This started as a blog about training together as a family, in part to inspire other women & families to get involved. As female participation in jiu jitsu has increased, as we have grown as athletes and as we learned that families training together aren’t such an anomaly, the blog has evolved. Jen gets personal with posts on ambition, challenges & achievements in BJJ, CrossFit & with nutrition, while Tom's posts are more educational, informative and analytical in regards to training. On occasion you may hear from the kids.

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Success in showing up?

by Jen

I haven't posted for a month! Work has been particularly stressful and the stress continues to spill into other areas of my life, including training. I half jokingly told Tom that I feel like I'm hitting my mid-life crisis.

In early July I arrived back to the gym from vacation to learn that I would be competing in a CrossFit competition that weekend. I had less than a week to prepare, and unfortunately, my vacation menu wasn’t conducive to competition preparation. The competition was called Partner Pandemonium and my partner, Andy, and I were one of 6 teams from our CrossFit box to participate. Andy's a beast (that's a compliment) so my main goal was to not disappoint him. We didn't place, but we did well.

Our judge for our first of three WOD's was one of our former trainers, Christine. It was helpful to have her at my side yelling at me to keep moving. I asked her to yell -the yelling pushes me when my mind and body tell me that there is nothing left. (So if you see me losing steam at a tournament, and you're not cheering for my competitor, please yell at me.)

BJJ training has been brutal. I have been preparing for the Florida BJJ Federation tournament this weekend. But grrrrr, I'm just not feeling the fire of competition. These days my lousy attitude has been that "my success is in showing up." I am quickly realizing that this isn't enough. I can tell as I find myself stuck on the bottom, thrown around the mat, and leave feeling discouraged and questioning if I'm too old for this stuff.

I'm hoping that the spirit of competition awakens in me soon, especially by Saturday morning. Hopefully the success won't just be in showing up. The spirit did emerge briefly at the CrossFit competition. I spent the morning questioning why I agreed to compete and looking for excuses to get out of it. But I felt the rush once I arrived and fed off of the competitive energy in the room. I miss that feeling and hope it awakens in me again soon.


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CrossFit ATP's Partner Pandemonium Competition Team

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Me with my partner, Andy

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Christine "yelling" at me during the brutal 100 m walking lunge portion of WOD 1

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The BJJ team came out to cheer me on

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Me with my BJJ girls!
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