Are you going to do the Open?

After the sudden and pretty aggressive changes to the CrossFit Games season, it seems that registration for the Open is down pretty significantly.

I’m not sure that this is a bad thing, though.

As a coach to people for whom CrossFit is a serious sport and to people for whom it’s simply a fitness program or a recreational activity, the conflation between “CrossFit for sport” and “CrossFit for fitness and fun” has long been a sore spot for me in my coaching.

Especially since the demands of CrossFit as a sport are so severe – I’ve seen a lot of people who have wanted to “participate” moreso than “win” end up going down some pretty negative physical and emotional paths based upon trying to play a sport at a high level that their lifestyle and (quite frankly) their genetics were not suited for.

If someone fully understands the trade-offs that they’re making and is happy to try to compete anyway, I’m ok with adults making decisions about what they want to prioritize in their lives.
But, I don’t want to create an environment at SLSC where people think that – in order to “do CrossFit” – they must compete.

So, with the changes to the season, I think the Open has now become much more of a “participation” activity for just about everyone doing it, since very few people have the illusion that they are going to either win their country or finish top 20 in the world.

Contrast this with the number of people who had an outside shot of making Regionals over the last several years – either as an individual or as a team member – who made themselves and everyone around them miserable for the 5 weeks of the Open.

As a gym owner and a coach, I’m thrilled that the Open doesn’t “matter” anymore more for almost all of the athletes that I work with.

And I’m thrilled that most of the people doing it are now in it for participation rather than winning.

So sign up if you fancy. Should be much less stressful than previous years. 🙂