As many of you know Power and Grace sent almost all of our individual Regional competitors down to Miami last weekend for Wodapalooza. Despite the fact that it monsooned in Miami Friday. This event is by far the premier, non-Crossfit sponsored event in the country. Seriously top notch and could have been a Regional or Games event. With that in mind I wanted yall to hear from some of the competitors that threw down in Miami. Here's South Regional Competitor Richard Andrews with his thoughts:
Wodapalooza Recap!
This weekend I had an opportunity to compete against some of the fittest people in the world at The Wodapalooza in Miami.
I competed with two other athletes in their RX Team division where we finished 14th out of 47 Teams. Thousands of people signed up for an online qualifier to compete in Miami they took the top 25 of those teams to compete agains sponsored teams (those were teams with people like Rich Fronning, Nick Urankar, Lauren Fisher and plenty of other big name athletes). The next 50 teams were taken as RX.
We did all the same workouts as the Elite Teams with a few changes due to some weather issues and the equipment. Our team, which was sponsored by my sponsor Greater Than My Pr Llc, and was made up of myself, Josh Swann and Matt Morton.
The first day was kind of a bummer because it literally stormed for the majority of the day and it was causing literal chaos in the athlete area. In our first workout they had a mix up at the check in table and they never called for our heat. I happened to hear someone say Heat 3 is going now, I ran to the check in table, snatched our score card off of it, on my way out the door I happen to pass my team mates who followed me on a dead sprint to the workout area. I ran onto the floor waving my hands for them to stop as they were counting down for the workout to being. We found a lane, lined up and threw down in the pouring rain. Definitely not the way we wanted to start.
With it storming they modified our 2nd workout because the Assault Bikes they planned to use were not turning on because they were so wet. They replaced the Calorie Bike with 27 extra burpees. The change didn't hurt us but it definitely didn't help us either.
Day 2 started without a cloud in the sky and the sun shining bright. Which is what everyone expected to see in Miami. Our first workout was great for us:
I hit 11/15 snatches (between 225-235) for the team and did 25 Ring Muscle Ups at the end. We were one of the only teams to finish the workout and it was a great start to our day!
The next event was the only event we were dreading. It involved a swim in the ocean…at night.
Going into the workout I wasn't to nervous because I consider myself a strong swimmer. I grew up near the gulf and did some competitive swimming in Jr High School. But the moment I hit the water with 29 other dudes everything I thought I was capable of went our he window. Every breath was blocked by a wave of ocean water, I couldn't see more than 10 ft in front of me and I was trying not to end up under one of the other 29 guys around me. I am usually very good at handstand push-ups but after that swim I was pretty useless and so was everyone else. We finished that workout two places from dead last.
Day 3 was a battle to make up the points we lost the day before. Our first event was made much more difficult after they put in a standard on the Legless Rope Climbs that made them significantly more difficult. I managed to get through the 7 reps but it took me much longer than expected but my teammates picked me up and killed their portion of the workout.
We had a two minute rest and then we jumped right into the second part. Again my team mates came to work because I felt pretty crippled after the rope climbs. I managed to put in a number but those guys split over 80 Clean & Jerks together and we were one of the only teams in the day to finish both parts!
Our final event might as well been called "Team GTMPr" because we were coming into wanting to leave on a good note. We had the perfect game plan that had only one slip up but we finished second in our heat and 5th over all in that workout.
As a team we honestly felt that we could podium in this competition. We had one bad event but overall we did not have enough top 10 finishes that would have put us in contention any how. I believe we learned a lot and we have lots of take aways from the weekend. This was awesome and exactly what I needed in the last few weeks leading up to the open.
Thank you to my sponsor Greater Than My Pr for helping me with some travel expenses and finding us a place to stay for the weekend. Thank you Oscar and Lala for allowing us to stay in your home and for letting Josh use your dryer ;). And of course thank you to my gym BayWay CrossFit for their support and always rooting for me.
Without them this trip may not have been possible.
Until next year Miami!