What Drives You?

          This video below, brings up the question for me. What Drives You? Chris Spealler is an undersized Crossfit athlete that is loved by pretty much, everyone. Why? because he brings the shock factor when he competes. Since he is so undersized when compared to many of the other competitors, people do not expect him to be able to move as much weight as the other bigger guys while being able to keep up with them. The fact is, he does, and he does it remarkably.

          Chris represents a lot when it comes to Crossfit but to many he represents themselves and how the world views them. People doubt him before getting to know him, but little do they know he is one of the most elite Crossfit athletes in the world. I myself look at him as an inspiration. Many look at me and do not expect me to be able to do some of the things I can do. They judge me because I dont have big muscles, I am tall and lengthy, I dont walk around with a cocky attitude that boasts my achievements. And because of that they doubt before getting to know me.

          Luckily the Crossfit world is not full of people like this, the Crossfit world is the place where you can just try your best and whatever the outcome is, as long as you gave it your all, people will congratulate you with a high five or a hug with the look that says "we survived that together".

         So the answer to my own question of what drives me is simply proving things to myself, and others wrong.

So, What drives you in the Crossfit gym?

A Medical Review

CrossFit Review

By Michael Esco, PhD, CSCS
WebMD Feature

Preparing the body “not only for the known, but also the unknown” is the mantra for CrossFit, one of the fastest growing strength and conditioning programs today. It is not a traditional, specialized training program like doing isolated weight lifting for a certain muscle or aerobics.

“Our specialty is not specializing," says CrossFit founder and former gymnast Greg Glassman.

It's also a very tough workout -- not one to take lightly, especially if you're not active right now.

Here's what you should know before you get started.

What is CrossFit?

CrossFit combines strength training, explosive plyometrics, speed training, Olympic- and power-style weight lifting, kettle bells, body weight exercises, gymnastics, and endurance exercise.

By doing this, CrossFit targets what it calls the major components of physical fitness: cardiorespiratory fitness, stamina, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, power, speed, agility, balance, coordination, and accuracy.

Training the CrossFit way requires you to work out 3 to 5 days per week. The workouts are highly intense and short, taking about 5 to 15 minutes to complete.

CrossFit workouts typically combine explosive exercises done in a circuit format: One exercise follows right after the next, with very little rest in between.  

The main CrossFit exercises involve the whole body and include pushing, pulling,running, rowing, and squatting.

There are hundreds of CrossFit exercises. Here are a few examples:

• Power Cleans: Pulling a weighted bar from the floor and bringing it up to and in front of your shoulders in a quick and forceful manner.
• Burpees: This is a body-weight-only exercise that involves beginning in a standing position, quickly dropping to the floor and doing a push-up, then coming up to a squatting position and explosively jumping straight-up.
• The Snatch: A weighted bar is rapidly pulled from the floor to directly over your head with the arms held straight.
• Thruster: This exercise begins with standing upright with weighted bar held in front of your shoulders. You squat down to the point where your thighs are parallel to the floor, then quickly standing back-up and pressing the weighted bar over your head.

Other examples are variations of push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. CrossFit also often uses kettle bells (a weighted bell with a handle on top), medicine balls, climbing ropes, jump ropes, and rowing machines.

The CrossFit WOD

CrossFit posts a Workout of the Day (WOD) on its web site. Some of the WOD are specially named after women or military heroes. The WOD changes each day and there are a lot of them. And they can be quite demanding.

• The Barbara involves five circuits of 20 pull-ups, 30 push-ups, 40 sit-ups, and 50 body weight-only squats performed in order, while only resting at the end of each circuit for a 3-minute period.
• The Angie - 100 pull-ups, 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 bodyweight-only squats to be accumulated (not performed in a row, unless you are fit enough) during the entire workout.  
• The Murph - a timed 1-mile run, followed by 100 pull-ups, 200 push-ups, 300 body weight squats, finished off by another 1-mile run.
• The Jackie - 1,000 meter row, 50 thrusters with a selected weight, and 30 pull-ups: preferably performed without any rest between each exercise.  

Twig to Gym Rat to Crossfitter

Senior Year High School

          Hello to all my fellow Crossfitters, welcome to my blog. This is a blog where I will post anything and everything Crossfit. This being my first blog I might as well introduce myself.

          My name is Nick, I am 22 and have been interested in physical fitness ever since I saw my first Rocky Balboa movie in middle school and did push-up and sit-ups in my room until I couldn't lift myself off the ground. Going through high school I was the tall, skinny, quiet kid, scared to death of confrontation in any way. But deep down i had this competitive side in me, lurking to get out and prove myself to others and myself. The only way I truly felt I could get this desire out of me is to workout.

          I got a gym membership my senior year in high school, and went 4-5 days a week not having a clue what I was doing. Over the years with the help of my friends/family and the countless hours I spent on the internet searching for ways to get bigger, faster, stronger, I began to learn and apply new techniques. Many of the techniques I learned and heard of could have probably been considered a joke, but I tried them and of course they failed. The one approach to my physical fitness as an Ectomorph body type that I learned that never ever failed was simply....Hard Work and a passionate Dedication. 

Gym Rat Nick, looks better
but not in shape.

          Fast forward 3 years later, I had made some great progress but had hit a wall that was difficult to get over. With going to school full time and working 30 hrs a week mixed with some personal issues that can also be known as just LIFE, I began to get lazy and back away from what I knew and tried to find a shortcut way to the "healthy life" which in fact was just appearing healthy but not truly in shape by any means.

          During this time my brother had introduced me to Crossfit. Just like almost everyone that is introduced to Crossft who has had an experience in a gym before, I was completely overwhelmed and humbled. What had just happened to me? I thought I was in shape....boy was I wrong. Collapsed on the ground, gasping for air, I fell in love. As soon as possible, I dropped my gym membership, joined a Crossfit, and never looked back.

          I can honestly say Crossfit is one of the best things that I have ever done for myself. I am in the best shape of my life. The personal fulfillment I get from; reaching my goals, setting new Personal Records (PR's), making improvements, helping other's reach their goals, being a part of a community that is constantly helping each other, is irreplaceable. I am constantly learning new things about this amazing world of Crossfit and planning on sharing all I learn with you.

          I am very excited to see where this blog goes, please leave comments and share with us your stories and things you have learned along the way. I hope you enjoy and share this with our fellow Crossfitters.

The beginning of my Crossfit Journey