Today’s post comes from Julie Penny – CrossFitter, wife, friend and business owner. Don’t let Julie’s constant smile confuse you – Julie is one hardcore athlete. She’s tough and compassionate and she’s always encouraging us to keep on pushing harder. Today she explains what helps her keep pushing harder in workouts.
Within the world of CrossFit, some workouts are named after women. These workouts have names like Annie and Barbara and Grace and Helen. And Fran – we can’t ever forget about Fran.
Then there are workouts named after men. But not just any men. These workouts are named after heroes – soldiers and law enforcement officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty. They go by the names of Murph and Daniel and Josh and Ryan.
These benchmark workouts are hardcore.
They are generally high volume and high repetitions. These are the kind of workouts you only take on once a quarter or less. Simply because your body needs time to recover from each tough workout.
To say they are intense is an understatement. They are a booty whooping, in my humble opinion!
So, when my girlfriend invited me to do the Memorial Day Murph, I was more than a little reluctant. Seriously, why would anyone want to run a mile then do 100 pull ups, 200 pushups, 300 body weight squats & then run ANOTHER mile!?!? Oh, did I mention it’s for time?? I said no thanks a few times… then she hit me with the fact that it was in memory of a war veteran that died in the line of duty. Ummmm, how could I possibly say no?
I worked out a strategy ahead of time with my trainers.
I would tackle the reps in a 5/10/15 for 20 rounds or a 10/20/30 for 10 rounds.
(pull ups/push ups/squats)
On Memorial Day, I made the trip across town to my girlfriend’s gym. It was cool to see her gym & to meet so many other CrossFitters. It was also amazing to hear the story of Murph from the man that organized this to be the WOD (Workout Of the Day) in Michael Murphy’s honor.
As I was midway through my Murph, I was breathing heavy and cheering on another crossfitter. He was wearing a weighted vest, just as Michael Murphy did. We were commiserating and saying “why do we do this stuff?” when it hit me… “because these fallen soldiers sacrificed so much for us & that is a lot harder than any workout!”
Wow, what an epiphany… I pushed so much harder after that!
When I am starting to lose my resolve in a tough WOD, I now go back to that moment. It fires me up and I push through, it’s the least I can do!
Click here to read about our goal of competing in the 2013 CrossFit Games.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Unfortunately, some of the hero workout ARE named after women. See “White,” http://www.crossfit.com/mt-archive2/007993.html
– and see this thread: http://board.crossfit.com/showthread.php?t=62747
Also, several of The Sevens were female.
Certainly gives us something to think about.
Hi Anne – thanks for the correction. Yes, the hero workouts definitely put things in perspective for us – male and female heroes.
Peace,
== niki