I see a lot of people talking about how, although the open was difficult for them, they have walked away with a feeling of accomplishment and a list of things they need to work on. My reaction, possibly because I got injured right out of the gate, is different. I don’t want this to take away from my victory in doing 42 double unders that fateful Friday night, cause that moment was awesome. What this is, is a first-timers reaction to what I perceived from the marketing machine that is CrossFit and then the reality of what happened.

Disappointment

I am disappointed in a few things. Myself being one of them. First off, the very first movement in the open were double unders. This is an incredibly tricky movement to do, one that I had been practicing since June. I felt like I was the walking example for insanity—trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Add onto that, that I am not a patient person and you might understand the frustration I felt when I saw the first WOD. But I went into it with a positive mind frame. In fact, I went into every WOD feeling like maybe {just maybe} a little magic dust might sprinkle on me and I could do it.

The harsh reality set in when I was unable to do overhead squats for 14.2 and when I posted a 0 score I was removed entirely from the competition on CrossFit’s website. I was still able to put in my scores for the following WOD’s but they no longer counted on the leaderboard. If this competition is supposed to be for everyone why is the leaderboard set up in a way that doesn’t show the athlete’s standing just because they couldn’t do one of the workouts? Why are you not kept in the game, just a lot lower? If the Games are going to advertise that the open is accessible to everyone including grandparents, maybe the leader board needs to be tweaked a little, because I was disappointed to see that I had no idea where I stood after 14.2.

Accessibility

If the open is truly accessible to everyone, from a teen to a grandmother, I find it astounding that that first movement is double unders. I know a lot of people who were doing the open for the very first time. Some landed the double unders, others didn’t. Given the complexity of the movement, shouldn’t the first movement of the first WOD be something everyone can do? I understand that this competition is meant to find the people who will go onto regionals, but you can do that while still making this accessible to all, which this open failed to do. Even if I hadn’t been injured in 14.1, it’s debatable whether I would have been able to do 14.2. I have never done a 65lb overhead squat, as that is another weakness of mine. And again, my news feed popped up with considerable comments after that WOD, saying they had PR’d or that {again} they hadn’t been able to do it but tried. Finally, I want to discuss 14.5. That WOD was a beast. 84 Thrusters at 65lbs is a mind-fuck. I don’t know how else to express this. That WOD was all mental. At my first round, at rep 15 I said to myself “I am so glad I am injured and don’t have to finish this”. I don’t know if that is a poor mentality to have, but it’s what happened. I watched a few people tackle this WOD for over an hour and one of them didn’t even finish it. This is not accessible.

So I apologize for being negative about the open, because it was a wonderful experience and the community at my box was second-to-none. I just think it is irresponsible of the people marketing these games to say they are accessible to everyone, because they aren’t. I can’t be the only person who got injured because they participated. I am lucky I can still workout, it could have been worse.