Crossfit Games Open 14.4: The Return of the Suck

When 14.4 was announced, I was positioned the back of our box, starting my first class of a ten-week Oly-specific training program. Aside from my coach and the four of us other athletes secluded to the back, everyone was else was huddled around the electronic WOD board streaming the live feed. As we were reviewing clean and jerk progression drills, I positioned myself so that I could subtly catch a glimpse of Castro as he announced the WOD, and hopefully be able to hear what was going on, all while trying to maintain proper form with my training bar as the Coach was giving direction.

As I was humbly jerking the barbell from my chin (bizarre drill), all I caught was something about muscle-ups.. and then I heard, as if it was being echoed off some sort of mountain top: “wall balls…” wall balls.. wall balls..

Yeah, me and wall balls and my go way back.

Way back to the Open last year, where I attempted to do 150 wall balls. Twice.

This year I finally got an official Karen time, barely tossing up the ball in the last minute of repeating Open workout, right under the 12:00 time-cap limit at 11:57.

Wall balls for me are a mind-f***.

If you know me, you would know I do not curse, at least not out loud. Ever. It has probably been about ten years or more since a cuss words has sprung from these lips, but if anything were to ever make me swear, it would be wall balls. The general consensus from Facebook agreed.

Knowing that wall balls were going to be an inevitable part of the Open and knowing my major mental weakness with them, I had a plan on working on them everyday I was at the gym. 50 wall balls or 5 minutes.

I started Day 1 strong completing my 50, with some helpful tips from a Regionals-bound athlete. The next day, our WOD was a 14 minute AMRAP of 5 T2B, 10 burpees, and 15 wall balls. 75 wall balls? Check! And then, I refused to do any more wall balls. Ever. *insert pouting tantrum here*

So alas, when the chipper 14.4 was announced, I could kick myself for not spending any extra time and effort on learning to embrace the suck. With no real clue how long it would take to row 60 calories and complete toes to bar, I figured it would take me the full 14 minutes to do the rowing plus toes to bar, so it would be bittersweet to not make it to the wall balls. After a 4:49 row and 50 single toes to bars, I had more than enough time to focus on the dreaded wall balls. I started with ten unbroken, then went down to sets of five, then did plenty sets of fours and threes, wasting way too much time resting, dropping the ball, or getting frustrated. My judge kept reminding me it was only 40 wall balls, not the 150 that I have struggled with before. I somehow managed to finish, then stumbled to the bar for the 95# cleans, which may as well have been 150#. Every clean was uncomfortable; I was pulling early, my elbows weren’t coming up quickly enough, I was gasping for air.

When time was called, I had made it through 8 cleans, for a final score of 158 – which I was quite pleased and proud of. My judge (below), who was one place below me in the overall rankings, whooped me in this WOD which may have slightly crushed me with my comparison game I play..

Afterwards, I summed it up in a forum for our gym ladies:

1. See the WOD. “I don’t want to do this.”
2. During the WOD. “I never want to do this again.”
3. After the WOD. “I will never do this again”
4. Later that day. “Well, maybe I could have done better..” and contemplate a re-do.

Saturday I had a half-hour skills session booked with my Coach, which I thought was going to be something like linking pull-ups or toes to bar, or practicing ring dips. Much to my surprise, he had me warm-up with a 60 cal row. Then we worked on some T2B skills, followed by 50 T2B for time (in which I created a nice hole in my hand), followed by 5×8 wall balls, followed by 20 95# cleans. Hmm! Oddly familiar!

With each mini-WOD, he gave me tips on pacing and movement efficiencies and trying to get the dreaded wall ball suck out of my head by breaking it into manageable pieces, with a backup plan for when that failed (drop to 5s instead of 8s). At the end of my” broken 14.4″, Coach came up with a calculated re-do score. He then proceeded to tell me to let my hand heal and I will repeat this WOD on Monday night. And make it through 20 cleans. It was more than the fact that he thought that I could get a better score, but it was also to push me mentally. Because this workout was just as much mentally and emotionally taxing for me, he knew it would make me stronger in those respects as well.

Sadly, I agreed.

To make the rest of the long story short.. I begrudgingly repeated the workout. I finished my row over a minute faster than the first time, but stalled on the toes to bar. I finished the wall-balls a little slower. And heck if I wasn’t going to beat my score on the cleans. They were not pretty, but I managed to get one extra rep in just before time was up.

Final score: 159

And now, I never want to do this workout again.

I feel with each Open workout, I am continuing to learn more about myself than the one before, and taking away something new every time. This workout was by far the most mentally taxing working, but I did not cry. I know that may sound silly to a lot of people, but I have repeatedly had workouts where I end up having some sort of panic attack in the middle, causing me to feel more upset and frustrated and full of self-doubt. But this time, I faced that awful dreaded workout head-on a second time and pushed through it, which I think may be another defining moment in my Crossfit life – this workout pushed me so much more into the direction of becoming much more mentally strong.