As many rounds as possible in 14 minutes of:
10 Deadlifts, 155#(105#)
15 GHD Sit ups
20′ Handstand walk
25 Double unders
Post rounds and reps to comments and BTWB
Drum roll please. . . .
It’s the last week of the Open folks, any guesses as to what 16.5 will be? I will officially put in my guess of some sort of “for time” workout involving heavier thrusters and box jump overs. Just the thought of those two things on my legs is enough to make me not come to class on Friday. Not really. . . but it does make me cry a little on the inside.
We are excited to heat what Dave Castro has come up with and we are excited to celebrate the end of the Open season. This Friday night we will have a Friday Night Lights party courtesy of Kill Cliff, starting with the evening classes. As we are not sure what the actual workout is, please join your normal WODing class time throughout the day, however when you get off work at night head back over to Verve to cheer on the pm guys/ gals and enjoy some tasty Kill Cliff. We will follow up this event with an even bigger party on Saturday April 2nd. It will be a fun filled grilling event held at Verve. The party starts at 12pm and goes as long as you can. Please see the Facebook event page created for the party or check out the details at any one of the numerous flyers posted around Verve.
And as I have done for the past few weeks, I would also like to highlight two people that participated in 16.4, that we can start celebrating right meow.
Anahita Khosravi
I was hanging out during the evening classes, watching 16.4 go down. I was watching another athlete chip away at some handstand push-ups when I looked to my left and caught Anahita kipping out of the bottom of a handstand push-up. I saw her kick hard, drive her head through, and flex those ankles to get her heels over the tape line. As soon as her judge said good, I saw Anahita lower herself and kip up again, getting another handstand push-up. As soon as her judge said good, she came down off the wall to shake it out. While I was watching her perform these very easy looking handstand push-ups I thought to myself, “huh? I don’t think I’ve ever seen her do them before. I must have missed something during workouts”. Right at that moment, Anahita and I made eye contact and I said out loud what I had been thinking, “I’ve never seen you do HSPUs in a workout before, I didn’t know that you could.” “That’s because I never have before, until now. Those are my first ones.” That’s right ladies and gentlemen, Anahita worked her way through 16.4, and when she got off the rower with enough time to attempt HSPUs, she did. . . very successfully. Congratulations at pushing yourself hard and still finding the moment to catch your breath and put in to play the skills you practice during WODs. Congratulations on getting your first ever 3 HSPUs during an Open workout, especially when they came at the end of the workout!!!
Joel Swanson
In the 2 years Joel has been a member of Verve he has become a very strong, competitive athlete. To look at 16.4, there is no doubt in my mind that Joel could do the workout as prescribed. I’ve seen him move heavy deadlifts, I’ve seen him crush wall balls, I’ve seen him excel on the rower, and I know he can do HSPUs. When his scoresheet was handed in, he score read 250+ reps, scaled. I wasn’t sure if the “scaled” part was correct or not so I went to confirm with him. I asked him if he scaled the workout, and with a smile he said yes. When I asked why, he told me his back was a little achy recently and he didn’t think lifting 225# deadlifts was a very good idea. I want to congratulate Joel on embodying the spirit of the Open, the spirit of CrossFit, and for literally doing what we ask everyone to do every day. Joel listened to his body. Joel didn’t get pouty and say to himself, “since I can’t do it RX then it’s not worth doing”, and he didn’t say “I’m going to push through this pain”. 250+ reps for 16.4 is a full round plus more deadlifts and into the wall balls of round two. Joel crushed the workout. He pushed himself and never stopped moving, he still proved to himself that he is fit and competitive, and the bigger bonus yet is that he remained pain free and healthy enough to come back again and again over the next several days to continue to train. I’m proud of his decision and I’m even more proud he did it with an amazing attitude. Congratulations on killing the workout and being able to get up and walk away from it normally when you were done. 😉
I would also like to give a very honorable mention to Miss Maddie Berky. Not for her performance in 16.4 but simply caring about the well being of others and being a very generous, thoughtful person. She left something on each desk of a full time trainer to show encouragement and keep us positive as we’ve worked through Verve’s transition into it’s new home and as we coach/ train through the Open. While this is our job, and I know I can easily say we all love what we do, it was a nice surprise in the middle of the week to reenergize us all and remind us why we love what we do. Thank you Maddie.
Get ready to rock and roll guys/ gals, Thursday’s announcement is the last one for a whole year. Keep all that energy and excitement going and let’s finish this Open up strong!! Make your predictions, the closest guess will win a prize from me. . . and no, it’s not burpees. It is also not sitting and watching as others do burpees. 🙂
