Tag: crossfit

I an athlete

Despite the fact that CrossFit considers all crossfitters athletes and that I’d already competed in two CrossFit Games Open’s, I haven’t actually considered myself to be a competitive athlete. (Note, at the time of this writing I’ve completed my third CrossFit Games Open.) However, during the summer of 2016 I started reflecting on my Why for doing CrossFit.

I honestly don’t remember where the off and on reflecting of my why came from – most likely from something Scott McGee said during some episode of the Wodcast podcast. I started CrossFit originally to finally get myself in shape to better function as a firefighter. I was barely passing our three yearly physicals and knew that something had to be done. But as time passed and my conditioning, strength and what not else got better I began to notice that just doing the daily WODs wasn’t enough for me. I started hitting some other stuff every now and then either to improve my skills or specific weaknesses or just to get something more.

While Anna and I were helping build CrossFit Paja we were doing a weightlifting program which was good – but it also clearly showed me that pure weightlifting wasn’t something I wanted to do. So I had to face the fact that my why had changed from just wanting to be in better shape as a human and firefighter to something more. Or to be clear, I had to make the choice of whether I would continue training just to be a stronger human or for some other goal.

Since at the same time I was approaching the magical age of 40 and being able to compete as a CrossFit Masters athlete I started to seriously consider if ramping up my training and aiming to be a competitive athlete would be a viable goal. The end result of the reflecting that I did during the summer – and of course the discussions I had with Anna – was that I would start putting a bit more time and effort to my training than I had been.

(Another author’s note – like many over 40 year old masters I consider the new 35-39 masters category as baby masters.)

So I decided to participate in the Linna Masters qualifiers and managed to get a spot in the 40-44 age group. So now I really had to start consider myself as a competitive athlete. Which honestly was a bit of a mental shift for me since I never was one for competitive sports when I was a kid or even younger…

So in all honesty, be prepared for this blog to cover much more CrossFit related posts in the future as I walk down this path of being an athlete – and firefighter, computer nerd, photographer and crazy dog person… :)

Sawotta 2016

A few weeks ago I spent the Saturday again at Sawotta judging and photographing between the heats in which I was a judge. This year the event had moved to a new venue – the Savonlinna Ice Hall. The new venue had more space for the audience, but since it was a cool summer day no part of the venue was especially warm even though there was no ice to be found.

crossfit athlete Liina Vartia running

I have to admit that I enjoy the double role of judging and photographing functional fitness events. Sure I could live with just photographing, but only judging would find me somewhat frustrated during breaks since I would be annoyed with the missed photographic moments while watching heats. And also when tiredness starts to kick in (as it always does in long events like these), photography keeps me more alert even during the downtime.

crossfit athlete clean and jerking

This time I also managed to be quick and go through my photographs and do some quick edit quickly so that I could get them out to the world. It’s been fun to see my photographs show up on Instagram in athletes’ own feeds. That’s all the thanks I need for this sort of photography which is done to support the growing CrossFit community in Finland.

crossfit athlete clean and jerking

I’m also overjoyed that the athletes appreciate and share also the images in which they don’t look handsome and pretty. I guess all of know full well that the faces we make during grueling WODs will never be pretty or handsome…

crossfit athlete Anna Ollikainen jumping and tripping over the bar

From a judges perspective the events this year were well planned and easy to judge – well everything except the double unders which are always hard to judge… There were some challenges that came from the change of venue, but on the fly changes to how some things were handled solved those quite well and the ability of the staff and judges to quickly adapt to changes allowed even quick paced heats to be handled with limited amount of hassle.

crossfit athletes throwing wallballs

From a photographers perspective the new venue was much better than the previous one simply because the white floor provided a neutral color when compared to the wood floor of the basketball court. Of course as is the case with any indoor venue, more light would have made photography easier but it was still a piece of cake when compared to shooting a gig in a small club ;)

crossfit athlete Satu Kansikas overhead squatting

Sprinkled throughout the post are some of my favorite photographs from the event. For the full set of over 200 or so, head over to our photogallery: Sawotta 2016.

crossfit athlete doing a pull-up

crossfit athlete tired after an event

crossfit athlete tired after an event

Sawotta 2015

In June I was a judge at a smaller Finnish functional fitness competition, Sawotta. It was my first experience as a judge in a CrossFit competition and quite valuable at that. It’s been long enough from the event that I don’t have any clear recollections that are unique to judging at Sawotta since I was also a judge later in the summer at Karjalan Kovin, but the photographs I took during the competition may well be of interest.

I promise to get around to writing a bit about my thoughts on judging at CrossFit competitions later, but meanwhile enjoy the photographs I took in between the heat where I was a judge.

An unfortunate bachelor participating in the women’s masters final…

Jonne Koski seminar

Sometime in September (or maybe October), Anna sent me a link and asked me if I’d like to go as a birthday present. The event in question was a seminar held by two time CrossFit Games competitor Jonne Koski.

I have to admit – I didn’t feel confident enough in my skills that I would have immediately answered in the affirmative, but after contacting the seminar organiser Antti Akonniemi I felt like I could answer with a yes. So, finally on Halloween I boarded a bus to Helsinki and spent the following day – my actual birthday – listening to Jonne talk about preparing for competition and competing. And we also did three workouts during the day which was supposed to simulate a competition day…

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I haven’t set any specific goals for myself when it comes to competing, but most likely I will at least attempt to qualify for some smaller competitions once I reach that magical age of 40 and qualify for the masters divisions. As someone who started working out at 37, competing with 20-somethings is virtually impossible :)

Photo by Laura Hämäläinen
Photo by Laura Hämäläinen

Even though my plans on competing are vague and in the air, the seminar itself was very good and thought provoking. For someone who tends to think and over-analyse (and read), getting some real feedback on how to periodise training and what to focus on was extremely beneficial. At least for whatever approach I want to take to my training I now have at least some knowledge from a valid competitor on what works in his case.

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We had a nice small group of 11 participants and Jonne and his assistant, Juha Metsämuuronen, were able to give all of us technique tips during the workouts and give us individual attention. Sure, the seminar was not focused on learning technique, but getting tips on how to be more efficient is always good. And as is always the case, a different coach than the one you typically use can give you new perspective on how you move and give new hints on what to do to improve matters.

Tero Kotilainen

I have to admit that I am extremely glad that the workouts Jonne had planned were not technically difficult but really put all of us through the ringer with pure CrossFit.

If you are at all interested in the sport of CrossFit, then I strongly recommend going to a seminar held by a Games (or even Regionals) level athlete and get their perspective on how to train and prepare for competition. And of course, by participating in a seminar you are also helping support their training.

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Anna did make one request regarding my trip: I had to take a selfie with Jonne. He was naturally ok with it, and lucky for me he also reminded me to switch the camera to the selfie camera on my phone once my hand was already up and all we saw on the screen was CrossFit Herttoniemi’s ceiling… Just goes to show you how often I take selfies.

And yes, I was very tired once I made my way to the bus and the six hour trip back home.

15.1 and 15.2 – Yes, I really am that bad

The CrossFit Games Open season started almost two weeks ago with the presentation of 15.1 – the first of five workouts to be done during the season. I planned on doing the workouts, but held off on registering until about a week before it started. I finally decided to register just to get a bit more of a mental push to complete each movement to the full standard.

When I woke up on Friday and saw the workout for 15.1 and the surprise 15.1a I grimaced. I really can’t remember when I’ve snatched anything over 40kg last and my PR in snatch at is a measly 55kg which I’ve gotten during a weightlifting class when the focus was on technique and not weight. So the 52.5kg was going to be a challenge. T2B I’m ok with, but have trouble stringing them together especially at our gym where all of the pull-up bars are a bit too low for me.

I knew going in that if I can manage the snatches at all, I should be able to complete two rounds. In the end I surprised myself by finishing three rounds and doing 7 T2B on top of that. Now I’m annoyed that I didn’t manage to squeeze in another three reps to break 100 :)

T2B

15.1a was another beast entirely. Shoulder to overhead strength is something that I was dismal at when I started CrossFit so I knew I wouldn’t be getting any earth shattering results. My PR from January was 75kg in C&J so I had some kind of baseline. My first attempt at 70kg failed since I couldn’t quite get lockout. The second attempt succeeded. Then I decided to gamble and threw on 80kg of weight, which I attempted twice and failed both times. But at least I PR’d my clean while doing the attempts :)

So after 15.1 and 15.1a I was at 97642 worldwide.

When 15.2 was announced, I again faced a relative unknown. I’d just started working on chest to bars myself and had so far done them a few times before the WOD. However, I’d done them so that my collar bone had to go above the bar and not touch the bar. So during the warm-up for 15.2 I tested to see that yes, I can do C2B in singles, but I won’t be doing many of them. I did flirt with the idea of going scaled to get more of a metabolic workout, but decided to challenge myself more and stay RX’d.

The first set of OHS went unbroken and then I spent a long time working on getting the 10 C2B. When I went to continue my OHS I decided to squat with a slightly narrower grip to save my shoulders a bit, which worked but caused me to lose my balance after the sixth OHS. Then I had a hard time of getting the bar back up and simply failed to get any more reps in.

C2B

So with a score of 26 I managed to PR my C2B and even go up in the worldwide standing placing 88031 at the moment.

I’m not sure what I think of my performance in the Open so far. I’m satisfied with the effort I have put in, but the workouts have really highlighted how far the sport has come in a short time. The results that the top athletes have posted are simply amazing.

I’m also uncertain on how this will affect my future training. I’ve already noticed that our normal scheduling doesn’t challenge me to the level I wish it would but have struggled to find something that I could stick with instead. A few friends are following Ben Bergeron’s Competitors Training which I could possibly start following myself. So far even most of the open workouts there have seemed like insanity in most cases, but now I see why. Being able to do the programming RX’d would give a better chance of getting at least semi-decent Open scores while at the same time increasing my own strength and conditioning.

What I feel that competitors training lacks though is focus on additional skill-work. So that is something that I’d have to add on and find suitable programs for from somewhere else. Any ideas dear occasional readers?