Another CrossFit Open has come and gone. That is the 6th CrossFit Open we have hosted at CFH, and without doubt, it is the best one we have hosted to date.
On reflection of this worldwide CrossFit competition and something that is well known in the CrossFit community, this years Open really reminded me of a few things.
My top reasons why I think the CrossFit Open is valuable to CrossFit Gyms worldwide and people who participate are:
1. It brings the community together. It provides more opportunity for interaction and connection. People are doing something together, regardless of their age, fitness level or experience – people are in it together!
2. Every year people do things they never thought they could. Every year we see people conquer challenges, do workouts RX for the first time, get their first pull up or muscle up, PB their max lifts. It’s awesome. It’s exciting. It’s inspiring.
3. Regardless of the result in the workout or whether errors are made, there is always a sense of accomplishment or achievement and endorphin rush post workout. It is like a natural drug. It’s worth it!
4. People learn more about their fitness. About their strengths, About their weaknesses. About their limitations. These things are important to know. They can drive future development.
1. We had close to 50 people registered this year, and maybe 5-10 people doing the workouts without being registered. We have a lot more members than that, but due to this number, it was easier to manage than other years when the cohort has been larger.
2. The people competing / participating this year at CFH brought the goods. Positive attitudes. Very little negativity. Friendly and healthy competition. No bullshit. I love it. Thats how it’s meant to be.
3. As a staff we discussed the open on two occasions – our retreat, and our monthly meeting. We made a late change to the logistics providing more sessions to complete the open this year. Friday night, Saturday morning and Monday night. We could do this now due to the expansion of the gym, and it made it much easier for people to complete the workout and was a move in the right direction.
4. We also decided as a staff to share the responsibility amongst the team to promote, set up, organise, run, validate, and wrap up the open each week. This made it much easier and more fun to manage.
5. Due to our recent expansion we had enough room to host the open and still have other members of the gym training a the same time with minimal disruption. Therefore we had an alternative program for non open participants and plenty of space downstairs and upstairs for them to complete it.
6. The first stage of open this year was only 3 weeks long. This was GREAT. Less disruption to the gym. Less stress and anxiety for competitors.
7. Due to the inclusiveness of the open this year, the workouts required minimal equipment which made it much easier to set up.
8. The selection of movements and the design of the workouts including the movement standards made it easy to judge.
9. The structure of the open and the final stages provide the opportunity for more people to progress to the next stage which provides more motivation to those striving for greater things in the sport of CrossFit.
It is always important to reflect in order to make future events better. After each event we do this at CFH and our take-aways from the 2021 Open for future years are:
1. Keep running the open at CFH. There is too much GOOD not to!
2. Do it the same as this year – it was successful It was fun. There was minimal fuss.
3. Try get more people pumped and keen for Friday night lights. It should be a spectacle each week
Thanks to all of you reading this who were part of the 2021 CrossFit Open. It was a pleasure to host and watch all of you compete and give it everything you had. If you have anything to add to the above we would love to hear from you. And of course, best of luck to those of you who are progressing to the Quarter Finals.
I would also like to thank the CFH coaching team on a job very well done. You are some of the most professional, reliable, hard working and beautiful people I know. I am blessed to be part of our amazing team, and our community are so lucky to have you as their leaders.
