Hopper Challenge: The Setup & WOD I

Saturday, Oct. 17;

Mid-Atlantic Region Hopper Challenge

It rained all day long.. some times it was a heavy rain, but mostly just drizzle through the day. It was cold too, but CFOT was in super high spirits! We had been getting mentally and physically prepared for this thing for months now. We had been posting back and forth about what we'd bring, what we'd eat and how to manage our nerves. Really, for a Hopper challenge the best way to prepare is hitting every WOD hard and trying to fight through your weaknesses. Oh.. and you have to eat clean. Weeks of clean eating.. because it's always easier to move your body weight when you're lighter. Right?!

Anyway, we were ready. At least as ready as we were going to be.

The setup for the day was... Two WODs in the morning. One was a strength WOD and the other was a mono, couplet or triplet. During lunch the scores would be tabulated and that would determine your heat time for the final WOD.. a chipper.

WOD I: A Triplet

21, 15, 9

OHS, Bastards (a burpee with a lateral jump over the barbell), and Pushups

(65lb w, 95lb m)

Danya and Alyssa were in the first heat. A tough deal, because they were like the guinea pigs. Everyone could watch them and see what the judges were letting people get away with. Unfortunately, they didn't get that luxury.. thus the flawless form on all movements.

Blain and I were set to go at 9:40am. Like always.. numbers and time confuse me, so I was sticking to Blain like glue. I didn't want to miss my heat. Blain was at the front of my row, and I was all the way in the back. Directly in front of me was Steve O. from Crossfit DC.. an old friend, who is a beast! My goal was to try to keep up with him.

They said go, and I was off. I cleaned the bar, got it overhead and started squatting. OHS are an easy movement for me. Especially at 65lbs. I just needed to worry about my squat depth and shoulder fatigue. I did all 21 without putting the bar down. I dropped the bar and went for my Bastards, but my judge said I had only done 19. I had to pick the bar up and do two again. I could feel the shoulder fatigue setting in, but I was going to fight through this one. 21 bastards and 21 pushups. The bastards are fine, but they burn your legs. The judges were pretty lax on the form in the bastard pushup, so I was basically collapsing my legs and doing pushups from my thighs. The pushups were rough too.. the shoulder fatigue is unbelievable. I pieced 10 together off the bat, but then I had to break the pushups down into sets of 3 and 2. Definitely humbling!

On to 15.. I banged out 8 OHS, put the bar down and then did 7 more. Should have just done them all at one go, but I was concerned with the fatigue. I tried not to rest too long and fight through the burn. There was one point when I wavered a little with my core strength, but I refocused, repositioned the bar and went right back at it.

My perfect pushups came into play here.. both with the bastards and the pushups. The judge was pretty strict with me and didn't count any reps of pushups where my hips and chest didn't touch at the same time. No cheating these. I had to repeat a few reps, but I'd rather that than know I did a half-assed job.

On to 9.. I cleaned and jerked the bar up and my arms were so close together. I was so exhausted that I knew I didn't have the strength to snatch the bar, and I still won't jerk the bar from behind my head. The position feels so gross on my shoulder. I should really work on this! You can see how close my hands are in this picture. There's nothing "wrong" with this, meaning the judge wasn't going to hold it against me, but it makes the squat a little more difficult. I did all 9 at a time and went to bastards. I did the first bastard and my judge told me it didn't count because I started on the wrong side of the bar. Really? So, I did that one over again. The key to the bastards is just to keep moving, and don't stand up all the way. The judges weren't looking for full hip extension. They were looking to make sure you didn't step over the bar. You had to jump it. The final 9 pushups were greuling. I was doing one at a time. Thank God Steve was laying next to me and yelling for me to push through and finish.

I finished this WOD in a very painful 11:33 seconds... as RX!