Friday, January 2, 2009

1.1.09 WOD

When a workout is named after a Medal of Honor receiving Navy Seal one can assume it’s going to be hard.

LOL oh such an understatement.

So let me preface the story….

I do CrossFit. It’s hard to explain…here is how they briefly describe it:

“CrossFit is the principal strength and conditioning program for many police academies and tactical operations teams, military special operations units, champion martial artists, and hundreds of other elite and professional athletes worldwide.”

So basically it is an in-your-face-kick-your-ass-until-you-hate-life type of workout. Not for the faint of heart….and too be honest, not really for people who don’t have much of an athletic background. I love it. I have just started (few months) but I can already see the definition in my arms returning (bat wings…sayonara!). It’s not for the faint of heart...wait, did I already mention that? If you don’t think you can (wo)man up to the challenge then you need to get the heck out of the gym.
The gym is set up so that everyone is there at a specific time of day (I usually go at 5:30 or 6:30pm). Everyone does the same workout…so there is an air of competition. For those of you who know me well…you can only imagine how much I love heading into something knowing that I can and will beat someone else’s time or reps. Suckas! Competition drives me…..probably in an unhealthy way at times. As long as I just keep the competitive edge in the gym I should be fine. Right…?
Anyways…so I walk in yesterday to the freezing gym. It’s always cold in there….like wicked cold. But it’s nice when you get done and are trying to not keel over and die and the cold air is the only thing keeping you from passing out (sounds fun, right!) It’s New Years Day and I decide “No way am I punking out of doing CF today….I need to start 2009 off right”. Then I look on the whiteboard to see the WOD. The Workout Of the Day. Two Words. “The Murph”. Hmmmmmm……ok? This could be good or this could be bad…and who the heck is “Murph”?

The “Murph” is a workout known by a previous name (of which I do not know) but was later renamed after Lt. Michael Murphy who was a Navy Seal killed in Afghanistan in 2005. Google him…it’s super interesting.
He was an avid CrossFitter (even the Navy Seals know what’s up!) and this workout was his favorite workout. He used to call it “Body Armor”.
Anyways…..so before I explain what the workout is….let me just say that this is the 1st time after reading what the WOD was, that I actually wanted to try and sneak out of the gym and go home to each some chips and salsa.

“The Murph”
1 mile run
100 Pull Ups
200 Pushups
300 Squats
1 Mile run
Completion cutoff is 45 mins


Now everyone starts with the 1 mile run (if you are new to CF you can do half of everything listed! I chose not to…) and then once you get back into the gym (you are running around the block a few times) then you just hit it hard. The reps can be done any way you want….you just need to bust out the prescribed amount. The best way is to do a set of 15 squats, 10 pushups, and 5 pull-ups. Barf. Repeat 20 times. Oh and if you thought life sucked then……now get up and run another mile. LOL it looks so ridiculous even when I type it out. 200 pushups! LOL!

Well Kids….I did it in about 40 mins. Some people beat my time….and of course I schooled some people on their time. But in the end…all you can do is laugh at how hard the WOD of the day was and express gratitude that you completed it and are still alive. Oh and the cold gym makes for some fun steam coming off of your head afterwards. We all looked like we had smoke coming off our hair!

And most importantly…..I can walk away with joy that I am physically able to push my body in this way. Lt. Murphy loved this workout and would still be busting it out at CrossFit today if it wasn’t for the ultimate sacrifice he made for our country in June 2005.

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