Two weeks ago, I competed in my first big Crossfit competition at Crossfit Taranis. First off, I just wanted to say thank you to the whole Taranis crew for organizing such a great event. The whole weekend was very well organized and went very smoothly. I thought the programming was great as well, it was very well rounded and didn’t bias anything. The volume was just perfect for a 1 day workout.
Pete Kendrick, Dai Manuel, Geoff Behrend and I arrived in Victoria on Friday afternoon. After signing in, all the athletes were informed of the first workout. In 10 minutes time, do 1 set of max pull-ups, and in the remainder of the time, do a 1 rep max squat clean. I felt pretty good with this workout as I knew my strength was in bodyweight movements and my squat clean was pretty good for my size. Heading into the competition, I had a nagging pain somewhere around my scapula. It wasn’t a pain or an injury, per se, but it was definitely a twinge or a tweak. Whatever you wanna call it, it was bothering me anytime I moved my right scapula around (shoulder blade). On to Saturday, the competition day, knowing that I would be one of the smallest, if not, the smallest competitor, I knew that I would finish in the bottom quarter, my goal was just not to finish last.
Workout #1
In 10 minutes, perform 1 set of max pull-ups, in the remainder of the 10 minutes; achieve a 1 rep max squat clean.
The standard for the pull-ups was that your chin not only had to be higher than the bar but it had to break the vertical plan of the bar. I hadn’t practiced this pull up at all in my training as I usually do butterfly kipping style pull ups but I wasn’t worried as I knew pull ups were one of my strengths. My PR for max pull-ups is 45 so my goal was to get to at least 40. I did my first 10-15 or so pull-ups butterfly style and after a couple of missed reps, I switched to a regular gymnastics kip pull-up and got up to 33 reps. After that, I had 5 straight missed reps that didn’t count as my chin didn’t break the vertical plane of the bar. In total I had about 7-9 missed reps. In retrospect, I would have started with the gymnastics kip right off the bat as I think that would’ve helped my muscular endurance.
Score = 33 pull ups
After I dropped from the bar, I took my time to put on my lifting shoes, there was about close to 9 minutes left so I knew I had a lot of reps to figure out my max squat clean. Here is what I did from what I can recall.
1 x 165
1 x 185
1 x 205 (fail)
1 x 195
1 x 205 (fail)
1 x 200
1 x 205 (fail)
Score = 200lbs
Workout #2
3 rounds for time:
15 wall balls (20lbs)
10 burpees
This workout had a 7 minute time cap. I had a few a couple of missed reps of wall balls but that was it. By the third round, I had to break my wall balls into 3 sets of 5 cause the ball got really heavy. I always liked front squats but not wall balls for some reason. My time was 4:02
Workout #3
As many rounds/reps as possible in 20 minutes
20 backward skips
20 air squats
20 double unders
200 meter run
Each rep of the backward skips, air squats and double unders were worth 1 point and each completed run was worth 80 points. This was an aerobic workout, which is again, not one of my strengths (see a common theme here?) but I was going to give it all I got. I went into the workout with a strategy of using 2 ropes, a buddy lee for the backward skipping as I thought the weighted rope would help and I was going to use a cable rope for the double unders. My double unders were surprisingly quicker than normal but the time it took to switch ropes cost me a lot of time. In hindsight, I would’ve gone with just one rope. The run distance was not bad, running is another one of my weaknesses but the distance was short so I didn’t mind too much. Score: 7 rounds and 40 reps = 1020
Between the third and fourth workouts, I went to use the massage service at the facility and told my friendly RMT of my scapula twinge. She found a massive muscle knot/trigger point on my levator scapulae on my right side and proceeded to knead it down. It gave me some temporary relief.
Workout #4
5 rounds with 135lbs bar for time of:
9 deadlifts
6 power cleans
3 squat cleans to overhead
This wod had a 10 minute time cap, my goal was to just finish the workout in time. By the third round, I had to start breaking up all the sets. I think I crashed because of poor game day nutrition. I finished with 4 rounds, 9 deadlifts, and 3 power cleans for a total of 84 reps.
Epilogue
So my first competition earned me a 59th place finish out of 64 male competitors. The final scoresheet showed me scoring 81 reps in the last workout when I actually got 84. I didn’t mention it because even if it bumped me up 1 or 2 spots, I was still a bottom dweller. All in all, I had a great time and was just glad I survived the day. Moving forward, I now know I have some serious holes in my game that I need to work on. Next up is the Oly-Lifting Competition hosted by Crossfit North Vancouver and BCAW at Semiahmoo Secondary. I’m going to start training hard for that. Wish me good luck!
