Bring a Friend Day

This morning was the first bring a friend day at ITF Downtown, and I brought a good friend of mine.  I would say she is my BFF at this point, but we have not mutually confirmed this....anyway
She did awesome!  Soooo much better than I would have done if the situations had been reversed!
We had to do a partner WOD that consisted of a 12 minute amrap of 20 box jumps, 200m run carrying a med ball overhead, 20 pushups, and 2 passes of lunges carrying the med ball overhead as well.  We could split it up any way we wanted to as long as we completed each part before moving on to the next.  We did 3 and 3/4 rounds Rx, which was at the top of the line for the all girl teams!  She totally kicked ass!  I told her that we need to compete in some CrossFit competitions......Why not?  We are a great team!
I have decided that I HATE running while carrying objects overhead, or otherwise!  There was much cursing on my part!!!!  But it was great.

More Snatch

As it is the season for the beginning of the qualifying for the CrossFit open games, Fridays we do whatever is required in that arena.  This week it was a series of 3 rounds of 30 snatches and whatever time you had left over you were supposed to do as many as you could with a crazy amount of weight! 
Since this is a relatively new, and complex movement, I exercised caution to nail form and confidence before anything else. My partner and I did 25#, followed by 30, then 35.  It was tough doing 90 reps total, but it was a good learning experience. With some things I am still establishing a frame of reference as to how I need to proceed.  This WOD showed me that  I know I could have done more weight, but like I have said, I want to be good and sure I am doing it correctly, before I start piling in the weight,  I don't want to get hurt. 
That being said, I do feel more confident with it now.  I understand it, and feel like I can do more.

SOTS is a four letter word

Sots press??? Who the hell has heard of that?
Not me, until I looked at ITF's WOD.
It is an awful fucked up thing. 
You have a barbell resting on your back, you come down to the full deep squat position, then you press that barbell overhead.  For the WOD, the Rx for women was 35#, and I'm thinking...ok, I can do that.....
So first we had to find our 5Rm.
Mine was 26#.  And all the while I know I made a face worthy of the AWODS "best wod face!" Not a good thing.....
So for the WOD we had to do three rounds of 15 sots presses, and 25 squats with the same bar we were using.
Man, my quads were dead.  Then we find out we had to do three rounds of 200m sprint and 20 tuck jumps!  Ouch!  At least I was able to hang with the guys on that one, and not feel like a total whimp!

Bam!

I am sure that people everywhere encounter this at some point.  People that seem...cliquish...?  Yeah.  There is a group of ladies that seem this way at my gym.  Maybe I am totally wrong, but that is just the vibe that I get. Good at what they are there to do, and totally unwelcoming to those of us that are new.
 Ok then.
 I realize that I may give off he wrong impression when people first encounter me, but I have been trying not to. For me, being quiet and insecure comes across as stuck up. But I have been making an effort to try to reach out to people here and there. For the most part, it has not been well-recieved. Keep trying, I guess...

The other night we had to find our 1RM max for thrusters.  To do that, you have to get in groups at a rack and take turns with the weight. Yeah, that can get akward when you feel like you are being excluded in general. I wound up getting 90# for my thruster, which I was pretty pumped about!  Next we had to do a WOD: three rounds of 10 squat clean thrusters, 150 ft one legged bear crawl, and 200 m run. 
For the amrap, the rx for women was 65# on the thrusters.  I finished rx in 11:36.  And I beat a lot of those stuck up people.  BAM! Small personal victory for me, I guess.  I don't want to feel like that about people, but if I was in their position, I would have welcomed and encouraged a new person, because I know what it is like. When you come in there out of 101 it is intimidating, scary, and you're not sure what to do in some cases. See, unlike them, I genuinely enjoy watching people grow and evolve with their skills.

Mathematically Challenged? Hell yes.

Well.  It appears that I shortchanged myself yesterday in my final testing for the transformation challenge.  We didn't have tons of time to go through everything, so time to find our max deadlift was limited.  I had a 55# bar already, so I added a set of 45's. I lifted my now 145# bar a few times.  Then I thought of adding sets of 10's until I reached my max, but didn't really have time to do that, so I said, screw it, and put on a set of 25's, thinking I had reached my goal of 185.  Hmmmm.....
55+90+50=195
Holy crap!  So I actually increased my max in 6 weeks by 30 pounds!  Hell yeah!
I don't know if my score can be changed for the contest or not.  I emailed this info to one of our coaches, so we'll see....either way, it is an even bigger victory for ME!
See, I'm one of those people who has to make score marks and write stuff down if the wod requires keeping up with lots of numbers.  I always have to record rounds.  I get so caught up in what I'm doing that it is soooooo easy for me to forget.  I have always been mathematically challenged anyway!

The Challenge is over!

Today marked the end of the Transformation Challenge at ITF.  I had really been feeling down on myself, and felt like I really hadn't made the progress that I had wanted to.  I am not used to failure.  In the beginning, I thought surely in six weeks I will be able to kick up into a handstand like all the other normal people.
Apparently I am not normal, because, every time I do it, it is a crapshoot as to what will happen.  But at least it is not for lack of strength.  Oh well.
I really thought I would make more progress with my pullups, but my arm injury halted some of that.  I am happy to say that I can now do 7 chin ups in a row, so that's good at least.
So this morning we got re-tested on all of the required perfomance elements. Here's what happened.
Baseline WOD: original score- 5 rounds, today's score-6 3/4
Pullups (using black resistance band. I should have not originally tested with this): original-21, today-24 Damn, that sucks.
Double unders in 2 minutes: original-20 (stop/start), today- 45 (continuous-alternating single, double)
Max deadlift: original- 165#, today 185#
Handstand hold (I wall-walked up): original- 0, today- 1:05
L-sit hold: original-1.7 seconds, today-10.89 seconds
400m run: original-1:28, today-1:19

Well, I don't think I am going to win any awards, but I am a stronger, better athlete!  I was pretty happy with the results for the most part.  It was cool seeing my other competitors pushing themselves and being really happy with the results.  Pretty damn cool.
Again, the kind of accomplishments you can experience in a situation like this- getting stronger, overcoming fears- spill over into other areas and make you a better person all around.
I hope to take to the streets again this weekend.  And the IT Band on my right side better stay the hell out of the way.

Fat Ass Tuesday

So it is that time of year again for Catholics.  The beginning of Lent. Last night I tried to be good.  I only had one glass of wine when we went to dinner.  I ordered greek salad and broiled greek snapper. My food was devoured in less than 10 minutes.
 I then proceeded to eat 3 or 4 of my 2 year old's chicken fingers, and then convinced my husband that we needed to order lemon ice box AND peanut butter pie!  Holy shit.  Someone almost had to carry me out of that place.  WTF?  Did I fool myself and think, "Well, Lent is coming and I'm going to be totally good, so I will just blow it tonight??" Obviously.
And as a result, I have a new theory.
PIE MAKES YOU WEAK!
This morning in the WOD, I did 5 sets of 5 over head presses with 55#, 37 pullups (largely unasssisted!), but when I began the 50 burpee box jumps/75 situps for time, my legs felt like they would not cooperate. Nobody loves box jumps, but after like the 10th one, I had to stop and stretch, because I was afraid I would have to scale!  I made it through, but I am still blaming it on the pie.....  :)
I told someone at work about what I ate last night, and she was like, " So you are human!"  Well, yeah! My weaknesses are, at times, as great as my triumphs.  If only I could cut that shit out...

I saw a quote today that I really liked:
" Obsessive is what the lazy call the dedicated."
 Hell yeah they do.

Not as bad as I thought...

I have been feeling pretty pathetic. For one thing, I did NOT eat well this weekend.  Indian food, cookies, candy, wine, beer, I mean, give me a break!!! What is my problem? And I totally felt like shit afterwards.  Had to get up early this morning to do a little spot on the news for work, and was totally foggy.  Ug. Going to get back on track with a vengeance.
 I didn't get to go to class on Friday morning last week, because my stepdaughter puked all over our hotel room, and I just couldn't sleep after that.  Figures.
 I fell on my head again trying to do a handstand yesterday.  Why, Oh Why???!!! I have done it successfully several times!  I can hold it for 40 seconds!  It is just that my stupid brain cannot seem to coordinate the transition when it happens quickly.
Maybe I have fallen on my head too many times.
Yesterday I totally sucked at double unders.  At one point, I was like...screw it!  I have been putting in so much work and I am getting worse, not better.  Screw it.
 However.....I am not as bad as I thought.
Tonight in class, I got my first complete Rx.  Hell yeah!
To get that Rx, you have to do the WOD as prescribed- no scaled modifications. (Less weight, pushups on knees, etc.)
First we had to find our 5rm for hang squat cleans.  I got to 85# and decided I had had enough.  Maybe I could have done more, but these are new for me.  A couple of weeks ago I almost went down doing full squat cleans!  Seriously, had I not caught myself, that barbell and I would have crashed backwards through the freezers! Typical. hah
So then we had a 10 minute amrap of: 5 hang squat cleans (Rx for women was 65#), 10 pushups, 15 double unders.
I totally had a breakthrough with the double unders and got into a good rhythm of single, double, single, double etc.  Felt like I was going to die, though, Holy Crap!  So I only got five rounds total, but I got the Rx, baby!  Form, weight, speed, then the ability to combine all three.  That's where I want to be.
It doesn't matter if I place in the challenge or not.  Through my efforts I am becoming a stronger athlete, and that, at the end of the day, is really the point. Still striving to become that better version of myself.

Snatch It, Baby!

Much to my consternation, no WOD was posted online before I went to class at 6:30 this morning.  I like knowing what to expect, or in some cases, fear!  This morning we had to find our 2RM hang power snatch, then do an 8 minute amrap of 5 burpee box jumps and 7 hang power snatches.  Rx for women was 55#.  No way in hell.  I had never done these before, but luckily, due to my own inner geekiness, I was watching videos on YouTube on how to do a full snatch.  I actually practiced it with a wooden stick. If I hadn't, I would probably have been totally confused, to say the least! It is a complex move.
I started out with the 15 # training bar, because I really wanted to feel it out.  I wound up having a 2RM of 55#, and MAYBE could have done more, but I still want to focus more on form and safety at this point with a move like that.  For the amrap, I used 45#, and fell one rep short of 6 rounds!  I was happy enough with that for now.  Again, today was another example of overcoming that fear of lack of skill and ability.  Granted, I am by no means perfectly executing this movement, but it is a step in the right direction! Yay!

Home Stuff

This week we are having to get out of our house for two days or so, due to part of our remodeling project.  Our house used to belong to my husband's grandmother, and it got to the point where she really couldn't take care of it anymore, so we took ownership of it, and she now still lives there with us.  It has been a LONG road in that respect!  Firstly, everything about the house screamed 70'S HELL!  Secondly, she was/is totally a hoarder.  You would not believe the stuff that was piled up in that house! But that is another story entirely.  In a nutshell, we eventually convinced her to let us pack up her stuff and keep it in a storage facility while we remodel the entire house.  We are nearing the end of that process, thankfully, but this week we will have to stay in a hotel for two days while they complete the toxic process of reglazing all of the bathroom tile.  Goodbye pink and brown!  BWWAAAHAHAHAHA!  But needless to say, having no kitchen to use has made the whole Paleo thing a bit more challenging, and being in a hotel is going to impede my ability to practice double unders. 
Last night at Iron Tribe, the WOD was as follows:
200 air squats
100 situps
100 kettlebell swings
100 pushups
Good news was that you could attack it however you wanted to.  Rx was 35# bell for women, but I just didn't feel ready to take that on yet.  I really want to master the 26, and really get my body, especially my back stability right on target.  I broke it up into 10 sets of 20 squats and 10 of everything else, and finished in 18:36, which was ok.  Afterwards, one of the coaches said, "Why didn't you go for the Rx, it was easy for you!"  I said I just wanted to be careful, since I had never even used kettlebells before starting Crossfit.   But he's right, the 26# IS getting much easier for me to use.  Honestly, though, I have a hard time imagining swinging a 35# ball of iron above my head with ferocity at this point. 
That's the great thing about Crossfit, though.  You have a hard time imagining yourself doing all sorts of things in the box.  And then you do them.  It's all about breaking those boundaries, and when you do that, you really start building a type of confidence that spills over into other areas of life.
There were a bunch of new guys in there last night straight out of 101, that were pointed out to us at the beginning of class. When class was over, one of the coaches told us to introduce ourselves to the new people.  "Don't be jerks, guys."  My problem is that I am still relatively new and didn't know ANY of the guys in there to begin with, nor did I remember who was new and who wasn't! I introduced myself to one guy, but he had been at ITF longer than I have.  Feeling stupid now.  Not going to make any more introductions! So I guess I was being a jerk.

It's more than just exercise

Throughout my life I have had difficulties.  I have battled eating disorders.  I battle depression.  I came to a determination years ago, that I would not live my life dependent upon some psychoacitive drug.  No fucking way.  So I manage my problems through lifestyle decisions.  And it is not always easy.  I still have my  peaks and valleys, but if I have something to strive for, something that motivates me, then I feel like I can make it. 
I watched my grandmother on my father's side of my family struggle with bi-polar mental illness.  The medications did not make her into a stable person.  She eventually committed suicide when I was 17.  I was the only relative in the state, and I was called to deal with her first failed attempt, and eventually the successful one.  I have decided that I will not end up like that. 
Before I joined Iron Tribe, I was stuck in a rut in many ways.  I was losing my motivation, which was then in turn, having a detrimental effect on my total well-being.  So I am grateful to have sometheing new to focus on. 
When people first meet me, a lot of the time, I don't leave a favorable impression.  It's not that I don't want to, but I come across as standoffish, or stuck up in some way.  And I'm not.  I am nothing like that.  I am insecure, I doubt myself and my abilities, and I have a hard time judging most days what I look like, or what I can do, or how I am coming across to people.  But for the people who can get past that stuff, they find that it is hard to find a more understanding, empathetic, or forgiving person than me.  I genuinely enjoy seeing other people accomplish things and be successful.  It thrills me to no end to see other people discover the best within themselves and to strive for more. But I have a level of perception about other people that is both a blessing and a curse.  I can sense what other people think. How they feel about things.  Things that are said, done, or just how they feel about people in general.
Today was a bad day.
Martinis from the night before did not agree with my state of mind.  All day I felt depressed.  I was going to try to run this morning, but I just didn't feel like it.  I was just feeling down on myself because I feel like I cannot make the kind of progress I want to make. I am still wary of the handstand, althought my husband spotted me while I kicked up and held it three times, so I feel a LITTLE better about that.
I was in Dick's sporting goods tonight, and had a long conversation about Crossfit with a random guy who worked there.  Clearly I need to make some friends who also do this. 

Former Vegetarian Finding the Inner Caveman

I have been doing Crossfit for approximately 12ish weeks now? A few weeks into it, I began to make the Paleo diet modifications.  To eat Paleo aka caveman, you only need to eat meat, veggies (no potatoes or corn), fruit, nuts and seeds.  Nix the grains, sugar, dairy. I am somewhat good with this.  I eat lots of different salads, eggs, veggie/egg souffles, veggie soup, kale chips, nuts, pastrami turkey, etc.  I am always looking for something new in this area.  I do not eat 100% Paleo.  I eat soy sauce, and probably get certain sugars or dairy stuff from sauces or dressings, and I use stevia as a sweetener.  The thing I like about the Paleo philosophy is that it is not some kind of diet fad thing that is not maintainable in the long term.  You are not re-programming your body to use something unnatural as a source of energy, and it emphasizes total long term health.  I am lucky in the respect that I was essentially raised by vegetarian hippies, and any fast food, chocolate, caffeinated thing was like a four letter word in our household.  So this whole Paleo thing might be a little easier for me than some...however, I am trying to branch out in the "meat" direction.
When my husband and I got married, it was an unlikely match.
Meat Barbecue Man meets Veggie Girl....
I began eating chicken and seafood, and admittedly, I am a total food snob now.  Only the freshest fish from Whole Foods, and only organic chicken from the same place.  If I do delve into beef, it must be organic, and grass-fed.  Period.
A typical day's diet for me would be as follows:
Pre-workout at 5:45- Amazing green meal replacement, coffee, and chia seeds
Post-workout at 7:15- a protein shake
At work- an apple and a handful of raw almonds
Lunch-veggie souffle, turkey, green beans
Mid-afternoon- split pea soup, turkey, kale chips or almonds
Later on- Bananna Lara Bar
Dinner- Chinese takeout- Mongolian chicken, Mixed vegetables
Really, I feel like I can go pretty much anywhere and eat mostly Paleo-  Mexican= chicken fajitas, veggies, guacamole, sour cream, salsa.....  Indian= Hot tandoori fish, a veggie dish.... Chick-fil-A- nuggets and a salad.... see, it can be done for the most part.

Now, my #1 weakness is wine and such.  Presently, I am having a diry martini.  Even when I drink and cheat, I still try to eat well, ex- Japanese- grilled shrimp and salmon with mixed veggies.
I will lie and pretend that I didn't eat about 20 girl scout cookies last weekend.
Before I joine Iron Tribe, it was not uncommon for me to have a drink or two most days of the week.
Now, I MIGHT drink a little on Wednesday nights, but reserve most it for the weekend. And I am trying to cut down  on the weekend amounts.
I know this change has had an effect on my appearance.  Thank goodness, or I would just keep doing it! :)
But really, total health is a big part of it all, vanity aside!
I am so happy to be getting stronger as well.  In the WODs, these are my priorities: Proper form/technique/safety, RX weight, speed.  So looking forward to when I can easily combine all three elements!

Hell Yeah!

So for the past few weeks, I have been going to Iron Tribe on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, where I do the WOD.  Then on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I practice wall climbing into a good handstand hold, do L-sit progressions, and sometimes do double unders.  I usually do more of those on Sunday.  Then on Saturdays, I have been doing the AMRAP WOD (gone from 5 to 6.5 rounds with a barbell that is 10# heavier!), along with pullups, and some hip rehab work, and then on Wednesdays nights I teach Body Pump at the Alabaster Y, then head over to the Shades Valley Y to train deadlifts, pullups, and more hip rehab stuff. Yeah, I've been pretty busy. I think I need to rest more!
I have fallen on my head twice now, trying to kick up into the handstand hold, probably because I just am not focusing on locking my arms. Dumb.  Now I am even more scared to do it! But I know I am strong enough!
I have bruised the hell out of my shins with a barbell a few times a week now, so my legs look like crap, and I have repeatedly bruised my knuckles with my speed rope when I mess up the double unders.
Oh- did I mention, bruised collarbone from power cleans as well?
My husband does not like this.
Before it is over with I will look like a UFC competitor.

I'd finally begun to really gain some ground with unassisted overhand grip deadhang pullups, but of course, now my left forearm is injured.  Muscle strain or something.  It's no wonder....
Clearly I need to chill out. So I'm just gonna take a step class and run this weekend.

So here's where the Big Hell Yeah comes from-  This morning in class we had to do a partner WOD where you take turns doing 5 handstand pushups, 10 deadlifts, and 15 med ball cleans. As many rounds as possible in 20 minutes. Every five minutes, one of the coaches would blow a whistle, and you and your partner have to stop and do 30 burpees.  Jeez. Rx for deadlilfts was 125#, med ball was 14#.  And....I did it!! Still had to have my feet in the windowsill for the HSPU, but I am definitely making progress!  I am just happy to be improving.  At this point I would rather be slower and go for the Rx, rather than blow through the WOD quickly.  Wouldn't it be great to be able to do both.....

The Beginning of the Challenge

I happened to have Jan. 16th off of work, and I'm thinking, "Man, it sucks that I have to be at the gym (according to my online class schedule) at 6:00 a.m. for this initial testing." I went out to dinner and to a movie with a friend the night before, and did not get enough sleep at all.  So I walk into Iron Tribe all bleary-eyed, and notice something odd.  The 5:45 class is in progress, and no one else is there. Damn. Please don't tell me I came here this early on my day off for no reason. So I ask one of our coaches about it, and he's like, "Oh, yeah, you just do the testing in any class today throughout the day."  He's kind of laughing, and tells me I can just do the 6:30 class. 
Great.  I am obviously the only person in the whole constest who didn't know this. Typical.
So I do 6:30, and my results were as follows:
5 rounds in the AMRAP WOD with a 55# barbell (Yeah, whimpy, I know...)
20 pullups with the black rubber band (Lame. But at the time, I wasn't sure WHAT I should use....)
20 double unders ? I think? That seems like a lot, since I am so bad at them.
165 # max deadlift
NO handstand hold. Zero. Have no idea what I'm doing. Not strong enough to wall climb into valid position either.  (I am terrified of stunts of any kind, and have been dropped on my head in the past.)
1.7 seconds for the L-sit (It is so damned hard it is almost impossible!)
1:27 400 meter run (I am ok with this.)

Now that Iron Tribe has an official record of my lameness, I set out to make a training plan that will mold me into a LESS lame athlete over the next six weeks.  I am an AFAA certified personal trainer, but I do not train anyone. Why not?  Because I am selfish about my own limited workout time, and up to this point, the certification course has just served to feed my own geeky obsession with exercise science. So here is what I came up with.....

The Transformation Challenge

In early January, I noticed on Iron Tribe's website that they were having a contest called the Transformation Challenge.  One division was for weight loss, and the other was for performance.  I watched a video describing what was involved in the performance division. A few of the things totally scared me. On January 16th they would record your initial numbers in the following categories:  An AMRAP WOD (5 burpees, 5 power cleans, 10 full situps, 10 20" box jumps- do as many rounds of this as you can in 10 minutes.), your max number of pullups, max number of double unders (you jump rope and the rope has to pass under your feet twice in one jump) in 2 minutes, max deadlift, max wall handstand hold, max L-sit hold, and best 400 meter run time.  Then you would be tested on the same things six weeks later, and whoever made the biggest improvements would win first, second, or third place. Whew! So....I can't even DO some of those things to begin with, and I'm like, "Maybe next year...."  Then, a few days later I was drinking some wine and looking at the website again.  You know how some things seem like a really great idea when you're half-drunk?  So yeah, I registered for it.  The initial testing started off with a bang, let me tell you.....

Who the hell are you, and why is this important??

Part of our human experience ought to involve us wanting to be and striving to be better versions of ourselves, right?  We try to educate ourselves, find our strengths, conquer our weaknesses, learn to compromise, learn not to judge, become compassionate, and try to grow alongside the other people in our lives. Or we should.  I could go on and on....but you get the point. We try to answer those questions, "Who am I? and Who do I want to become?" Easy answer for some, not so much for others.  I fall into the latter category.  Without delving into the regrettable details of my unfortunate life experience, I will say that for my entire life, I have been unable to answer either of those questions.  Only in the last year, did I truly realize who I am, and what I am capable of.  I am now finished with living life in the murky darkness of feeling like some pathetic shadow creature. And now, I am in the process of discovering who, and what I want to become.
So, is Crossfit the center of my existence?  No. This whole Crossfit thing is just a part of the bigger picture here, and everything that I feel is an achievement, each thing I am able to do and be proud of, contributes to that newfound identity that I am finally trying to build.  Granted, I am by no means doing great things- I am not setting any records, or making amazing progress with anything.  But I am learning new skills that I hope one day to master, and I am stepping far outside my comfort zone in many ways.  And I am really proud of that fact.
I have never really thought of myself as a someone who would turn into a blogger, but one day I just got really sick of keeping all of my thoughts to myself.  I guess it was after the umpteenth time my husband and I got into a fight because I mentioned something that I did in a Crossfit WOD.  He tries to be really supportive of what I want to do, and helps me in so many ways, and I am really grateful for that.  But he has made it clear that he doesn't want to hear about any of it.  I was really excited the other day, because I finally Rx'd the weight in a WOD, and I made the mistake of telling him about it. Oops. He is admittedly trying to be better about this, but I have decided to make it easy for both of us and not bring it up anymore. Who the hell else am I supposed to talk to?  One of my close friends, who is most definitely a workout junkie, has also made it clear that she generally doesn't want to hear about it either.  Forget about the fact that we should be able to share what is going on in our lives, and what we are excited about with the people who are close to us. (Bitterness....Hello!) And don't think for a minute that I am bragging to them or going on incessantly about things.  Quite the contrary. But does it matter?  Nope. Subject is off limits with everyone. Got it. So here I am.....

I joined IronTribe Fitness in November of 2011, and went through a month of Crossfit 101, beginning on November 28th.  Good thing it took place right after Thanksgiving, because I am pretty sure I came close to eating a whole pecan pie at some point.
 So if you know anything about Crossfit, you know that it is a somewhat controversial exercise program.  High intensity, constantly varied, functional training. Your workouts are short, but super intense.

Newbies have to go through the Crossfit 101 class for a few different reasons.  Firstly, the body has to get somewhat acclimated to this new method of exercising, not to mention, the average adult probably does not incorporate things like overhead squats, ring dips, or handstand pushups into their weekly routines!  There is a lot to learn.  The workouts are usually done for time, seeing who can complete the work the fastest, or who can do  the most rounds of a sequence in a given time frame.
Now, the night of my first 101 class, I really had no idea what to expect.  My husband made a dinner of shrimp dumplings and rice before I went, and man was eating that a mistake!  It was great, but on my last 200 meter run of our baseline WOD (workout of the day) I really thought I might throw up. Note to self: consume only a small amount of food in liquid form before going to this class again...

101 was great, though. I wasn't in terrible shape to begin with, but I dropped four pounds, so that was cool.  The thing I like most about Crossfit is that I have some new goals that I am trying to reach, and better fitness and appearance are the by-products.  For me, I would rather be in the mindset of, "I am going to practice these handstand progressions until I can do it", rather than "I am going to do three sets of 10 shoulder presses with these dumbells." Anyway, this is enough of an introduction for now.  Next up: The Transformation Challenge!