Well, I smartly took over 1200 pictures of this trip. So it has taken 2 weeks of 5 minutes here and 5 minutes there to sit down and look through them all just ONCE, marking any that I liked. Last night I finally decided to just go ahead and upload any/all that I liked because I don't want to wait any longer, sorting through them, to get this post up and done and move on to more current posts. If you are not into fitness, this will be a Verrryyy LONG, boring slide show to you- so just skip this blog post. :) Otherwise, it is inspiring to look back through them (for me) and recall how incredibly strong and fit these athletes were.
The CrossFit Games. was. A. BLAST!! I had so much fun. It was a very different environment from any other event I had ever attended. Any other time I've been in a large crowd, it has been a collection of all lifestyles of the masses. Here, the fittest people on the planet were competing for the title of fittest man/woman in the world. The culture of the sport is strong and well supported which drew out almost strictly CrossFit athletes as spectators. It would be comparable to attending an NFL football game where only college and maybe high school football players were in the stands watching. Everywhere you looked, people looked strong/fast/fit. I've never seen so many fit people in all my life. On top of that, there were lifting/mobility/gymnastics/etc. workshops and workouts set up throughout the day at the games so everyone pretty much stayed in their workout clothes most of the time. The commentators called it a waterless beach because it was baking hot and workouts going on 'round the clock- which yielded a fair amount of skin.
One of the things we were most excited about was seeing a family friend, Jared Stevens and his wife, Andrea. Jared owns a CrossFit gym in Missouri and competed at the North East Regionals CrossFit competition, doing really well there. We really enjoyed hanging out with them during the games and going to dinner together afterwards a few times as well.
(*Drum roll*) Here are the pictures. They are biased to a few of our favorite athletes. My favorite female athlete is Julie Foucher (pronounced Foo-shay). She is the killer fast runner below (won that race).
Great "Pose" Running form.
What I like about Julie is that she is an animal! She was a gymnast. She became a medical student, thought she'd try CrossFit out, tried out for the games shortly after, and MADE it (last year), did well considering, she is a medical student and trained for this year's games with every intention to WIN... all in her "spare time". I also like that she can be as strong as she is and still look like a girl. Some of them... not so much.
Enter: Annie Thorisdottir
Annie was the defending champion fittest woman in the world from last year. She's from Iceland (nicknamed, "Iceland Annie"). I really wanted Julie to beat her. Julie's from the U.S. Julie is in the picture below, in the big screen, catching her breath having just won that particular workout.
Same workout, here in the big screen in front are Chris Spealler (bald) and Dan Bailey (red head band), two of our (Todd and I's) favorite athletes.
Chris has been qualifying for and competing in the games year after year
more than any other CrossFit games athlete... Back in the days when
nobody had ever heard of CrossFit and they did their games competitions
on Dave Castro's ranch in the middle of nowhere. Chris has seen it
evolve from friends and family watching, into selling out the Home Depot Center and 17,000 crazed fans.
He is literally THE crowd favorite. He's had all those years of success
at only 5'5" tall and weighing between 130-150 pounds! (He put on 20 pounds of muscle this year so he's currently 151, but for most of his carreer weighed much less.) He's 33 years old. Getting up there in age to be competing at these games. They make every
athlete lift the exact same amount of weight as everyone else in each
workout and there are some BIG guys out there. Chris is known as a freak
of nature how strong he is in such a small frame to be not only keeping up with but competitive with those guys. But that helps in any of the workouts that are body weight related because he's light and big guys have more body weight to work with. Anyway, if you tend to
like to root for the little guy, Chris Spealler is your guy.
Chris is one of the nicest guys there. So friendly and positive, just an all around good guy. You never hear him swear or say anything off color. We really like watching his instructional videos for that reason. He is famously about the best/most brilliant teacher in CrossFit. He owns a gym in Park City, UT and, being close to Idaho, Todd and I are itching to take a course from him some time.
Unfortunately, this year was Chris Spealler's worst year as far as
ranking. He is getting older while the other qualifying athletes keep
cycling through with new "youngin's".
Dan Bailey in the lead for the 400 M sprint. It was said before the games began that he had the fastest 400 M sprint out of all of the athletes at the games. And his running form is incredible.
BUT, there was more than running in this workout.
This is Rich Froning Jr. below, the defending champion from last year. He is Todd and I's favorite athlete. It's fun to watch someone win ALL THE TIME! He always starts slow, paces himself, and just when you think he'll never catch up, he not only does, but SMOKES everyone else. This was his 3rd games. He almost won his very first one 3 years ago, but came across a rope climb in the very last work out and hadn't ever been taught the right technique. So he stood at the bottom of the rope exhausted from the other modalities of the workout while everyone else passed him up using the right fatigue-friendly technique. He went home and learned to rope climb straight-away! That would be so humiliating. Especially to know you were definitely going to win until that. He's 25. He has a lot of videos on youtube that Todd and I like to watch for motivation like, "A day in the life of Rich Froning", etc. He has the most calm confidence out there of all the athletes. Almost like he doesn't care who's there or what's going on around him, he's just there to get the job done. That's him below on the big screen.
Todd and I LOVE his training philosophies. His training has very few structured rules- a few lifts he works on regularly, but the rest, especially conditioning, is all just based on how he feels from day to day. He trains with Dan Bailey and they just have fun, all day. Very little of what they do is planned longer than in moment. They might feel like playing catch with a football and they turn it into a massive sprint/ hard throw competition. Or they might feel like doing weighted muscle-ups using random things and they just play it by ear the whole time. They look like they have SO MUCH FUN. They are a college football team's trainers and they work out in the college football gym. They do their own training through out the day there on their down time. Rich believes over-training is psychological. Always having a programmed "to do" list in the gym before hand without the flexibility of doing whatever you think sounds good that day can "stress you out". Of course, this may not work for a lazy mind. But Rich.... is not lazy... He does train in different ways throughout the WHOLE day. Not doing metabolic conditioning over and over or weight training over and over, but doing something throughout the day to be active. If you have time like that... it could make you the fittest person in the world.
Then you take Chris Spealler, who works out only once a day and gives himself strict rest days every 3rd or 4th day. And still maintains incredible, competitive fitness. I think I would say I'm a blend of the two philosophies but lean more to the Froning side. I like structure and chaos :) Just with a
This was part of the second work out, to throw medicine balls across the field while doing a GHD sit up (glute ham developer machine sit up).
See there's Froning in the back with the black head band on. Yet... he won that event.
Passing people one by one...
Below on the left, one of the many eateries. It was nice because they had several food stations serving "paleo food", aka "REAL" food is a better name- no processing, preservatives, fresh produce, grass fed meat, etc.
On the right, one of the workshops teaching Strong Man techniques with Rob Orlando, a famous old-time CrossFit Games athlete.
One of the best perks about watching the games AT the games, was all the vendors! If you like to shop and like CrossFit, this can be dangerous place to be. There were over a hundred vendors- not just the CrossFit brand, but other random CrossFit related clothing companies/food/supplements/gear/equipment companies, kids CrossFit toys... on and on. It was WAY too much temptation. I stocked up on shirts and workout clothing, new gloves, got some paleo treat samples that were awesome and coupons to buy more at home. Things like grass fed beef jerky (not fresh, but nice for road trips), paleo cookies (made with honey, almond flour, raisins, and cinnamon that are actually super yummy. I even bought my own almond flour when I came home because I mean to attempt to replicate it.)
Sporting my goods
(Todd got his share of souvenirs, but he wasn't giddy enough to pose in a picture with it...)
One of my favorite buys was this bag/case that I'm holding above.
Here's closer look at it:
It's a bag with ice pack compartments that keeps the food throughout it super cold for a whole day (and depending on where you keep it, possibly all night too). It's shocking how well this bag insulates. At least as well as your average cooler. Even if it sits in your baking hot car all day parked at Roaring Springs water park because they won't let you bring food inside when all they sell is junk corn dogs, pizza, etc! :)
The bag has 6 main compartments, hence the name. Three large tupperware trays slide into compartments in the front for three main meals (there's a bigger bag with more trays available too), pockets on either side that fit protein bottles/ water bottles, and have a place for napkins and utensils, and finally, the top has small slots for daily vitamins/supplements, and a place to put bars/snacks. Todd and I each got one. His is all black, mine looks like the picture. He uses his at work and I keep mine in my car whenever I leave the house. No more eating out when I leave the house very far or for too long to go without eating. Especially in the summer when anything I'd bring with me would melt or go bad if it was fresh and left in the car. It's one of my favorite buys EVER. In case you think you'd enjoy it, here's a link to buy it from Amazon (it's about $20.00 cheaper than the website where the company that makes them sells them). 6 Pack Bags
One thing just about everyone there had in common was their shoes. Reebok is CrossFit's parner. So they recently studied up on the shoe side of the sport and created a shoe that specially met all the CrossFitter community's demands. I've been looking for good lifting shoes, they're not real easy to come by for women. And whenever I'd find any online, they were always low on stock and out of my size. But lifting shoes aren't usually that great to run in. These Reebok shoes are solid with great balance for lifting and sleek and minimalist for sprinting/running. In every way, they are awesome. They even reinforced the toe perfectly for rope climbing. I LOVE them. They're a few months old. As soon as I heard about them I was all over them. And appearantly thousands of other CrossFit athletes around the globe did too. What lemmings we are ;-)
Here's the new Reebok CrossFit Nano 2 (lots of other colors available):
Anyway Todd felt left out
since he was one of maybe 5 people total out of 17,000+ who didn't own a
pair. He bought a pair there at the Reebok booth and
he does love his too. You can
design your own Nano 2 now. They're backordered around 4 months out, but that was
perfectly timed for when I'll probably need another pair since my Dr.
told me to replace my athletic shoes every 6 months after my
bunionectomy (double foot surgery) 12 years ago. So I designed a pair
online and ordered them when we came home :) Can't wait to see them in a few months!
These weighted balls they had to lift/toss over should so many times, then haul across the court, weighed 150 lbs. for the men, 100 lbs. for the women.
Turkey legs!
The woman on the left is Annie Sokamoto, one of the earlier female games athletes. She's the female version of Chris Spealler, very well-loved and getting up there in years (36!). She's the mother of 2.
Chris Spealler on the far left.
Rich Froning on the far right doing hand stand push-ups.
Rich, having just won that event.
Jared and Andrea Stevens, and Angus.
Dave Castro briefing the athletes as to what the first workout would be that day. The point of the games is not knowing what you'll do until you do it- to find the athlete with the best capacity to do anything and everything well without knowing narrowing down their training to train specifically for any one thing. And the winners do have a well-rounded fitness. They don't look strictly like weight lifters, don't look like endurance athletes, sport specific athletes, gymnasts, sprinters, swimmers... CrossFitters have their own look and it's a blend of all of the above.
Showing the athletes what was expected at each station.
Random picture that Todd took of a tough looking guy...
My friends that work out here at the house just did this Games workout today (modified the muscle-ups).
10 Overhead Squats, 10 Box jump-overs, 10 Thrusters, 10 Power Cleans, 10 Toes to Bar, 10 Burpee Muscle-ups, then you go back and do it all in reverse (except the muscle ups, they are only done one time). Julie Foucher won this one and did AWESOME. This was my favorite workout to watch out of all of them.
The toes to bar/ muscle-up rig.
I love that in CrossFit, there is SO MUCH camaraderie. Here the women who have finished go cheer on the last to the finish.
Here's Julie Foucher's heat.
She's in the purple top and Annie Thorisdottir is in the grey chamo top in front.
Julie doing her burpee muscle-ups.
Power cleans.
.
Thrusters.
Overhead Squats.
Eye on the finish- you had to run and jump onto the red plates to finish.
She won!
Again cheering the last people to the finish.
Then the men did it.
Rich Froning on the toes to bar (on the end- black band on the head).
Jason Khalipa kissing his daughter in the crowd after that event.
Rich encouraging Grahm Holmberg on after he finished. Grahm won the title 3 years ago when Rich ended up unable to climb the rope. (Obviously, Rich smoked everyone else on this to be done/ tinkering around when they still have 3 stations to finish.)
Still pushing his friend to the finish.
Getting a hug from his training partner, Dan.
Dinner at Famous Dave's.
Long Beach Boardwalk.
Morning of day 3.
The "Double Hammer" WOD.
They had to pound steel boxes across their track with sledgehammers using 3 different swing styles and had to do double unders between each station (hence the name.)
Chris Spealler in back with an IMPRESSIVE performance that WOD!
Standing on the box to finish.
Rich Froning hammering.
Watching with our friends.
This (below) is the coach my brother, Devan hired to teach CrossFit at their Usana Health Sciences facility in Salt Lake City, UT. His name is Mike Cazayoux. Anyway, he was Devan's coach until recently when he stopped working there. I went to his class the few times I went in to work out while visiting Devan. He's in a few of CrossFit's most popular videos "What is CrossFit", etc. He looks like a lion, to me. I don't know why. The facial hair, the over-bite maybe, but aside from that and attacking CrossFit workouts like a maniac lion, he's really nice and mellow. He was competing in the team division for Ute CrossFit aka Hacks Pack Utes.
Getting ready.
The women on the teams went first. First was the workout called: "Elizabeth", then "Fran", then "Isabelle", then the men did "Grace", "Diane", and "Karen". Each is a famous CrossFit "benchmark" workout that they use periodically to test your improvement by how much faster you've gotten at that same workout over time.
This team girl below did the fastest, meanest Fran WOD... just CRAZY fast on her butterfly pull-ups.
Mike doing the workout, "Diane".
And upon finishing, knowing his last team member to go was probably the most incredible person in the world at that particular workout he was about to do, and that they were in the lead, Mike began celebrating!
The women on his team congratulating him.
Mike's team member (the owner of the gym their team is based from), Tommy Hackenbruck, speeding away at "Karen".
Look how happy Mike looks :)
And the Utes WON!!!
The Hack Pack Utes talking to the MC.
The women's individuals had to do 3 of the previous workouts: "Elizabeth", "Isabelle", and "Fran".
All in a row.
Julie Foucher on the rings and Annie Thorisdottir on the cleans. These workouts are done frequently in CrossFit and therefore, the longer you've been in CrossFit, the more time you've had to improve them and hack away at your time. Julie lost her lead in the competition in a "Clean Latter" workout just earlier that day, Annie winning that event. And Annie overtook Julie in the series of these three workouts as well, winning the title AGAIN. I was super bummed. Julie beat her at pretty much everything else all the other days, but that totalled four things each with enough point value that it was detrimental to Julie to lose on all of that.
Waiting between workouts.
Julie on her Fran pull ups.
Annie having just won the title of Fittest Women in the world.
Dan Bailey on cleans.
Froning on ring dips.
Just won "Elizabeth"- in fact he set a world record for it!
(After all he'd done that weekend and that DAY, that was incredible to see him achieve.)
The die hard crowd in the hottest time of the hottest day of the competition.
Dave Castro reading off something, can't remember what.
(He is in charge of coming up with the wod's for this.)
Froning on Fran Thrusters.
Fran Pull-ups
Froning, just finished, knowing he won the title of Fittest Man in the World.
Rich and Annie are the first two athletes to ever win two years
in a row and both did it the same year.
I love how happy Rich's training buddy, Dan Bailey was for him (the only other guy smiling out there).
When it was all said and done, we went to the beach and watched the sunset.
And had dinner at Chili's.
And flew home the next day, snacking on our paleo snack samples throughout the flights.
Our kids were in great hands here at home with their sitter, Ashley, a college-aged girl from our ward. She stayed here at the house with them. She is also our neighbor so the kids got to play over there a bit too. They went to a movie, played slip 'n slide down Ashley's family's hill, and did all kinds of other fun things. We missed them, though :)
But the CrossFit Games was super fun and we plan to go back next year! Hopefully with more CrossFit friends from home.
1 comment:
So awesome. We are totally going next year. We are already saving up! It will be a blast.
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