Snowmageddon and WOWs

I was trying to take pictures for last weeks blog outside.
You can't see behind me but their is ice everywhere.

The infamous snowmagedon 2016 has hit along the east coast this year.  But if you ask me, it was more along the lines of Frozen where I'm from (freezing rain).  We didn't get a dusting of snow until Saturday night and it literally looked  just like someone that, a dusting. All this started Thursday night/Friday morning causing post to already close down by 2pm on Thursday.  Well at least that gave me plenty of time to pack for Greensboro to compete at War of the WODs.  This would be the third year of me competing in this

competition.  My first year I did Team scaled, my second year Indiv Rx and Team Rx, and this year would be Indiv Rx.  I got up and went to workout on Friday morning.  And for those that compete you're probably wondering why in the world I would workout the day before.  It's suppose to be a rest day!  My body would have had 24 hours of rest even with the workout on Friday morning. 

Team Day at WOTW 2015
Jake and I

After working out Friday morning, my car was already getting frozen rain on it.  So home I went to shower, finish packing clothes and making sure I had all my food packed. (Loving my 6 pack meal bags - see previous post).  I was staying with a friend in Greensboro and they were suppose to get worse weather than I was so I checked in with her because I was going to drive up later and didn't want the weather to be that bad.  My mom was not wanting me to go because of how bad the weather was going to get, and my friend suggested waiting until the morning of.  So I held off.  But until Saturday morning I decided to be productive and get some things done on my to do list.  I even took a nap and as you get older getting a nap is cherished!  Unfortunately the weather hadn't gotten any better in Greensboro, but I was still really determined to compete.  Which I wasn't sure why considering I knew how poor I was going to perform.  My conditioning has suffered the last several months for working out by myself and I had gotten better at my Olympic lifts which would come in handy for one of the workouts.  But I listened to my mom and my friend and didn't go up to Greensboro.  I can't tell you how irritated and disappointed I was that I was being pushed to stay home.  I wanted to compete and this is coming from not looking forward to competing at all the day before.  My desire to push myself has been lost, but that fire to compete on Saturday when I wasn't able to was burning deep inside me and maybe that was what I needed.  The irritation gradually built the longer I stayed cooped up in my apartment.  And with the weather we had here, I said screw it and headed to the gym.  But at least that meant I was going to be able to watch the new moving coming out on the Hallmark Channel (it's a guilty pleasure of mine).
It still baffled me how upset I was about being held back from competing on Saturday but maybe it was for that simple purchase of finding my desire to compete again.  So because I knew things would be melting on Saturday and Sunday and people had been out on the roads I was determined to get out of my apt on Sunday and head up to judge for half the day like I had signed up for.

Snatches during our first event at WOTW 2016

War of the WODs (WOWs)

Judging "Green Hornet and Kato" this past
Sunday (1/24/16)

Sunday morning started out early for me and I felt a little guilty because I was going to be missing church.  I left my place at 520am and arrive at the coliseum at 730 like they had asked.  I got all my goodies (tshirt, wristband, cooler, meal ticket - pure gold) and waiting for them to tell us the specifics of the workout I was going to be judging.  I was going to be judging "Han and Chewie," the weight lifting event.  Each team (of 2) had 1min to complete six lifts, 3 clean & jerks and 3 snatches at the heaviest weight possible.  The weights were preset, only 4 barbells.  The was a lack of volunteers that day so I ended up judging a different event called, "Green Hornet and Kato."  This event had partners working at the same time on different movements so each team needed 2 judges.  One judge was primary (judged the majority of the workout) and the secondary judge helped with the other two movements plus tie breaker times.  It was definitely a busy day judging, even though I only judged half the day.  It was awkward though seeing some people that I know.  And even though this is a sport I do everyday I felt out of place around people I knew.  I am so glad thought that I didn't have to get on that airdyne, but it would be nice to be able to work on one every once in awhile.  The one good thing about judging and constantly being busy is that it was 12pm before I knew it.


I will say that besides the lack of judges on Sunday, and of course some of this was due to weather, that the competition that day was ran very smoothly while I was there.  The judges for "Green Hornet and Kato" we briefed a couple of times on standards as our head judge had not planned on being the head judge.  But I think the best part of that morning was when we went over the standards with all the athletes.  One of the competitors that was in the coed scaled division asked if he had muscle ups if he could do them instead of pull ups.  The scaled division was suppose to do max (as many as possible with the remaining 10min after they had completed the other movements) pull ups.  One of the organizers looked at him and in all seriousness asked him, "Why are you in scaled if you can do muscle ups?"  Turns out he was competing with a  friend who was in the scaled division. We laughed for several minutes because he just called him out on it.  And honestly if he wouldn't have been competing with a scaled competitor and had muscle ups then he didn't really need to be in the scaled division.
But that's one thing I will say about those who can compete in the Rx division, we don't mind going down to the scaled division for teams to help someone out.  We just love the competition and being able to help someone out.  I want to think that we encourage those in the scaled division, when on a team, to push themselves a little harder! I always look forward to being paired with someone who I feel like we are at the same level but are still chasing each other.

WOWs in Review
But contradictory to that I do think that the competition should have been postponed.  For athletes that do not live in the area and it was too much of a risk for them to travel because of the weather (snow and ice) for the competition, but I do understand that some people are willing to brave the weather conditions anyway.   However, I am unaware of the coliseums policy on moving event dates after a certain time period.  If it was not possible then I can understand deciding not to push the competition to a later day, but if it was possible then I think it would have been the better option.
One great thing about volunteering is that you are usually provided a meal for the day, in this case lunch.  Meals for athletes and volunteers were provided by Muscle Maker Grill out of High Point, NC.  We had two options for lunch, the "Godfather" or the "Arizona."  I went for the "Arizona"  Just from looking at it through the heated up container, it reminded me of what a meal from Chipotle would look like.  And man do I miss eating Chipotle.  I can't remember the last time I had it expect sometime midway through last year.  The "Arizona" was a combination of "grilled chicken breast with turkey bacon over brown rice with tomatoes, scallions and a gluten-free, zero-carb signature sauce.  It was almost like a Chipotle sauce in my opinion.  The only thing that disappointed me about the meal was that the bacon was not cooked enough to my liking.  I felt like the bacon was raw.  I also thought it was pork bacon and didn't realize it was turkey bacon until I read the website earlier.  But it is definitely worth giving another shot.
I'm looking forward to next year and hopefully the weather will be better or at least wait until Saturday to start going crazy!  Here's to WOWs 2017!

~God Bless

"Training strength and endurance mentally, physically, and spiritually."