When I started CrossFit just over a year ago, being able to do an unassisted pull-up was a mere dream, let alone getting my chest up to the bar. I remember hanging from the rig, trying with every ounce of my being to pull myself up, but alas, I would just hang. After a long, grueling year of progress, I'm still working on the rhythm of kipping and linking my pull-ups together, however I can do strict ones (with a little bit of a "leg kip" - think of kipping a ring dip, yeah, that's pretty much what I do on the pull-up bar). Up until Friday, I had managed three chest to bar pull-ups in my lifetime. Three. Not consecutively, total.
When workout 14.2 was announced, I was both nervous and excited. Nervous because I was dealing with movements I wasn't fully comfortable with and excited because I knew this was something I could tackle. My goal - more chest to bar pull-ups in that workout than I've ever done in my CrossFit career - basically, 4. The workout began with 10 overhead squats at 65#, something I knew I could managed relatively quickly, followed by 10 chest to bar pull-ups, then repeated within a 3 minute time cap. During my first attempt Friday evening, I managed to get a total of 16 reps - that's 6 chest to bar pull-ups! Along the way, I made 8 other pull-up attempts that didn't quite get high enough unfortunately. While I was so proud of myself, those 8 no-rep pull-ups were mocking me. I decided to reattempt the workout on Monday evening, just before the score submission deadline, and guess what - 32 reps! That was 12 chest to bar pull-ups with every single rep being high enough to count toward my score.
Like I mentioned before, my 32 reps probably made me about as happy as Camille was with taking first place worldwide in the event. No, I can't compare my performance to hers as we're not even in the same stratosphere of fitness, but I achieved something I wasn't sure was possible - probably much like Camille taking the event by 49 reps over the second place finisher (damn that girl is amazing).
This is my first time competing in the Open and only two weeks in, I've learned so much about how to push myself to achieve more than what I previously capable of. I don't need to be a Regionals contender in order to get the best out of my performance that I can, I just need to have the tenacity and faith in myself that anything is possible. 14.3, I'm coming for you! (Fingers crossed for some heavy deadlift action...)
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