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*whew*

What a weekend. It's Sunday. It's a rest day. I'm resting. Happy Mothers Day to all the moms that stop by my blog. Especially to my mother. I love you, you are awesome. I'm excited to see you soon. I'm lying on my newly constructed gigantic outdoor swing/bed as I type this. I'm drinking a cold Bud Light and fighting off an urge to go to sleep. Jealous? Heck, I'm even jealous of me. That is, if I wasn't me. But i am. Figure that one out. Sarabeth and I competed in the Pound 4 Pound event yesterday in Montgomery, AL. It was part of the Again Faster Garage Games series. These Garage Games events have a reputation for being poorly managed, for being overly expensive to compete in, and for giving out shabby excuses for prizes to the winners. In keeping with this rich heritage of mediocrity the Pound 4 Pound competition was a complete letdown. To be fair, not ever thing was bad. The venue itself was pretty cool. It was held at the Riverwalk in downtown Montgomery. I had never been down there, and it was a very nice area. The highlight of the venue, for me, was the fact that one of the events was held in front a quaint little outdoor bar at the Riverwalk called The Sand Bar. Being able to sit at the bar, order a drink, and watch that portion of the competition was neat. The volunteer judges, overall, did a good job. I didn't hear much complaining about the judging standards, which is rare for these types of regional events. The workouts themselves were a good mixture of movements that tested one's overall fitness, which is the whole point of Crossfit, so that was well done. However, unfortunately, the bad outweighed the good. The first problem was the weather. I know no one can do anything about whether or not it rains, but the event organizers should have planned for inclement weather. I am not a big fan of Crossfit events that take place entirely outdoors for this reason. Right beside the Riverwalk park is a venue known as The Train Station. It is basically a huge concrete area with a very high metal roof. It's easily the size of a football field. Apparently they had the competition there the previous year. They should have held it there again. I heard they tried to book it because of a previous engagement being held there, which ended up being a crappy concert with a cover band playing hip hop music. There might have been 50 people attending this concert. There were over 750 people at the Crossfit event. They should have reserved it sooner. However, the weather didn't ruin this event. A lack of organizational skills ruined the event. The first problem was the schedule. It was so tight that there was no way it was going to run on time. Even if the weather had been perfect, even if everyone was where they were supposed to be when they were supposed to be there, it simply would not have worked. By mid day the event was already 1.5 hours behind schedule. By the time they called it due to weather it was over 3 hours behind. They were 3 hours behind and they had even re-structured one of the events so they it only took half the time originally allotted for it. The next problem was a lack knowledge between the organizers and volunteers. No one really knew what was going on. No one could tell you what was going on. One minute one event was going to be in a certain place. The next minute all the equipment was being moved to another location, but no one knew why. Etc. Another problem was last minute changes to workouts. During the first men's advanced heat on a certain workout a couple of the guys made wrong turns during the run. So, the organizers completely re-routed the run. Fair? Maybe. I don't know. Efficient? Probably not. Another example of this was a workout that included. One of the reasons I decided to compete in this event was the fact that it included an intermediate division. I am just starting out and I have a bad back, so asking me to lift the same weight as the advanced men seems a little lofty. The deadlift weight for the intermediate men was supposed to be 1x your body weight. This means I would have had to lift 210 lbs. This is reasonable for me and the rest of the intermediate men. At the very last minute someone made the decision to bounce this up to 1.25x body weight. This was the same as the advanced. This put me lifting more than 250 lbs. That is a lot to ask from us, and it showed as most of the intermediate men struggled under the weight. They also used axel bars for the deadlift. I had never used them. If you aren't familiar with them they are lighter than traditional bars, but much bugger around. I can only fit my my hands around half the bar, if that tells you anything. I have no problem with the use of these bars under normal conditions, but it was raining. Axle bars are made of painted steel. With no knurling. And mine had 250#+ on it. It was wet. Try holding on to that. In any case, they cancelled the competition when it was just past halfway over. I got to complete all 4 of my workouts. Sarabeth only got to complete 3 of the 5 she was supposed to complete. When they cancelled it they just placed everyone where they were standing at the time. The problem with this was the following: they were going to take the top 12 men and the top 12 women and cut the rest of the field. Then, these top athletes were to run the last workout to determine the winner. Meaning after the first 4 workouts your placement up to that point was erased and only your standing on the final workout determined the winner. Since they were doing this all the top female athletes (and probably males too) were simply trying to stay in that top 12 and pace themselves for that final workout. Sarabeth, Leah Polaski, and Jordan Pepe, three of the top athletes in the southeast, were playing by this game plan. They were all in 5th through 10th place through the third workout, biding their time to go all out in the final workout. Then they simply called the event and awarded the top three places to the current top three female competitors. These were nobody girls that could not hold a candle to any of these three previously mentioned women in any competition. This was rather silly. But, whatever. I had fun seeing a lot of our Crossfit friends and spending the weekend with my wife. It was, after all, my first competition. These were the workouts:

EVENT 1- As many rounds and reps as possible in 8 minutes:
2 snatch attempts at any weight you wish
Row 150 meters
Notes: It was very important to make all the snatch attempts count as any missed rep still counted as an attempt. Your score was comprised of the total amount of weight you moved during the 8 minutes divided by your body weight. The row counted for nothing except that you had to complete it before moving on to the next 2 snatch attempts.

EVENT 2
-15 minute clock starts at the horn. During this 15 minutes you have to run 1000 meters from the venue to the Crossfit Montgomery gym. Once there you had to complete as many rounds and reps as possible of the following: 5 pull ups
10 hand release push ups
15 air squats
-When the 15 minute clock was up you left the gym and ran 1000 meters back to the starting line. The scoring was 2 parts, one score for the number of reps you completed in the gym and another for the time it took to run from the gym back to the starting point. This was a pretty cool event.

EVENT 3
-As many rounds and reps as possible in 8 minutes:
2 Clean and Jerk attempts at any weight you wish
6 over the bar burpees
Notes: This was a lot like the first event. Your score was simply the amount of total weight moved divided by your body weight. They cancelled this event just before I started it and changed it to simply as many reps as possible in 4 minutes of Clean and Jerk at any weight you wish. This was for total weight as well. It was much tougher.

EVENT 4
-As many deadlift reps as possible in 12 minutes:
Run 160 meter downhill
8 handstands (both heels much touch the wall on each rep)
Run 80 meters up stairs
8 deadlifts at 1.25x body weight Notes: the scoring for this was simply the number of reps done of the deadlifts.

*****MY RESULTS*****
EVENT 1
- I used 115# for all my Snatches in order to do them quickly and not fail any attempts. I completed 7 rounds for a total of 1610# lifted. This gave me a score of 7.67

EVENT 2
-Once at the gym I think I completed a full 9 rounds, plus another 5 pull ups, 10 push ups, and around 10 air squats. I don't remember exactly, as it was not written down anywhere. I think completed the second kilometer run in 6:29 . I don't know what kind of score that gave me.

EVENT 3
- I again chose to use 115 for the Clean and Jerks as I decided a high number of reps at a lower weight would be worth more points than a low number of reps at a higher weight. I completed 28 reps of Clean and Jerk in the allotted 4 minutes. The movement was broken into 2 parts, the clean and the jerk, so each counted as a separate lift, which gave me 56 reps at 115# for a total of 6440# lifted. Divided by my body weight this gave me a score of 30.67 for the event.

EVENT 4
- I was very worried about my back during this event, so I really took my time. I would rather finish in a lower ranking and not have spinal surgery. I completed just over 2 rounds of the workout, for a total score of 20 dead lifts.

Remember, my entire goal was to not finish in last place? Lets see if i accomplished it. Where did I finish overall in the competition?......... I have no clue lol.This brings me to my final complaint about the event- the schedule and scoring were so complicated that they still haven't figured them out! The event ended almost 24 hours ago and the judges are still tallying the results! This is what happens when you try to reinvent the wheel. They tried to get fancy with the weight classes and scoring at this event and it bit them in the butt. There was no live scoring system, like at most events, so no one knew where they were in placing! Their most recent announcement states that they are still figuring the placements and that should should have them up shortly. This is what they have been saying since lunch yesterday! Amateur hour. Maybe it is because I lived a previous life playing professional paintball, attending huge events that encompassed thousands of individuals competing over several days. Those events were VERY well run and put this rinky dinky operation to shame. Hopefully I will be able to update you on my final placing later in the evening and we can either celebrate or cry together. Look for an update tonight. Back in the gym with a new workout posted tomorrow! Thanks for all your support this weekend!