Posts Tagged ‘hdc’
Open Drama
Wow. Just…wow. Quite a bit of strum un drang around the 2013 CrossFit Open, eh? Says here it’s really nothing new, the drama and the controversies. Re-runs of stuff from Games of yesteryears, just playing on more screens and viewed by more people who have more time on their hands than sense in their heads.
Yah…I just went there.
What’s got so many panties in a bunch? Let’s see. Everyone who has a great score must be a cheater. Of if they didn’t cheat they surely must be using PED’s of some sort. This canard took flight in Games 3 when a qualifier was first put into play. Funny, though, that you never hear this coming from any of the athletes who are likely to rock the Regionals (check out Freddy Comacho on FB, for example. No whining from that 3 times Games competitor). Seems there are a whole lotta folks shooting off their fingertips before they shoot off any neurons; if the mere possibility has somehow crept into THEIR head, well then, it must be a dead-on FACT. Because they just know, ya know?. Never mind that year after year it all just seems to work out even though year after year the Games grow bigger, change, and improve. Anybody think someone who should have been in the top 15 in any Regional got bumped out by a cheater last year? Really?
What else? Oh yeah, fairness. It’s not fair. Somehow, somewhere, someone at HQ is just out there doing stuff that’s…that’s…unfair. There’s a conspiracy here. Really. Gotta be. Just because someone has a limited frame of reference regarding what it takes to pull off something as audacious as an Open competition with >150,000 entrants, surely they know all the better than the rest of us. And the newer they are to CrossFit the better they know. Naturally. To be fair there are some folks who sincerely try to follow all the rules, do their very best in that effort, and for whatever reason they mess up. That’s truly a bummer. I really mean that. But how do you do anything other than invoke a strict enforcement of the rules for everyone, regardless of sincerity in the mess-up? How do you measure fairness if you allow even a bit of color into a black and white process? Fair tends to be hard.
Which brings me to the most important part of this whole harangue: there are real, live people involved here. Just like you. Just like him. And her. People who are trying their best on all sides of every issue. Doing the workout. Judging the workout. Administering the Open. Watching literally thousands of videos. And not for nuthin’, reading all of the vitriol being vomited through cyberspace and befouling our little corner of the planet. Listen, I’m no pollyanna. I know there really are a tiny few people who are trying to get over. They really deserve all the venom you can dispense. But it’s rare. There really aren’t that many of them, and they always seem to do something to draw attention to themselves. Have at ’em. My pleasure.
For everyone else, though, let’s have a little perspective. Expand your frame of reference to include the notion that it really IS fair. That almost no one is trying to cheat. That even the very best athletes are approaching this in almost the same way as you and I, as a challenge to be met. An opportunity to participate in the collective, the community of our CrossFit. That every PERSON is doing his or her best to put forth something that they can be proud of. Something that will put a smile on the face of a Brother or Sister CrossFitter. Every athlete. Every judge. Every HQ staff member. YOU.
Stop. Think. There’s a CrossFitter on the other end of your post.