San Francisco CrossFit Throwdown

Bill and I get comfortable on the field after finishing our heat.

Another month, another affiliate cup throwdown. On one of the most beautiful days the Bay Area has seen, we had the immense good fortune to go to one of the most beautiful places in the Bay Area (Crissy Field) and lug heavy shit around. It was a fabulous day.

16 folks from CFEB showed up, which allowed us exactly four teams of four. SFCF was very cagey with the details of the workout, so we had to have our teams picked out AND signed up in advance. Nobody wanted the first slot, but my team volunteered to go second (I like just getting it over with, though there is something to be said for learning from the experience of previous teams). My team consisted of Bill, Jennifer, Doron and myself. We had about 10 minutes of prep time between when they told us the announcement and when we had to go (they released a new team every minute, making this the all-time shortest throwdown I've ever seen).

Here was the workout:

Two-man sled drag, ~150 pounds
One-man zercher pipe carry, ~60 pounds
One man rest

Drag the sled .3 miles. Everyone on the team does 30 burpees. Drag the sled back. The catch? The pipe (they were yellow and affectionately dubbed "french fries") can never, EVER touch the ground, or else incur a 20-burpee penalty for the whole team, and every team member must drag, carry and rest at least twice.

15:04 RX

We acquitted ourselves well, I think. Nowhere near the best times, obviously (the top time was 11:20), but somewhere around the middle of the pack. Everyone was worried about the zercher carry, but it really wasn't THAT bad - and there was always someone to hand it off to in case of trouble. The real pain was the sled - that got tiring FAST, and we really should have switched off more frequently, as fresh legs made a BIG difference in keeping that thing moving. Our burpees were also not terribly fast. It was a fun workout, and a nice change of pace from the weight-lifting orientation of the other gyms. My personal hunch is that the Games are going to be more like this.

Gita and Polly dragging the sled. Team A came in sixth place, with a time of 12:20 (I think)

Afterwards, we grabbed lunch (Blue Barn - one of the best salads I've ever had) and headed over to Rodeo Beach across the Golden Gate, one of Gita's favorite spots (it's where Sandra got married). The place had a good amount of people, but it wasn't terribly crowded, and (since this is what we do), we decided to go for a hill run. Nobody kept time or marked distance, it was very casual, but we figure it was about a mile, and pretty damn steep (several sections were stairs). Truth be told, I found that to be much more tiring than the throwdown. I tried to run as much of it as I could, but wound up walking quite a bit and came in third - WELL after Brandon and Gita. We admired the vista from the top of our hill, then about half the folks ran back down. I hate running downhill - it stresses my knees and makes me nervous - so I walked back down at a leisurely pace with Rebecca, Ynez and Max. Then we had about an hour of lying on the beach in the sun, which was totally great. That night we had the victory dinner for Polly's qualifications to go to the Games, so it was a day almost entirely spent with the CFEB family, and it was fantastic.

Team CFEB at SFCF