The Wodapalooza Part 1/2

 

 
 There is so much I want to share about my trip to Miami and my experience competing at The Wodapalooza. This first part will be a breakdown of each day of the competition and each workout (just like I did for the Battle of the East post). The second part of this post will be more related to competing with my baby girl with us, interactions with CrossFit Games athletes and reactions to my hijab. Enjoy!

 

Sunday and Monday, January 10-11

From Kuwait to Miami

The flight from Doha to New York wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. Don’t get me wrong; it wasn’t easy but manageable. I had hidden many little surprises in my backpack to keep my little girl entertained. Our flight at New York, along with almost every other flight, was cancelled due to bad weather. We had to stay the night and travel to Miami the next morning.

Wednesday, January 15

Change of Division

Today they had announced that we would be able to find our heat timings and the schedule of the workouts online. As I opened the website to the scaled division, I couldn’t find my name. For a second I got worried and wondered if maybe something went wrong and I’m not part of the competition. Then I thought let me check intermediate division and there I was. My name was under Intermediate Women! I emailed Wodapalooza and they replied back saying because some athletes dropped out I was bumped up a division. I was excited, nervous, scared, and thrilled all at the same time. I had been practicing all the workouts with the scaled movements. But of course, my coach/husband Yousef was so happy because it would be a great challenge for me. So there I was, registered as part of Intermediate Women for Wodapalooza 2016.

Thursday, January 14

Athlete Registration

By the time we got to the Intercontinental Hotel, which is where the athlete registration was taking place, there was already a line of athletes that went from the inside of the hotel to the outside and down the street. We picked up our free gear and customized Wodapalooza Reebok Nano shoes and got our athlete photos taken. There we met Noah Olsen (and his dog Maximus), who is such a humble person. I congratulated him on his win at the DxB Fitness Championship in Dubai. Then it was time for us to head back to the hotel and prepare ourselves for a weekend of competition!

Friday, January 15

Day 1

Rumor was going around that Miami was going to get some rain today. And it did. It wasn’t just a little rain, it was pouring! The green grass suddenly turned into mud puddles, the workout stages and equipment were soaked, and athletes and spectators were running around trying to stay dry. But the rain never stopped…and the show must go on! Judges and volunteers got their plastic rain covers on, spectators brought out their umbrellas and athletes decided since we are getting soaked anyways less clothes sounds like a better idea (except for me of course, hah!)

First day of competition and it was the most stressful for me. Not because of nerves before the workouts, but because my daughter’s clothes and diaper were soaking wet and we had to carry her all day to keep her out of the muddy puddles. I prayed the rest of the weekend wasn’t going to be like this.

“Little Chipper”

21/15 calories assault bike

15 power snatches

9 burpees

15 thrusters

Time Cap: 5 minutes

The first workout is actually “Big Chipper” but the Scaled and Intermediate division started the day with the “Little Chipper”. The original workout included assault bikes which the scaled division before us used, but because of the rain the screens of the bikes eventually stopped working. So there we were the first heat of the intermediate women all lined up to start when they announced that the workout has changed. It became 21 burpees over the bar, 15 power snatches, 15 thrusters, 21 burpees over the bar. I hate burpees but didn’t even have time to consider if the change was for the better or worse because seconds later it was 3-2-1-GO!

There we were, rain coming down on us as we threw our bodies on to the wet ground for 21 burpees. The first burpee shocked me as I threw myself on to a puddle of water and felt every piece of clothing I had on get soaked but then it went by so fast. Breathing heavy at the finish line, I thought to myself, that was way more fun than expected.

“Big Chipper”

60 pistols

40 GHD sit-ups

20 Overhead squats

D-Ball Carry

Time Cap: 12 minutes

This workout was mostly mentally challenging. I can do all the movements; it was about staying consistent and surviving. I didn’t stop during the pistols but I kept at my own pace. The GHD sit-ups weren’t as bad as I thought. The OHS was okay. The D-ball carry almost made me cry…I can’t remember the weight of the ball but basically you carry it over your shoulder and go up and around a hill then back to the stage. Half way up the hill I thought I was going to collapse. I just wanted the workout to end. Those pistols though had my quads sore for the rest of the weekend.

Saturday, January 16

Day 2

Oh how happy I was to wake up and see the sun! But guess what? Today we get wet again because the first workout is the swim!

“Swim Triplet”

Complete 2 rounds for time:

25 Deadlift

50 meter swim

25 HSPU

50 meter swim

Time Cap: 11 minutes

The set up for this workout was really cool. We had to do the deadlifts at the stage in front of the spectators then jump into the bay and swim to this floating stage in the middle of the water where we would do the handstand pushups. I knew I was going to suffer in this workout because I’m not the best swimmer and handstand pushups are my biggest weakness. What I didn’t know was how much harder the hspu were going to be after a swim! Have you tried swimming then doing handstand pushups? It was torture for me.

“Snatch Medley”

4.0 Complete for max load (total weight)

4.1 Complete for time:

1 Snatch

1,000 meter row

2 Snatches

200 Double Unders

3 Snatches

30 Bar Muscle ups

Time Cap: 17 minutes

This workout sounded really cool on paper and it was! You had to lift your heaviest 1 rep snatch, then 2 rep snatch, then 3 rep snatch and in between you had some other movements to do. You get two scores, one for the total weight carried, and the second score is for the total time to finish the whole workout. I think all of us girls in my heat underestimated the effects the past 3 workouts had on our legs. We all failed the first lift for our snatches and had to drop weight, each with her own chosen load. I wasn’t so happy with how the workout was going but then we all reached the bar muscle-ups around the same time. Most of the girls in my heat couldn’t do the movement. I still struggle with them but I managed to get 9 bar muscle-ups before the time cap and that was the highest number of reps in my heat.

Sunday, January 17

Day 3

Everyday both Yousef and my heat wouldn’t start earlier than 9:30am. But we are awake everyday by 5 sometimes 6am because, well, we have an early rising baby girl! On Day 3 we woke up to tornado warnings and an insane thunderstorm outside our window. The wind was so strong I thought the palm trees were going to fall! I kept checking the competition’s instagram page to see if they were going to cancel or if there were any updates. Eventually it was decided that all heats would be postponed 1 to 2 hours later. It actually turned out to be 3 hours late and off schedule. Eventually storm stopped and the competition continued!

“Bars + Balls”

16 D-ball ground over shoulder

36 Toes-to-bar

36 Chest-to-bar pull-ups

16 D-ball ground over shoulder

Time Cap: 9 minutes

I was a little nervous about this WOD because in practice I usually struggle with CTB and TTB. But this WOD was actually the most fun out of all the workouts. I loved the d-ball movement and the CTB and TTB weren’t so bad! I did much better than I expected.

“Double or Nothing”

Complete for time:

3-2-1

Legless rope climbs

Squat Cleans

Dumbbell Squat Snatches

Time cap: 6 minutes

Rest 2 minutes

Complete for time:

50 Clean & Jerks

*penalty for dropping bar is 1 rope climb

Time cap: 6 minutes

The last workout 6.0 and 6.1 weren’t released until the morning of the last day, Sunday. Literally my jaw dropped when I saw the workout. Legless rope climbs for intermediate? Seriously?! This was no joke. The workout looked exciting and fun, I was especially excited for the squat cleans which were at 70kg…BUT that’s if I can get through the legless rope climbs! No surprise there, only one girl in my heat managed to reach the squat cleans. The rest of us girls got stuck with the legless rope climbs. We had to start hanging on to the rope, legs off the ground and arms fully extended then climb our way up. Much harder than jumping up! I got one rep! Hah.

Two minutes rest and we started the second workout of 50 clean and jerks. Every time you drop the bar you have to do 1 rope climb. It was torture. The rope climbs were fine but my grip was gone and my forearms were dead.

I had completed The Wodapalooza and felt so proud.

This was the biggest competition I have participated in. It’s an even greater experience than when I competed as an individual at the Asia Regional in 2013. Overall I ranked 42^nd out of 56 Intermediate women. Being in the first heat for most workouts I had an idea of where I was placing even though I didn’t check the leaderboard even once during my time competing. I wasn’t interested because I know what my goals are, my strength and skill levels, and my weaknesses. I had an image of how my performance would be and I surpassed it and did better. This was a great experience for me to grow as an athlete. I’m so thankful for the opportunity and feel so blessed to have been there with my family, my coach, my biggest supporter Yousef and of course my baby girl.

A special thank you to my girls at CrossFit Q8 and to anyone who supported and encouraged me.

STAY TUNED for part 2!

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