Chad

All right, my CrossFit-weary friends. Sit back and let us regale you with another story from the CrossFit mines.

Most of CrossFit is regular stuff. Lifting weights, rowing a fake rowboat, riding a bike to no where but the eighth circle of hell. But there are also commemorative workouts. On Veterans' Day, we had the WOD"Chad," to remember Chad Wilkinson, a Navy service member who died from suicide in 2018 after numerous deployments that caused traumatic brain injury. Thousands of CrossFitters around the globe do the workout in his memory.

The workout as RX'D is 1000 box step ups with a 20# weighted vest or ruck onto a 20" box. Buds had done it before, at Thanksgiving 2020, highlighted in 2 blog posts here and here. Watch the video at the end of the second blog post for my very funny joke at Buddie's expense. The video is a great reminder that his health and power have built back up a great deal since 2020.

The box was full of a host of folks. Some sharing the box to split the 1000 steps in two, some sharing a box because we ran out of boxes. (We took our box from home with us. It normally holds a lamp in Buddie's office, but it was glad to remember its true purpose.)

We began around 8:45 a.m. on Saturday, and the time cap was 90 minutes. I won't meander you through the aches, pains, warm-ups, resignation, euphoria, and blessed end. Buds had achy feet, my toes on one foot were numb by the end. Both of us are a little slow moving today, but overall feeling great.

I'm still babying my knees, so I did my 1000 steps onto a stack of plates that measured 13.75 inches. Here you can see our friend Ken resting on the stack after the workout.

I was 4th from the last to get done. One other couple was doing the full 1000 steps, but doing it sharing a box, so they had transition time they had to plan for.

Buds was the final finisher. He cut a lot of time off his previous score from 2020, and as is his way, once he knew he was in great shape for beating the time cap, he plotted out his plan and stuck to it. The wisdom of years has taught him to listen to his own body and adjust as needed. Fantastic news is that his knee injury didn't bother him at all.

We love our Coach. She's so supportive and fun, yet clear in expectations and boundaries. She asked everyone to join in with Buds for his last step ups. You can hear in the video she thought he had only 20 left, then looked at his wipe board, thought he had 40 left, and so told people they were going to be stepping up longer than advertised. 😆😆

It's so good to be back in Rochester to stay, back to our home box, back together.