Crossfit day 3: How the first week went

Well kids...I made it through the first week. And I have one thing to say about it:

Remember my talk of turning beet red? I wasn't lying (this is right after I got home today).

Ouch.

HOWEVER!

I am already noticing improvements so that counts for something! I was able to do far more burpees than I was during my into last week and my hands are nowhere near as chafed.

I ended up going to crossfit three days this week, Mon/Weds/Fri and I think that was a good decision. Wednesday night my usual running partners bailed on me but I went to run club anyway because it starts and ends at an Irish pub and is therefore my most favorite run club I am in so I am always sad when I miss it. Besides it always gives me a reason to talk to new people when I show up alone. I ended up running 4 pretty brutal miles (my thighs were not on board with any of it) but I made it through and then spent the next few hours doing this around the downtown area:

I was FREEZING, what happened to August?

It turns out that running a few hours after crossfit is something I'm going to have to keep building up to.


Yesterday (Thursday) I did nothing. I didn't factor in a few key things when signing up for crossfit:

-How I feel about getting in and out of the car

-How I feel about walking up and down stairs

-How I feel about walking. Period.

At one point I actually walked from Petsmart clear across the massive parking lot to Target and back because that seemed easier than getting in and out of the car because my butt muscles hurt SO BAD. By bad I mean that I spent the whole night last night having to wake up to roll over because it was a conscious process. But I've always like the saying, "Pain is just weakness leaving the body" and next week will be better. It's a good pain, I promise (she tells herself as if that will convince her otherwise...).

Today my friend called who goes to the same box (that's what a crossfit "gym" is called by the way, a box) and told me that the workout was really hard but he lied. It wasn't easy by any means but I thought Wednesday's was much harder. Here's what we did:

Warm up
30 seconds each of push ups, sit ups, mountain climbers, inch worms, jumping jacks and burpees for 6 minutes (I think there was one or two others in there I can't remember).

Workout
20 minutes to run one mile and then do as many sets of these as possible: 5 handstand pushups (I did the modified version so I had to do 15), 10 pull ups, 15 burpees. I got through three sets without dying, praise the lord. When we were done with the 20 minutes we had to do 100 full body sit ups and then 20 jump lunges (ow).

"Cool down" (for the lack of a better term)
We were in teams of 4 and had to do sprint relays carrying a sandbag on our shoulders which has made my left shoulder really unhappy (don't tell my chiropractor...sorry, Russ) for about 5 minutes.

Then I came home and died.

Only kind of joking.

I know its probably boring to read all of that but I know before this week I was so confused as to WHAT exactly goes on in crossfit. I mean, I knew it was a bunch of masochistic people who loved to beat the snot out of themselves and I was completely on board with that but I had no idea what I was really getting into.

And after my first week I have to say that I really do like it. It's not easy by any means and once I get more familiar with things I plan on pushing myself a lot harder but I was trying to keep the pain at a minimum this week (Ha! I say. Ha!).

Oh! But here's a surprising development...they are making me HATE running, at least in the crossfit context. That one mile run? Apparently means full out. And as I have mentioned before it takes me 3 miles to get into a good pace so banging right into a sub 8 minute mile out of the gate makes me unhappy. I don't like to push it when I first go out so it's making me mad that I am getting murdered by everyone else. I would really love to see these crossfit people run 10 miles (that's the anger talking, I am sure some of them would do just fine). It's all good though, I'll be right there with them soon.

Also, my normal coach was gone today so I had two different coaches and they were correcting everything I was doing which was equal parts awesome and annoying. But they played this during warm up so I think I may be in love with both of them...

And if you just want to fast forward that to 1:47 for JT's biceps I completely understand, this is a judge free zone.

I have about 15 miles of running on my plate for this weekend and then I'm ready for next week, who else is??

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Edited to add:
I guess I failed to mention this crucial part: I am already obsessed with crossfit. Love it, need it, don't want to think about being without it. I knew before I started I would love it because distance running is all about talking yourself out of quitting and everything I have heard about crossfit says the same thing and it's so true. I am so looking forward to pushing myself harder and farther than I ever have before and more importantly building my core strength to make me a better runner. Because I may or may not have a reason that I need to be the best runner I can be in the next few months... ;)