You want me to pull what up?

Pull me up? Like, by my own strength? That's not going to happen.

And so began my foray into crossfit.

Truth be told, I've been curious about this cult-like fitness explosion for some time. The  people I know who partake, swear by it. The people I know who oppose it, swear against it. Where does this leave the people like me, no strong opinion, but a desire for a high and tight(ish) bod?

Back my good old days in Madison I had reached out to a few of the local crossfit boxes. Generally run out of oversized storage unit-like spaces, the rates seemed astronomical (still do) and the trainers intimidated the shit out of me. So I never took the proverbial plunge and tried it. Also, I should mention, I love me some carbs and sugar, which seems to be against crossfit's very being, so there's that.

In moving to Minneapolis I was talking with a my (only Minneapolis) friend's boyfriend who had just recently started crossfit at Tangletown Crossfit. I was shocked when I saw him because his pants were literally falling off him. After his intro month of 3x a week beginner crossfit classes, and "eating healthy," he had noticeably trimmed down. I was further convinced to test the waters when he told me about the all female trainers at his box. Ok, fine, I'll go to a free intro class.

On Monday I went to my intro class with the owner, Darcy, who according to her online bio is a runner and former competitive triathlete. I can dig that. She was super friendly via email and made it not entirely scary to come in. After a quick tour around the storage unit box, I was put to work.

Warm Up.

400m jog. Got this. BAM.

Pulls Ups. Here, use the fatty band to launch yourself up there. Nope. Ok, jump just enough to get yourself up, and control the down. I suppose if you ignore my flailing limbs, I accomplished the later. But it wasn't pretty. And that set of 10reps, made me want to die.

Ring Dips. Er, maybe we'll start with ring holds. Ahhh, maybe if we create a bouncy sling with the fatty band you'll be able to hold yourself up. Yep, that did. I found this one frustrating though, because given stationary surfaces, I can do tricep holds and dips. Rings? Not so much.

These first two exercises took me so long I missed the double-unders and push ups of the day's warm up. Oops.

WOD (workout of the day). Grace: 30 Clean & Jerks. Have you Olympic Lifted before? Nope, but I took weight training in high school. 13 years ago. Heh. In that case, here's a completely weightless piece of PVC pipe for you to practice with. And so with my PVC pipe in hand, I learned just how uncoordinated I really was. Good god, it was entertaining.  After 15 or so minutes working on my form and the general movement, I was upgraded to the baby bar, 11lb mini-weight bar, to start to get serious. After another 5 or so minutes, I even got to put weight on the baby bar. 10 whole pounds.

Then she programed a giant stop watch on the wall (not intimidating at all), circled us all up (also not intimidating), and told us to get ready for the WOD (wait, the last 20mins wasn't a part of it?!). Shit.

And the clock started.  Apparently the goal is to complete the WOD as quickly as possible, 12mins being the max. This is where my inability to multitask was truly tested because not only did I have to attempt to remember all of the steps and proper form of the clean & jerk, but I had to count. And move quickly. Heh. Right. I finished the WOD...as the clock hit 12 minutes. That's right. My 21lb baby bar and I took the full 12mins to do 30reps. Granted, I was focused so hard on doing them correctly, I didn't count the ones that weren't correct. So in all fairness, I probably did more like 45-50. But who's counting (not me, obviously)?

The real humiliation was when Darcy, who's a TOTAL MILF btw, walked over to the giant dry erase board and added my name, time and weight to the list. Really? Was that necessary? I'm not even a paying member.

And that concluded my first ever crossfit attempt. As I type this, four days later, it still hurts to lift my arms over my head. And my triceps damn near explode anytime I push off them. But whatever.

Would I go back? Absolutely. Everyone was really friendly and encouraging. And despite my complete lack of coordination and strength, I had a good time. I left feeling thoroughly worked over (still do).

Can I afford to go back? Nope, not so much. Turns out there's a serious downside to funemployment. Womp womp womp.