with the pig and get to the log while Rich Froning was breathing down his neck back in 4th place.

Once he got to the log it was the Jason Khalipa show all the way, Jason stayed out in front and even had time to rest a little pulling the sled. Our own Rob Forte managed to sneak in front of Rich Froning in the final seconds to finish 6th while Chad Mackay finished 23rd and Brandon Swan 43rd.

Sam Briggs dominated the “Burden Run” from the very beginning, opening up a huge lead in the run portion. Sam maintained her lead throughout the “Pig Flip” and was the first woman to pick up the Log and head towards the soccer stadium. Kaleena Ladeairous overtook Sam during the Log carry and was the first woman to begin the 60 metre sled drag. Although identified by the commentators as Valerie Voboril, New Zealand native Ruth Anderson Horrell had been making steady progress on the leaders throughout the event and moved into 3rd place during the Pig Flip and the log carry and never stopped moving once she got to the sled drag and actually overtook Sam Briggs to finish in 2nd place. Kara Webb finished strong to take 9th place and Pip Malone put in a solid performance to finish in 32nd place.

Event 5: ZigZag Sprint

Kara Webb was the only Australasian woman to progress past the first bracket of the Zigzag sprint as she finished 1st in her qualifying heat and was even relaxed enough to wave to cameras afterwards. Kara then finished 3rd in her quarter final heat and 5th in her semi-final giving her 8th place overall. Michelle Crawford had been dominant in each of her heats and really turned it on in the final to take 1st followed by Lindy Wall and Stacie Tovar.

Brandon Swan was the only Australasian male to enter the second round of the Zigzag sprint by winning his qualifying heat. Unfortunately Swan finished last in the quarter finals heat leaving the competition open for quicker athletes like Marcus Hendren, Dan Bailey and Aja Barto to dominate.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

15

2013 ReEbok CrossFit Event 6: Legless Pip Malone was the only Aussie in heat one of the Legless event competing against some big names of previous CrossFit Games including Kristan Clever and Gretchen Kittelberger while both Ruth Anderson Horrell and Kara Webb were competing in heat 4 along with all the top athletes of this years games including Christy Phillips and Sam Briggs. Sam took an early lead with four quick rope climbs in the first round while Kara and Ruth kept pace with the majority of the athletes in the heat.

As Sam Briggs gave up the lead on the third rope climb of the second round Christy Phillips and Alesandra Pichelli took full advantage and pulled ahead fighting for the lead. The stadium erupted in the final moments of the event as Pichelli took 1st place with her amazing legless kipping rope technique.

Brandon Swan was the lone Australian male in heat two of the Legless event. Lacee Kovacs was the standout athlete for this heat as he put in a dominant performance easily climbing the ropes without his legs. Both Rob Forte and Chad Mackay faced off in heat four with some big name athletes like Josh Bridges and Neal Maddox. Rob and Chad held pace behind Josh Bridges through the first round of four rope climbs and made it to the second round of thrusters as Bridges got started on his second round of rope climbs.

Rob and Chad held 3rd and 4th place throughout the first half of the heat and as Bridges approached his final set of thrusters Rob fell out of the top 6. Chad was still fighting for 3rd place with Travis Mayer and Daniel Petro but ended up taking 6th as he was beaten by a very narrow margin up the final rope by both athletes.

The final heat of the day was an all star who’s who of CrossFit with Jason Khalipa, Rich Froning, Ben Smith and the rest of the top athletes for 2013. Going into the event Jason Khalipa was holding 1st place on the leader board and Rich was sitting in 4th but after his failure on the rope climb in 2010 Rich had something to prove.

Going into the final set of thrusters and rope climbs Rich, Marcus Hendren and Jordran Troyan were fighting for the top spots in the heat as all three athletes were eyeing off each other at the last rope climb and as Jordan Troyan began to celebrate his win Marcus Hendren dove over the line to steal the top spot leaving Troyan with 2nd and Rich with 3rd ahead of all the other athletes in front of him in the standings enabling Rich to climb a little closer to the top spot he is so familiar with.

Clean & Jerk Ladder Lindsey Valenzuela

16

|

WOD MAGAZINE

t games

How did the Aussie's stack up...

Event 7: Naughty Nancy Coming into day three Kara Webb was sitting in 8th place overall. In the first heat Pip Malone was in the top five women to put down the barbell at the end of the first round and was the 3rd athlete to reach the overhead squats in the second round. Malone took 2nd place during the overhead squats in the third round and looked to be going strong heading into the fourth and final round.

Pip was able to hold her own against Tiffany Hendrixsen until the final set of overhead squats and ended up finishing in 3rd.

The second women’s heat saw the top 21 athletes push themselves hard right out of the gate, after the first run Kaleena Ladeairous was in first place while Ruth Anderson Horrell was among a dozen athletes in the pack just behind her. As Sam Briggs was fighting for 2nd place in the event she was several places ahead of the current games leader Christy Phillips giving Sam an opportunity to score some valuable additional points to put towards her run at the top spot on the overall ladder. Ruth Anderson Horrell finished strong and took 4th in the heat and 5th overall.

Before the men’s heats of Naughty Nancy began Brandon Swan was advised by event medical staff to not take the field after his grip failed the night before and he fell and injured his knee during the Legless event. After taking their advice Brandon withdrew from the competition.

Rob Forte took an early lead coming down the hill during the run in the first round in heat one and was in the lead going into the first set of overhead squats but lost the lead when he had to brake them up and was overtaken by Tyson Takasaki. Coming down the stairs on the second round Rob was holding pace in the top 3 but began to fall behind during the second round of overhead squats. Ben Stoneberg overtook Takasaki on the stairs in the final 600 metre run of the heat but Takasaki took the lead back on the downhill section to get to the overhead squats first as both athletes went “rep for rep” neither athlete putting the bar down. Ben Stoneberg won the heat in a sprint to the finish and Rob Forte came in around 7th or 8th in his heat.

Heat two once again saw Chad Mackay again take on the top athletes in the final heat. Lacee Kovacks took an early lead in the second round but Josh Bridges was hot on his tail. Chad Mackay looked to be suffering in the second round as we saw him walking up the hill in the middle of the 600 metre run placed somewhere in the middle of the field. Josh Bridges then took a commanding lead heading into round three after making the second set of overhead squats look easy. Going into round four Jason Khalipa and Rich Froning were battling for 2nd place and the overall lead for the competition. Froning took 2nd place, Khalipa 3rd and Chad Mackay finished 35th with 11 reps remaining at the end of the 20 minute time cap.

Event 8: Clean and Jerk Pip Malone entered the ladder at 185 pounds (84kg) and was a little shaky putting the weight over her head on her initial lift but managed a successful jerk on the first platform. Malone looked much more confident with her 195 pound lift a few minutes later and again for the 200 and 205.

Malone took three attempts to lift 210 but exited the ladder in the overall lead for the event at the time.

Kara Webb entered the ladder at 205 pounds (93kg) and successfully cleared the ladder through to 230 pounds while Ruth Anderson Horrell looked good on the clean at 220 pounds but was not able to get the bar overhead. Kara gave it everything she had on two attempts at 235 pounds but was unable to shoulder the bar exiting the ladder very happy with her lifts for the day.

Event winner Amanda Goodman had the heaviest lift of the day for the women at 235 pounds (107kg) while Lindsey Valenzuela and Elizabeth Akinwale both managed to clean 235 pounds but not get the bar overhead.

The Aussie men began the clean and jerk ladder with Rob Forte working his way up to a partial lift at 295 pounds (134kg). Chad Mackay entered the ladder at 285 pounds and made his first lift look easy. Chad kept his cool and didn’t struggle with any of the lifts through until 325 pounds where he had a little wobble after jerking the bar. At 335 pounds Chad had a solid clean on his first attempt but was unable to get the bar over his head, he took a second attempt but had obviously ran out of energy and was unable to clean the bar for a second time.

The event winners Lucas Parker and Aja Barto were both able to clean the 355 pound (161kg) barbell but were unable to jerk the bar overhead. Rich Froning came in 3rd place after successfully lifting 345 pounds (157kg) and finished 4 places ahead of Jason Khalipa allowing Rich to take 1st place on the overall ladder for the first time in the 2013 CrossFit Games by just 6 points.

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

17

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

2013 ReEbok CrossFit LEGless

Rich Froning

Event 9: 2007 Coming into the last event of Saturday Kara Webb was in 7th with Ruth Anderson Horrell holding 11th. Pip Malone competed in the second heat of the event with some big names including Camille Leblanc-Bazinet and Deborah Corner Carson and came off the 1000 metre row at about 4:25 with the rest of the field.

Once the row was finished though it became the Camille show as she dominated on the pull up bar going the first two rounds unbroken on the 25 pull ups. Malone kept pace with the bulk of the athletes and was in the middle of the pack during the third set of pull ups but fell behind in the fourth round and ended up finishing in 9th place for the heat.

Ruth Anderson Horrell and Kara Webb took on the 2007 workout in the fourth and final heat with the top 11 female athletes of the competition. Kara and Ruth came off the rower and began their pull ups with the bulk of the women and during the first round Ruth was hovering around 5th or 6th place. As Valerie Voboril dominated the heat to finish 1st overall Ruth finished in 8th place for the heat and 30th outright while Kara finished in 10th place for the heat taking out 33rd.

As the men began the 9th event Chad Mackay was in 8th place. Rob Forte entered the field in lane one sitting next to Matt Chan for the second heat and got off the rower in about 3:40 with most of the athletes. Rob was holding pace with Matt Chan during the second round of pull ups but began to drop off heading into round three and ended up taking 6th place for the heat.

Chad Mackay took his spot in lane ten next to Scott Panchik in preparation for the final event of the day and put in an excellent performance on the rower finishing 1000 metres in about 3:30 and looked solid on the pull up bar in round one. As Chad moved onto the barbell for the first time the top five athletes had already began their second round of pull ups and Josh Bridges then ran away with the heat while Rich Froning managed to stayed in front of Jason Khalipa and Garret Fisher.

Unfortunately for the “Big Australian” workouts with high rep pull ups are not kind to athletes as with arms as long as Chad Mackay and as a result he took 11th place in the heat and 36th overall.

18

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Event 10: Sprint Chipper Pip Malone was the last athlete to finish the GHD medicine ball sit ups in heat one for the ladies and ended up finishing in 8th place and 37th overall. Kara Webb took lane four and Ruth Anderson Horrell took lane fourteen for the third and final heat of the sprint chipper. Both Ruth and Kara finished the sit ups within seconds of the leader Alessandra Pichelli but the competition was so close that it was going to come down to who could complete the nine six foot burpee wall jumps the quickest. Jen Jones finished her snatches first but Sam Briggs won the heat in a sprint to the finish. Kara Webb crossed the line in 9th place and Ruth Anderson Horrell took 11th in the heat to claim 11th and 15th overall places respectively.

As the men lined up for the sprint chipper Rob Forte gave it everything he had in heat one but finished the GHD sit ups towards the back of the pack. Rob looked good as he strung together a few “touch and go” snathces but fell off the pace a little heading into the burpee wall jumps crossing the finish line in the middle of the pack for heat one. As the top athletes finished their sit ups in heat three Chad Mackay was right there with leaders, as they worked through their 15 snathces Chad was within a couple of reps of the leader Rich Froning. After the burpee wall jumps Chad crossed the line in 5th or 6th place for the heat and finished in 6th place overall only 21 seconds behind The Champ – Rich Froning.

Both the men’s and women’s fields were cut down to 30 athletes after the Sprint Chipper resulting in both Pip Malone and Rob Forte being unable to compete in the final two workouts of the 2013 CrossFit Games.

GAMES

How did the Aussie's stack up...

CINCO 1

Sam Briggs Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

Event 11 and 12: The Cinco 1 and 2 Coming into the final two events of the games Ruth Anderson Horrell was sitting in 12th place and took lane six in heat two. Ruth had no problems with the 265 pound (120kg) deadlifts and was in second place behind Elizabeth Akinwale going into the third round of deadlifts. Ruth was the fourth woman to begin the handstand walk behind Jen Smith and Stacie Tovar but Rebecca Voigt stormed down the 24 metre black mat on her hands leaving Ruth struggling to cover the distance eventually taking 6th place before the one minute reset for the next event.

Ruth Anderson Horrell was still working her way through her muscle ups and deficit handstand push ups when Michelle Letendre got started on her overhead bar walking lunges and was unable to complete them within the seven minute time cap taking 8th place with 17 reps remaining.

As the final women’s heat of the games got underway Kara Webb took lane ten and looked strong during the deadlifts and weighted pistols but had fallen behind the leaders by the time the women got to the handstand walk. Kara put in an outstanding effort on the handstand walk and managed to finish just inside the seven minute time cap leaving her only one minute to catch her breath before Cinco 2 began.

Kara seemed to struggle with the muscle up and deficit handstand push ups at the end of what I can imagine was a very long weekend as we saw her walk away from the rings to catch her breath on more than one occasion. As Talayna Fortunato and Lindsey Valenzuealla began their overhead walking lunges Kara continued to work on her muscle ups and handstands. In the end Kara placed 19th in both the Cinco 1 and Cinco 2 events to finish the games in 12th place outright.

As the men took the field for the final time Chad Mackay was holding onto 9th place in lane one.

With 184kg on the bar Chad got through the deadlifts without any trouble but looked to struggle a bit with the weighted pistols. As the seven minute time cap concluded Chad had made it about four fifths of the way down the handstand walk taking 9th in the heat and 21st overall.

Chad looked much more comfortable on the rings during Cinco 2 but as Rich Froning ran away with the outright victory and was celebrating Chad had only just began the overhead barbell walking lunge and came 10th for the heat and tied for 7th place overall. www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

19

2013 ReEbok CrossFit GAMES How did the Aussie teams and masters stack up...

Iditarod 1

Iditarod 2

Iditarod 3

Legless

12 CrossFit Active

26

th

13

25

18

18T

14 CrossFit Melbourne

13

th

35

6

12

th

18T

35th CrossFit Horizons

34th

19th

29th

29th

11T

Masters teams

Burden Run

Day 1 – Friday 26/7/2013

th th

th

th

th

th

th

Squat Burpee

Ascending Chipper 1

Ascending Chipper 2

CrossFit Active

18T

21

st

12th

CrossFit Melbourne

11th

31st

27th

CrossFit Horizons

36th

37th

41st

Day 2 – Saturday 27/7/2013

Day 3 – Sunday 28/7/2013

Stadium Relay

Final

CrossFit Active

th

8

2nd

CrossFit Melbourne

7th

3rd

CrossFit Horizons

40

CUT

th

Day 1 – Tuesday 23/7

Day 2 – Wednesday 24/7

Day 3 – Thursday 25/7

Nancy

Push Drag Pull

Pullgatory

Deadlift / Box Clean & Jerk Jump

Final

8th Matt Swift

8th

10th

11th

6th

1st

7th

20 Brian Beck

19

17

16

20

CUT

CUT

1st Amanda Allen

1st

1st

1st

3rd

4T

3rd

13th Megan Smith

16th

8th

5th

17th

CUT

CUT

-

-

-

-

-

-

5th

7th

18th

16th

CUT

CUT

10th Matt Nicholson

13th

6th

7th

8th

7T

7th

18th Russell Kapper

17th

11th

18T

18th

CUT

CUT

5th Lynne Knapman

4th

7th

11th

5th

7T

2nd

12th Nicolette Dunstone

5th

8th

16T

8th

12th

9th

10th

10th

12th

5th

12th

3T

12th

13th

15th

14th

CUT

CUT

4th

5th

3rd

1st

5T

3rd

5th

9th

13th

4th

12th

5th

Men 40 - 44 th

th

th

th

th

Women 40 - 44

Men 45 - 49 No Australian Athletes

Women 45 - 49 13th Lynne Fitzharris

Men 50 - 54

Women 50 - 54

Men 55 - 59 8th Alan Hindmarsh

Women 55 - 59 15th Jen Stagg

Men 60+ 2nd Garry Jones

Women 60+ 6th Vivienne Henderson 20

|

WOD MAGAZINE

S

AV

AI

R

F

O

M EMBERS

E

OCRA

BL

DI

UNTS

LA

CO

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

Rich Froning

3Written times CrossFit Games champion

by Megan Drapalski CrossFit is known for not specialising. It doesn’t favour the athlete that is only strong or fast. It favours the well-rounded individual, and even then, it favours no one. You cannot prepare for CrossFit because it is the unknown and the unknowable. Therefore, it would stand to reason, that no one could dominate the sport. Until three years ago this reasoning held strong…enter Rich Froning Jr.

In 2010 an untried rookie took second place at the CrossFit Games, missing first place because of a single deficiency in his repertoire: the rope climb. When he returned to the CrossFit Games in 2011, Froning, in his own words, “bombed” the first event before coming from behind to win the Games convincingly. In 2012 he got off to a much smoother start, hitting first place before the end of the second day, a lead he wouldn’t relinquish.

Coming into the 2013 CrossFit Games, CrossFit HQ posted a video, “How Do You Beat Rich Froning?” and the verdict after the Games was fairly convincing… you don’t. In that video Chris Spealler is quoted saying that you won’t see another athlete like Froning for 100 years when his time has come and gone. This then begs the question: will the Games first ever three-peat champion become the Games first ever fourtime champion in 2014? Is there any known athlete who has the arsenal to beat Rich Froning? For Froning’s three years of domination, no man has stood on the podium with him more than once. No male competitor has been able to demonstrate the level of consistency of Froning.

It’s not only how do you beat Rich Froning it’s who can beat Rich Froning. Will it be the newcomer, Garrett Fisher, who finished in 5th at his first CrossFit Games? Or will it be a tried and tested CrossFit warrior like Josh Bridges or Jason Khalipa that wrestles the title away? The 2014 CrossFit Games are still 10 months away and a lot can happen in that time; however, it seems like a relatively safe bet that Froning will become the first ever four-time CrossFit Games champion.

22

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

Coming into the 2013 CrossFit Games, the question on everyone’s mind was whether or not the first ever back-to-back male Games champion could make it three in a row. Unlike 2012, it was a question that remained in everyone’s minds until the final day. Unlike 2012, Froning got off to a poor start, finishing 30th in The Pool, well behind Jason Khalipa in 13th who would go on to post three consecutive first place finishes in the following events to create a sizeable lead. Khalipa then placed poorly in the Zig Zag Spring and Legless, which allowed Froning to move up the ladder; however, in arguably the toughest CrossFit Games ever it wouldn’t be till the last day that the reigning champion would truly put his mark on the competition. Froning finished the Games with three consecutive wins to finish the competition 72 points ahead of second placed Jason Khalipa to become the first ever three-peat CrossFit Games champion.

GAMES champions

samantha briggs

Injury, recovery, winning the games, and the looming rumble in carson...

Taking the time to recover, and “train smarter” as Sam put it, helped her to re-focus and stop over training. According to Sam it was her tendency for long hours in the gym that had contributed to her initial injury, although as her trainer puts it “Sam is Sam” and she might still put in an extra work out here or there. After Sam recovered she came back stronger and more determined, she took the time to really focus on her weaknesses and at the end of the 2013 open was sitting in first place worldwide.

Written by James Wilson

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

It’s March of 2012 and Samantha Briggs, a career firefighter in Manchester England, is coming off the back of a 4th place finish in the 2011 CrossFit Games and has had to make one of her hardest decisions of her life. Due to a major knee injury (a fractured patella) Sam has had to pull out of the 2012 CrossFit season. This decision takes Sam out of contention for a podium spot in Carson California for 2012 but she vowed to be back.

Having time to rehab, re-train and rebuild post injury may have been just what the doctor ordered (the B, is for bargain!) as Sam won a tough fought battle at this years Games and took the title of Fittest woman on earth for 2013.

Knowing when you are injured and actively preventing yourself from doing anymore harm isn’t an easy thing to do for any athlete.

CrossFitters tend to think, “nah I’m good bro, just a bit sore, I’ll push on, I will be fine” when in reality the smartest and safest thing to do when you are injured is stop.

Unfortunately that old ego often steps in and we solider on. Well in this case (thank Shirley - sorry to make such an old reference, kids ask your parents) “Ego [really] is a dirty word”. Being able to actually pull yourself out, stop what you are doing despite missing out on a “few more reps” or even a chance to compete at the games, this takes true character.

There is however, a piece of the paleo pie missing, the smiling Viking, Iceland Annie – Annie Thorisdottir.

Thorisdottir, the 2 times Games champion for 2011 and 2012, was preparing to match Rich (if you need his last name, do you

even CrossFit bro?) Froning’s, efforts to secure a three-peat at this years games but shocked everyone when she announced part way through this years open, that she would have to withdraw due to a back injury.

In the early stages of the 2013 open there was a lot of buzz about how Annie and Sam were stacking up, and the entire CrossFit community was looking forward to seeing them battle it out at Carson. In yet another strong showing of character Annie was forced to make the same tough decision Sam had made just 12 months prior. It would not have been easy for someone in Annie’s position, a 2 time defending champ, to pull out and forgo the opportunity of getting a hat trick.

Having had a serious back injury myself (well before I CrossFitted guys so let’s just all relax) it can

be quite debilitating and frustratingly slow to recover from. So even though the mind would have been willing I could bet that the body would not. If the events in Sam’s life over the past year and her amazing turn around is anything to go by, then Annie, being a super badass Viking ninja, will come back stronger than ever after 12 months to recover, refocus and re-train.

I cannot wait to see the epic throw down between these to giants of CrossFit in next years Open season. Not to blow things completely out of proportion, but watching these two going head to head could be bigger than the AFL grand final (yeah, I’m from Victoria, what of it?), the Bathurst 1000, the ultimate Frisbee world championship, the Darwin ice hockey league and dub-step cat all rolled into one. Think about it.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

23

AMANDA ALlen

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

Photograph courtesy of Joel Vogler Photography

In your life before CrossFit you were a professional triathlete, cyclist and canoeist. Can you give a quick summary of your sporting achievements prior to CrossFit? Primarily my sports were Triathlon, Cycling and then High Kneeling Canoeing. High Kneeling Canoeing was probably the hardest thing I’ve every done! I won state and national titles in each of these sports not to mention a World Masters Triathlon Title. I also qualified for the Paralympics riding tandem on the track with a blind athlete by the name of Sarnya Parker. I’ve also been reasonably competitive in mountain biking, adventure racing and orienteering.

You have said that the day you walked into CrossFit Adeliade was the day your life “began to come togeth-

24

|

WOD MAGAZINE

er” – can you elaborate on that?

I’m a misfit, I’ve had a trillion jobs including being a firefighter, model, radio announcer, marketing manager in the wine industry, professional triathlete, corporate team building facilitator, fundraiser for Greenpeace and massage therapist. The list really does go on and on!

I’ve moved houses, states and countries too many times to remember; I’ve tried my hand at a few sports over the years; I tried drinking, sometimes excessively; tried being vegetarian; I took a guru, bought a rural-hills property and tried total immersion in a ‘yogic’ style of living.

I’ve never been married and I have no kids. I have always felt that I didn’t belong anywhere in particular and that I probably never would and by

40 years of age I was starting to become ok with that! As it turns out I did belong somewhere after all, I’ve just taken the long road to get there while all the while eliminating things from my life that are not me. The best part about my particular situation is that I’ve found where I belong and there is no shadow of a doubt about it. Misfits now surround me every day, people equally as individual as me who share a common passion for discovering the depths of their characters and physical capabilities through the sport of fitness that we know and love: CrossFit! One of the common threads I have found in many of the “how I found CrossFit” stories I have read is a sensation of finally finding yourself through CrossFit – what does CrossFit and your ability to “do” CrossFit mean to you?

There is something remarkably real, gritty, and honest and humbling about CrossFit. I really resonate with this as a way of life, as a way of being an athlete and as a way of relating to others. I’ve become entirely myself in this environment. CrossFit invites or even demands me to be me, I do not have pretend to be something other than me, or be only the palatable bits of me. I love that CrossFit seems to be constantly asking me what I’m made of, I always want to know the answer, to plumb the depths of my character and take a peak at my foundations. I’m always ready to chalk up and find out if I’ve got what it takes this time - no matter the fear or doubt I feel. I’m never more fully alive than in the thick of a workout out, surrounded by my CrossFit family.

As someone who has seemingly always been very competitive was CrossFit ever

Games

the general strength and conditioning lifestyle that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

I actually took up training at CrossFit Adelaide a couple of times a week to get strong for Canoeing so it wasn’t really ‘a thing’ when I began it. I really enjoyed it but at that stage my focus was on qualifying for world in canoeing! When I didn’t make the Worlds team that’s when CrossFit became ‘a thing’. This was basically the week the 2011 Open began and I never returned to Canoeing, I couldn’t, I was totally enamored by everything about CrossFit. What does your average day look like?

Work 6-10, train 10-12, work 12-1, train 2-4, recovery/massage/float 4-6, dinner & ad-

Aussie athlete interview...

"I love that CrossFit seems to be constantly asking me what I'm made of, I always want to know the answer, to plumb the depths of my character and take a peak at my foundations. I'm always ready to chalk up and Find out if I've got what it takes this time - no matter the fear or doubt I feel. I'm never more fully alive than in the thick of a workout, surrounded by my CrossFit family."

min 6-8, bed 9.

How often/long do you train?

Basically 4 hours per day M-S, split morning and afternoon, with a long run & long stretch on Sundays!

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons It keeps changing, right now I’m going back to basics with my strength, fixing my squat and other gymnastics weaknesses, I now have an Olympic coach twice per week, I love met cons, but that’s backed off a bit to just a couple a week.

Do you have a period-ised training program?

My coach Ben Norman program’s for me with input now

from a couple of other specialist coaches; so the basic answer is yes, but in my case, although I program for other athletes all I do with Ben and my program is turn up and kind of do what I’m told to do. I love that, I don’t have to think about it, just do it!

How much sleep do you get?

I should be sleeping right now!

LOL! I get 8-8.30 hours per night, I try to have a 30min nap if I ever get a chance during the day - it’s not very reliable! But the 8:30hrs works well...less than 8 almost never happens, the wheels fall off quickly if I compromise even one night on my much needed and valued sleep.

What do you eat?

Apart from bacon?

Oats & rice are my preferred carbs, I’ve reintroduced them

more recently as I have found that I need them! Lots of green veggies, lots of beef, chicken, lamb; almond milk, berries, Maca, black coffee and I take Professional Whey - WPI, Dextrose, Glutamine, BCAAs, Creatine, Taurine, Beta Alanine, L-Carnatine post workout!

Your CrossFit games performances to date have been amazing – in the 2011 CrossFit games you placed 19th outright and in 2013 you won the new 40-44 masters age bracket. Given the choice, which category would you prefer to compete in for the 2014 games?

It’s no secret to anyone where I have my heart set! My goal, determination and utter focus for the last 2 years have been on returning to the Open division and that is my goal again this year. I’m so excited, this will be year #3 of CrossFit and I know great things will hap-

pen this year, I have a plan in place that fills me with excitement and confidence. I want to return to the main stadium to compete against the best women in the world as a 44 year old! Imagine how cool that would be!

We had several questions come in from our Facebook page: Tihane asked – Favorite and most effective recovery methods?

Massage, floating and 8 - 9hrs sleep per night! No competition or doubts there!!!

Marlene asked – How do you stay mentally focused during training, games preparations and while competing?

I love, love, love CrossFit! This passion fuels everything, during everyday, every session and every competition I am fully present, engaged, delighted and determined! I’ve spent many years looking for where I belong and what I am good at and I have no doubt that CrossFit is that thing for me.

It makes it all very easy to maintain a healthy perspective and total commitment and focus and honestly, in times of doubt, I do check in with myself during competitions and training. Sometimes it’s simply necessary to remind myself if why I do this, which only takes a moment and my head is clear and ready to support me on my mission again!

Joel asked – You have won Australia’s first CrossFit medal. What is next?

It’s time to take my performance to another level and return to Regionals and Games with NO WEAKNESSES!!!

And finally Ciara asked – What will you do differently in 2014 to make sure you qualify in the top 3 spots at regionals to ensure you make it back to the games?

I have a new and better plan than I did previously with some wonderful new specialist coaches onboard to work with me along with my primary coach Ben Norman. Additionally I have the support of new sponsors - SMAI, JAW, PROFESSIONAL WHEY and WOD GEAR. They truly care about me as a person and have shown immense support as I journey toward 2014. They help so very much! And I guess finally I have a deepened belief in my abilities and the support from people around me. I trust the process!!!

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

25

Chad "The Unit" Mackay

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

26

|

WOD MAGAZINE

According to your profiles on the CrossFit Active and CrossFit Games websites you attribute your drive to being brought up in a sporting family.

Baseball, Tennis, Little Athletics and Surfing.

What sports did you play as a kid?

Growing up I was always fairly competitive until I stopped playing Baseball and Tennis

Have you always been competitive? Did you ever compete in any other sports?

at 16 years old. My competitive drive to be the best athlete I can be started when I found CrossFit in 2008 and was further fueled by my first comp in 2009. My family has always been competitive, my Dad played Rugby League for the Roosters and represented Australia in 1974.

How and when did you “find” CrossFit? My boss at the time and now business partner Luke Starr introduced me to CrossFit in 2008.

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning

Games

Aussie athlete interview...

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

lifestyle that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

It has always been a sport for me due to the competitive nature of the workouts.

What does your average day look like?

Start at 5.15am, Coach from 6am-7.30am, Business related work from 7.30am-10am, Training from 10am-2pm, Client session’s from 2.30-5.30pm then Training 5.30-6.30pm.

How often/long do you train?

"Growing up I was always fairly competitive until I stopped playing Baseball and Tennis at 16 years old.

My competitive drive to be the best athlete I can be started when I found CrossFit in 2008 and was further fueled by my fIrst comp in 2009."

3-5 hours a day.

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons?

Strength and Metcon everyday, with every other day O-lift, Strength and Metcon.

Do you have a period-ised training program?

Yes. My strength and Olympic lifting is period-ised.

How much sleep do you get?

From the brief peak we got in your Search4hurt episode it looked like you were eating Paleo. What sort of diet do you normally follow?

I eat clean food all day every day. My diet includes meat, veggies, salad, some fruit, nuts and a little dairy.

Your CrossFit games performances to date have been amazing – in the 2012 CrossFit games you placed 9 and in 2013 you placed 11th. Are you doing anything different in your training for the 2014 games?

I will continue to work on both strengths and weakness throughout the year. I will be dedicating more time to improve my gymnastic skills and running efficiency, as these areas need more fine-tuning.

We had several questions come in from our Facebook page: Adam asked – How much is your weekly food bill? $300. Money well spent.

Chris asked – What do you feel is your biggest weakness that you are working on?

Gymnastic and running.

Jason asked – Do you size up every day objects and think – “I could life that”?

At times, yes. I had to push a car last week that couldn’t get into reverse up a small incline, but not sure if I would want to try and lift it.

And finally Andrew asked – What do you think about to push through the pain and lactic barrier?

I think about my game plan and being as efficient as possible when it gets hard. When it gets really hard my family comes to mind and there is no greater motivator than your family.

7 - 8 hours per night.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

27

Kara "Big Dub" Webb

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

28

|

WOD MAGAZINE

According to your profiles on the CrossFit Roar and CrossFit Games websites you have only been CrossFitting since 2011. In that time you have competed in the Australasian regionals each year and have won them the last 2 years. What is your sporting background?

Yes I have been doing CrossFit since CrossFit Roar opened in February 2011. I don’t really have a sporting background though and certainly not at an elite level.

All I can say is that my mum got me involved in school sports from day 1 and I always loved it.

I did swimming training before and after school and I played whatever was going during school. I did that until about year 9 of high school and stopped doing anything all together.

I spent some time just being a teenager doing stupid things and then realised when I was 19 that I felt a bit fat and lethargic from all of the “I just turned 18” drinking and partying. So I joined a regular gym that my mum was going to and started to just try and get some health about myself with the help of my now Coach Brian who was my PT at the time.

By the time I started CrossFit I guess I just had a good enough level huffy puffy fitness to allow me to work hard at CrossFit but still a very blank canvas in the way of skills and strength.

Do you think your sporting background put you in an ideal position to move to CrossFit in 2011?

I think the most important thing for a successful attitude towards life and just general wellbeing in life is playing sport and being involved in physical activities as a child.

I am so grateful my mum got me involved or I wouldn’t be the CrossFit athlete or the person I am today.

You need to develop body awareness, coordination, and a love for being physically active from a young age otherwise life is much more difficult when you are older.

Have you always been competitive? Did you ever compete at an elite level in any of your other sports?

I have always been competitive in that I like doing well. I like everything I do to be the best

t Games of my ability but if I see someone else do something better then me then I figure, surely if I work really hard that it possible for me too.

The highest I competed was in primary school in the Metropolitan North swimming events. Back then I originally wanted to be a competitive swimmer but as I got older there was so much pressure around that and at age 12 I just wasn’t ready for it.

I just really enjoyed swimming and wanted to be good at it because I was having fun, but as soon as the expectations were there I just didn’t enjoy it anymore.

That comes with age I guess. I have learnt to have both now.

Aussie athlete interview...

a competitive sport until after regionals 2011. At the time I didn’t even know that was possible.

I just really enjoyed how I felt and the confidence I regained from doing it.

Once I heard of the opens and thought oh why not and gave it a try and made it to regionals, then competed there and realised wow competing is awesome, I just kept training the way I was and didn’t do anything specific other then Brian’s gym programming. I turned up everyday and worked my butt off. Then coming into the 2012 season I realised that I had gotten pretty good so Brian put some programming together for me leading into the opens and here we are 2 wins later.

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons Brian keeps everything fairly balanced for me. I need to work on certain aspects of CrossFit but you never want to sacrifice anything. It’s important to improve what needs to be improved without losing something else.

I do only train one aspect per training session though. So I won’t do strength and a metcon in the same day/session as such, but I will combine the two into something like and “every minute on the minute” kind of style with something heavy.

The way I train resembles very

Then I pick it back up and start training CrossFit. Which means whenever I am training I am training at 100%. It doesn’t matter what that is, it needs to always be my best.

How much sleep do you get?

I am a great sleeper and really make it a crucial part of my life. I sleep typically 7 hours 20 minutes on weeknights due to when I have to get up to coach.

If it’s a little later for bedtime then I will make it up with a nap in the day. I typically need 8 hours and that works perfectly for me. Any more or less and I am a monster!

Sleep is where the magic happens so if I don’t get it then I can’t recover, adapt, and be better when I come to train

How and when did you “find” CrossFit? Brian was training me at a regular gym and he did his CrossFit level 1. He was hooked, he explained it to me and then I thought it was awesome. That would have been in maybe late 2009 or something like that.

He began giving me CrossFit style workouts, things that were rounds for time with the basics, box jumps and kettlebell swings etc and I loved it so much I couldn’t stand the thought of running on the treadmill for 20 minutes, riding on the bike for 20 minutes and getting on the bloody stairmaster any longer.

When Brian left the gym to do his own thing out of his home, I started training with my now husband under my mums deck. We didn’t have any gear except a skipping rope, a 16kg KB between us, and later we got a set of rings and medicine balls.

Brian had said he was trying to open an affiliate so we were just waiting. I taught myself whatever I could in the meantime and went and trained at Brian’s place once per week for a partner WOD with Jase.

When he told us he was opening in February 2011 I was so excited I couldn’t wait. I have trained at CrossFit Roar pretty much every single day pretty much since opening.

How often/long do you train?

I train once per day usually in the afternoon. I do a regular CrossFit WOD each day, but it is just something that is programmed to suit something that I need to be working on.

A few times per week I might have a starter or finisher to my WOD, for example 1 set max-unbroken muscle ups.

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning lifestyle for you that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

I am in the gym for my session for about 2 hours but I NEVER train that long haha.

I spend more time warming up and dawdling lol but typically if it’s a metcon it might be anywhere from 5 minutes up to 30 minutes and a strength is just a regular strength session.

CrossFit was fun and it was fitness. I never thought of it as

I don’t do anything weird or out of the ordinary.

much a balance of strength sessions per week and metcons just like a regular gym programming.

Do you have a periodised training program?

I don’t really have anything to do with my programming as such. Brian goes through with me what the year ahead will look like roughly. I guess you could call it periodised programming to a degree in that we have to work around the games season and be ready when I need to be ready and take advantage of the time I can use to make gains when I don’t have anything on.

For example when I got back from the games I had a chunk of time dedicated to repairing my body and re-activating everything. I worked at 80% weight and focused on moving beautifully again.

I do love Olympic lifting though. Out of everything I have learnt in CrossFit as an athlete and a coach I just feel as though Olympic lifting made sense straight away. It feels right and natural so I am definitely a sucker for it. Understanding something definitely makes it more enjoyable.

I could Olympic lift any day!

A couple of days ago it was announced that you have been chosen to be part of “Team World” at the CrossFit Invitational in Berlin on October 26th. What does your preparation for this event look like? Will it be hard ramping your training back up so soon after the games?

My training won’t change.

My number one priority is the Games and so I will do what I need to do for that. I have already picked up my training so there won’t be any change there and I should be fit enough for this anytime of the year really.

"whenever I am training I am training at 100%%.

It doesn’t matter what that is, it needs to always be my best."

What does your average day look like?

so fun because I never do those kinds of WOD’s. I just enjoyed doing something different.

I am actually thinking it will be a great booster for that time of year. It’s easy at the end of the year to get lost in training since it feels like the games are so far out of sight.

I think this will be a perfect way to keep the momentum of some tough training going and to really keep me focused.

What would be your number 1 tip to someone completely new to CrossFit on day one stepping into the box for the very first time?

next time.

I even go so far as to pull my bed back, have dinner cooked, PJ’s out ready all before I leave to train and coach in the afternoon so that when I get home I can be ready as quickly as possible and have time to wind down for a proper night sleep.

NERD! You came 2nd in the first event of the 2013 games, the swim & bar muscle up event and 4th in the Clean & Jerk ladder. These events seem very different – are swimming, bar muscle ups and clean & jerk all amongst your favourite movements?

I really enjoy most movements really. I think the swim WOD came down to the swim and just being an Aussie and being comfortable in the water gave me an advantage to keep going in that regard. Also it was just

Take your time and LISTEN! Hopefully if you have found a good affiliate to train at there are coaches to support your new journey with the sport.

The number one difference I see between people who do well and people who stay the same are those that take the time to listen and learn will always pull away from the rest.

No matter what, I do whatever Brian tells me to do. I trust in him as my coach and as someone who has my best interests in mind.

If you turn up, listen and ask questions and take in as much as you can and apply yourself for that one-hour then you will go far. Training time is just that so enjoy it and forget everything else and do YOUR best and not anyone else’s.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

29

Rob Forte

2013 ReEbok CrossFit According to your profile on Reebok CrossFit Frankston and the CrossFit Games websites you have a sporting background in motocross, Jiu Jitsu and bodybuilding. Do you think the combination of these sports makes for a good CrossFit-ter?

stronger for the rest of my life not just during my competitive years.

Not really, most of my time was spent racing motocross, which is more of an endurance sport. If you come from a sport that requires you to be more explosive and powerful then you’ll have a great base going into CrossFit.

I usually train once a day for about 2 hours.

You have finishing 3rd, 2nd and then 1st in the Australasian regionals in the last 3 years – what is your secret to dominating the regionals?

I would say that training consistently has played a huge role in my success and also adapting to the growth of CrossFit. The level of competition today is a lot tougher than it was 2-3 years ago so that means you have to put in the extra work to stay on top.

Have you always been competitive?

Can you tell us a little about your competitive motocross days?

I don’t think I was always that competitive although that changed when I started winning races and developed some self-belief. My motocross days was a great learning curve, we had to be very mentally tough and focused at a young age to do well in the sport. There is a lot of ups and downs in the sport and you have to learn to deal with them and keep moving forward.

How and when did you “find” CrossFit? My dad started CrossFit first by looking up Commando Steve off the Biggest Loser. He told me about it so I gave it a go and loved it straight away.

I started in November 2009 and did my first competition at CrossFit Brisbane in March 2010 and after that weekend I knew that’s what I wanted to keep doing.

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning lifestyle for you that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

At first it was but that changed after about 4 months because I got the taste of competition.

Although now it’s about both, making sure I get fitter and

30

|

WOD MAGAZINE

What does your average day look like?

How often/long do you train?

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons.

I usually start with a couple of strength exercises then I hit a WOD or two after that.

Do you have a periodised training program?

No, I do pretty much the same thing all year round.

How much sleep do you get?

On average about 8 hours.

In 2013 games you came 6th on the Burden Run and 8th on the 21km row – would you consider yourself an endurance athlete?

Yes, I’ve always done really well at longer events, I don’t train for this stuff much, I’m trying to get the rest of my game to the same level as my endurance and mental capacity.

Did you learn anything new from 2013 CrossFit Games? Are you going to do anything differently in this years training?

Yes, I’ve learnt that you have to broaden your experience as an athlete not just focus on the typical CrossFit WODs. I will try new things and broaden my experience as an athlete.

What would be your number 1 tip to someone completely new to CrossFit on day one stepping into the box for the very first time?

Don’t be intimidated, take your time, concentrate on moving well and have fun.

Games

Aussie athlete interview...

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

"I would say that training consistently has played a huge role in my success and also adapting to the growth of CrossFit. The level of competition today is a lot tougher than it was 2-3 years ago..." www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

31

Ruth Anderson Horrell

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

32

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Games

Aussie athlete interview...

"I've stopped any thoughts like “this isn't my type of WOD”. I've been tackling weaknesses for the last 5 years so I would like to remove myself from that label.

I think the advantage I have had on some of those workouts is having the mental strength to push through. Like when you run over a mountain you are often coming around a corner and seeing more mountain and you just have to be like ok I’m fIne I can keep going."

According to your profile on the CrossFit Games website you train and coach at CrossFit Invercargill. I have not been able to find much information on CrossFit Invercargill – can you tell me a little about your box?

We’ve renamed as CrossFit Wild South now, and I now have some other partners I have bought on board. This has meant that I’m not juggling as many jobs within the business. I’m now head coach and I only coach 4 - 6 hours a week. I do the entire box programming, and I take care of finances.

You have performed incredibly well over the past 3 years finishing 2nd at the Australasian regionals every year

since 2011 and have finished in 17th and 15th at the games in 2012 and 2013. Do you have a competitive sporting background before CrossFit? I used to do mountain running and cross-country events like the coast to coast and triathlon. These were just things to keep in shape really until I found CrossFit 5 years ago.

Have you always been competitive? Did you ever compete at an elite level in any of your other sports?

No last year I competed in Olympic Weightlifting for NZ but that was really after I began CrossFit. How and when did you “find” CrossFit? 5 years ago my brother in law Chris McSweeney and I started experimenting with the WODs. I couldn’t tell you my first workout, I think we kind of slowly transitioned from variable cross training to WODs until we were hooked.

The next thing we knew we were signed up for the First Aussie regional and well… now I’ve competed in 5 Regionals!

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning lifestyle for you that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

I initially was interested in it to accompany my triathlon training. Then I just stopped entering triathlons because I just didn’t get the same buzz from them any more. I guess even when Chris and I first started working out together it was always a competition. Unfortunately he and my sister moved away to set up CrossFit Kapiti but it pushed me to set up an Invercargill box so I could WOD with like-minded people.

You train most of the year in New Zealand but are coached by Dusty Hyland and Jules Dempsey out of CrossFit Dogtown – can you tell us how this came about?

Jules used to lift when I started but injury meant he had to step back from lifting and we were coming home from Nationals one day and he said “I can make you strong” I was like sweet lets do it, and we got in to it, and now he has a whole bunch of athletes that are doing awesome.

Dusty I met doing at Gym Cert at Schwartz a few years ago he said “I’ve just started training Lindsey Valenzuela you should come train” and I was like ok, I came home and

rang Dog Town a month later and now I think I’ve had 4 trips to train there. I guess I’ve just been offered opportunities so took them.

Tell us a little about Lindsey Valenzuela – did you also train with Sam Briggs this year before the games while she was training with Lindsey?

Lindsey has been an awesome training partner in the last couple of years. Unfortunately I was injured so close to the games this year that I didn’t get in much training with either of them, but I did get to hang with them a little. They are both great people. Sam is really down to earth, she is totally chilled, but also totally made of metal, it was obvious she was unbeatable this year.

I’m really proud of both of them, they both have put in so much work to achieve really great things, and I know they will both continue to do so.

What does your average day look like?

Wake 5-6 breakfast is first, followed by emails. Head to the gym. I usually get some Ruthless Ltd orders out to people during this time, and approximately an hour of the box paper work done. Run errands.

Train before or after lunch, really varies, then get in some more paper work. I coach usually a lunch or an evening class and then lift with Jules in the evening.

One day a week I travel around an hour and work as a vet as a small animal practice, this is my day of body rest too, sometimes I get in a lunch time swim or a light row or run but usually I take it off.

Get home around 8pm, shower, dinner and bed by 9.30 – 10pm.

How often/long do you train?

3.5 hours often split into CrossFit and lifting, sometimes as one session.

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons The last 2 years has been mostly strength. The metcons have been there and more so from the open to regionals and then obviously to the worlds but strength has been No1.

This year I feel I have a good base, so my focus is continuing to improve my cardiovascular ability, my power, and agility.

I’ve also had to work through a lot of rehab on my neck and thoracic spine so that’s a constant part of my training.

I want to be lifting 5 - 6 days a week, but just not the same amount of volume as I was doing.

Do you have a periodised training program?

I guess more strength has occurred in the last 6 months of the last 2 years, and more metcons in the first 6 months of the year. I feel I’ve more just been building that base so I feel quite excited this year that I can keep maintenance strength and just tidy up some other areas rather than let my fitness slip a little like I normally would be at this time of year.

How much sleep do you get?

8 hours.

You came 2nd in Burden Run and 3rd in Row. Would you consider yourself an endurance athlete?

Initially yes, that’s been my background but I’ve also had some excellent performances in shorter WODS like Jackie and the rope climb WOD at regionals where I momentarily held a world record. I really consider myself a CrossFit athlete. I’ve stopped any thoughts like “this isn’t my type of WOD”. I’ve been tackling weaknesses for the last 5 years so I would like to remove myself of that label. I think the advantage I have had on some of those workouts is having the mental strength to push through. Like when you run over a mountain you are often coming around a corner and seeing more mountain and you just have to be like ok I’m fine I can keep going.

What would be your number 1 tip to someone completely new to CrossFit on day one stepping into the box for the very first time?

Get the basics perfect. Don’t be in a rush to get your muscle up or that heavy snatch, tidy up your shoulder position, make sure your strict pull ups look awesome. I am still working on perfecting even the most basic movements like air squats and push ups. Don’t just think “oh yuk” more air squats, just get better at them.

Also… be prepared to work the stuff you suck at, not the stuff your good at. If you want to be a good CrossFit-ter trying to improve on your sub 2.30 Fran is probably not going to make you awesome but fixing that ugly overhead squat might.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

33

Pip malone

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

According to your profiles on the Reebok CrossFit GCS and CrossFit Games websites you have only been CrossFit-ting since 2012.

Since then you have finished 3rd in the 2013 Australasian regionals and 36th in your first CrossFit Games appearance. Do you think your 20 years of gymnastics put you in an ideal position to tran-

34

|

WOD MAGAZINE

sition into elite level CrossFit competition?

first competition was gymnastics at age 4.

Having a lot of years experience in elite sport definitely helped me in preparation for the 2013 season. I’ve been able to maintain the discipline, determination and stamina required to get through regionals and make it to the games.

Competing in CrossFit and preparing for the unknown however is unlike any other sport I’ve done.

How and when did you “find” CrossFit?

You have also competed at a high level in Canoe Slalom - have you always been competitive?

I have been competitive from as early as I can remember, my

I found CrossFit in 2011. I met someone in a regular gym that told me about it because they thought I’d love it. They introduced me to an affiliate and I loved it from the first session.

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning lifestyle for you that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

Coming from Olympic sports it was strange at first, watching a competition, learning how a games season works,

and the concept of the open being online. But I thought it was incredible, I still do. I watched a video of Camille Leblanc-Bazinet in the 2011 CrossFit Games and did my first competition less than 6 weeks later. When I first started CrossFit-ting I knew instantly it was what I wanted to do. I finished my last gymnastics national season about 4 months later then I retired and switched my focus to CrossFit. What does your average day look like?

How often/long do you train?

On average I train 4 hours a day.

t Games

Aussie athlete interview...

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons Everyday is a hard day, every day I burn my lungs, and every day I move weight.

Do you have a periodised training program?

I follow the givemcoldsteel. com program.

How much sleep do you get?

When I’m not studying, as much as possible. 8 hours a night is the minimum requirement although studying can mean a few all night-ers a week, which doesn’t help my training at all!

You came 9th in the Naughty Nancy event at 2013 games, are running and overhead squats among your favorite movements?

The running was where I had to push myself way out of my comfort zone. I was hurting.

The overhead squats were pretty light and comfortable for me as they one of my favorite moves.

What are your training plans for the 2013/2014 season?

Are you going to change anything after your experience at the games this year?

I will stick to my coaches program and plan, and utilize ev-

erything I have learnt from my rookie year in the last CrossFit Games season.

What would be your number 1 tip to someone completely new to CrossFit on day one stepping into the box for the very first time?

Listen to the coach’s instructions and learn how to move safely. Every workout is achievable at any level of fitness. Don’t compare yourself to others. Just have a go and you will surprise yourself with what you can get out yourself when you step out of your comfort zone.

"Every workout is achievable at any level of fItness. Don’t compare yourself to others.

Just have a go and you will surprise yourself with what you can get out yourself when you step out of your comfort Zone." www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

35

MatT Swift

2013 ReEbok CrossFit

According to your profiles on the CrossFit Brisbane and CrossFit Games websites you have a background in Triathlons, various martial arts, cycling and weightlifting. How much do you believe your background has contributed to your CrossFit success to date?

I played a lot of sports growing up but I was never very good any one thing. I think from a very early age I liked the idea of being able to do lots of different things rather than focusing on any one thing, so personality wise I am probably well suited to the generalist nature of CrossFit. Having a broader sporting background probably helps a lot with acquiring the different skills of CrossFit. Triathlon helped develop my running, Karate and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) were a great lesson in the importance

36

|

WOD MAGAZINE

of technique, Cycling teaches you how to suffer, and Weightlifting has obvious transfer to a lot of what we do. It definitely helps having played sports growing up, but I don’t think it is necessary for success in CrossFit. I think it is more the case that people who by their nature are attracted to playing lots of sports are also attracted to what CrossFit has to offer.

Have you always been competitive? Did you ever compete at an elite level in any of your other sports?

The second question is easier to answer than the first. I have only ever competed at what I would call a “serious recreational” level, never elite. My previous sporting results are really good evidence that I can do most things ok but no one thing well, so CrossFit was a perfect fit. As for being com-

petitive, I have always liked competing and testing myself, and I love the feeling of competition, but a common complaint of every coach that I have had is that I am not competitive enough. This is one of the specific things that I am working on in training at the moment, I am learning to push harder to win. Playing the game well has always been more important to me than coming first, but that is something that doesn’t serve me well at higher level competition, so now I am learning to be more driven to win.

How and when did you “find” CrossFit? I stumbled across the crossfit. com website in 2005. I was training in BJJ and looking for information on kettlebell training for martial arts. I found a link to CrossFit and initially recoiled because it

went against everything that I had been taught. After following the site for a while out of curiosity I dabbled a bit in the workouts but didn’t get it until I saw the Nasty Girls video in December 2005. That video blew my mind and echoed like a challenge to be able to match what Nicole, Eva and Annie could do, which of course I couldn’t. It started an obsession with the program and very quickly I worked out that I wasn’t very fit at all! The more it humbled me the more addicted I became.

When you started CrossFit-ting back in 2005 was there a competitive scene anywhere in the world yet?

How about Australia?

In 2005 there were only a handful of people doing CrossFit in the country! I remember being so excited to meet

t Games

Aussie athlete interview...

box. We held our first competition in 2008 as a “housewarming” party for our first building in 2008 and called it the “Hard’nup Challenge”. It was meant to just be a couple of workouts and a BBQ for our members but Steve Willis and Mick Shaw from CrossFit Effects brought up their crew to support our opening and almost by accident we found ourselves running a semi-serious competition. The first serious competition that I did was the 2009 Australasian Regional Qualifier. Although it is everywhere these days, CrossFit competition is actually a very recent phenomenon.

Was CrossFit ever the general strength and conditioning lifestyle for you that it is for many people or was it always a “sport” in your eyes?

Photograph courtesy of Adam Lesniak up with other CrossFit-ters and just being able to do a WOD with someone. Before I affiliated in 2006 I travelled to Sydney to do a WOD with Andrew Cattermole from CrossFit Sydney in a park. At around the same time Fiona Muxlow from CrossFit Townsville came to Brisbane and we did a WOD in a commercial gym. Those were really the only experiences I had training with someone else that actually knew what CrossFit was. There was no concept of CrossFit competition. In 2007 we started to hear about basic competitions in the States and then the first CrossFit Games at Aromas, but even when the Games were announced I didn’t think it was going to develop into a Sport.

The beginnings of organized competitions were really just opening day celebrations when an affiliate moved into a new

For me CrossFit will always be my strength and conditioning program. I do it because it keeps me fit and healthy, and it makes my life better. The sport side of it provides a lot of fun and motivation, but it is just a tiny piece of what the program has to offer. If the entire competition side disappeared nothing would change in my training or attitude to CrossFit. There is no doubt that competition has been instrumental in the development and popularity of CrossFit, and the Games are an incredible experience as both competitor and spectator alike, but nothing can compare to seeing someone turn their life around and become strong and healthy. The sport side is just a visible expression of how driven this community is to be better all the time.

What does your training look like? Strength vs Metcons Do you have a periodised training program? How much sleep do you get?

My training volume has ramped a lot since last year. I train 5 days in a row during the week and then rest on weekend. That cycle fits in nicely with family and work and means that I hit each week rested and ready to go. I only train once a day in a 2-3 hour block usually from 2pm to 5pm. My program is not periodised as such but I do tend to work around themes and at the moment my lifting is percentage based and I don’t max out anywhere near as much as I used to. There is a lot of variety in what I do, however each session does follow a standard format that involves about 5-6 different training pieces. The first couple of pieces are strength or lifting, followed by the WOD which is usually the third piece for the day, and then a couple

of pieces dedicated to specific conditioning or skill work. So every day has both strength and metcon work, and over time I am handling more and more volume within that 2-3 hour block. The most positive change that I have made is hitting the WOD already fatigued. The most important element in the program is consistency. I have a rule that the work gets done no matter what. Perhaps the most important lesson I learned from the Games is that it is won or lost in training. You have to do the work if you want to perform well. The poorest part of my program is sleep, I never get enough, and with the demands of the gym and family I am often staying up too late and getting up too early. A typical night is 6 hours and this is a big area for improvement in my program.

Much of the inspiration for coaching at CrossFit Brisbane comes directly from the CrossFit syllabus. We aim to be a pure expression of the CrossFit Methodology, and time and time again we draw on the basics that are taught in the Level 1 Trainer course, we teach sound Mechanics and want Consistency before increasing Intensity, we stick to Functional Movements and we make the program as Varied as possible. Everyone follows the same program, but we adjust it to individual needs by scaling where appropriate to achieve “Relative Intensity” which is such an important concept. These are the basics and when you wrap them up in a pursuit of Virtuosity, striving to do the common uncommonly well, you have a very powerful set of coaching tools.

You won event 5 - the 5 minute Clean & Jerk 1 rep max event at the games with 295 pounds (133kg) but came really close to getting your final attempt on the day of 315 pounds. According to your games profile you have a 1 rep max of 319 (145kg), do you think if you had another couple of minutes you would have been able to stick a 315 or even get a new PR?

My own personal coaching philosophy is centered on a belief that my role is to help people find the best version of themselves. Said another way, I believe there is no point making someone fitter and healthier if they also don’t become a better person along the way. So I see CrossFit coaching as transformational rather than transactional, I want my athletes improvement in performance to be matched by their improvement as a person. My coaching framework is based around “ages and stages”, i.e. every athlete can be placed on a continuum of developmental age in much the same way that a child can be mapped against their stage of development, so my general coaching approach is to make sure the teaching matches the stage. What we teach a novice is different to what we teach an intermediate, and different again for the advanced athlete, even though all three may be practicing the same movement or doing the same workout. I think this is an important concept that is lost on a lot of CrossFit coaches.

That was a great event and I was lucky that it was right in my sweet spot, but there are so many things going on that can get in the way of a PR, and I planned to be conservative. The 295 was the important lift because I knew it would give me the win. Everything after that was for bragging rights. I was feeling confident that I could make the 315 pounds but I rushed the first attempt, was off balance in the receive of the clean and found myself at with one knee on the ground. In the heat of the moment I tried to stand it up (I still don’t know why) and used a lot of energy when I should have just dumped it quickly. On the next attempt I made the clean but didn’t adjust my feet for the jerk and consequently dipped forward pushing the bar out in front. Within that short timeframe it is not easy hitting multiple max efforts and so missing the clean on the first attempt was a major mistake. With a bit more mental toughness it could have gone the other way. That is the great thing about competition pressure though; you always find things to work on for next time!

As the owner and head coach of CrossFit Brisbane can you give us a little insight into your personal coaching philosophy?

What would be your number 1 tip to someone completely new to CrossFit on day one stepping into the box for the very first time?

Relax! There is no need to rush. Get the basics right first and take your time building up the intensity. A lot of people hit the program too hard at the beginning and get crushed by it. I like to remind new people that training is a process and it is going to take them some time to learn the process and get good at it. Slowing things down at the beginning leads to much better outcomes in the long term. This is even more important if you have body things going on. It takes time to develop the required

mobility, or to resolve prior injuries, and taking it slow not only allows your body to catch up and adapt, it also takes the pressure off your poor coach who is trying to get you to move in ways that you probably haven’t been able to since you were a kid. There is plenty of time, you will be doing this program, and loving it, for the rest of your lift so be nice to yourself and ease into it gently.

"FoR me CrossFit will always be my strength and conditioning program.

I do it because it keeps me fIt and healthy, and it makes my life better.

The sport side of it provides a lot of fun and motivation, but it is just a tiny piece of what the program has to offer.

If the entire competition side disappeared nothing would change in my training or attitude to CrossFit."

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

37

2013 Reebok CrossFit Games experiencE

Rob forte's 38

|

WOD MAGAZINE

The Games week started with an athlete dinner on the Monday night. We were loaded onto a bus and taken to the Stubhub Center for a few announcements. It was then that we found out we had to row a half marathon. I immediately thought that I would rather a run and I dreaded the thought of sitting on a rower for one hour and twenty minutes.

The first day of competition we also had to travel around on the bus. I left my hotel at 5:30am on the Wednesday to meet up with the other athletes, and leave for the swimming pool. There was a bit of the unknown element as to how the bar muscle ups would feel with wet hands. After watching the girls, Cobi and I came up with a game plan for the event.

Before I knew it the Games had started and I was in the water. My first round was really slow because I decided to dry my hands before jumping up to the bar, I realised that I was wasting too much time so I jumped straight up as I got out of the water in the following rounds. I had Dan Bailey in the lane next to me and we were back and forth the whole time, then on the last round I slipped on my second Muscle Up, which cost me that position. It was good to get the first event out of the way and I was happy with my performance.

Event two and three (2000m Row & 21097m Row) were on a bit later in the day and I don’t think anyone was looking forward to this event. I was positioned next to the champ, Rich Froning, which I was happy with so I could see where I was at the whole time. We had a big screen in front of us, which had the top 20 at the time, so we could see where we were positioned. The row had started and I was pushing for a quick 2000m time, when I was a little over half way I looked up and saw that I wasn’t in the top 20 so I decided to back it off a bit and push hard on the half marathon. I felt good mentally and watched Froning stop a couple of times for a quick drink, I immediately thought that this was my chance to catch him and I refused to stop and have a drink. With about 5km to go I decided to pick up the pace and put the head down, I kept looking over at Froning’s screen and could see that it was going to be close.

The last 300m we were sprinting, we had the rowers down to 1:35 500m pace and he just got me, bloody bastard. I finished and got up to walk around and about 3 minutes later my glutes and hamstrings wanted to cramp up, so for the next hour I couldn’t really bend down to grab anything. That was day one, and it was now time to recover.

On Thursday we had to go to the Stubhub Center for some orien-

tation and after a quick lunch we also had a press release to go to.

It wasn’t much of a rest day, there was a lot of sitting around and the body gets tight very quickly.

Friday morning we were up early again for an athlete brief at the Stubhub Center. The first event for the day was a longer one, “The Burden Run”. We didn’t have a pig to flip or a sled to drag in the warm up area, so the first time we got to try them out was in the event. I wanted to run fast in this event to have a lead going into flipping the pig because by watching the girls it looked heavy. The pace on the run was fast, I was up in the front group trying to make up some ground but I didn’t want to over do it. I got to the next part of the event, flipping the pig, and started flipping that thing which got very heavy and gassy. I had people going past me but I kept telling myself to get back on it and keep pushing. At the end of that we had to carry a log back into the soccer stadium, it was awkward and uncomfortable. Once in the stadium I dropped the log and grabbed the sled straps, put my head down and started dragging the sled. I got about half way and looked up to see a few guys not too far in front of me to my right, I knew I was catching them so I went for it again and finished in 6th place. I was happy with my performance but I know I need to be stronger on a couple of things in that event.

The next event was the “Zig Zag Sprint”. I had done some work with Tommy Hackenbruck the week before on sprinting and changing directions, which helped me immensely. I’ve never been a fast sprinter I’ve always been much better at longer distance running. I felt good mentally knowing I had learnt the correct technique for this event the week before. While warming up I tweaked my hamstring a little bit that had me worried going into the event because I didn’t want to carry that injury into the rest of the weekend. I told myself before I was up to go for it and deal with it later, but I think I hesitated taking off and when you’re up against the best in the world that will cost you. It felt good and I didn’t make the injury worse. Again I was happy with my performance. I got my hamstring treated straight after the event which made it feel much better going into the last event for the day. Any free time that it looks like we have between events, that’s where they put the workout briefs, so we don’t really get a chance to get away and have a good rest.

This adds to the challenge of staying mentally tough all weekend and going in fired up for every single event.

The last event for Friday was the

"I felt good mentally and watched Froning stop a couple of times for a quick drink, I immediately thought that this was my chance to catch him and I refused to stop and have a drink. With about 5km to go I decided to pick up the pace and put the head down, I kept looking over at Froning's screen and could see that it was going to be close. The last 300m we were sprinting, we had the rowers down to 1:35 500m pace and he just got me, bloody bastard."

“Legless Rope Climb” event. I love rope climbs because I’m fast and efficient at them and it’s something I’ve practiced a lot. This was very different, warming up it felt great and as efficient as it could be for not using legs. I was fired up to do well in this event and I was ready. I got to the second round of Legless Rope Climbs and my grip started to go and they became difficult. I had to slow down and rest. My whole CrossFit career I’ve struggled with pulling movements, I guess you could say I didn’t do enough pulling when I was younger. Jokes aside, I’ve done hundreds of Pull Ups and Muscle Ups on a weekly basis and I’ve come a long way, but on the world stage it still gets exposed as a weakness. I walked away from that event knowing I did everything I could and performed at my

The next morning we had another early start because of the first event brief, I think I was up at 5:30am to be ready. The first event for Saturday was “Naughty Nancy”. This would be the first event to challenge my wrist injury, with the overhead squat weight at 64kg, where a little under two weeks prior I couldn’t squat snatch 60kg.

I taped my wrist very heavily which made the bar sit forward a little more and push me more onto my toes. It took me a little bit of time to get in a comfortable position but I don’t think it affected me in the event. The game plan in this event was to take advantage of the run and try to hold two sets for the overhead squats. I went out hard on the first run to get out in front, I then did the first set of overhead squats in two sets.

Running up the stairs and going up the hill was very tough on the legs, this forced me to do the middle two rounds of squats in three sets. After 100 overhead squats my legs and shoulders felt like they had copped a beating. I immediately jumped into an ice bath and started my recovery ready for some heavy Clean & Jerks.

The second event on Saturday was the “Clean & Jerk Ladder”. I made sure I started warming up well before I had to go out because I was unsure how my wrist would feel.

My best Clean & Jerk is 145kg and I was hoping to hit between 135kg & 140kg after the beating my legs copped in the morning. I warmed up to my start weight and my wrist felt good, I felt fast and again I was fired up and I was focused on doing my best. The first lift felt good, it felt just like my warm up sets. On my third lift (125kg) the jerk felt awkward and the lockout wasn’t great. This is a weight that I usually do comfortably so I told myself to move faster. My fifth lift (135kg) I missed the jerk which never happens, usually if I clean it, I jerk it. I was disappointed that I didn’t hit the numbers I wanted to hit, but two weeks prior I wasn’t even sure if I would be able to lift any decent amount of weight.

After the Clean & Jerk Ladder I was looking forward to having a lay down for a couple of hours before the final event for the day. Just after I had my post workout nutrition I was told I had to go and do a drug test. I had just gone to the toilet before they grabbed me so I knew I was going to be waiting in the room for a little while. I sat in a room slowly sipping on water for about 90 minutes because if you’re too hydrated you have to

give another sample, which has happened to me before. After I had given them what they wanted I headed back to eat something and prepare for the last event of the day.

The final event for Saturday was “2007”. This event had heaps of pull ups, which was something I had been working on a lot in recent months. I really wanted to do well in this event and I felt good about it. I came up with a strategy to break up the pull ups into manageable sets right from the start.

After the first two rounds I started to feel the fatigue set in on the pull ups a lot earlier than normal, the legless rope climbs had come back to haunt me in this event. Again I performed at my potential but I was a little disappointed that my body wouldn’t let me go faster. I went straight back to the hotel to eat and do some recovery work.

With day three down, I slept very well that night.

Going into Sunday I knew I had to make up a few places to make the cut for the final event, I didn’t feel pressured, I felt great mentally even though my body was telling me otherwise. I wanted to give it all I had once again. The event was the “Sprint Chipper”, it started with 21 Medball GHD sit ups which didn’t feel bad at all. Then there was 15 reps of 75kg snatch, I did a couple of sets of 3 reps touch & go then I went to single reps, I knew I was moving slower than the other guys on the snatch but I was fighting for each rep. I got to the 9 burpees over a 6’ wall and left nothing in the tank, I made up a few places but it wasn’t enough to get me through to the last event, therefore ending day four for me.

Looking back at this years Games there was a massive improvement on last year, I performed to my potential on every workout and I was having fun doing it. I felt great through the whole competition regardless of the result. Last year was very different, I felt like I had to do the events and I felt tired and beat up. This year I was ready for another day of competition. Most of the time I had to slow down because of muscular fatigue, not because I wanted to slow down or give up. I’m excited for next year and I thank you all for the support.

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit Inc.

potential. I was a bit disappointed that my body let me down like that, but I was still in good spirits. After the event I got a feed and did some recovery work and by that time it was 10:00pm, day two complete and time for sleep.

A special mention goes out to Cobi Head for being my coach during the Games, he told me when to warm up, what to eat, when to eat and made sure I did everything possible to recover for every event. Thanks mate, I really appreciate your efforts.

Rob Forte www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

39

cr

AN

bo

xe

I sh

oss

oot

fit

D.. .. c s * o mp s * po r ev t & fo eq l i o e nt s ui s * * pm ge en ar t

te

rs

Matthews

FRANKIE LEE

P h o t o g r a p h y www.mphotography.com.au

Invitational

2013 Reebok CrossFit |

WOD MAGAZINE

Written by Ben Quinney

Photograph courtesy of CrossFit, Inc

42

On the 26th October 2013 in an airport hanger in Germany an all-star team of the top CrossFit athletes from the USA faced off against a team of the best CrossFit-ters from around the rest of the globe.

Men Rich Froning Jason Khalipa Ben Smith Women Talayna Fortunato Lindsey Valenzuela Valerie Voboril

vs

Team World Men Chad Mackay (AUS) Albert-Dominic Larouche (CAN) Fredrik Aegidius (DEN) Women Kara Webb (AUS) Samantha Briggs (ENG) Camille Leblanc-Bazinet (CAN)

The teams

Team USA

Competition format 75 minute team competition

5 workouts Each team member had to compete in each of the 5 workouts

Event 1: Mixed –pairs Jackie for total time

Female competitor completes Jackie then male competitor completes same workout Row 1000 metres 50 Thrusters 20kg for both male and female 30 Pull-ups Score: Winning pair takes 6 points, second takes 5, and so on.

Results: USA 10 – World 11

with different loads.

15 dumbbell burpee box jumps (in unison) 30 pair deadlifts (approx. 265/184kg; two athletes on a single bar, with third rotating in) 30 overhead squats (102/61kg; each athlete can do 10 reps per set, and each must do at least one rep per set) 15 muscle ups each (not in unison) Score: Each event is worth 3 points Results: USA 3 – World 3

Event 4: Max combined clean weight Before the workout the coach for each team chose one pair to compete for 4 points, one for 3 and one for 2

Each pairs maximum clean weight is combined and compared against the corresponding pair from the other team

The workouts

Event 2 & 3: Male & Female team workout Event 2 has 3 females competing as a unit, and Event 3 will feature three males. They had to perform the same workout for total time

Score: 4 points, 3 points, 2 points Results: USA 6 - 3 World

Event 5: Final 30 Metre handstand walk

60 Worm thursters 30 Metre overhead walking lunges (74/45kg) Score: 7 points Results: USA 0 – 7 World Final Results USA 19 – 24 World

Summary

Heading into the competition team world were regarded as the “underdogs” but they remained quietly confident stating on several occasions that it is a team competition and it is more about communication and transitions than individual performance. In an interview for CrossFit.com Chad Mackay said “They are only human, we are going to go out there and do our best”.

As the competition unfolded it became clear that Valerie Voboril was not 100% fit and was carrying a shoulder injury that as the competition unfolded meant her teammates often had to do additional reps to allow her to rest and recover during the competition.

In the beginning Team World took the lead through events 1 and 2 but Team USA were able to claw it back over events 3 and 4 and go into the final event with a two point lead. The combination of Team USA’s mistakes on the worm thrusters in the final event and Voboril’s shoulder injury resulted in quite a bit of lost time and allowed Team World to win the final seven point event to claim an unexpected, but welcome, victory.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

43

What is the CrossFit Open?

2014 CrossFit Open

FEATURE

The CrossFit Open is the first step on the road to the CrossFit Games. It is a world wide competition hosted online that anyone can enter. First ran in 2011 the open gives athletes an opportunity to compare their strength and athletic abilities against their friends, fellow box members and athletes from around the world in a standardised competition over several workouts.

CrossFit.com calls the Open “… the most inclusive competition in the world”.

How is the Open structured?

Each year of the open has consisted of 5 workouts, with the exception of 2011 where, due to a technical issue, we were presented with 6. Traditionally each workout is announced at 5pm US Pacific Time Wednesday and results for that workout must be submitted by 5pm US Pacific Time the following Sunday. For Australians this will mean we will get the workouts on a Thursday and have to have our scores submitted by Sunday night – or Saturday if your box, like mine, is closed on a Sunday.

Workouts are given numbers for the open rather than names; in 2011 we had 11.1 – 11.6, in 2012 we had 12.1 etc.

When WILL it happen?

On January 1st 2014 CrossFit Inc announced that the first workout for the 2014 open will be released on Thursday February 27th USA time with the fifth and final workout released on Thursday March 27th.

What will we have to do?

Traditionally the CrossFit Open workouts have all been an As Many Reps As Possible (AMRAP) format in various lengths ranging from 4 minutes for 13.5’s first round up to 20 minutes for 11.5.

The workouts will very likely be made up of traditional CrossFit movements such as: burpees, double unders, snatch, box jumps, deadlifts, cleans, jerks, squats, overhead squats, toes to bar, wall balls, thrusters, chest to bar pull ups, push press and of course muscle ups.

How do I register?

The CrossFit Open registration process requires that you have a free CrossFit.com account to enter, this year registrations for the open begin on January 15th.

In 2013 the CrossFit open registration cost US$20.

What can I do now to best improve my Open placement?

Learn new skills. If you can squat 150kg putting in the work to add another 10kg to your squat is not going to make a lot of difference to your Open ranking.

If you can’t do muscle ups, for example, then this will be your major limitation. In workout 13.3 everyone that was capable of doing 150 wall balls and 90 double unders in 12 minutes but were unable to do a single muscle up would have gotten the same score – i.e. 240. But an athlete who could complete at least 1 muscle up will potentially place hundreds of places higher just for having been able to complete that one gymnastics movement.

Written by Ben Quinney

Image courtesy Matthew Townsend

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

45

Feature

The early daYs of

46

|

WOD MAGAZINE

in

Australia

Article and images by Adam Stranecki

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

47

CrossFit? What the hell is CrossFit? It’s 2005 and few people in the world, let alone Australia, have heard the name CrossFit. Fewer still have any idea what it means, what it stands for or what it will become.

Back then I became one of only a few people who had discovered CrossFit after a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu training partner of mine told me about CrossFit.com. In 2005 it was quite the underground training method and many viewed it as controversial.

My first visit to CrossFit.com left me completely underwhelmed. I couldn’t work out what all the fuss was about. At first glance, I was unsure what set it apart from other training philosophies; there was nothing to compare it to, the concepts were so different from anything taught in courses available at that time. It was hard to reconcile the material with what I’d learned and practiced as a somewhat inexperienced trainer.

Thankfully I took the time to read through the early Journal articles, watch the videos and monitor the WODs for a few weeks after which the revolutionary nature of CrossFit revealed itself.

The first WOD I tried was “Diane”. I’d never done 45 reps of 100kg deadlifts before and I couldn’t do handstand push-ups very well at all. Needless to say I was crushed and simultaneously hooked.

From that point onward I changed how I trained myself and shortly after how I trained my clients. Soon after I affiliated.

And then there were three In 2006 there are only three affiliates in Australia; one in North Queensland, one in Sydney and another in Melbourne. CrossFit remains largely unknown to most trainers and athletes.

The biggest challenge at this time was educating the gym going public. Just proclaiming that: “I am a CrossFit coach” meant nothing.

There were many blank looks from people when we tried to explain what it is that we were doing and why. We all must have looked a little crazy, perhaps we were. Even HQ hadn’t distilled the message to the “constantly varied, functional movements at high intensity” tagline that is commonplace today.

Our training was conducted wherever we could get space. We used parks, martial arts studios, and “globo gyms” where we didn’t last long due to complaints about the noise from dropping barbells and other traditional gym faux pas.

Finding the right equipment was a logistical nightmare. Kettlebells were ridiculously overpriced; the only Olympic weightlifting equipment available was Olympic Games level like Eleiko and equipment like pull-up rigs, lifting platforms and GHDs were all pipedreams. It was a time of experimentation. Everyone involved in CrossFit coaching was developing his or her own method of programming while spreading the message of the benefits and results of our newly found system.

48

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Going back to the source Sadly in 2007 there are no certification courses in Australia. With less than 250 affiliates worldwide travel was the only option.

One of the conditions of my affiliation with CrossFit was that I would complete a certification course within 12 months. However, in 2007 the only courses available were held in the USA. So, my wife and I packed our bags and took the opportunity to spend four weeks traveling around meeting new folks and training at various boxes as well as attending the cert.

The certification course was hosted by Big John McCarthy - the first ever UFC referee - in his huge facility in Valencia, CA. I was not the only Aussie there that day also in attendance was a bloke from Sydney named Steve Willis, you might know him as “The Commando”. I remember Steve completing a 3:59 Fran, his personal best at that time and boy did he look a little unwell after that!

The cert was amazing; there was lots of great coaching, time spent with some of the original CrossFit HQ crew was invaluable and the lectures from Greg Glassman were unforgetable. There was even a bonus session with John Hackleman and Tony Blauer.

My strongest memory of the course is the feeling of family as my wife and I had traveled so far to attend everyone there went out of their way to make us feel welcome. Nicole Carroll almost squeezed the life out of me, Greg Amundson invited me to dinner and Greg Glassman was keen to make sure I had a blast.

After the course my wife and I went traveling around the country on a bit of a whirlwind

tour. In Las Vegas I trained with Joe Marsh who, in stifling 40c plus degree heat, put me through a brutal met-con WOD during which I completely shredded my hands. Joe’s only complaint was that I didn’t vomit as he was hoping I’d get to meet “Pukie” during my trip.

In LA, Andy Petranek’s team doubled the numbers on the WOD as I’d turned up to a novice class. I thought to myself “that was very kind of them” – after the WOD I left a giant sweat angel on the gym floor. That was no novice class that’s for sure!

In Boston, we finally found Neal Thompson’s gym in South Boston. Little did we know that being out and about in that area at that time of day was not entirely safe – they have since moved.

In San Francisco, we spent a few hours trying to find Kelly Starrett’s box with no luck. Everything around was closed up for a bank holiday resulting in my only regret from the trip: not getting to see some performance art from the supple leopard himself.

I even trained at the original CrossFit box in Santa Cruz with Annie Sakamoto and Greg Amundson. There were a few PBs that day – none of which were mine.

Jumping in feet First In 2008 CrossFit is still relatively unknown. A few more dedicated people are on board.

The early days of my involvement with CrossFit will stay with me as some of my fondest memories. The team in the USA were just coming to grips with international interest and the first Australian affiliates were trying to find their feet. It was a fun time.

"Our training was conducted wherever we could get space.

We used parks, martial arts studios, and 'globo gyms' where we didn't last long due to complaints about the noise from dropping barbells and other traditional gym faux pas." www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

49

"The biggest drama was our starting on a shoestring and trying to work out what we could afford given the woefully expensive equipment prices at that time" My personal coaching journey took me from classes in a Hawthorn park where other people couldn’t help but gawk, to the Hawthorn Weightlifting Centre where the lifters looked at us with derision, to the George Knott Athletics Field for what became know as “Crazy Camp”, to our first box in Fitzroy (complete with resident objections).

Opening the box was a significant challenge.

Our first choice for a facility was rejected as the roofing contained asbestos and the neighbours objected to a gym being nearby.

The second – and successful – premises took quite a while to negotiate. The biggest drama was our starting on a shoestring and trying to work out what we could afford given the woefully expensive equipment prices at that time.

Growing and growing and growing 2009 and beyond: CrossFit gains momentum, the Games takes it up a notch and Australian affiliate numbers start to climb.

50

|

WOD MAGAZINE

At some point CrossFit reached critical mass and took off. I can’t remember when it was; it seemed like the first few original affiliates were pushing against an immovable object for ages. Then, all of a sudden, people just got it and wanted to find out more about CrossFit. Soon, we had more members than we knew how to properly accommodate. The operational issues became more about providing service to everyone rather than finding enough people to fill the classes. It was a great problem to have, so much so that we had to move to a bigger venue. Luckily, we nabbed the unit next door.

I think it was a case of the perfect storm. The public wanted a no bullshit approach to fitness training, the Games generated some online hype and enough CrossFit gyms had opened up to start to get noticed. We had been pushing against the norm for so long that we were finally getting recognised for what we were, not what the public thought we were.

So... What's next?

I don’t see the growth of CrossFit slowing down any time soon and this will provide both positives and negatives for everyone involved. As always those who are passionate about making a difference are going to lead form the front.

It is a really exciting time to be involved with CrossFit and I look forward to remaining part of the story for it’s future.

Adam Stanecki has been involved in the fitness industry for over a decade. He discovered CrossFit in 2005 and affiliated in 2006 when there were only two other affiliates in Australia and less than 100 worldwide. In 2013, he sold his share in CrossFit Victoria (located in Fitzroy, Victoria) and now coaches and mentors CrossFit affiliates and other fitness professionals. He is happily married with two children.

Programming scAling

James Wilson’s hints to help you through the fog…

...for time!

So, it’s another typical day at the box. You’re standing there looking over the WOD and thinking to yourself: “Should I scale it? Or try and be a bad-ass and go RX? What if X or Y looks down on me because I scale? What if X beats me? What if everyone thinks I’m Weakling McWussenheimer because I scaled?”

I have seen this play out at my box almost every day, as I’m sure most of us have. We have all stood there and thought: “yeah I could do that weight or movement… I think?” and for a couple of reps sure, but a whole WOD? If you have to think about it that much it’s a sure bet you should probably scale it.

If the WOD is meant to be a gassy one (and yes that’s a real term), a short and sharp workout and you think to yourself “If I do those front squats at the RX weight I will most likely explode and die”, well not really, but you will fatigue far too quickly and be forced to break your sets into 2 reps at a time and take three times longer to finish then you have sort of missed the point of the WOD. Short and sharp workouts are supposed to build anaerobic capacity or threshold, by taking much longer than was anticipated you have changed it into a strength workout – that was not the point.

The thing with a WOD is that they can achieve different things for different people, that is one of the many reasons I love CrossFit, you can really make it work for you. “In soviet Russia weight lifts you!” So the next time you look at the white board have a look at what it’s really asking you. Is it meant to be short and sharp, heavy or building a particular skill?

52

|

WOD MAGAZINE

And

Unfortunately trying to do too much too soon will often work against you. If you lower the weight of a lift you could work on a skill or if the workout is shorter and you are confident with the movement you could make it heavier to work on strength, or jump on a higher box so that in future workouts that 24” box doesn’t seem so bad. You need to take into consideration where your own strengths and weaknesses are. Do I have good form? Am I moving consistently? Do I rest too much? Should I take the weight back a bit so I can get through sets unbroken and try and work on my work capacity? Everyone is different and will want to focus on different outcomes each work out. So just because the person next to you uses a certain weight doesn’t mean that you should too.

If you keep these things in mind when you are considering whether or not to scale the question becomes an easy one to answer.

It takes time to build strength, learn new skills and build neurological pathways. So trying to rush ahead and lift too much or use movements we are not ready for isn’t really going to

PERFORMANCE help us get better. If you know you will need to scale something back to work on your technique, then do it, you might finish a bit quicker, slower or not at all, but that shouldn’t matter. When you are at the box training that is exactly what you doing – training! It isn’t a daily throw down where the person who scales or finishes last is punished; you are at CrossFit to learn to move better, more efficiently and to be better than you were yesterday.

CrossFit teaches us to use ten physical skills: cardio-respiratory endurance, strength, stamina, flexibility, co-ordination, accuracy, balance, agility, speed and power and the WODs programmed in boxes around the world are a combination of movements put together to challenge our ability to use each one of these skills. I will let you in on a little secret, if you don’t finish a WOD because you took the effort to work on a weakness you won’t burst into flames, the ground wont split open and send you spiraling into the pits of hell, in fact you might just get better. The guys and girls at the top level of competition didn’t get there by just RX’ing everything and magically they became CrossFit ninjas, they have spent the time scaling, practicing, and improving over time. Improvement comes from progressively overloading over time. Progressive, not instantaneous!

Load is another one of those concepts that can come in many different forms; we are not always talking about weight when we talk about load, the distance of a run or the amount of rounds in a workout are both examples of loading other than weight. If you are faced with a lengthy run in a WOD which, at this stage in your CrossFit journey, will take you longer than the time cap to finish, then maybe making the run slightly shorter would be a more appropriate load for you. Scaling in this way will help you to build the capacity to run longer for future WODs. The same can be said for rounds for time. If the WOD has a large number of rounds then perhaps doing 8 rounds instead of 10 would be more appropriate for you. This is merely a guide however, as everyone is different you need to be able to assess your own abilities and decide what is going to be right for you.

A very knowledgeable coach and friend of mine who taught me a great deal about CrossFit once told me: “there should never be much more than a 10 minute window between the person who completes the WOD first and the person who completes it last.” From my personal experience he is right, when I have managed to get everyone working at the appropriate load and intensity there is seldom an occasion when the last person to complete the WOD is more than 10 minutes behind the first. I have also found that when everyone is finishing all around the same time people have more fun and feel a lot better about themselves to boot.

Now lets look at that time component, it takes time for our bodies to recover and adapt and make lasting neural connections that make up those complex movements so thinking to yourself that “I scaled two WOD’s this week, that should be enough, right?” is not on, bad CrossFit-ter! Your performance and skill and strength gains will depend a lot on how much recovery and sleep you get, your nutrition and how much extra work you do outside of class times will all make a big difference. You should expect to make changes over months not weeks, remember we are doing CrossFit to make life long changes, not just for 8 weeks in some kind of “challenge”. If you are really

serious about making big changes then you might have to slow down and put in the effort to build correct movement patterns. This will mean time spent in the box outside of class time, with just a bar, PVC pipe, broom stick, small child whatever it is you use to practice technique.

None of what I have said however, should be an excuse to get out of working hard, WOD’s being appropriate is different from making them easy. When you adjust the WOD so you are working on your weakness is still going to be hard work, probably more so, because of the specific challenges you have set yourself.

CrossFit is unique in that way, each and every box is different, different coaches, different athletes, different facility set outs, atmosphere, and most of all different programming.

Us coaches like to think we are pretty clever as we come up with programming week after week, enabling our athletes to learn new skills, build strength and work capacity all while keeping things fresh and interesting in the box, but if our athletes are not getting the intended outcome from our fancy programming then what is the point? Your box’s programming should have a purpose, a goal in mind or something you want to achieve with it, be that building a specific skill, strength, work capacity or all round ninja-ness.

So if, as an athlete, you are scaling the WOD so that it is more “do-able” for you by doing scaled movements or using weights you are “comfortable” with, what are you really achieving?

Note: by do-able I mean “I’m going to use a 12kg kettle bell today for the swings even though the WOD says to use a 24kg” but you have been using that 12kg kettlebell for the past 6 months.

Are you really stepping out of your comfort zone? This shouldn’t be taken as direction not to scale but as a reminder that going out of your comfort zone and challenging yourself might just mean using a 16kg kettlebell this time. The 16kg kettlebell is still scaled, but it is a more appropriate scale, remember we are looking to take progressive steps over time, so stepping up the weight in small increments and trying harder versions of movements is important.

Progression doesn’t mean jumping straight to RX, you have to crawl before you can walk after all and if you aren’t quite sure what you should do, ask your coach, that’s what they are there for – to provide you with guidance.

If you aren’t quite sure about the WOD’s intent then asking isn’t going to hurt anyone. You might ask: “So should I try to go a little heavier than usual? Or work on getting through everything unbroken?”, if you take the time to assess the WOD and its make up, you might be able to figure it out yourself, but if not your coach will be able to point you in the right direction.

Let’s look at a few examples. If the WOD was; 21-15-9 reps of Kettlebell Swings @ 24kg / 20kg Box Jumps @ 24” / 20” Power Cleans @ 60kg / 40kg For time.

The first thing to take note of the classic 21-15-

"...remember we are

looking to take progressive steps over time, so stepping up the weight in small increments and trying harder versions of movements is important.

Progression doesn’t mean jumping straight to RX, you have to crawl before you can walk after all and if you aren't quite sure what you should do, ask your coach, that's what they are there for, to provide you with guidance."

Photograph courtesy of Matthew Townsend www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

53

This workout could be an opportunity to scale up from what you might normally do to work your squat strength for example. 5 reps is not a huge number so if you would normally use 40kg, for example, then maybe try 45kg, or even 50kg provided your form doesn’t break down, it might not be RX but it will be more of a challenge. You certainly wont get as many rounds, but you will definitely get more out of the WOD. You could do the same for the pullups, using a slightly less resistant band or trying without any bands and breaking them up into sets of 5.

21-15-9 reps of

These are just some examples of how you can make the WOD’s work to your benefit. Nothing ground breaking, but just a little thought and assessment of what is involved in the WOD and what you need to get better at and if you train smart, put in extra some time outside of class time it won’t be long before you see some real improvement.

Kettlebell swings @ 16kg Box Jumps @ 20” Power cleans @ 30kg For time.

This will not magically become an easy workout just because you adjusted a few things, in fact now you will actually get the benefit from doing it how it was intended at a level that is appropriate, but still challenging, for you.

Another example might be; 20min AMRAP of: 5 Front Squats @ 70kg / 50kg 15 Pull ups 30 Double unders A brutal WOD, 20mins is a long time for any athlete, so it’s not going to be a sprint that’s for sure! Pacing and trying to be as consistent as possible will mean more rounds than going flat out. A good score or fast time comes from efficient consistent movements and not missing a rep. Having the ability to sustain a particular pace with little rest will help get you those precious extra reps that could mean a new PR.

Hopefully this has given you some helpful insights to getting the most out of the time spent at your CrossFit Box. Train to be better months from now, not tomorrow, and really have a look at what you need to improve on. We all have things we can improve on and CrossFit-ters are a rare breed, so often you seen an athlete professing their weaknesses as the first thing out of their mouths when talking to another CrossFit-ter: “Hey you do CrossFit too?

NO WAY! That’s awesome! Yeah I suck at pull ups too, and thrusters are the worst!” I’m sure you hear it all the time, and it’s fantastic. There is no other sport in the world where people are so open about their own weaknesses. So don’t be conscious of your short comings, embrace them and work on them. You can’t get better at squats if you never squat, and you won’t be able to run longer if you never run.

So the next time you look at that whiteboard in your box, take a step back and assess the WOD so that you can train in a way that is really going to make you better a better CrossFit-ter day after day.

May the WOD’s be ever in your favor!

Photograph courtesy of James Wilson & 21 15 Nine

"...20mins is a long time for any athlete, so it's not going to be a sprint that's for sure!

Pacing and trying to be as consistent as possible will mean more rounds than going fLat out.

A good score or fast time comes from efFicient consistent movements and not missing a rep.

Having the ability to sustain a particular pace with little rest will help get you those precious extra reps that could mean a new PR."

9 rep arrangement is a sprint. Gassy as all buggery, so it should be hard and fast. So if I’m still new-ish or I know I won’t be able to use the weights, or box jump height and get through it quickly then I could adjust it so I’m working at a capacity that I can get through it relatively quickly, not sub 3 minutes or anything, but under 10. This might not mean unbroken sets, but like I mentioned earlier if you could manage the 60kg power cleans but only 1 at a time with a bit of rest between each, it’s not really going to be hard and fast. So instead of doing it RX you adjust it to:

James Wilson is the owner and head coach of CrossFit 3350 (www.crossfit3350.com.au) and has been CrossFit-ting since 2011. He has been a level 1 trainer since mid 2012 and is a level 1 club weightlifting coach, a level 1 sports power coach and holds a level IV in Fitness.

James has a background in building and construction and found CrossFit while rehabilitating after surgery for a serious lower back injury. He lives and breathes CrossFit and loves to help others find that mental toughness that gives people newfound confidence.

54

|

WOD MAGAZINE

NOW NOWAVAILABLE AVAILABLEININ2727AMAZING AMAZINGCOLOURS! COLOURS! Nat Cook, Nat Cook, Olympic Olympic gold gold medalist medalist & 5 time & 5 time olympian olympian

Matt Matt Knight, Knight, PerthPerth Wildcats Wildcats

ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPEBENEFITS: BENEFITS:

ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE cancan provide provide support support andand stability stability whilst whilst allowing allowing full full range range of movement of movement ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE cancan remove remove swelling swelling or bruising or bruising andand reduce reduce pain pain ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE cancan delay delay fatigue, fatigue, reduce reduce thethe likelihood likelihood of injury of injury andand enhance enhance recovery recovery ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE is water is water resistant resistant enabling enabling youyou to shower to shower or swim or swim withwith ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE on on ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE is hypoallergenic, is hypoallergenic, zinczinc oxide oxide andand latex latex free, free, andand lessless likely likely to cause to cause skinskin reactions reactions ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE hashas excellent excellent adhesive adhesive qualities qualities andand cancan staystay on on thethe skinskin for for up up to 5todays 5 days ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE is elastic is elastic andand offers offers a more a more comfortable comfortable alternative alternative for for thethe patient patient or athlete or athlete

WWW.ROCKTAPE.COM.AU

ORDER ORDER YOUR YOUR ROCKTAPE ROCKTAPE AT AT WWW.ROCKTAPE.COM.AU WWW.ROCKTAPE.COM.AU ANDAND QUOTE QUOTE THETHE COUPON COUPON CODE CODE “OCRA2013” “OCRA2013” TOTO EARN EARN YOUR YOUR 20% 20% DISCOUNT. DISCOUNT.

PERFORMANCE

56

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Photograph courtesy of Joel Vogler Photography

Recovery & Performance

Amanda AlLen on I hear it every day, athletes sharing stories of excessive soreness; they talk about it like it’s a badge of honor! Every time I hear these conversations I can’t help but think that these athletes are simply out of balance. Soreness and fatigue are feedback, they are not states that you should expect or accept just because you worked out hard yesterday or because you’re 35, or 45, or 55+ years old.

Soreness and fatigue are indicators that you do not have the balance right for your body, for the stressors in your life and your current training load. Simple.

So when people ask me if I was sore after the CrossFit Games or 150 wall balls or a rough, heavy, high rep workout of any kind and I emphatically, gleefully reply “No!”. It’s completely and utterly true, and this is how it could and should be for you - at least for 90% of the time!

So how do you get to be this cocky 30, 40 or 50+ year old who rarely gets sore (other than a light general, acceptable soreness) while the other young ones suffer, moan and hobble about day after day?

Well the answer is: A.) Knowing what to do B.) Doing it Like I said, it’s simple!

So, what to do? Well the formula is straight forward enough and simply begins with 6 foundations of athletic awesomeness.

1.) Sleep 2.) Hydration 3.) Stress Management 4.) Nutrition 5.) Warm Up and Cool Down 6.) Supplements

Yes, we’ve all heard it, we all know it, but the magic is in the strategic and consistent application of these six points in your life, everyday!

I have developed disciplined routines, habits, contingency plans and priorities around each one of these points. I apply them in every hour of everyday because I want to train and perform like a machine day in day out. As a result I am constantly reassessing the effectiveness of my strategies and tweaking the delicate balance that keeps me ticking over in the machine-like fashion that I almost take for granted… almost!

Change is a constant companion. As much as I like to fix my routines so I don’t have to think too much about what to do and when to do it (routines have their own positive momentum) I recognize that to thrive I have to be sensitive to the subtle shifts and changes in my energy, strength,

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

57

recovery, performance, mood and motivation on a daily basis. I have to be ready, willing and able to respond with appropriate adjustments as required. I like having reliable positive habits; one of them has to be a willingness to make changes when not doing so would cause me harm.

The consequences of not responding appropriately to your body’s feedback include a plethora of negative side effects that we CrossFitters do not want interrupting and compromising our training, progress and performance. So get a plan and apply it!

Amanda's Six steps to becoming AWESOME! Hydration SLEeP

You cannot afford to skimp on this. Do so at your own peril! Your body needs 8-9 hours to recover efficiently - physiologically and psychologically - otherwise you will suffer symptoms like inflammation, poor neuropsychological function, stunted anabolic function, suppressed immune function, sweet cravings/excessive hunger, difficulty with weight loss and that impossible to lose belly fat, compromised recovery, ongoing muscular soreness - the list goes on and on!

Get 8 hours - the older we get the more imperative it becomes to get 8 – 9 hours. Sleep is FREE - it is the cheapest, best medicine ever - take advantage of it!

Is hugely important to recovery. When you are dehydrated you could suffer from the following: excessive DOMS, cramping, poor muscular firing and weakened muscular contractions, increased heart rate and blood pressure, compromised recovery, ongoing fatigue, sweet cravings and excessive hunger - and that’s just skimming the surface!

Get 3 litres of quality water per day on an average training day and up to double in the heat or on big training days of 3+hours.

Next most important factor is the quality of your water, I’m a huge, huge, huge fan of Vital Greens (these guys should definitely sponsor me) and Professional Whey 4:1:1 Branch Chain Amino Acids (these guys do sponsor me) in my water. Look long and hard at your hydration and the quality of that hydrating liquid you are consuming – it could make the world of difference.

Stress

is a necessary evil, too much and you tip into the negative side effects and too little and you will experience little or no growth. The challenge with stress is getting the balance right, you have to know yourself pretty well and have strategies in place to combat the stressors in your life otherwise exposure to prolonged excessive stress will eat you up, eat up your muscles, your progress, your performance, your motivation, your neural & cognitive functioning, your ability to sleep deeply and well and your digestive health. It literally sucks the life out of you and your CrossFit journey, being over-stressed and therefore under-recovered is a 100% guarantee of soreness and breakdown.

I employ a gazillion stress reduction techniques, the major ones include: weekly meditation, breathing, floating, massage, ‘no people’ rule on Sundays, quiet beach time, dog park time, journaling, no electronic devices after 8/8:30pm rule, and a regular pattern of sleeping and waking to manage my stress levels.

I couldn’t survive the demands of my training and work life without these strategies carefully structured and operating in full swing every week of my life.

Nutrition

I could go on and on about the importance of quality nutrition. Primarily the goal is to eat enough highly nutritious foods from the 3-macronutrient groups: carbs, proteins and fats. The next the goal is then to only eat foods that cause no inflammation or negative reactions in the body - hence the no wheat, no dairy, no sugar, virtually no grains (for me), no legumes, no preservatives and no chemicals.

This is the approach that I have to my nutrition, I eat predominantly (and a lot of) green veggies, I consume a truck load of green organic veggie juice every day, I eat a lot of grass fed proteins, raw cake and raw protein balls (with ingredients including: coconut, goji berries, cranberries, chia, Maca, Pumpkin seeds, walnuts, Brazil nuts and Professional Whey WPI).

Anti-inflammation properties and super-concentrated nutritional value are the most important things I look for in food. So for anti-inflammation, nutrition and amazing recovery I stick with green veggies, a truckload of the super foods, no sugar, no dairy, no wheat, lots of lean clean proteins and enough carbs to replace the glycogen used during heavy training. I’ve actually just discovered organic baby food this week and have immediately adopted it into my daily nutritional habits - high quality, no nasties, nutritious, easy to digest, transportable, perfection!

Warm up/ Cool down

Warm up and cool down properly. Give it the respect and attention it deserves! I never train without a good 15-20min light warm up before I begin my movement specific warm up and I also finish every session moving my body easily and lightly. My favorite cool down activities are rowing, air dyne and running. When I warm up my body I’m also warming up my mind, it is so important to warm up the mind on those days when my head tells me I can’t do whatever unknown work awaits me, by the time I’ve finished 15 – 20 minutes of light movement I’m generally physically AND mentally prepared for the tasks ahead.

I believe this has a huge part to play in my capacity to bounce back from the massive volume and intensity of training I absorb each and every day.

Suppliments

I couldn’t leave this topic out. I believe in the value of supplements, not to replace good nutrition but to support it and the huge work and stress load I place on my body. I have worked with a Naturopath for over 4 years to determine my changing needs but the basic prescription remains the same. I take a high dose of magnesium, glucosamine, vitamin c, vitamin d, a good quality multi-vitamin, calcium and krill oil.

The extras are then addressed each 4-6 weeks as things shift and change. I can’t recommend it highly enough. I also rely on high quality pre and post-training supplements from Professional Whey - WPI, 4:1:1 BCAAs, Dextrose, Glutamine, Creatine, Taurine, L-Carnatine. I do not do a workout without these products to assist with recovery, performance and protein synthesis.

My post workout smoothie looks like this: 300ml of water 1 banana 2 raw free range egg whites 30g PW WPI 25g PW Dextrose 20g PW Ajinomoto Glutamine 2g PW Taurine 2g PW L-Carnitine L- Tartrate

58

|

WOD MAGAZINE

when people ask me if I was sore after the CrossFit Games or 150 wallballs or a rough, heavy, high rep workout of any kind and I emphatically, gleefully replY "No!".

Photograph courtesy of Joel Vogler Photography

I believe that absolutely every moment that I’m not training is an opportunity to be recovering which means my every action and thought is either building me up or breaking me down.

My choice in each moment is to recover optimally, so I have strategies to control the controllables and contingencies in place to manage the unforeseeable as best I can, like baby food on hand everywhere!

It’s the commitment to every one percent that makes all the difference when optimizing recovery and performance – what is your plan?

Amanda Allen

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

59

PERFORMANCE

Chad Mackay on

it F ss ro C in th g en tr S f o ce an rt o p The Im

60

|

WOD MAGAZINE

strength takes time, dedication, desire and patience.

The most important part of Coach Glassman’s definition of fitness is to ‘move large loads over long distances, and to do so quickly’. You don’t need to even worry about the ‘long distances’ or doing it ‘quickly’ if you can’t move the load. In my opinion athletes should worry about moving correctly as first priority and then building their strength base, you can never be too strong.

You only have to look at the podium finishes in this year’s CrossFit Games to see how much strength influences CrossFit results, Rich and Jason on the men’s side, are arguably two of the strongest men in the entire competition, while there is obviously no denying the strength of both Sam and Lindsey.

It’s clear to see the benefits of strength in a 1RM or a ladder event but in any WOD you attack, it’s much easier when you are working at a smaller percentage of your max than the competitor next to you. The lesser percentage the WOD weight represents of your maximum, the faster you will be able to do the reps and the less energy you will spend doing them.

As a bigger athlete this has been one of the keys to my success, I know that I am not going to move as fast as a smaller athlete on the gymnastics movements but I know when we get to the barbell that I will find it lighter than a lot of my competitors.

To build strength I like to incorporate the Smolov squat program into my training as I find it provides a great structure and is easy to follow. For all athletes the key should be finding a strength program you have the time to follow and hitting this consistently. The best program is the one you can stick to. The problem I hear most people make is not dedicating enough time to hit it at maximum effort – strength takes time, dedication, desire and patience.

Most importantly for me, lifting a heavy barbell is fun. I enjoy putting a heavy barbell on my shoulders and squatting more than hitting a metcon. For any athlete enjoying what you are doing is going to go a long way to giving you overall success. For more info of some of the training I do follow my Facebook athlete page where I post videos and photos of the training and skills I’m working on.

- Chad Chad’s athlete page is: https://www.facebook.com/ChadMackayathlete

Smolov Squat Routine Smolov is a 13-week squat program that was developed by Sergey Smolov. It is regarded as being an intense program that can deliver amazing results for athletes.

The Smolov routine is a “super cycle” – a long term training cycle composed of shorter, but different styles, of training cycles. (www.seriouspowerlifting.com) With 5 microcycles: Introductory microcycle, Base microcycle, Switching, Intense mesocycle and Taper. It is claimed that most athletes can add 10kg – 20kg to their max squat using the program.

Like other programs Smolov works off percentages of your maximum lift and will see you squatting 4 days per week at a range of percentages, reps and sets. For an athlete with a 1-rep max of 140kg the 4-week Base cycle would look something like:

. .

Week

Monday

Wednesday

Friday

Saturday

1

98kgx9x4

105kgx7x5

112kgx5x7

119kgx3x10

2

108kgx9x4

115kgx7x5

122kgx5x7

129kgx3x10

3

113kgx9x4

120kgx7x5

127kgx5x7

134kgx3x10

4

Rest

Rest

1 rep max test

Rest

There is plenty of information about the Smolov program online, here are just a couple:

Images: Chad Mackay images courtesy of Sam Fitzpatrick. Above images left to right, Rich Froning, Jason Khalipa, Samantha Briggs and Lindsey Valenzuela courtesy of CrossFit, Inc.

Serious Power Lifting has a good breakdown of the program and the micro-cycles. www.seriouspowerlifting.com/3615/articles/smolov-squat-routing

All Things Gym have a Smolov Squat Routine Spreadsheet that you can use to plug your numbers into www.allthingsgym.com/smolov-squat-routine-spreadsheet/

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

61

Opinion Piece

The CrossFit Open – the path to regionals. Boasting 26,000 athletes in 2011, 69,240 athletes in 2012 and 138,000 athlete registrations for 2013. It’s undeniable - the accelerating numbers tell the story of the exponential growth in the sport of fitness. The growth of communities, scores of new affiliates, and in addition to the sheer velocity of participation, so too has the level of competition utterly skyrocketed to an entirely new stratosphere. What was once considered world class is now simply the norm, and what was once considered elite is now an expected prerequisite for competitive edge.

Given this phenomenal increase in the competitive nature of the sport, when you walk into a Regional Games stadium as a spectator (and no doubt, a CrossFit enthusiast), you expect certain things. You expect the event venue to be top notch, the competition to be fierce, the atmosphere electric, and, you expect the ability of the athletes in the coliseum to be of the highest caliber. So why was it that this years Australian regionals saw many of the team events looking like an amateur hour CrossFit session? The answer is in the CrossFit Open process.

e h t g n i t t Pu

in the

s s e c o r P m a e T l a n io g Re Article and images by Ginny Gallegos

62

|

WOD MAGAZINE

PRO www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

63

The CrossFit open is the process by which individuals and teams qualify for regionals. The individual’s process, much more straightforward than the teams, sees the top 48 men and top 48 women with the best scores across the open events advance to Regionals.

The way the team selection process works however, is a bit different, and sees each athlete’s individual event scores attributed to their affiliate teams overall placing. The affiliates with the best athletes thus have the highest team rankings. Lets say Jack and Jill at affiliate X are both kick ass athletes and their scores pull affiliate X into a placing which takes their team to regionals…but then Jack and Jill have both qualified for individual competition and decide they will compete as individuals. Their scores from the open events still count towards their team placing, which means the next best athletes in affiliate X get pulled into the team as competitors to fill the empty places. The problem here is that the next best athletes could all but be Crossfit newbies, fresh out of their fundamentals program. There is no pre-requisite required for them to compete at regionals, let alone for their abilities to complete Crossfit movements at a highly competitive level.

At the Australian 2013 regionals, 8 out of 30 teams received a DNF in the 3rd event - that’s over 25% of the competitive teams in the field that did not make it past 3 of 7 scheduled events, and could not proceed to the next event of the competition.

Now don’t get me wrong, the majority of the teams out there were beasts, absolute machines, and for the most part, replacement athletes are chosen from a pool of competent crossfitters – but that is not always the case, and that is not the focus here – a quarter of the competition were scratched less than halfway through what is expected to be an elite sporting event – it’s less than pro to say the least. As many of the spectators have themselves competed in the open, and many missed out on the opportunity to have their team compete, its utterly soul destroying to watch someone wail away on a burpee muscle up for a quarter of an hour, or watch someone struggle to overhead squat 40 kilos for 3 reps. Not only is it boring, but has the distinct impact of making the sport look like a circus.

Pulling the entirety of the team events into line with the elevated level of the individuals competitive scale is really relatively simple. Options would be to have all athletes choose to compete as either an individual or team prior to taking part in the open, and register that given team. Teams would then be on an even playing field, with each team member well and truly earning their place at regionals. Another option would be to just scratch the score of any athlete that chooses to compete as an individual from the team score altogether, with full awareness of the potential to pull that team rank down into the nether-regions of the leaderboard.

Regardless of how the regional team selection process gets fixed, it is unquestionable that it does need to change. CrossFit needs to look at this loophole in the current method, weed out the affiliates that ride on the coattails of their heroes, and put the pro back into the team category of this progressively evolving, stellar sport.

- Ginny Gallegos

What do you think - does the open and regionals competition format need to be overhauled?

Join the conversation on our Facebook page and website: www.wodmagazine.com.au www.facebook.com/wodmagazine

64

|

WOD MAGAZINE

RUnNInG

YouroWn -

Box

Part One - The Basics by Corrine Chalmers

66

|

WOD MAGAZINE

BUSINESS Who is Corrine Chalmers?

Photograph courtesy Corrine Chalmers

Corrine Chalmers loves putting her health at the centre of her life and believes this is the key to success.

As a highly regarded business leader and manager of staff, Corrine owns and runs CrossFit Geelong, alongside her husband Chris Chalmers (former BJJ Australia + State Title Holder/Professional Stuntman). Now with almost 400 members at CFG, they’ve grown from a modest 80 members since relocating to a purpose built CrossFit facility 2 ½ years ago. Together they also keep busy raising their 3 children.

Prior to this they ran Australia’s largest outdoor Bootcamp which they successfully sold prior to opening up CFG at the new location in Newtown, VIC. Starting out of a tin shed in 2002 before Affiliating in 2008 they ran a small boutique box which was their starting block for bigger and better ventures.

When Corrine’s not striking a near-perfect balance between working “on” the business, training, and caring for their children, she can found cooking up a Paleo storm in the kitchen. She also competed in the 2013 Australia NZ Regionals representing CFG as a team.

Corrine + Chris launched their specialist business coaching service to help CrossFit boxes establish clear direction and development as she could see that there was a real need for it in the industry.

Find out more at www.crossfitgeelong.com.au

It is wonderful to be part of the first issue of WOD magazine. This is a very exciting initiative for the CF community!

Each issue I will be writing about a variety of CF box operational and business topics. I will go into more depth each issue, explaining exactly what it takes to run a box effectively and the tools required.

My goal for the regular article is to give box owners and people involved something which enriches their life, provides the owner and employees with a career and funds their lifestyles. Some issues I may cover more than 1 topic and discuss CrossFit as a business with many components.

Apply 21st Century Business Skills to Back to Basics Fitness Due to CrossFit being centered around the basics before life got complicated, some misconceptions have become pronounced. Terms such as Paleo, Caveman, raw foods, “getting our hands dirty”, anti-machines and functional movement are all example of the back to basics approach.

However, as soon as these “basic” components are used within a business then 21st century business skills, procedures and techniques need to be relied on and learnt.

You've got the passion. Now don't overlook the planning In my experience I have seen some passionate CrossFit-ters make the jump to opening a box with little or no planning besides the purchasing of equipment. This happens because initially they don’t want to go into it making money - they just love CrossFit-ting. However, once a box opens, some owners are suddenly faced with the reality of having to generate enough money through the doors to pay rent, insurance, electricity, chalk, replacement equipment, stationary, general supplies. Time then also gets invested into cleaning and administration. Owners then become overwhelmed and realise they need to either employ someone else to do this so they can keep working their “day job” but then run into the problem that they aren’t earning enough in the box to pay someone a wage. They continue on the cycle of trying to do everything, but in reality, are achieving very little.

Avoid extra stress by having extra savings Another common theme amongst some boxes is, upon opening, they have only allowed enough money for a basic fit out and equipment.

Direct Debit income is great for regularity but still takes a long time to build up from the ground. But if there is no money aside for any marketing or a float to pay for the expenses before the income breaks even. In saying all this, it doesn’t mean that if owners don’t have all these tools that they won’t survive. I’m my experience it just makes the whole experience a lot more difficult, stressful and a lot of money can be potentially lost.

Your success depends on good staff Paying good staff to help manage the box (before you pay yourself!) is absolutely paramount in any box. I am yet to meet a box owner who can successfully (and solely) coach 15-25 classes per week, answer all the

calls promptly without the phone ringing to message bank which results in mountains of lost business, return calls, administer direct debit forms, file paperwork, co-ordinate orderly bookkeeping and keep track of GST/ tax money, reconcile monthly bank records, generate invoices, market the business, clean the entire box daily, maintain the equipment, attend to essential member retention calls, structure the daily WOD’s and program well in advance, maintain a professional database, maintain a website and Facebook page and still have time for their own training. Not to mention, leaving the box for some downtime / family time or whatever it may be.

Final Questions On a finishing note, ask yourself, if you fall sick or injure yourself tomorrow do you have the appropriate backup plan to keep your business operating to ensure a stable income? Will your business continue to run while you are removed from it? If the answer is no, then it is important to understand you have a job not a business, make sure you keep reading to help understand why the foundations need to be built (or renovated) before you can move forward.

Coming Up Next Issue In upcoming issues I’ll be discussing the very first steps to opening a box and for existing box owners how to take the step to working “on” the business not so much “in” the business. Not necessary by doing more, but doing one thing and doing it well.

-

In the next few issues I will be covering a range of topics such as: Why Programming is crucial to success -- and how box owners need to get this right.

Why Trial CrossFit Classes work so well to build up a box – and how to implement them correctly.

How to use a Business Facebook page to solely benefit the box. **Full Disclosure** Facebook can be the death of the box or assist in fast tracking the growth of the box. It’s important.

How to delegate, plus how to capitalise on the strengths of your people within the box.

How to hire the right people who will grow your business from strength to strength.

Why a solid Fundamentals Program is absolutely necessary to introduce new people into their CrossFit journey and what happens if they come into classes un-prepared.

The many layers behind a “well-oiled machine.”

If you would like to book in for CrossFit Box Coaching please email Corrine Chalmers on: corrine@crossfit geelong.com.au to see availability. www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

67

athlete Spotlight

Amanda Allen Article by Ben Quinney

If Amanda Allen isn’t already a household name amongst your CrossFit family and friends here are a couple of reasons why it should be:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

She is the First Australian to win an individual CrossFit gold medal (2013 Masters 40-44) 19th place 2011 CrossFit Games at age 41 1st place CrossFit Open for the Australasian region in 2013 and 4th in 2012 4th place CrossFit Australasian Regionals in 2012 at age 42 and 5th in 2013 Ex state and national Canoeing athlete Ex state and national Track Cycling athlete Ex state, national and international triathlon title winner Ex Fire fIghter and all around badass athlete!

After discovering CrossFit in 2011 as part of her training for the 2014 Olympics High Kneeling Canoeing event she was hooked eventually giving up her Olympic hopes to devote her life to CrossFit.

As natural athlete who is always positive and genuinely friendly down to earth person Amanda is one to keep an eye on as she doubles her efforts for the 2014 season and her hopeful return to the open age bracket as a 44 year old at the 2014 CrossFit Games.

Good luck Amanda – we are all right there behind you screaming for you to make that next lift and make the games again!

68

|

WOD MAGAZINE

ATHLETE FEATURE

Photograph courtesy Joel Vogler Photography

69

|

www.wodmagazine.com.au

Basic Written by Alex Richardson

W

hen we think about CrossFit, we think about constantly varied, functional movements performed at high intensity. While the movements performed and workouts completed are certainly one aspect of CrossFit, I’m going to talk to you about arguably the most important aspect of CrossFit: nutrition.

When we’re introduced to CrossFit, one of the first things you will (or should!) see is the hierarchy of fitness pyramid. The hierarchy of fitness is made up of 5 layers with the base formed by nutrition. The message this is trying to get across is that nutrition underpins all of your other health and fitness goals. If you base your pyramid on poor nutrition, all your other health and fitness goals will suffer as a result.

To get the best out of your training, you need to focus on good nutrition.

So, with that in mind, what constitutes good nutrition? To answer this question, we need look no further than: “eat meat and vegetable, nuts and seeds, some fruit little starch and no sugar”. There is a reason this statement is at the start of “Fitness in 100 words”. For the majority of people, for the majority of the time, these are great recommendations and you don’t need to go any further. For general health and well-being, basing your meals on these principals will get you where you need to be.

Image courtesy Natasha Quinney

We also don’t need to be following these guidelines 100% of the time. A good way to look at good nutrition is the 90:10 rule: follow these guidelines 90% of the time, you can give yourself some leeway and not feel the adverse effects. Feel like a drink on Friday night? No worries! As long as the rest of your week looks pretty similar to the guidelines above you’ve got no problems. If your meals are based on meats and vegetables, with some good fats, maybe some fruit for dessert and occasionally some sweet potato, you can’t go wrong.

However, these guidelines are not the be-all and end-all of nutrition. There are some fantastic nutritional guidelines out there that hundreds of thousands of CrossFit-ters worldwide are taking advantage of. This brings us to some of the more popular nutrition plans for CrossFit-ters.

The hierarchy of Fitness pyramid The Hierarchy of Fitness Pyramid was introduced by Greg Glassman in his “What is Fitness?” article in the CrossFit Journal in October 2002.

For further information, you can find the entire article here: http://journal.crossfit.com/2002/10/ what-is-fitness-by-greg-glassm.tpl 72

|

WOD MAGAZINE

CrossFit Nutrition The Paleo/Primal/Caveman diet

The Zone Diet

The paleo diet is, in essence, the diet that hominids, going all the way back to Australopithecus Afarensis, have evolved to eat. That’s a period stretching back to around 4 million years ago. These beings are our great, great, great, great, great... grandparents and the foods they ate allowed us to evolve as a species and, especially, increase the size of our brains. This led to higher level thinking and planning and, well, the rest is history. Our ancestors were not farmers but hunter-gatherers, which meant their food could normally run/swim/fly away from them. They were able to walk huge distances every day in search of food. They sprinted, jumped, carried heavy objects (like wildebeest, which weighed up to 600lbs), climbed and swam, which sounds pretty similar to CrossFit. This wasn’t just the men either, but the women in numerous tribes also hunted and had to be as physically fit as the men.

The Zone Diet was raised to popularity in CrossFit gyms world-wide as a way of measuring not only your workouts but also your food intake. The basics of the Zone Diet are to balance your macronutrients – carbohydrates, proteins and fats – into specific 40:30:30 portions at each meal, for a certain amount of ‘blocks’ for the day. A Zone block is made up of 9 g of carbohydrates, 7 g of protein and 1.5 g of fat. You work out how many blocks you need per day and divide this up over several meals. This keeps your blood sugar in check and stable throughout the day while providing lasting energy and a positive hormonal balance to limit inflammation.

One of the main positives of this diet is that it is flexible. As long as you stay with in your macronutrient ratios and ‘block’ counts, you can eat what ever you like. Of course, certain foods are labelled as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ but aren’t off limits all together. This means you can still have sugary foods and alcohol while still technically maintaining your diet. However, the main downsides to this diet, for a lot of people, are that you need to weigh and measure your food – at each meal, every day. This is to make sure you’re getting what you need as per your blocks each day. This level of attention to detail is not enticing to a lot of people who aren’t looking at competing or breaking records. The Zone Diet can certainly be an effective alternative for people who can incorporate the rigid structure into their daily routine.

Our ancestors ate a huge variety of foods depending on their location and what was seasonally available but it can be basically summarized in a few words. They ate: Lean meat, seafood, nuts, berries, fats, vegetables, fruits... and that’s about it.

While this matches up pretty well with our nutritional guidelines, when people first attempt to eat this way they can find it a bit restrictive. This is because it cuts out certain modern foods that wouldn’t have been available to our ancestors.

There you have it; we’ve just gone over some of the basics of nutrition to achieve health and wellbeing. And for the majority of people, for the majority of the time, this is all they need to do. We’ve also been introduced to some of

the other popular nutritional plans of CrossFit-ters from around the world.

In the coming articles, we’ll take a look at going from just being healthy to the performance

Low carbohydrate/ketogenic Low carbohydrate dieting has become popular over the last few decades as a way to lose body fat and keep it off without really limiting what you’re eating. The appeal of it is that you can still have the fatty foods and lose weight at the same time.

Numerous studies have shown that calorie for calorie, you lose more weight on a low carbohydrate/ketogenic diet than a low fat diet. The basics of ketogenesis are that when your body has low circulating glucose, you start breaking down amino acids. This only maintains your blood sugar levels and you still need something for energy production. Your body starts breaking down fatty tissue and producing ketones, which take the place of glucose.

Ketogenesis is fairly easy to maintain as long as you keep your carbohydrate levels below around 50g/day and moderate protein intake. The rest of your calories come from fat, either ingested or from fatty tissue. For general health and wellbeing and a few workouts a week, this is a very manageable way to eat. It keeps blood sugar in check and provides a nice catabolic environment for the breakdown of fatty tissue. The problem will come when you try to push the intensity of a workout. The higher the intensity, the more glucose you need to use to maintain it. Without much glucose, you start relying on fat for energy production which is slower and less efficient. While this may not be an issue for the recreational CrossFitter, for anyone wanting to push themselves further it becomes a problem. aspect of nutrition, from protein consumption, composition and timing through to micronutrients required for you to perform at your best.

sport weightlifting &throwing gymnastics metabolic conditioning Nutrition

Photo courtesy of Alex Richardson Alex Richardson is the owner and head coach of Sydney Strength, a strength and conditioning and nutrition coaching service based in Sydney. Alex has competed in numerous sports over the years including CrossFit, powerlifting, qualifying for the national championships in March 2014 and ultra marathons, completing the Northface 100 in may 2012. If you’d like to ask advice or schedule an appointment with Alex, contact him at: sydneystrengthandconditioning@live.com.au.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

73

NUTRITION

CLean eAting Kangaroo Burger with Purple Sweet Potato Chips Recipe and image courtesy of Bronwen Sparkes @mypaleoprincess

Kangaroo is one of my favorite meats. In my opinion it is one of the best paleo meats on the market. It is totally free range, high in protein, low in fat and cooks super quick!

Making these burgers is a great way to start introducing kangaroo to your paleo table. Sometimes I mix it with grass fed beef mince, to add extra texture and healthy fats.

Kangaroo Burger Purple Sweet Potato Chips 300 gm kangaroo mince 500 gm grass fed premium beef mince 1 free-range egg 1 grated brown onion

2 small purple sweet potatoes Macadamia oil Sea Salt

Handful chopped parsley Sea salt and cracked pepper (to taste) Note: You can add other flavors to your burger: chopped chili and fresh coriander, turmeric and dry roasted cumin seeds or whatever flavor combination takes your fancy!

Mix by hand and form 200g patties (150g for kids).

Cook on the BBQ for approximately 5 mins each side until cooked.

Assemble your burger with accompaniments and serve with purple sweet potato chips.

Burger Accompaniments: Sliced tomatoes Baby spinach Sliced dill pickles Sliced roasted beetroot Sliced spanish onion Crisp cos lettuce leaf Coriander or Italian Parsley for garnish

Nutrition Information Serves 4 Per single serve with chips and salad 352 calories 16g fat 22g carbs (6g sugars) 36g protein 74

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C Prepare a baking tray with greaseproof paper then finely slice sweet potato. I use a food processor for speed as the white flesh will oxidize and go brown if you are too slow.

Quickly place one layer of finely sliced sweet potatoes on the tray and immediately drizzle with macadamia oil.

Bake approx 15 – 20 mins, turning over once.

Once they are slightly browned, remove from oven and sprinkle with sea salt.

CATCH ALl THE LATEST IN AUSTRAlIAN CROSSFIT

STAY UP TO DATE wodmagazine.com.au

/wodmagazine

/wodmagazine

/wodmagazine From time to time there are news items or special offers from our friends and partners that are too good to pass up, but we promise not to fill your inbox with junk. Sign up for our email updates on our website.

WOD MAGAZINE www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

75

4 | Obstacle Racing Magazine

Waterproof EXTRA LARGE

NTS

AV

AI

R

F

O

E

OCRA

BL

DI

U CO

LA

S

Picnic Rugs

M EMBERS

obstacleracingmagazine.com.au | 5

FROM THE CROSSFIT CoMMUNITY

. .. it F s s o r C t a , e im t e n o This This my friends, is a true story I never thought I’d be the type of person to end up in the emergency room due to a gym related incident. I’d never broken a bone before and for the most part considered myself quite capable of looking after my body and remaining injury and death free.

I found CrossFit in July of 2011, it was now February the next year and I was eating paleo, making snatch jokes and posting pictures on facebook of my torn bloody hands for all to see. It had officially taken over my life. I had set my sights on being able to do pull ups as my relationship with the resistance band had become uneasy due to the unpredictability of the band and the inevitable violent ordeal of having it fly up and whip my face on an almost daily basis. We had finished class and I hopped up on the bar to attempt to kip. I was doing it.

It was my shining moment on the once dreaded pull up bar. Gloriously swinging myself chin over bar, feeling weightless and slightly unstoppable… and then I slipped. I’m not exactly sure how it happened, but I was pushing myself away from the bar (a little too aggressively apparently) and I just lost my grip. You know that feeling when you know something bad is about to happen but you can’t do anything to stop it? That was how I felt when I was flinging myself from the 8 foot high bar into the air. Soaring majestically, the idea of being able to land on my feet was long gone considering I was practically horizontal. All I could do was let out a girlie high-pitched squeal and hope for the best.

It didn’t really hurt that much. I had winded myself and thought that was about it. I didn’t realise what I’d really done until the next day when I went to get x-rays after two doctors had told me that I probably hadn’t done anything but should get checked ‘just to be safe’. Well, I had two compression fractures. One was in my C7 and the other in my T3. They found the first fracture at my local hospital, where I ended up texting my parents and boyfriend at the time saying, “hey, don’t freak out but I’ve broken my neck and I’m being transferred by an ambulance to the Alfred hospital. See you in the emergency room.” The second fracture was found at the Alfred, where I had to undergo extensive x-rays, a CAT scan and an MRI scan to see how bad the damage was. As soon as I arrived to the emergency room the doctor told me that I’d have to wear a neck brace for 3 months.

Balls.

I spent the night in the hospital wearing a temporary neck brace while it was decided what kind of brace I’d have to wear for the next three months. It all depended on my MRI scan. If I had any ligament or nerve damage, I’d be put in the Halo neck brace. Yes, it looks the way it sounds. A metal ring bolted around the top of your head, which is connected with prongs 78

|

WOD MAGAZINE

ie Sein Article and images by Bonn

“"You know that feeling when you know something bad is about to happen but you can’t do anything to stop it? That was how I felt when I was Flinging myself from the 8 foot high bar into the air."” to your shoulders. Oh dear God. After a very long night lying in a hospital bed, not being able to move, being referred to as a “log” when I needed to be rolled, and having to pee in a bedpan (twice), I felt myself slightly regretting the decision to go to the gym the night before.

My MRI scan came back unexpectedly perfect however. The doctors were shocked. To come away with only clean fractures meant there was no need for surgery, and no need for the Halo neck brace. Cue ridiculously huge sigh of relief.

I was fitted out with a Miami JTO, which was less intrusive than the Halo and way better than the ghetto temporary neck brace I was rocking in the emergency room. It worked in two parts. One part was fitted around my neck, and the other part was fitted around my chest.

I was fairly optimistic up to this point. I was making jokes and smiling for most of it, because at the end of the day you can’t change

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

79

"It was a constant battle in my head every single time I was in the gym.

I had lost so much strength, it was like starting from the beginning again. I had to keep reminding myself over and over that I wasn’t what I was before.

It took me months to Finally feel comfortable on the pull up bar.

I would want to burst into tears in anxiety and frustration."

what has happened and dwelling on it only makes things worse. However, once they put the neck brace on me and left me in my room to get used to it, it sunk in. Big time. 3 months of wearing this. I was devastated. The idea that I’d have to wear a neck brace 24/7, not be able to do any physical activity and on top of that have to be seen in public wearing a neck brace.

Yeah, that kinda sucked.

So I did what everyone does in situations of frustration and confusion. I googled it. ‘How to live with a neck brace on’. I found one site with a lady giving advice like: “Cut your hair short, or even give it the GI Jane buzz-cut look”, “say goodbye to makeup” and “wear… slip on shoes, and pull-on pants.” Safe to say I was not impressed. I then proceeded to binge eat very non-paleo foods and look longingly at my ab mat, skipping rope and kettle bell, which had strategically been pushed into the corner of the living room.

It didn’t take me long to get used to the neck brace. I welcomed the fact that I was an uncanny resemblance to a storm trooper. If someone told me, “hey look at that!” I would have to completely rotate my entire body towards whatever it was that they wanted me to look at.

Let’s just say stealth was not my strong suit. My biggest battles were mostly mental, rather than physical to be honest.

It took me two weeks to muster up the courage to go out in public by myself. The idea of being embarrassed to be seen in public isn’t the best feeling. I remember it so clearly because it was like I was psyching myself up before a WOD. I put my headphones on, turned my music up really loud, just sucked it up and did it. I got used to being stared at. It happened so often and so frequently that it became something I didn’t even notice after a while. The constant conversations I had to have with strangers about how it happened was the worst thing.

Especially because I’ve always spoken so highly of CrossFit, and so I felt like I was giving it a bad rap trying to tell people how awesome it was with this big neck brace on. I was the epitome of awkward. But sometimes you’ve just got to embrace the crap and make it work.

Since I couldn’t do CrossFit, I did pilates instead. I had a weak core, my glutes weren’t firing properly and my quads needed a lot of work. Although pilates can be boring as anything, the gains I made in my training helped exponentially when I got back into CrossFit. I also spent a lot of my time writing. I started up my blog right after the accident to avoid going crazy and to also help anyone else dealing with similar injuries. Writing became my saviour.

Even if I had the worst day ever,

80

|

WOD MAGAZINE

I could sit down, write about it, let it go, and move on.

I had a lot of time to perfect my paleo recipes too. I would bake batches and batches of different paleo cookies, brownies, cakes and muffins. I even tried a bacon pudding (actually wasn’t that bad). I was like a domestic goddess.

A super awkward looking, couldn’t really do anything but cook and eat, domestic goddess.

After three months of wearing the neck brace, sleeping in it, showering in it, working in it, sweating in it (yeah, not the best sensation), the time had come to get it taken off. I had my final x-rays to check how my bones had healed and was told that I’d need to keep it on for another month. Shit. I felt like I was back to square one. The last three months seemed like the longest of my life, and all of a sudden it was another month of wearing the neck brace.

The support from my family and friends was amazing. Although I felt like all I wanted to do were shots of tequila after my not so awesome news (a skill that I acquired during my time of wearing the brace), in reality, it was just one more month. The days went by quickly and I could see the light at the end of the tunnel.

The day I got my neck brace off was pretty goddamn sweet. I had imagined in my mind that I’d have terrible muscle atrophy and somehow resemble a noodle once I was no longer in the brace. Of course that was not the case, I was free to move around, turn my head from left to right with ease, and that was it. No rehab.

No tips from the doctors. Just thanks and bye.

There is so much more room for activities when you’re not wearing a neck brace. It’s a fact. A badass fact. Everything was put into perspective for me when the neck brace was off. Being able to shower on a daily basis, turn my head from side to side, wear whatever clothes I wanted, sleep properly, lie on my stomach, not get stared at in public. It was endless. The one thing that didn’t come so easy was getting back into training. I had to talk to four different specialists on the subject of my rehabilitation. I was told I could do everything apart from overhead movements, that I should only do running and rowing and that I shouldn’t do anything at all. It was frustrating because I wanted an expert opinion but everyone seemed to think differently about my injury, which made me not want to listen to anyone at all. I ended up meeting with a physio who specialised in spinal injuries and reassured me that the best thing to do would be easing into my training and to be sensible. Seemed legit.

So I went back into the gym and busted out some back squats and power cleans in celebration. It felt awesome.

Don’t get me wrong, it was a constant battle in my head every single time I was in the gym.

I had lost so much strength, it was like starting from the beginning again. I had to keep reminding myself over and over that I wasn’t what I was before. It took me months to finally feel comfortable on the pull up bar. I would want to burst into tears in anxiety and frustration. To have something as insignificant as a pull up bar make you feel breathless with fear, it was a sensation that I had to overcome every day.

Slowly but surely, I became more comfortable and more familiar with being on the bar. I wasn’t going to let a piece of metal dictate what I could and couldn’t do in the gym. Then, on the one-year anniversary of the incident, I got out my first few kipping pull ups. It was one of my greatest moments of all time.

It’s so easy for us to take for granted what we have. I could’ve been paralysed. I could’ve had chronic neck pain for the rest of my life.

I attribute majority of my painless and easy recovery due to the fact that CrossFit had made me strong. Not just physically, but mentally as well. I have never pushed myself so much, felt so vulnerable, so weak, so strong, so exhausted and so full of life, than I have since finding CrossFit. Even if it was CrossFit that got me into that mess, it was CrossFit that got me out of it as well. Life is short and our time is limited. Sometimes it just takes a neck brace to make us realise how sweet things really are.

"I have never pushed myself so much, felt so vulnerable, so weak, so strong, so exhausted and so full of life, Do you have an inspirational story than I have since to share with the Finding CrossFit." Australian CrossFit community?

Bonnie Sein is a 21 year-old blogger from Melbourne.

She currently trains at CrossFit Victoria and works as the email and blog specialist for lululemon athletica Aus/NZ. In her spare time she enjoys blogging on her own site www.bonniesein.com, making memes, listening to the Joe Rogan Experience Podcast and mobilizing in inappropriate places.

I bet you do!

Come on now, Don't be shy!

A little bit of inspiration can go a long way!

Send us an email at info@wodmagaZine.com.au

WOD MAGAZINE www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

81

FROM THE CROSSFIT CoMMUNITY

The CrossFit Journey of...

W

hen I started CrossFit a year ago it was with the determination to be skinny. I had been successfully brainwashed, like most young women, to believe that skinny was the ideal. It was imperative to not only my self worth, but also how much others would value me, to be the skinny version of me. While I was by no means overweight, I saw the few extra kilo’s I was carrying as the only thing holding me back from being beautiful, successful and healthy. Naturally, in my pre-CrossFit world I saw the fastest route to skinny to be lots of cardio and calorie restriction. Despite wanting to shed the extra weight, I already saw myself as fit. I ran 10km multiple times per week and could do a few push-ups so when I first walked through the door at CrossFit Southern Highlands I had no motivation other than losing the fat to become skinny and toned. Strong really didn’t come into it at all.

For my first workout at CrossFit Southern Highlands, coaches David Miller and Naomi Benedetti put me through a simple 12-minute AMRAP of squats, burpees, push-ups and pullups that left me in the CrossFit rest position (spread eagle on the floor) after only four or five rounds in post-WOD agony. Despite being far worse than I could have ever predicted, it snapped me out of my pre-CrossFit delusion and woke the athlete in me. As a teen I’d been very competitive in hockey, something I gave up as a 16 year old to focus on my education.

Since then it had been five years of not realising I was missing that serious physical challenge. I knew immediately that I had to sign up. It was amazing how fast my perspective changed.

While I still had no idea about nutrition or just how far I had to go before I could truly call myself fit, I almost immediately stopped the long,

82

|

WOD MAGAZINE

slow runs and started obsessively watching CrossFit videos like Beauty in Strength on YouTube. It didn’t take long for that obsession to translate into how much time I spent at the box.

While I originally planned to go 3-4 times per week that immediately became 5-6 times and, after being introduced to lifting, I’d start dropping in just to ‘play’. I loved that lifting a heavy bar made me feel strong mentally as well as physically. Not long after the love started my body began to change. Within weeks I saw dramatic differences, far more than I saw in months of running. My legs and arms toned up and my stomach got flatter. Sure I was still a long way away from that longed for 6-pack but it felt amazing. While I was yet to get any thoughts of competing, I started getting PR’s that I was proud of. Before Christmas, after only 3 months of CrossFit, I strung together some very ugly pull-ups and deadlifted 90kg.

It gave me a sense of achievement I

Megan Drapalski

I spoke to Dave and Naomi about fine tuning nutrition, which we’d been working on in a box-wide nutrition challenge, and upping the workouts to two-a-days three times per week as well as singles three times per week. While I was yet to be brave enough to say out loud what my goals were, inside I knew I was aiming at Regionals. I didn’t know when I wanted to get there, just that I did. The Open came around not long after and how hard I would have to work was right in front of me. Hundreds of girls were fitter, faster and stronger than me. The knowledge only made me hungrier.

When the Regionals came around 6 weeks later I got to see first hand exactly how impressive the athletes were. Every single individual that took to the floor had an impressive physique and fitness levels well above my own. I had the privilege to work on the CrossFit Media Team for Regionals, writing articles and

ugh to say out loud what “While I was yet to be brave eno was aiming at Regionals. I my goals were, inside I knew I get t I did”” didn’t know when I wanted to there, just tha

hadn’t felt since I was 14 and playing hockey. I’d really worked for something and it’d paid off.

In February CrossFit Southern Highlands entered their first competition: the CrossFit Ingleburn Burnout. I was lucky enough to earn a spot on the team and got my first taste of competing. I was immediately hooked. The team put in a great showing, placing 11th out of 50 in the Open division, and what I wanted from CrossFit changed completely. That afternoon

interviewing athletes and it was the most awe-inspiring experience of my life to date. There were my idols in the flesh sweating it out in the very arena I one day hope to compete in. It was yet another demonstration of how much further I had to go and I couldn’t help but be excited. I wanted to hit the workouts as soon as possible and see exactly what the difference was. When we finally attempted them back at the box I couldn’t get past the handstand push-ups of the second last event and the final event at 40kg was a

January 26th each year is the day that us Aussies celebrate the founding of our country. It marks the arrival of the First Fleet of British Ships at Sydney Cove, New South Wales in 1788.

Most everyone in the country will probably celebrate the day by eating something burnt from barbeque and a beer or two to wash it down – but as CrossFit-ters often celebrate a little differently.

Join us here at WOD Magazine by throwing down with our very own Australia Day Hero WOD:

struggle, despite my certainty while watching event that I could do it RX’d. The gap was huge.

It’s amazing the difference consistent hard work can make. I had thought before watching Regionals that I was working as hard as I could, eating as well as possible and 100% focused. Like everything, my CrossFit journey has been full of learning curves and I anticipate they will continue. Since Regionals, the intensity has increased and the improvements have been marked. One rep maxes have increased, benchmark workout times have gone down and weaknesses have been attacked. In a matter of months I’ve gone from being unable to complete the final workout from this year’s Regionals RX’d to being able to finish it in 8:36. It’s not a time that would compete with the top athletes by any means, but it’s respectable. It’s progress.

While I have no idea if, or when I’ll make Regionals, the Games, any of it, I know that I won’t quit. I know that with coaches like Dave and Naomi and an amazing community around me I won’t be scared to have big dreams. When I told them I wanted to aim for Regionals they were completely supportive. They never questioned my ability or if it was realistic. Instead, they’ve done everything they can to help me make the dream a reality and really? The strength of the community is the biggest thing I’ve gotten from CrossFit.

Article and photos courtesy of Megan Drapalski

Article by Ben Quinney. Photo: Lachlan Fearnley

Feel like a challenge this australia day?

Australia Day 2014

15 minute AMRAP

26 x Double Unders 1 x Clean and Jerk 60kg/40kg 17 x Pull ups 8 x Burpees 8 x Box Jump 24"/20" Let us know how you go by posting your time & / or photos to our Facebook page:

facebook.com/wodmagazine

WOD MAGAZINE www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

83

: n e m o w g n i t r o p p Women su omen. w r fo , n e m o w f o n o A fun, celebrati

ise much s Dirty Day Out’ and ra irl ‘G a r fo er th ge to es of every ticket will le sa e Get your favourite ladi th m fro 0 $1 . es ort women’s chariti ur heart. needed funds to supp t a cause close to yo or pp su n ca u yo so ur choice go to the charity of yo

5 kM FuN RuN

awl!

Run, walk, climb or cr

AlL FiTnEsS LeVeLs

NsW2Nd mArCh 2014 rse

Canterbury Race Cou

SuNdAy

vIcAy 16tH MaRcH 2014 Novotel Forest Resort Creswick, Ballarat

SuNd

ReGiStEr NoW! InDiViDuAl $60 TeAm tIcKeT $200

Team Ticket (price includes 4 people) Invite more to join at $50 each

www.missmuddy.com.au

FROM THE CROSSFIT CoMMUNITY

Finding New Strength “"I am willing to put myself through anything, temporary pain or discomfort means nothing to me as long as I can see that the experience will take me to a new level. I am interested in the unknown, and the only path to the unknown is through breaking barriers, an often painful process."”

Diana Nyad Champion long distance swimmer.

86

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Not drinking the Kool-Aid In my first 6 months of CrossFit I came to grips with who I was. How out of shape I had let myself become by my mid-forties, and how the impact of this was slowly compounding in my day-to-day life. The tiredness, lethargy in repeating the drill of everyday life, energy levels completely sapped, with little gas left over by the evening to enjoy with my little boy or pursue any serious exercise goals. Cynical with any “marketing fads” being perpetually pushed through the media, particularly towards women to be “thinner” or the whole body image mantra being sold, I felt I needed a flexible and scientific exercise routine that was as much a mental adjustment, of facing up to some of my own long held fears and doubts, as it was a physical workout. It was a bold expectation that needed a solution.

Know Thyself. Then Act.

encouraged me at CrossFit RiseUp along with every member of the box. The members, my fellow CrossFit-ters, always get behind me, and others, to just “keep going”.

A Simple idea, but it worked.

Dead Weight Our bodies are capable of far more than we give them credit. Far too many people self-exclude themselves from CrossFit and other sports, like running, because they feel that they are the domain of the naturally talented, gifted or elite athletes. Let me break it down.

Throughout my life I accepted that my athletic talent was minimal, however, I have a strong work ethic and the ability to persevere. When given a challenge I have a dogged personality that allows me to seize the opportunity and not look back.

Self-awareness holds the key. I honestly believed since childhood that there were limits to what my body can do, the wear and tear over the years, childbirth, the absence of the “athleticism gene”, these are all imaginary self-imposed barriers made me comfortable. Over the years they had compounded, feeding my fears and keeping me in my comfort zone. After realising that I was my own worst enemy, I took a tremendous leap of faith to try CrossFit. That was beginning of a new phase or the “lifechanger”, not only in the physical sense but it provided me with real insight into the inner dialogue going on in my head.

The first few sessions were extremely difficult; I could not help but compare myself to others.

They all appeared to be tackling moves with ease and had accomplished the workout when I was, at times, just trying to maintain my composure to keep going. I fought hard against the waves of doubt that I had filled my mind and the very real physical limitations that, at the time, seemed insurmountable. A year on I’m fitter and stronger than ever, the change is measurable and encompasses both physical and mental wellbeing. I largely attribute this to the supportive and highly skilled coaches who

My introduction to CrossFit was the reality check I really needed, my resolve to better myself was what kept me ‘in the game’, my passion to improve was fuel I needed every day. I had the drive to get the job done and do it to the best of my ability. The ‘talent’, or skills, required in performing the prescribed movements developed with time and focus. CrossFit provided me with an opportunity to harness my own mind, to overcome the negative thoughts, something that has, and probably always will be, my real battleground. With consistent practice a pattern of skill acquisition will develop and, coupled with pushing your endurance, you will become stronger and grow both physically and mentally. You will also notice you are carrying less of the “dead weight” both internally and externally that was holding you down.

Resilience.

Self –discovery can come in many forms, sometimes the only way we discover our inner strengths is when we are tested time after time after time. CrossFit provided this for me. The movements and workouts are generally simple, but everyone processes them differently. “You

A CrossFit Journey Article and images courtesy of

Virginia Vij

only get out what you put in”, this is particularly true in the challenging workouts where you are half way through and have given it your all but have to dig a little deeper to finish it. It is within those moments that you find what you need to get you through, often in contrast to what your body is screaming at you. In these moments of mind-body disconnect your mental dialogue will kick in, and what occurs is, for me at least, transformational. It is in the depths of all those negative thoughts, desperately wanting to give in to the physical wants and “give up” that you will really find out what “makes you tick” – you can, and will, keep going. You will become resilient.

Use It. The mental toughness you develop and harness through CrossFit will spill over into your daily life. The dividends of building both mental and physical strength are what people call their CrossFit “endorphin kick“ or “crack”. You will learn to set realistic goals for yourself and slowly, with expert guidance, attain them. You will learn that the only way to overcome the movement that scares you the most is to actually attend every session that features it. Avoidance will not make it disappear; you learn to make peace with such enemies. You will learn to earn your food, and your shower, and your own benchmarks or PB’s through consistent hard work. You will also learn to love lifting things, jumping on things, pushing things.

Functional movements that you will replicate in everyday life but with a new found energy, enthusiasm and appreciation. More importantly, you are on a path of self-discovery, you will tap into something that is within you perhaps an inner strength that has been dormant for many years or a moment of truth that you get to keep, and use in tough times.

The journey continues…

Virginia Vij Author note: Virginia trains at CrossFit RiseUp – owned and ran by Ben and Logan Poon.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

87

When Dave Miller, now co-owner and head coach at CrossFit Southern Highlands, first thought about opening his own affiliate he did so with a friend of his in mind. Dave has known his mate Robert, who was born with Spina Bifida, for about 7 years and knew that introducing him to CrossFit would be a fantastic way to improve his strength and physical fitness thus enabling him to have more independence and improve his general quality of life.

Robert’s childhood was tougher than most, his doctors thought that he would never be able to walk, but he proved them wrong when he started walking just a little before his 4th birthday. As a kid with a disability his childhood was difficult, he was in and out of hospital a lot during his school years and he was “always getting teased” by kids in his class. Because it had taken him so long to walk on his own he did 2 years of Pre School to ensure he was walking well enough to move onto a “bigger school”.

At 6 Robert’s knees started to bend on him and he found himself unable to completely straighten his legs any longer. As he grew older his legs bent even more until, at 15, he could barely stand up by himself. After the doctors failed attempt to straighten Robert’s legs he was no longer able to bend them much at all, and although he did physiotherapy for 2 years in an attempt to regain the flexibility, he struggled just to get his feet onto the footplates of his wheelchair.

At 32 Robert now spends most of his time in his wheelchair but uses a walking frame to get around inside his house. Thanks to his hard work at CrossFit Southern Highlands he can now get himself around on his walking frame “much easier and with a lot less pain”. Robert trains 3 or 4 days per week and the increased mobility comes in handy when you consider what an average CrossFit-ting day looks like for him: - 5:30am – Robert gets up and ready and is out the door in his wheelchair by 6.15am heading to the train station 2km from his house - 7:15am – Catches the train to the Mittong station, another 2km from the box - 8:15am – CrossFit WOD for up to an hour - 9:15am – Robert begins the return trip - 12:30pm or so – Robert returns home CrossFit Southern Highlands co-owner Naomi Benedetti says that working with Robert’s limitations is no different than working with any athlete with an injury, in fact, Naomi says it has helped her and her coaching staff to increase their creativity when dealing with similar clients. On a few occasions the coaches have even written entire WODs for the whole membership using only movements that Robert is capable of performing. Naomi notes that many of the regular athletes were quite impressed with how hard the workout was when you are limited to only using your upper body without the hip thrusting power that is such an integral part of our “normal” CrossFit moves.

Robert recently competed in the CrossFit Southern Highlands “Kick Crohn’s in the guts” WOD where each competitor completed the same workout throughout the day striving for the quickest time. Robert completed the tough workout in just over 12 minutes and said that his “body was really hurting by the end of it but I gained a lot of respect for people suffering 88

|

WOD MAGAZINE

The CrossFit Experience of...

Robert Carlin

"Be prepared for something extremely tough, but don’t give up no matter how much it hurts because the pain will be worth it in the end"

FROM THE CROSSFIT CoMMUNITY "At 6 Robert’'s knees started to bend on him and he found himself unable to completely straighten his legs any longer. As he grew older his legs bent even more until, at 15, he could barely stand up by himself."

from Crohn’s because I’m sure they go through much worse pain than that all the time”.

Robert is a pretty quite guy but as one of CrossFit Southern Highlands biggest supporters he is always trying to get the word out about how much he loves CrossFit and how it has improved his life. Robert is well known among the CrossFit community of Mittagong NSW and is an excellent selling point for Naomi and David. Naomi notes that she will often use Robert as an example of how scalable Cross-

Fit programming is when talking to potential members who are concerned they are not “fit enough to CrossFit”.

When I asked Robert what advice he would give to someone completely new to CrossFit he replied “Be prepared for something extremely tough, but don’t give up no matter how much it hurts because the pain will be worth it in the end”.

You can keep up the Roberts adventure via his

Facebook page: “My Crossfit Experience by Robert Carlin” can be found here: www.facebook.com/MyCrossfitExperienceByRobertCarlin Images courtesy of Robert Carlin.

Article written by Ben Quinney

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

89

FROM THE CROSSFIT CoMMUNITY

Rising Up to the Challenge A competitors perspective Article and images courtesy of Logan Poon

I woke up at 5:30am on Saturday the 21st of September, got dressed, had a shot of coffee and jumped in the car to drive to my first ever weightlifting competition hosted by CrossFit Diamond Valley. Six athletes from our box were competing on the day. All of us had been training hard, all of us felt the same anticipation, excitement, nerves and a mixture of different feelings that were hard to describe. Despite the nerves we all knew that we had the support of each other, this helped take some of the nerves away.

All the CrossFit RiseUp boys did very well. P.J and Luke hit every lift beautifully, Sammy was so close to locking out a 130kg clean and jerk and Ben finished the day in 2nd place.

We arrived at the venue just in time for the first briefing for the heat 1 females to support our girl Tegan. They explained the rules and directed us to the warm up area. The competition comprised of two lifts: the snatch and the clean and jerk and we were allowed three attempts at each working up to your maximum weight. If you failed a lift you couldn’t go lighter but you could always go heavier if you were daring enough to do so. The ladies weighed in and started warming up, people started to show up and fill the spectators seats. Tegan lifted well and even hit a PB, well almost!

The judging was super tight and official, it was ran by Goran and Lina Vukojevic, professional weightlifters, coaches and record holders, so there was no room for even the slightest press-outs or elbow bends. This cost many people on the day with a lot of people thinking they nailed it, only to get the thumbs down. But they were the official rules that made the day legit. Along with the platform, the clock and the silence, it was definitely a lot more nerve racking and heart pumping than any other competition I had competed in to date.

Then it was time for heat 2 some of these girls were such bad asses and I found them very intimidating. Watching the likes of Lindsay Hurte lift a massive 80kg clean and jerk was so inspiring, not to mention guest lifter Lina Vukjevic’s unofficial world record breaking clean and jerk of 66kg for her masters division. She makes me feel like, at 31, my sporting career has only just begun. Another highlight of the day was watching Chris Cianco snatch 160kg with finesse.

At the end of the day you go home like any other competition, learning what you need to work on and being more motivated than ever to work on your weaknesses. Another very cool highlight was the shout out to our Rise Up crew (there was a lot of us representing in the crowd) for coming along and supporting everyone in the competition.

Despite the nerves and shaky hands I managed to squeeze into 3rd place, being the smallest girl out there may have had something to do with this, but I was very proud of myself. I missed my last snatch and let out an embarrassing “oh bugger” amidst the silence, however this wasn’t as bad as our team mate Sam’s “F***!” when he made his lift but got the wobbles and couldn’t hold it. After I was done that’s when the day became fun, I was smiling, relaxed and got to cheer on the boys for the rest of the day.

90

|

WOD MAGAZINE

The Diamond Valley crew ran the day so smoothly and professionally and as a result sure that the DV Weight Lifting Competition is likely to become a regular event. We all had such a good time that the idea of actually wearing a onesie and trying out for national weightlifting competitions is no longer completely out of the question.

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

91

Event Review

CrossFit Southern Highlands

Kicks CRohn'S in the Guts!!

We are CrossFit Southern Highlands aka CFSoHi – owned and operated by Naomi Benedetti and David Miller. We opened our box just over 12 months ago and we always knew that we would want to celebrate our first birthday in a way that recognised CrossFit’s core values of community spirit and supporting others who need it.

Being only an hour south of Sydney we are not too far away from many well-established CrossFit boxes that already have traditions of fantastic games days. Instead of trying to compete with these we decided to hold a

92

|

WOD MAGAZINE

charity fundraiser with just one WOD that everyone could compete in and have an overall male and female winner at the end of the day.

Deciding which charity to support was the easy part, Dave suffers from Crohn’s himself.

Dave’s mother also suffered from the same disease and lost her battle with it at the age of 43 after complications developed.

As a not for profit organisation Crohn’s & Colitis Australia™ (CCA) rely on fundraising activity to be able to provide support and services to the 70,000 plus people living with

Crohn’s or ulcerative colitis.

CCA receives no government funding so it is only through the generous support of individuals and organisations that CCA has been able to provide help to thousands of people.

Thus our Kick Crohn’s in the Guts charity fundraiser WOD was born. We decided to stick to fairly basic moves for the WOD to try to encourage more people to have a go – whether they were CrossFitter’s or not. And on September 15 2013 our first public event was held.

Article Ben Quinney Article and images by Naomi Benedetti

The WOD was as follows: 2 rounds of: 40 sec dead hang 20 bupees 50m sprint with a plate (M 20kg/F 15kg) 50m sprint – no plate 30 sec dead hang 15 burpees 50m sprint – no plate 50m sprint – with plate 20 sec dead hang 10 bupees Time capped at 15 minutes

Our winners were: WOD Male Chris Slight – 9:05

From the international CrossFit Community

PHilippine relief wod CrossFit communities around the globe often come together to support worthwhile charities or causes within their local community. It is not uncommon to see collection boxes or items for sale at local boxes with proceeds going to one charity or another, but as CrossFit-ters our favourite charity event will always be a challenge WOD. In special cases where the cause touches us all CrossFit HQ will get behind it and either host an event like the Hotshots 19 or lend their support to an existing cause like the Philippine Relief WOD (PR WOD).

The Philippine Relief WOD was created by King CrossFit, this information was taken from their website:

On November 8, 2013 Super Typhoon Haiyan made landfall in the central region of the Philippines. The Philippine government at the time estimated that close to 600,000 people were left homeless with thousands dead and many more injured.

King CrossFit based out of Washington, USA spearheaded the PR WOD fundraising efforts and CrossFit HQ got behind them helping to raise awareness of their challenge WOD designed to be hosted at affiliates around the globe.

PR WOD Details:

WOD Female Megan Drapalski – 10:39

Workout to be performed in teams of two or solo

Deadlift Male Tyler Adamson – 250kg

Theme explanation:

Deadlift Female Liz DeGraf – 150kg

Typhoon Haiyan had sustained wind speeds of 145 MPH for 10 minutes so our WOD is 10 minutes long.

Fastest Row Male Tyler Adamson – 44sec Fasters Row Female Trudy Marquardt - 1:21 By the end of the day we had had over 65 people compete in the WOD and a further 25 people donate the entry fee as they couldn’t be there on the day. We also collected over $800 in extra donations from side competitions of the heaviest dead lift for male and female, and the fastest row to 30cal for male and female.

With the help of very generous sponsors – 21-15-nine, The Wodlife, SPS gear, MDAUS, Mama O’s, Life as Rx, Empire New York and some local companies such as One Stop Nutrition in Mittagong and R Coffee Co. in Picton we were able to provide some fantastic prizes to our winners of the day and raise a total of $2000 to a charity that is very near and dear to our hearts.

We couldn’t be happier with how the day finished up. We had a great crowd of enthusiastic competitors, some very helpful judges and all in the general consensus was that it was a great atmosphere.

This will definitely become and annual event on the CFSoHi calendar and hopefully it will only get bigger and better each year.

Repetition scheme: 11-8-13 i.e. date of typhoon landfall.

Rx WOD:

10 Minute AMRAP 11 Burpee Box Jumps 8 Power Cleans @ 145/95 pounds (66/43 kg) 13 Toes 2 Bar (break up reps with partner as needed) At last notice King CrossFit had raised $7921 for the people of the Philippines. Great efforts from our extended CrossFit family!

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

93

GEAR Reviews Elite Suppliments Australia - ESA WPI

ROCK TAPE

We all know that quality nutrition is one of the keys to helping us achieve our health and fitness goals. We lift heavy, workout hard and eat clean but for most of us that is not quite enough to ensure that our bodies can capitalise on all the work we put in. To better enable our bodies to rebuild, repair and recover many of us use some form of supplementation, and the most common supplement we take is a “protein shake”.

What a fantastic product! I received some samples from Rocktape to review and was pleasantly surprised. Application of the product can be tricky as the tape is light and flexible but very durable. As a tool for injury prevention it is very clear why it is the elite athlete’s choice of tape. Shoulders and calf problems have slowed me down in the past but after using Rocktape it has not only taken the edge off within my training but has helped to enhance my performance through greater stability.

When we are shopping for our shakes there are several factors that we take into consideration before we pick up that tub and put it in our shopping cart, but the most important factor to consider, much like almost anything else in life is: Price vs Quality.

Elite Supplements Australia (ESA) is a Melbourne company that aims to provide the best quality performance nutrition products at competitive prices and their Whey Protein Isolate (WPI) is a perfect example. At AU$85 plus shipping for a 1.5kg tub it is very competitive with other high quality powders.

Not all WPI’s are created equally; many other products on the market make use of a by-product produced during the high temperature cheese manufacture process to derive their product from but ESA’s manufacture process makes use of fresh skimmed milk and a unique cold microfiltration process helping to deliver a protein powder in fewer stages thus reducing the “denaturing” of the proteins resulting in “an exceptional amino acid profile”.

Another way that I have found this product to be superior is when taping my outer elbows and forearms for use during high rep ring dips. I have also had success taping over ripped palms to endure just on 100 toes to bar without the slightest give in the tape.

It has been a godsend when taping my thumbs for Olympic lifting.

Whilst not losing the feel of the bar the Rocktape allows my hands to take an absolute hammering during round after round of power snatches and snatch pulls.

Prices for Rocktape are more than reasonable and they provide information and contact details for workshops on their website where you can attend and learn how to use the product in advanced applications.

This would have to be one of my favorite CrossFit products on the market today.

While typical WPI’s have between 20-25g protein per 30g serve the ESA range of powders offers an impressive 26.6g per 30g serve for the Chocolate flavour right up to an amazing 28.5g per 30g serve for the “Natural” flavour. Combine this with the outstanding rich flavours of both the Vanilla and the Chocolate and the fact that it dissolves better than any other powder I have ever used and you have a truly fantastic product.

Elite Supplements Australia’s WPI is available through selected gyms and CrossFit boxes around the country or via their website (http:// www.elite-supplements.com.au/). Use the code “WODMAG” at checkout to receive a 10% discount when ordering.

94

|

WOD MAGAZINE

Reviewed by Ben Quinney - WOD Magazine

Reviewed by Coach Lethal - CrossFit Anarchy

Image: elite-supplementsaustralia.com.au

Image: rocktape.com.au

Nike Romaleos 2

Firstly - the Nano 3 looks great! For a lot of CrossFit-ters they are already sold right there. It is lightweight and flexible in the plantar flexion making it great for jumping movements like box jumps. Its rubber type texture and rope climb support in the heel and outer shoe make getting those foot locks easier as there is plenty of grip.

The moment you strap on the Romaleos 2 for the first time you know what they are built for. This shoe is weight lift central! The shoes entire purpose is strictly lifting heavy sh… stuff! Your walk, your posture, your entire purpose in this shoe is to lift.

The inclusion of the rubbery material on this shoe makes it ready to handle plenty of bumps or rubbing or grinding against ropes or other surfaces. I quite like the feel of the heel and the arch, for a light shoe it feels more supportive in comparison to a similar shoe like the Inov8 195.

The shoe never feels uncomfortable doing things like HSPU, burpees or pistols and when Olympic lifting the shoe has a stable and neutral feel when lifting weight up or above the head. When running over shorter distances the shoe feels ok and there is enough ventilation for air to move.

The only fault I can find is that, for me, the front part of the shoe is a little wide and the laces are bit long – but now I am nit picking. Having just completed my first CrossFit competition in them I would like to make mention of the fact that not once did I feel the shoe held me back, it’s a pity the same cannot be said for my lungs!

Photograph courtesy of Matthew Townsend

Reebok Nano 3

The heel and support gives you a solid platform from which to lift, there is no flex or movement in the heel. It feels like it is literally joined to the floor and this support will undoubtedly help improve your lifts by giving you a stable platform and better positioning from the get go! Driving from the heels? Oh yes you can!

If your just lifting for the day or your WOD is primarily just lifts then this shoe can’t fail. It is a little heavy and stiff so running, box jumps or skipping will be a challenge.

I really like the Romaleos 2, but as someone who spends most of my time doing traditional CrossFit workouts I would like something a little lighter and more applicable to other exercises. The mid-section feels very tight on my foot and the lower Velcro strap is too long.

It is an unapologetic weight lift shoe and if that is what you are looking for then it is a perfect fit.

I’ve been wearing the Nano 3’s for several months and have found their performance nothing short of fantastic; they still look as if they are still fresh out of the shoebox.

Do you CrossFit? Then this shoe is for you, it has been specifically designed to cope with all aspects of your time spent in the box and in my opinion, will not disappoint.

Reviewed by Ian Seboa - CrossFit Anarchy

Reviewed by Ian Seboa - Crossfit Anarchy

Image shop.reekok.com.au/shop\

Image: ironedge.com.au

www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

95

Box Directory Victoria

QUEENSLAND

Western Australia

CrossFit Bacchus crossfitbacchus.com

CrossFit Cogency crossfitcogency.com

CrossFit Access crossfitaccess.com

CrossFit Ballarat crossfitballarat.com.au

CrossFit Desire crossfitdesire.com.au

CrossFit Geraldton crossfitgeraldton.com.au

CrossFit RiseUp crossfitriseup.com

CrossFit Peak Fitness crossfitpeakfitness.com

Southern CrossFit southernxfit.com

Factory 3 CrossFit factory3crossfit.com

CrossFit Wired crossfitwired.com.au

Southern CrossFit Nedlands vfcrossfit.com.au

CrossFit Yeppoon crossfityeppoon.com.au

The Cell CrossFit thecellfitness.com.au

New South Wales / ACT CrossFit 2650 crossfit2650.com CrossFit Plus crossfitplus.com CrossFit R crossfitr.com.au CrossFit Scorch cfscorch.com CrossFit Southern Highlands cfsohi.com.au CrossFit Wagga crossfitwagga.com.au Live 4 CrossFit l4crossfit.com

96

|

WOD MAGAZINE

LOOKING TO PROMOTE YOUR BOX? GET LISTED IN OUR BOX DIRECTORY - IT'S FREE! YOUR BOX WILL BE HIGHLIGHTED IN THE MAGAZINE AND LISTED IN OUR INTERACTIVE DIRECTORY ONLINE EMAIL us @ INFO@WODMAGAZINE.COM.AU

THANK YOU!!

The people involved in and around the CrossFit community are unlike anything I have ever experienced before. Never before have I met people who are so genuinely friendly and willing to help at a moments notice. CrossFit founder Greg Glassman said “The magic is in the movement, the art is in the programming, the science is in the explanation, and the fun is in the community” and he was absolutely right.

It is well known that strong friendships can be formed through shared suffering and CrossFit allows us to do this with the members of our local box that we see every day. As we sweat through Fran or a nasty deadlift/box jump WOD we all get a little closer as friends. Every day when I turn up to my box, while I am warming up there is always someone talking about how sore they are from yesterday’s or last weeks workouts.

What is trully amazing is that thanks to the standardised nature of our workouts we can do this with people we may have only just met, or still more amazinglly, those that we may only know through Facebook or email and have never met face to face. Ask someone what their 1RM deadlift is, or what their Grace time is and you have an instant bond, an instant reference for how much hard work they have put in to get where they are.

The idea of starting our own Australian CrossFit magazine was a crazy dream, one made possible, like most things in life, with a lot of hard work and a whole bunch of help. In the middle of 2013 we put our hands out for help from the community and were met with an overwhelming positive response. So many people offered to donate their talents, to share their experiences, write stories and donate their photography skills so we just wanted to take some time to say thank you to all of you for helping us make our, and hopefully your, dream a reality.

From all of us at

ARTICLES & PERSONAL STORIES

Adam Stranecki Alex Richardson Amanda Allen Bonnie Sein Bron Sparkes Chad Mackay Corrine Chalmers Ginny Gallegos Ian Seboa James Wilson Leigh Taylor Megan Drapalski Naomi Benedetti Rob Forte Robert Carlin Virginia Vij

WOD MAGAZINE PHOTOGRAPHY

Aaron L - One12foto Bree Murrell CrossFit, Inc Frankie Lee Matthews Jackie & Jon Woolcock Jody Polson Joel Vogler Kevin Du Matthew Townsend Richard Anker Robbie Prideaux Sam Fitzpatrick Sheridan Hetherington Sigrid Petersen

CROSSFIT GAMES ATHLETES Amanda Allen Chad Mackay Kara Webb Matt Swift Pip Malone Rob Forte Ruth Anderson Horrell

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO CONTRIBUTE TO future issues of WOD MAGAZINE please EMAIL INFO@WODMAGAZINE.COM.AU www.wodmagazine.com.au

|

97

"I loved CrossFit before I even competed, I was just doing CrossFit.

It was a completely different thing.

You learn a lot about yourself and the people around you when you do it.

I started with my cousin and we're real close.

It's kind of a great thing to share with others."

WOD MAGAZINE

Rich Froning Jr