My Top 5 Tips To Perform Your best AND Enjoy The Open.

The Crossfit Christmas are almost here, and just like Christmas it brings on a combination of excitement and along with it some of stress (at least for some of us.)

These 3 weeks --> can both bring out the best and the worst in us as athletes.

And most often a roller coaster of emotions.

One week we are positively surprised and happy , when we perform better than expected and the next week we are not satisfied or happy with the current form we are in, our performance or other factors and that can lead to a lot of difficult emotions and frustrations.

Through the years, I have noticed for many, all this excitement, atmosphere and feeling like being reviewed and judged on their performance has a negative consequence for performance and your enjoyment for the process.

To help you avoid becoming one of those people I have put together top 5 tips.

These are the main things that I have seen, tried and tested through the past 9 years of competing "in the open" (where 7 of those I was competing for advancing in competition to the next level)

All the 5 advice below are rooted in the same thing, that is accepting where you are and controlling the things inside our scope to control (instead of focusing on the things you can not change or control.)

But I am going to break it down even more, and in the 5 tips below I aim to help you bring focus onto your game plan and expectations, so you can show up prepared on the inside as well as on the outside to perform your best.

1. Check Your Equipment:

   Double check your equipment night before/same morning with the workout in mind. Make sure your grips are intact, your jump rope is folded correctly and not kinks in it, knees-sleeves are packed if you use them, lifters and wrist-wraps are in the bag etc. Go through what you may or may not need, and decide what you are going to use on the day, to avoid any last min change to lifters or out of lifters before your thruster workout.

   Pro tip: It can be smart to include a carb drink here to have post workout if you have to go deep into the pain cave.

2. Nutrition: Nothing New On Game Day

   Eat the same type of foods in same quantities as you usually do - after all if you have been training this is "just another session" Only thing you need to be be mindful of is the timing of when you eat, so your stomach is not uncomfortably full (and risk of it emptying it self post a high intensity workout)

   So plan what time you are doing your workout, eat a solid meal 3-4 hours before you intend to do your workout. And follow up on that with a small familiar snack, fruit, protein bar, nuts or toast 1-2 hour before your workout. That should make sure you are optimally set for performance.
   

3. Strategize BEFORE YOU HEAD TO THE GYM:

   Make a Plan of how you are going to attack this workout & Visualise Yourself Doing The Workout:

   Write down a plan and goals for yourself at home, note down your ideal time, how you are going to break up the reps, how long you are going to rest between sets ect. the more details the better. Then take 5 min to visualise yourself going through the workout.

   Then note down all the things that could possibly go wrong & find a solution/strategy on how you are going to react. For example, went to hard on the burpees and am out of breath I take 5 deep breaths and continue on a slower pace. Jumprope brakes I will have my second jumprope ready close to my station.

   Lastly in the car / on the bus Before you enter the gym, Visualise your self being successful completing your planned workout, accepting the pain cave and think about how good its going to feel afterwards!

   In case you are wondering Where to get this strategy plan from?
   There is overload of info out there on the day regarding strategy on pacing and how to plan your workout. Use the advice from your coach/ influencer /gym or friend you trust. Good sources I take into considerations are Training Think Tank, The Training Plan and Alioth.
   

   Lastly make sure to listen to the advice that is aimed towards your level of capacity.

   You know if you are a games athlete, a bubble athlete for semifinals, gym warrior or a beginner. Make sure to be realistic about your plan, and NOT get carried away when you show up to the gym and other people have a different plan, or when the guy in the lane next to you goes unbroken on the first set!

   Stick to your plan, based of YOUR capacity.

4. Camera Setup: this does only apply in two scenarios.

   Read On If:
   1. You are competing for a spot at any of the further stages such as the Age Group Qualifiers, As apart of a team or for Quarter finals.
   2. You often feel like you didn't leave it all on the floor and would like the opportunity to spectate your workout performance from the outside after the workout.

   You can skip this part if this does not apply to you.
   

   Camera safety, and hacks, always use 2 cameras, because 1 usually fails for some reason or another.

   So general rule is that 2 is one and 1 is none. ON BOTH CAMERAS check the following:

   - Check the camera/phone has enough space

   - Check the resolution of the video is set down to 30 frames / min & lower resolution for faster upload and better usage of space.

   - Make sure your phone is on airplane mode when you are recording.

   - Make sure to film and review one round of movements to check if your are fully in the frame of filming.

   - Lastly make sure to instruct your judge where to stand so they do not block the view from your camera.

5. Last But Not Least:

   Don’t Be Upset With The Results You Didn’t Get

   With The Work That You Didn’t Do.

   Accept Where You Are with your fitness levels, without giving yourself a discount. In your plan and your review after the workout be realistic and honest with yourself and ask your self how has training been going? Did this performance reflect the work that I have been putting into my training, recovery and nutrition.

   Have you have been training hard, working on weaknesses from last year every week, hitting your workouts with intention

   - or did you just come of holidays been going to the gym 2-3 times a week, cursing the workouts and started working on our double unders again last week?

If this helped you please share and tag me on Instagram, with the open just around the corner maybe one of your friends could benifit from this too!

Make sure to sign up HERE and ENJOY putting yourself under the pressure and TESTING your fitness.

Remember, this is the time of year to celebrate where you are at, and figure out what you need to work on before next year.

Take it from me - no matter how fit you are, the work never ends and we never stop wanting to get better 🙂

Any questions, shoot me a message on Instagram as well