CrossFit Brisbane

Zen Habits is the brainchild blog of Leo Babauta.  It is a great blog aimed at de-cluttering your mind and getting things done without stress.  This is a great post about how to reclaim time …

…”Take my life, for example: there was a time, not too long ago, when my day was packed from morning to night, when I had meetings and long to-do lists and worked long hours and the rest of my time was filled up with social engagements and meetings for civic responsibilities. I had little time for my family, which ate me up, and little time to do the things I’ve always wanted to do.

I’ve always wanted to write, but never had the time. I’ve always wanted to exercise, but was too busy. I always wanted to travel, but who can get away? I’ve always wanted to spend time with my kids, but work comes first, right?

Wrong. I finally got smart and decided that my life is my own, to do with as I wished, and so I took a time out to decide what I really wanted my life to be like. Then I designed my life, and made a series of decisions and steps to get my life to what I wanted it to be.

Today, I wake early and exercise or spend some quiet time reading and writing. I’ve written a novel and a non-fiction book. I write this blog. I run and have finally run a marathon (two actually) and completed a triathlon. I spend afternoons and evenings and all weekends with my kids and wife.

My life is what I’ve always wanted it to be, because I designed it to be that way and worked to make that design come true.

It can be that way for you, to the extent that you’re willing to make changes. Even if you just want to free up a little time for a hobby or for doing something relaxing, you can do that.”  read more …

Want to commit health suicide?  Mark Sisson tells you how …

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/health-suicide-10-easy-steps/

One of the most common questions that I asked is “how do I lose weight?” Well, losing weight is less important than reducing body fat.  In fact, due to the fact that muscle weighs a lot more than fat, it is possible to drop significant amounts of body fat without changing weight on the scales.  This happens do to an exchange of fat for muscle that occurs when you start training.  So reduction in weight is not a very good measure of progress, but reduction in body fat is. 

There are some really easy ways to measure reductions in body fat.  The simplest one is to take girth measurements using a tape measure and note reductions in key areas as you reduce body fat.  Measure your waistline at your belly button, your hips at the widest part, your thighs 9cms above your knee cap, bicep at the widest part, and chest at the highest point under your armpits (above your nipple line).  Use these as benchmark measures and periodically re-measure to see improvements.  Ideally you will see waist and hips reduce, while biceps, thighs and chest increase or stay the same.  In reality, what you are measuring is how much you have changed where it really matters … the fit of your clothes.  Dropping sizes is the clearest indicator that you are dropping body fat.

So now that you know how to measure your progress, how do you actually bring about a change?  Here are 5 steps for fat loss that we know work, providing you are consistent and put in the effort:-

1. Reduce your carb intake to about 40%, increase your protein intake to 30%, ensure your (good) fat intake is 30%
2. Remove the following things from your diet (this is your NO list):-
• NO Bread
• NO Potatoes or Starchy vegetables
• NO Softdrink (includes anything that is low/no sugar, eg Coke Zero etc, if it comes in a can do not drink it)
• NO High GI or sports drinks (eg fruit juice, powerade, cordial)
• NO Alcohol
• NO Fried Food
• NO Sugar
• NO Pasta or noodles
• NO White rice
• NO Saturated fat
• NO Icecream
• NO rice cakes, crackers or biscuits
• NO energy drinks
3. Get 8 hours of sleep, drink a lot of water, eat every 3 hours, eat a solid breakfast, eat a small to moderate amount of protein at every meal, prepare your meals in advance (don’t be caught hungry at the shops) and reduce coffee/tea/processed foods
4. Make most of your diet consist of (the YES list):-
• Lean Meat (PROTEIN)
• Lean Poultry - preferably free range organic (PROTEIN)
• Fish (Tuna, Salmon, Reef & Deep Sea) (PROTEIN)
• Eggs (PROTEIN)
• Non-starchy vegetables (CARB) … lots of green stuff!
• Low GI fruit (CARB)
• Nuts & Seeds (including macadamia’s & almonds) (FAT)
• Brown rice (CARB) … in small doses!
• Pita bread (CARB)
• Good Fats (olive oil, avacado, mono-unsaturated) (FAT)
• Yogurt (CARB + PROTEIN)
• Olives (FAT)
5. Train CrossFit 5 times a week and give each session everything you’ve got!  Make sure that you have a good mix of strength and metcon sessions.

Giving up things on the NO list is hard.  It requires a sacrifice and effort on your part.  But it is worth it to have a healthy body and to be able fit into clothes that you want to wear.  If you already have your body composition under control, well done, BUT there is still no excuse.  Adopting the above formula will push your body to the next level.

No doubt there are plenty of things on your BUT list … “but, I really enjoy a beer at the end of the day” … “but I don’t like eating vegetables” … ” but … but … but”.  The reality is that if the BUTs are powerful enough to stop you, then you are not serious anyway.  That is a choice for you to make.  All I am asking you to do is be honest with yourself.

Still not sold?  Here is a challenge … take your measurements and follow the above 5 steps for 3 weeks.  Be disciplined and don’t cheat.  After 3 weeks, re-measure and see what has happened.  3 weeks is not long.  If you want more info about how to implement the above changes feel free to drop me an email or see me at training.  Once you have given the basic 5 steps a red hot poke, I will provide more info on how to properly tune your diet.

Cheers,
Matt

Crossfitters seem to be very aware of what they feed themselves to fuel their bodies. But what do you feed your mind? The WOD is always written on the board when we walk into training, and our trainers are always there to correct form, so it is easy to make the focus of training ‘physical’. But what you allow yourself to think has a massive effect on your physical performance. The strongest man will under-perform when filled with doubt or fear. 

The training of the mind is not often formally instructed. People become mentally stronger through experience. But there is a way to fast track your mental performance. First of all, you have to be aware of what you allow yourself to think. You cannot change anything if you are not aware of it. Once you develop that awareness, ask yourself – “is what I am thinking doing me any good? Is it helping me achieve my goal?” – if the answers to these questions is NO, then change what you are thinking.

There are some simple guidelines to help you construct better thoughts. First, make your thoughts about NOW, not about the past or the future. Second, make them task focussed. A technical cue would be a good example. Third, keep the language of your thinking in positive terms (e.g. instead of “this wont kill me” think “this will make me stronger”). And finally, make sure that what you put in your head is believable.

Once you know how to construct good thinking, go out and think ‘ON PURPOSE’. Don’t just accept whatever happens to pop into your head. Take responsibility for what is in your mind. In this way you are feeding your mind positives and it will grow strong.

- Wendy Swift

It is time to lift our standards.  In general our pullups are not up to the standard set by the CrossFit community.  It is becoming too common to see forehead to the bar, or bent arms at the bottom of the hang being counted as a rep completed.

Lets make no bones about it.  Pullups are hard.  That is why you rarely see them being done in commercial gyms.  CrossFit does a lot of pullups.  That is one of the reasons why CrossFitters are strong.  But really, the main reason why get strong is because we do things poperly.  Full range of motion, correct movement patterns, accurate form and technique are essential components of the program, not optional extras that can be conveniently discarded as soon as the WOD has a lot of reps.

Let’s have some pride and set the standard where it should be.

A pullup is only a valid rep if it starts from full hang with arms extended, moves through full range of motion until the CHIN is above the bar (not the eyes) and then returns to a full hang. 

Ultimately, if you are cheating form, you are only cheating yourself out of improvement. 

Here are some things that suck …

• doing hyper-kips, getting hairline to the bar two reps in a row, getting your chin over the bar on the third attempt and then counting 3 completed reps (this should be 1 rep counted)
• getting chin over the bar then dropping to the ground from the up position and counting a rep (this is only a half rep, doesn’t count)
• jumping up to the bar and continuing to chin over the bar position, descending and then completing a pullup and counting 2 reps (the first is a jump pullup, it should only be a count of 1 rep)

Don’t train to suck!  One of the truisms in life is how we practice is how we perform.  If you are not strong enough to get your chin consistently over the bar, then continuing to perform half reps will not magically make you strong enough, it will just make you very good at half reps.  Do it long enough and you will actually start believing that half reps are all you can do, ie, you are somehow special.  Pullups are hard for everyone.  If you are not strong enough, then that is the problem not the excuse.  Get stronger and fix the problem.  How? slow descends, band pullups, partner assisted pullups, quality kipping practice, deadlifts, cleans, ring rows, high pulls, hanging.  How else? ask your trainer.  How else?  practice the suckers EVERY warmup.

As trainers we see very few people do the specified pullups in the warmup and very many people do dodgy pullups in the workout.  One day, I hope to see everybody doing pullups in the warmup and nobody doing dodgy form in the workout.

Here is some homework reading …

http://www.crossfit.com/journal/library/pullup_Apr03.pdf

http://stronglifts.com/how-to-do-pull-ups-and-chin-ups-with-proper-technique/

http://www.stumptuous.com/cms/displayarticle.php?aid=51

Let’s lift the standard!  If your rep sucks, don’t count it.  If you are counting reps for someone and they don’t get over the bar, don’t count it.  If you are doing pullups and the trainer tells you to get your chin over the bar, that means your last rep sucked.  If getting told that your form is not good enough gets up your nose and makes you want to tell the person to “get f*****” then maybe you should take a step back and remember that you are here to get better, and that person is trying to help you get better.  Let’s not shoot the messenger.  Also, If you think trying hard somehow justifies bad form, I would like you to have a rethink.  Everyone is trying hard.

“Don’t paint a dirty car”

This is a quote from Greg Glassman, founder of CrossFit.  In relation to CrossFit it refers to people trying to disguise poor form by increasing speed or weight.  In the immortal words of Mark Rippetoe, “shitty form is shitty form”.  It doesn’t matter how much we try to deny it, sooner or later, limitations in form and technique magnify to become limitations in performance.  We all want to go fast and lift heavier.  CrossFitters are typically competitive people by nature.  The irony is that we don’t get to go faster or heavier in the WODs by using faster movements, or struggling with heavier loads. 

Speed and strength are borne from movement and technique.  If the underlying movement is not correct, improvement will be limited to only the first 3-6 months when corresponding improvements in basic metabolic conditioning allow us to perform better than when we first walked in the door.  However, this is just the “newbie” phenomenom and without constant improvements in the underlying CrossFit movement patterns, progress will stagnate.  If you have been doing CrossFit for more that 3 months and your progress has slowed, it will be for one of three reasons …. you are not consistent, you are not working hard enough, or (most likely if you have lasted 3 months) you are placing a higher emphasis on effort over form improvement.

Improving form takes time, patience and dedication.  It is also dependent upon corresponding improvements in flexibility, neurological awareness, stability, core strength, balance and coordination.  It takes time for your body to adapt and make improvements in these areas.  You need to attempt to do the movement correctly, replicating the pattern as closely as your body will allow and then perform precise reps to provide the stimulus for your body to adapt.  This is a process of chipping away at the problem each day with a conscious effort to improve.  Importantly, form improvement requires ongoing honest evaluation.  How honest is your attitude to training?

A great way to improve form is to use your warmup/warmdown time wisely to work on your body.  Be dilligent in the warmup and focus on movements that you have trouble with.  If Overhead Squat form is a problem, make sure that every session has some Overhead Squat practice.  You have to work on your problem areas.  Speed and strength are the rewards of paying attention to addressing weaknesses in form. 

Why wouldn’t we paint a dirty car?  The results don’t last and it is an expensive fix in the long run.

If ever you walk past a skate bowl, stop and watch the kids on their boards.  They practice their tricks over and over and over again.  The practice is the fun bit, not the actual trick.  The trick is just a mechanism to facilitate improvement.  This is also the secret to improvements at CrossFit.  Practice your tricks and get your tricks down before trying to make them harder.

Most days we post three workouts on the site … a “Strength/Skills Session“, a “Met Con Session” and an “O-Lift Session“.  These sessions match the timetable for the day, ie they are what is happening at CrossFit Brisbane at various times throughout the day.  It IS NOT intended that you would complete the three workouts each day.  Rather, depending on what your particular focus is for the day, our schedule is designed so that you can pick a session that matches.

It is important to focus on quality, less is more.  We sometimes get people attempting all three sessions in one day, subscribing to the “more is better” philosophy.  The reality is that if you are actually trying your hardest in any one session, it is extremely difficult to back up and complete a second session in the day and maintain any real quality in the second session.  Often what happens is that attempting multiple sessions results in a backing off in both sessions and an overall reduction in quality and intensity.  Intensity is where the results are!  15 minutes of maximum intensity is significantly better than 120 minutes of 70% intensity.  Anyone can do quantity.  Watch an ironman race and you will see a whole lot of quantity.  Watch long enough and you will see an incredible decrease in quality as the competitors continue throughout the day.  Quality builds you up, Quantity breaks you down.

Now, we often get people doing both the Strength/Skills and Met Con Session in one day.  The main reason for this is that the sessions typically follow each other.  This works if (a) one of the sessions has a technical focus, or (b) one of the sessions is done as a warmup/warmdown with reduced intensity, or (c) the athlete is a novice.  In fact, this is a great approach in the beginning when the limiting factor to improvement is technique development or acquisition of new skills.  For the seasoned CrossFitter though, this is a flawed approach and results in a “spun down” state sooner or latter.  We start to see a pattern of train one week multiple sessions a day, followed by a tired week with not much training, rinse and repeat.

So what is the message?  Each day, pick a session and give it your entire attention and effort.  Sooner or later we all try to hide behind quantity, because increasing the duration makes us feel like we are working hard.  It also gives us an ongoing convenient excuse “man my legs are fried from just doing that strength session, so I am going to take the Met Con easy” which is preceded by “I am going to go a bit lighter because I am going to do the Met Con after this session”.  But make no mistake, this is hiding from the challenge, as CrossFitters, we should be chasing more output, not more input.  The rookie always wants more input and often burnout because of ego.  It is what I call the “sparkler effect”, burn brightly for a minute and then die out.  Be more like the candle, still hot but a busload more functional and sustainable.

We lay out the program, you choose how to use it.  Train hard, train smart and seek intensity over duration.

Thankyou to Brandon Otto for posting this list on the CrossFit Messageboard.  Here is a link to the complete forum thread …

http://www.board.crossfit.com/showthread.php?t=30869

Brandon’s smaller lessons of CrossFit after 18 months of training … 

1. CrossFit is very, very hard. Unlike most things, it does not get easier and may actually get harder. This is a daunting prospect.

2. You can learn to CrossFit extremely well on your own with the internet as a resource. However, it will add 6-12 months to your learning curve and 1-2 injuries along the way.

3. You can work out on your own, but working out with others is almost always far better.

4. The impressive feat is not digging deep and pushing through pain at the end of the workout. Anyone can do that. The impressive feat is hauling *** as you reach the middle — right after you realize what’s ahead of you and how much you already hurt.

5. The impressive feat is not going balls-to-the-wall in a single workout. It’s doing it the next day. And the next. And the next. Forever.

6. The hardest part of training is consistency. It is also the most important. You can do nearly anything if you show up every day.

7. Everyone needs to rest. Your body is not a machine. (Look at how many people take a week off and set six PRs when they return.) Your mind is not a computer. (As Garrett Smith likes to point out, continual stress is not actually healthy.) “Burnout” is physical, mental, emotional, logistical, and a little bit like combining ennui with despair. When you no longer want to work out, rest.

8. If your breaks start cropping up constantly, either take a longer one (or a different training focus for a while) or just slap yourself and stop slacking.

9. The fewer mundane obstacles to working out, the easier it is to be consistent. If there are two gyms in your area and one is a little better but farther, go to the nearer one.

10. Try music and see if it helps. Try planning out your workouts (picking a time to shoot for and breaking down how you’ll get there) and see if it helps. Try the supplements and see if they help.

11. For 90% of us, diet is crucial to good progress. For the other 10%, diet is crucial to reaching elite levels.

12. Keep your nails trimmed short but long enough to comfortably cover your fingers and toes. Too long will get broken; too short will cause bleeding when, say, you use a hook grip. File your callouses every time you shower.

13. Chalk is better than gloves except to cover a wound, which tape does better than either except for holes in the web of your thumb.

14. You don’t need as much chalk as you think. You keep rechalking because you’re a spaz and the bar is scaring you.

15. The workout will last only a little while and you will feel happy again within a few minutes afterward. This is the only positive thought you can have while you work, but it is the important one.

16. The fear leading up to your workout can last many times longer than the workout. Find a way to manage this or CrossFit will begin to dominate your life.

17. Do not let CrossFit dominate your life unless you are a coach or trying to be the first sponsored pro CrossFitter.

18. The paradox of CrossFit is that it is an isolated system that attempts to make you better at everything else. If you never leave that system, you will forget the point. Regularly “step outside” and play a game of basketball, drop in on a step aerobics class, climb a mountain, or arm wrestle everyone in the bar. Sometimes you need to be reminded that you’re extremely fit compared to everyone who’s not a dedicated athlete, and that the gallons of sweat you’ve exuded have accomplished something significant. Call it ego or anything. The best CrossFitters may not need this, but they get the ego boost of beating the rest of the CrossFitters anyway.

19. Regularly learn and play new sports.

20. By the time you are an advanced novice, you will begin to learn your strengths. By the time you are intermediate, you will know most of your weaknesses. Addressing your weaknesses is the only way you will become advanced.

21. Logging your workouts is a little silly at the very beginning, but the sooner you start, the more data you’ll have later.

22. You can push harder than that.

23. If your Olympic lifts are more or less correct, but still limited by form, the problem is probably the bar path.

24. Buy Starting Strength right now. You’re doing it wrong.

25. Half of the reason your workouts suck is because you’re not strong enough. Get stronger and your “metcon” problems will diminish.

26. Strength develops fast at first then slows at the intermediate level. It takes a long time to lose.

27. Metcon develops quite fast, as long as the strength exists to express it.

28. Technique can take a long time to develop or not very long, depending on many variables.

29. That place you’re usually sore is where you’re weak.

30. Your grip may or may not limit you right now, but at some point it will if you’re not proactive about developing it.

31. When comparing yourself to other CrossFitters, understand that some of them are lifelong athletes and some of them did nothing before this. The difference in terms of progress between these groups is massive.

32. Muscular endurance is always a factor.

33. Very few things improve without focused effort on them.

34. Extremely intense and consistent effort on WoDs is a fast jetstream to improvement.

35. A lot of stuff on this forum is useless, but there is at least one person who knows anything you want to know. Search first, then ask, read all of the responses, pay attention to the ones that make sense and match what you already know, and ignore the ridiculous ones. In this way you can learn nearly anything.

36. Spend time with other websites, forums, and resources to understand the non-CrossFit perspective.

37. You’re not fully extending at the hips when you Olympic lift, and you’re bending your arms too soon.

38. Everyone has cheat meals. Find out if you do better with small cheating or big cheating. The advantage of big cheating is that you feel like crap afterwards and the food looks gross again, which will help to remind that it’s not so great after all. If you cheat small, this is not an excuse to cheat often; that’s not cheating, that’s just a mediocre diet.

39. Seek out new foods and new ways to cook them, or you will lose your mind with monotony. Everything you walk by in the produce section should be something you’ll eat.

40. Canned salmon or tuna is a good emergency protein source when you’re in a hurry or haven’t shopped. Some cans of salmon are exactly five blocks.

41. Determine how much of your carb intake you can get through low-density vegetables without exploding or going insane. Get the rest with fruit and don’t worry about it.

42. Expensive extra virgin olive oil is a waste if you’re just stir-frying with it.

43. You can stir-fry anything but “anything” will usually be mediocre.

44. Salt improves everything and is almost always necessary.

45. Looking into a mirror with your own eyes is a very unreliable method of judging body fat and muscle mass.

46. You’re not supposed to have a chronic pain. You’re doing something wrong or you have an injury. Deal with it.

47. Running and swimming are very hard, very specific in terms of metabolic and muscular development, very technique-dependent, and you need to work on them more.

48. If you’re on this forum, you are probably spending too much of your time and attention in the zone of CrossFit. If you do this in the long term, this essentially means you are dedicating yourself to training for a non-existent life.

49. There is nothing like gymnastics rings, a Concept2 rower, a jump rope, or a medicine ball. When you sub for these, you’re doing a different workout.

50. Everybody is different.

We are very excited to now have the CrossFit Brisbane Weightlifting club up and running.  The goal of the club is to provide an opportunity for CrossFitters to experience competition lifting, and to gain access to specialist coaching without having to join a separate club.
 
The weightlifting club will be training on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday nights from 6 to 8pm in the main gym area at Sassom Fitness.
 
There is no additional cost for CrossFitters currently paying the monthly training fee.  However, if you are not on the monthly plan (ie session card member or casual) the fee is $60 per month.  If you are not a member of CrossFit Brisbane the fee is $70 per month.
 
We will be enforcing the following conditions.  In order to participate, you must be:-

1. A member of the Qld Weightlifting Association (QWA), for insurance purposes
2. Interested in being a competitive weightlifter (The club is not there to teach CrossFitters how to weightlift, that will be covered in normal CrossFit training.  The club is about producing competitive weightlifters).  It doesn’t mean that you have to be elite, just willing to compete as a representative of CFB
3. Already know the basic lifts (deadlift, squat, press, push press, power clean, power jerk, power snatch), ie it is not a beginners program.  We will be running beginners sessions as a separate program within the Strength/Skills sessions

Coaching on the Wednesday night session will be undertaken by NCAS National Level Coach, Miles Wydall.  I am pleased to announce that Miles has accepted a role as Head Weightlifting Coach for CrossFit Brisbane.  Miles is an experienced and highly technical coach and I have no doubt he will help us raise the standard of our competitive lifters and developing coaches.  Here is some background information on Miles.  Not only is Miles a great coach, but he is also now an avid CrossFitter, we have successfully corrupted him!

 

This comes from a piece of life coaching by Richard St John.  The “8 to be Great” approach seems to map across brilliantly to success with CrossFit.  Do you want to be a great CrossFitter?  It is your choice. 

Every time you step into the gym you are presented with this choice.  A choice to be better, or to stay the same.  In the beginning when deprivation of oxygen removes any capacity for awareness of conscious thought, the choice is not apparent and it is easy to believe that you are doing the best you CAN do.  But as time goes on and you become experienced with the movements, when you are strong enough to hurt yourself and when you start to consider yourself a CrossFitter in the true sense of the word, then if you stop and pay attention to yourself, you will realise that really all you are doing is the best that you WANT to do.  The truth is, doing the best you can do is a lofty goal and takes something much, much more than simply turning up.  Now the best you want to do may be good enough to impress those around you, but ask yourself … is it enough to impress you?

Now let’s get one thing out of the way … “trying hard” is admirable but really is not the same thing as doing the best you can do.  From a coaching perspective and being an optimist, I believe that everybody turning up for the WOD on any given day is trying hard.  It certainly looks that way.  I mop the floors every day and there is always a lot of trying hard that I clean up in the way of sweat and chalk and debris.  But trying hard is not enough.  I can try hard to play the french horn but unless I do other things to help my progress I will always suck.  I am also pretty sure that if I try hard to play the french horn every day at home that very shortly everyone in my family is going to actually hate the fact that I try hard.  This is what it is like being a coach and watching people try hard in the sessions but fail to take any steps on their own to improve other than turning up.  The trying hard actually becomes irritating because it starts to seem like a cop out, ala “It wasn’t my best … but I tried hard”.  Here is an actual conversation that I have all of the time (think Groundhog Day) …

CrossFitter (at the end of the session): ” $%#&% that sucked”
Me: “What’s wrong?”
CrossFitter: “I am really pissed off because my time sucked”
Me: “You are resting too much, make the movements slower and rest less”
CrossFitter: “but I am trying really hard”
Me: “Your technique is all over the place, slow down and get the movement right”
CrossFitter: “I am just not fast enough”
Me: “If you slow down the movement and get it better now, later on you will be much faster”
CrossFitter: “I am trying really hard, I just can’t do it like <insert name of nemisis>”
Me: “Nemisis has spent a long time improving their technique”
CrossFitter: “I am going to try harder next time”

Two days later, we have the same conversation.  Nothing much changes except the nemisis’ time is a bit faster.

CrossFit is hard work.  If you are a regular then I am impressed because already you have something that most of the population is lacking, ie character and ticker, the ability to work hard.  However, if you want more than just to be better than the general population, if you want to gain everything that CrossFit has to offer, it will take much more.  To gain the keys to the riches you need to strive to be great.  Great times, great movements, great nutrition, great consistency, great form.  Aim to be great and you will start doing your best.  When you start doing your best you will start becoming your best.  “Striving to be great” is not a goal, it is an action.  This leads us back to Richard St John, who has inadvertently given you a training blueprint.  His formula for greatness is …

Passion + Work + Focus + Push + Ideas + Improve + Serve + Persist = Greatness

Be passionate about CrossFit.  Learn about it, gain knowledge, join the community and introduce others.  Love it.

Work harder than you think you can in every session.

Focus on the next thing that you can improve.  Pick one thing at a time. Technique by technique.

Push on through any obstacle.  Injury, work, hectic schedules and low motivation are all obstacles, push on always.

Look for new ideas and ways to approach the workouts.  Think about your performance all the time and seek ways to improve it.  Try different strategies and tactics.

Be self-critical and seek to improve all aspects of your form and technique.  Satisfaction is death.  Keep improving.

Find a way to serve those that you train with.  Support them with encouragement.  Teach things that you know.  Cheer to get them through workouts.  Loan equipment.  Give out and you will get back.

Persist no matter what.  No matter what happens, stay in the game.  Be more stubborn than the workout.

Do these things and you will be choosing to do your best.  This formula takes much more effort than just turning up and trying hard, but the rewards are great.  My groundhog day conversation happens when CrossFitters try to measure part of what they can give and get disappointed when it is less than the whole.  Strive for greatness and accept that the choice is completely in your hands, and more importantly, the choice needs to be made by you in every session.

“The seeds of worldclass performance are often born in the silence and solitude of the morning darkness.” (Andrew Thompson “Characteristics of a World-class Trainee”, CrossFit Journal April 2008)

Choose greatness.