10 Signs Your WOD Is Destroying You

This morning’s WOD was ROUGH.

8 rounds: Run 200 m, 8 Sumo Deadlift High Pulls (google it), 8 squat jumps, 8 thrusters. That’s a LOT of thrusters.

There were only 2 other people there, one being The BF who I never beat at anything (except Scrabble and being right about things), and the other being one of my very favorite people who we work out with. My second favorite thing about her is that she is better than me at most things, a little faster and a little stronger, but not by too much, so when we WOD together I can try to keep up with her and it pushes me without totally destroying me. My FIRST favorite thing about her is that she is one of those people who just has so much heart that you can’t help but totally root for her at all times. So I wasn’t too upset when she finished a full set in front of me, even though for the first 3 of 8 sets we had been exactly pacing each other. I am blaming it on the fact that halfway through the 3rd set I took some weights off my bar because I was getting crushed and that put me behind… but really I think it was just that I got destroyed.

So I decided to put together a few tips and tricks to recognize a WMD… WOD of Mass Destruction. (I just made that up, do you like it? Ha.)

1. You reach muscle failure during the warm-up. Twice.

2. You have to take weights off your bar less than halfway through the WOD, when your bar only had 5’s to start.

3. When you try to cheer someone else on, the only words that can come out of your mouth are “I’m going to die” and “Aaannggghhh…” (Maybe if you’re lucky you can get a “Yeah” out, but that’s it)

4. 8 sets of 8 reps turns quickly into 64 sets of 1 rep.

5. Your coach is watching you with a very concerned look on her face.

6. You start to legitimately wonder how long it would take them to notice if you passed out while running since everyone else is already finished.

7. You have to squeeze your eyes shut in order to get yourself to touch, let alone grab and lift, the bar.

8. There is a fleeting moment where you wish you were doing Wall Balls instead.

9. Later in the day you can’t actually recall almost any of the experience.

10. You look like the picture at the top by the end of it. Please notice The BF’s sweat angel in front of me. PS no that is not, by any stretch of the imagination, my bar.

Day 58: Tears

I feel like I’ve been hit by a bus. Is it possible to get whiplash from a jerk press? Ok, how about from 49 of them?

Last night’s WOD was 7 rounds of 7 jerk presses, 200 m run, then 7 front squats. My bar weighed 65 lbs. I knew I was in trouble when I couldn’t even link the first set of jerk presses, and it really only went downhill from there.

By the end I was only able to do 1, maybe 2 jerk presses at a time, and 3 or 4 squats between rests. I was running almost entirely with my eyes closed just to concentrate on moving my feet (a dangerous activity due to the constant presence of small children riding tandem on scooters at the end of the block where our 200m turnaround is). At the end of the 5th round, I dropped the bar and left for the run with tears in my eyes, and by the end of the 7th round, with TJ and the BF standing next to me coaxing me to pick the bar up just one more time, I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I was at muscle failure 2 reps before the end of the set. I ended up counting a 3/4 press and a 1/2 press together to create my 5th rep. When I did finally somehow make it through the last 2 reps, I dropped the bar, walked outside, and started crying.

I am not a crier. I get a little choked up occasionally, but it usually takes a significant personal tragedy before I actually cry. But last night it just felt like my body was out of options. It was a feeling I have definitely never experienced before, where all my resources were totally exhausted and my defenses were totally gone. I have had some really hard WODs in the past few weeks, but last night’s was the first where I was staring down the final set and thinking I don’t know if I can physically do this. It was beyond pushing myself and beyond convincing myself to go for it. And it apparently took every ounce of emotional stability I had in my body to get through it.

Even though I finished feeling like I had definitely accomplished something significant, it also made me think: When do you reach a point where you have to say “This is too much”?