After four years of doing CrossFit, I’ve learned a lot of things, including what I can’t do and what I can do, as well as what I shouldn’t do.
The main key to longevity at CrossFit is doing what you can do, and that’s it.
This means if you are injured and one move exacerbates your injury, don’t do it! Even it it’s programmed in a CrossFit WOD or a CrossFit competition. You’re allowed to scale.
Scaling in CrossFit
Furthermore, it’s okay to do your own thing. You know what you need to work on, so just because a move is programmed doesn’t mean you have to do it. Too many of us are followers at times.
Even at a CrossFit competition.
At my last CrossFit competition, chest to bar pull ups were programmed from a dead hang. I can’t do 21 chest to bar pull ups from a dead hang, so I told the judge I was just going to do pull ups. She told me, “Well, I can’t let you move on until you do them.”
I looked at her and said, “That’s okay. I’ll move on without you then.”
And that’s what I did. And she moved on with me. What else was she going to do? Stand there by herself? I was in last place. It didn’t matter.
My point is do what you feel you can do in that moment on that day and who cares what everyone else is doing. If you push yourself to do moves you can’t do or that you are too tired to do, you will only injure yourself and thus will stall your CrossFit workouts.
And if you’re not careful, that vicious cycle can continue, leaving you frustrated and apt to quit CrossFit.
Listen to your body. It’s your workout. Your needs. And on one else’s.
My Journey to the CrossFit Games 