The Crucible

A workout is a great time for learning about yourself and your movements. Justin Keane outlines one way to make the most of your time under the microscope.

As CrossFitters, we make daily distinction between our “pass patterns” and our “game routes.” The former is “skill work”; the latter is “the WOD.” Or perhaps we call one “strength work” and the other “conditioning.” Whatever our nomenclature, there is most often a palpable sense that our entry to the real proving ground—such as it is—sounds a hell of a lot like our coach yelling, “3, 2, 1… Go!”

And to a degree, this is a very useful dichotomy. How we respond under the klieg light of a WOD will reveal much: our wind, our guts and, yes, our heart. We go so hard at our practices in order that we might fail at the margins of our experience rather than in the thick of the thing. Running on muscle memory four minutes into Fran, we realize it is a beautiful thing indeed to be confronted with the essential question, “Who am I and how bad do I want it?” instead of its mundane second cousin twice removed, “Wait—do I drive out of the bottom of a thruster with my elbows or my shoulders?”

It’s one of life’s most resonant tropes, the athletic realm as crucible. It is a pretty seductive notion: we go in one end and, under fire, emerge through the other somehow bigger and deeper. Better. It’s such a seductive notion, in fact, that I’d argue we almost always shortchange the time spent within the crucible in favor of its sexier end result. Sure, it’s approximately 50 times more fun to say “I shaved 10 seconds off my Fran time” than it is to limn out the dirty dirties like “I didn’t give up on the set of 15 like I did last time,” but it’s ultimately that caliber of unbending and clinical focus on our smaller triumphs and failings that will make us better CrossFitters. Or: Show me a better journal; I’ll show you a better CrossFitter.

Amanda Detmer Emma Stone Raquel Alessi Marisa Coughlan Shanna Moakler