There are few things in life that are certain: the Mets suck, work makes me a miserable piece of crap and crossfit doesn’t get easier. It’s pretty tricky, this crossfit. I get stronger, faster and sexier and my times drop (sometimes) I’m still just as physically taxed as I was the first time that I hit Fran. But now, crossfit isn’t only maintaining it’s degree of difficulty, it’s getting even harder. For over a year now my main focus has been strength in the absolute rather than the relative sense. My goal has been to toss progressively heavier weights over my head. Well, I’ve done that. My snatch is astronomically heavier than what it was a year ago and my clean and jerk has gone up exponentially as well.
Guess what though, this singular approach in training has made me far from a great, or even good crossfitter. I’ve been #1 in my gym for a long time now and even #1 in a couple of others so I grew a false sense of my own fitness. It wasn’t until the Trials up in Albany that I learned that there are people hitting it hard, everyday. They are learning new skills and developing what they are bad at. Mine used to be strength, now it’s gone into longer metcons (which were at a point and time my bread and butter). Last Saturday I finished off barefoot-Murph at the 32 minute mark which shows to me that I can sort of still get it done (running, now matter what, has been evil to me) but there was a time when I could probably crush that and be ok to do it again. This is why I’m glad that I’ve finally signed up for the Cheshire pool. The hope is to get that aerobic capacity back to where it was. The focus is still on strength, to get my 250# snatch and 315# clean and jerk, but a few swims a week, probably ranging from 2000yds on sprint days to 10000yds on the long ones will help me retool my body. I might need to take my rest days more seriously because of this but it should pay off big dividends.
PS. If anybody wants swim lessons from an Olympic Trials semifinalist feel free to contact me.
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