So I woke up this morning (Wednesday the 30th) coughing, making it now day 20…

I thought that I would have been able to swim last night, that is how good I felt at lunch time. I get to the pool, change and write the workout up on the board, but once I have to start talking to my swimmers, my throat starts to close up again. So after getting them started and watching the first half of the main series, I go home again.

Monday afternoon was the last opportunity to attempt The Open 16.5, so after a morning at Leo’s Lekland I met up with a few others to see what I could do. This time there was no time cap, so the clock was not going to save me this time.

After judging and pushing Robert through his attempt, I decided that if I start I am going to finish.  My healthy goal time would have been 20 minutes, but today I would be happy going under 30 minutes.  I am paired up with Ian, and the clock counts down from 10,9,8,…2,1
My plan was to split up the Thrusters into 3 sets within each and unbroken burpees. When I get to 7 thrusters I feel great, I pause, but do not release the bar, then continue with 7 more. This time I drop the bar, wait 10-15 s then do 7 more.  For the Burpees I tried to take it easy as to not have my pulse fly off, so they take 5-7s each.  Time is around 4:33.

Start the 18’s with 3x 6 thrusters no problems. But as I start the burpees, my throat tightens up and it’s hard to breathe in, which after 6-8 burpees starts to give me a feeling that I am going to pass out every time I lay down. The 18’s take 5:47 and total time is now 10:20.

I was managed to keep my strategy with three sets and did the thrusters 3x 5, but again it was the burpees that slowed me down. I tried to not stop, but just keep moving, but I had to breathe through a towel, since the I felt it was the cold air in the box that was against me on top of my cold. I realize that I am more than half way through as i start the burpees, but it doesn’t help. The 15’s take 6:18 and my total time is now 16:38 and I am starting to wonder if 30 minutes is doable or if I will be fighting this WoD for 40+ minutes.

I wasn’t thinking straight any more, so instead of doing 3×4, I started with 6 thrusters, and then 2x 3. Three’s felt good, and I didn’t feel that I need to pause as much with threes. My burpees are slowing down, but still moving. The 12’s take 5:12 and I finally managed to do less reps faster 🙂 I think that feeling helped me push through the final 3 rounds, total time 21:52

The 9’s go as planed 3x 3 Thrusters, and in my mind I feel that I was able to hold a better pace with the burpees. and the 9’s only take 3:58 and my time is 25:50.  I start to feel the pressure to go under 30 minutes.

The 6’s are 2x 3 thrusters with a short pause between, and then 6 burpees which felt like I was back to my original pace from the 21’s. Mentally I am now on autopilot. I have no energy to finish, but these only take 2:32, with a total time of 28:22.

With the others in the box not letting me rest, I do 3 thrusters and 3 of the fastest bar facing burpees of the day, to land on the ground 40 seconds later for a total time of 29:02!

Clearly nothing to brag about, but I can not put The 2016 Open in the books, concentrate on getting healthy and working towards my summer challenges.

Final summary from the Open 2016 

16.1 – was a tough WoD for me because of the OH lunges and my back problems, but I was happy with my results.

16.2 – with the Double unders killed me.  I never had a chance to lift.

16.3 – was as close to a walk over as one can get. I worked for less than 20s of a 7 min AMRAP to get 10 34kg snacthes done.  I am no were near doing a Bar muscle up, but appearantly neither was 60% of the world 🙂

16.4 – Came at the start of my man cold. I was so looking fwd to Hand stand push ups, but because of my cold, I never got that far. But I am proud of myself, instead of just doing one deadlift, I struggled for 13 minutes and got in 104 reps. This one I plan on doing again in April/May when I am healthy.

16.5 – Still sick, but stubborn I gave it my all.  I will eventually redo this WoD as well.  I would love to go under 24 minutes, but I think 20 minutes is a realistic goal..

Masters Men 40-44 World Wide (total 20898)
16.1 10351 – 49,5%
16.2 10519 – 50.3%
16.3 8581 – 41.1%
16.4 10500 – 50.2%
16.5 9421 – 45,1%
Total: 8735  – 41.8%

Masters Men 40-44 Europe (2558)
16.1 1158 – 45.2%
16.2 1222 – 47.7%
16.3 1063 – 41.5%
16.4 1247 – 48.7%
16.5 1158 – 45.2%
Total: 1049 – 41%

Masters Men 40-44 Sweden (240)
16.1 142 – 59.1%
16.2 148 – 61.6%
16.3 131 – 54.5%
16.4 157 – 65.4%
16.5 149 – 62.1%
Total: 120 – 50%

Sweden is definitely a Crossfit country, when looking at how I place roughly 41% in both the World and Europe, but almost 50% in Sweden.