Benchpressing backstreet boys

 I've started to naturally wake up at 4:30am

 which really is just plain rude. 

Granted my alarm is set for 4:45am.......but those extra 15 minutes make a big difference.....

This week has been tough, but successful in the super non-scale-victory kind of way.

1RM of #123

During PE or track in high school, we'd spend time in weight conditioning. To be perfectly honest, I enjoyed those days the most--- because if we were inside the weight room, we weren't outside running. I'd like to smack my former self.
For as athletic as I was, and I've always been strong, I didn't know how to push myself or to use my muscles efficiently. Bench pressing the 45 pound bar was nearly impossible to me.

This week at Stumptown, we are establishing our 1RM and its a little nerve wracking to me still.

Thursday, I shimmied under the bar to do some warm-up presses--- nervously hoping that the work I've put in during the past few years won't magically dissipate as I lift the bar off the hooks. Its easy peasy, to my relief. So we add weight, and then some more, and then a little more. As I lowered a solid 95# down onto my chest and then pushed it into the air, the woman lifting with me said I made it look easy, slicing the air like butter. It was such a delight to me. Granted, #95 is not some world feat or particularly impressive in the grand scheme of things, but I am elated with myself.

I think the best part of crossfit is walking into a workout filled with preconceived notions about what I can and can't do, and then smashing those doubts with every rep and drop of sweat.