This morning I entered the Box determined to be kind to myself because Saturday’s workout had me almost in tears. I felt like such a failure:

Bookends

400m run
then:
5 rounds
30 Kettlebell swings 16/12
20 Overhead Lunges 10/5 bumper plate
10 Pushups
5 deadlifts 1x bodyweight
then
400m run

I managed to complete only 4 rounds and the last run. I gave myself a break on the deadlifts (50 kg) and I could only complete 4 rounds! By round 3 I was in meltdown mode so the coach told me to either ignore the clock and finish all 5 rounds or accept 4 rounds as my scale and round it off with a run. I scaled. On the way home I kicked myself for not going the full five rounds. I’m sure it would have probably killed me, but I should have done it because I am a badass Crossfitter. As far as I could see, scaling back the way I did is for candyasses. The walk from my car to my front door felt like the walk of shame. I should have pushed myself harder. What was wrong with me?

Sunday was an Advil day. Even my eyebrows hurt. It seems I pushed myself pretty hard on Saturday after all. Mulling over this brought a little grudging acceptance of my WOD result, maybe it wasn’t so awful as I thought.

Monday was my sporadic appointment at the sports dietician. Lately I’ve been convinced there’s something wrong with our washing machine because my clothes seem to be getting bigger. Maybe I lost weight. Maybe. I never weigh myself at home, and frankly, knowing the numbers has the potential to ruin a perfectly nice day. The dietician, however, doesn’t let me wriggle out of the weigh-in. Good golly, Miss Molly! I’ve lost 2.5 kilos since September! And 5 centimeters on my waistline! I was well chuffed.

The first snow/sleetfall came on Tuesday. I spent all morning reading Dawn French’s novel, According to Yes, in my pyjamas waiting for the snow/sleet to let up so that I could go for a run. The let up wasn’t happening, but where there’s Goretex, there’s a way, so off I went into the cold with a Stax compilation playlist on my iPhone. In my ears it was Memphis in the summertime and Booker T. and the M.G.s helped me keep up a good pace.

Back in the Box today at 9 am., only a few goats on the menu :

5 min AMRAP
3 Deadlift @ Bodyweight
5 Box Jumps 20″/24″
10 min AMRAP
15 Air Squats
25 Double Unders
5 min AMRAP
5 Kettlebell Swing 16/24 kg
10 Push Ups

After the Advil Sunday, it seemed prudent to stick to the 50 Kg. for the deadlifts and 12 Kg. for the kettlebells. I did the first box jumps RX, but they’re still shaky so I switched to stepping on and off the box. A gash in my shin is not on my Christmas list this year. I tried bargaining with Coach Marc about the double unders but he wasn’t having any of it. He’s a fair guy though and when he saw I was struggling through the first 25, he said I could count every attempt as a rep. By then I was feeling ornery and no-repped myself to two rounds + 21. It took me 10 full minutes to do 45 airsquats and 56 double unders, but all 56 were real double unders. I’ve never done that many before. That felt good.

Crossfit asks athletes to do extremely difficult things. Knowing your boundaries and how hard to push them is part of the game. Knowing when to show yourself a little kindness, which is not the same as taking it easy or cheating, is just as important. A true badass knows when to scale.