Ready For Anything – 2013 Open

The 2013 CrossFit Games season begins in 2 months with the Open.  The Open is an online competition where 1 WOD is posted mid-week for completion by Sunday.  This year, case the Open will take place over 5 weeks, so that’s 5 WODs.  You can perform the WOD as many times as you like and you get to submit your best score.  It costs $20 to enter as an Athlete.  I would expect the WODs to be challenging, yet doable.  The Open is a great competition for most of the CrossFit population that has been doing CrossFit for more than 6 months.  If you are doing WODs at, or near RX, I would HIGHLY recommend participating in the Open.  Don’t allow your inability to perform 1 thing (double unders, pullups, handstand pushups, muscle ups) stop you from entering this worldwide test of fitness.
My goal this year is for CrossFit Oakdale to qualify a team for the CrossFit Games Regionals in May.  The top 30 teams from the Open will qualify for the 3 day test of fitness in San Jose.  The top 3 teams at Regionals move on to the CrossFit Games.  My goal, before i die, is to go to the CrossFit Games as a competitor.  I’ll go in any capacity, as an individual, a team, a master’s athlete.  I just want to go and compete on that stage.
For Master’s athletes (beginning at 40 years and…more experienced) the top 20 in each category will qualify for the CrossFit Games master’s competition in July.  We have several master’s Athletes that have done extremely well in competition over the past year, and the Open will be a great opportunity to test your fitness against the whole world.  I believe we will have several athletes that are extremely competitive in the master’s divisions.
For most of us, fitness is a life long process.  CrossFit competitions are a way for us to pursue fitness, have friendly competition, a goal and a challenge to try to attain, to root each other on, and have fun.  That being said, for many of us, the Open is our “season.”  All the lifting, mastering movements, building our engines has been with the goal of getting better, more well rounded athletes.  The better athletes we become, the better we will perform on the “test” that is the Open.
In the past 2 years of the Open, CrossFit HQ has done an amazing job of creating tests of fitness that are both inclusive yet push the limits of the best athletes in the world.  Not every WOD has been great (7 minutes of burpees…yuck) but when looked at on the whole, the competitions are incredible tests of overall fitness.  If you can do 1 rep of any of the movements, you can get on the scoreboard and compare yourself to Rich Froning and Annie Thorisdottir.  Generally, the WODs have not been overly heavy, except when tested against the top level athletes.  Advanced movements like muscle ups have generally appeared at, or near the end of WODs, so making it to the MU has been a feat unto itself.  You don’t need muscle ups, or even pullups, to compete in the Open.  But if you have them, you will score better.  More on this tomorrow.
The Open is fun.  I promise.  We will all wake up each day a WOD is announced, wondering what the test will be.  You will be nervous.  We’ll click refresh 900 times at 5pm when the WODs are posted to see what kind of hell CrossFit HQ has come up with.  We’ll scour Mobility WOD, Gymnastics WOD, Outlaw and more to find ways to warm up better, move better and strategize better.  Through this process, we will become better, more prepared athletes.
Right now, I plan on closing off 2 times a week for the Open WOD – 6:30pm on Wednesday night and 10am on Saturdays.  We will review the standards before we perform the WOD.  Each athlete needs a judge, and after the WOD is performed, you will submit your score to the Games site.  CrossFit Oakdale will validate your score.
The NUMBER 1 thing tested in the Open is heart.  Your ability to accept a challenge, prepare, push yourself, and get comfortable with being uncomfortable is what made you choose to walk through the doors at CrossFit Oakdale.  The Open is just an extension of that.
I will post tomorrow on my plan to prepare for the Open and I will speak about what I expect to see.
 

Warming up the Jerk