Sarah S. Talks CrossFit Games Open

With all the hype about the Crossfit Open, you are probably asking yourself, “Should I sign up for the Open?” I found myself asking the same thing last February. I was hearing all about this competition, but I was just finishing my six months of Crossfit, and I had never dreamed of competing in Crossfit events, much less being able to qualify for anything. Then I started hearing our gym’s plan for running the Open workouts and how many people were going to be involved! After that, I started hearing about the scaled options for the workouts. It finally dawned on me that I was going to end up doing all of these workouts in some form no matter what over the next month. So, there was really no disadvantage to signing up and having a place to log my scores.

For the opening announcement of the first Open workout, a group of my friends and I met at the gym to stream it live. I remember seeing the huge crowd that showed up to watch the announcement in person and seeing all of the excitement and nervous energy as we all waited to see what the workout would be. Once we found out what the workout was, I realized I could actually perform all of the movements! Even if I didn't score well, I knew I would have mark to compare myself to the following year. When we all met back at the gym Saturday morning to do the workout, it was amazing to see the amount of encouragement everyone had for one another. We had several people who had never done the Open before, some who were so nervous they were shaking, and some who had never actually snatched 75 pounds before. Cheering each other on during the workout and celebrating everyone's accomplishments and clean and jerk PR’s that morning was so inspiring! This just got me more excited for the next four weeks.

Over the course of the 2015 Crossfit Open, I learned that I could do chest to bar pull ups, I wasn't as terrible at rowing as I thought I was, and I even got one muscle up during the third workout. At the close of the five weeks, I was so proud of what I accomplished after deciding to push myself out of my comfort zone. I also realized that more competitions were definitely in my future. I began following Crossfit in Facebook and saw that hundreds (maybe more) of people were experiencing the exact same things! First muscle ups, first double unders, snatch and clean and jerk PR’s were happening all over the world, all driven by the Open season.

I realized that participating in the Open is really more about being a part of the Crossfit community on a variety of levels, than it is about making it to the Games (for the vast majority of us). It doesn't matter if you get 1 rep in an Open workout this year, or over a hundred. It doesn't matter if you do the RX or the Scaled version of the workouts because you will be testing yourself and finding they you are stronger than you imagined. We will all be cheering you on and celebrating with you each and every step of the way! So, the answer is, “Yes!” you should sign up for the Open this year!!