crossfit Archives - CrossFit Armidale

A recent trend on social media, with ‘influencers’ has been to bark the way of consistency.

It isn’t about what you do, or how you do it, but that you do it consistently.

And hey, I agree with them, mostly because I have been saying this for my almost 17 years now in the fitness industry.

I see the internet ‘gurus’ saying things like, ‘so someone recently asked what is the secret to losing weight/gaining muscle/being successful?’ and the trend of late has been to say, stick with it!

Are the ‘Influencers’ right?

Now I won’t bullshit you, people aren’t asking them that, and they aren’t answering those Qs, they are just playing the algorithm to get likes. But I digress.

They are correct with that answer, doing a little thing each and every day will add to big things. It really is no different to a river winding its way to the ocean, it erodes rocks and boulders by consistently flowing down to the sea. Sure occasionally there is a flood and, well we can see the results of that and the devastation after yeah? Can you see where I am going here???

To get big results quickly it is a massive upheaval! You have to change everything all at once to wash those boulders down to the ocean, and then you are left with the clean up!

The MESH model has come about through me looking at the most important factors for our health and wellbeing. Now to improve we have to be consistent with our attention to these four things. We have to maintain consistency with our efforts in these areas. Sudden bursts in one area will leave others floundering.

Personal Experiences

I am going to relay a personal experience of mine in regards to this.

Can anyone recall 2020 and a few little events that happened there??

Well for a few years prior to that I trained to be a borderline, amateur, recreational athlete in CrossFit. I was doing a couple of sessions most days, I was really watching my food and well, my performance demonstrated this dedication to the sport. Each year in the CrossFit Open I would crawl my way up the leaderboard! It was fun, but oh it was hard work!

So then 2020 happens, I take my focus off my training and put it into survival of the gym. Realistically, I could have done both, I really could have, others did, I just chose a path that placed me down the order of priorities.

What happened first?

So the first thing to go for me was consistency with my food.

Nutrition should be the foundation of all of this, the solid ground that everything else is built. I sometimes would skip meals, chose takeaway much more regularly than before, and sought comfort in alcohol as well.

Next came the inconsistencies in my training. I did a lot of cleans and handstand push ups, well, because I like them, and a lot of other stuff got left by the wayside. I also would some weeks only do two sessions in the week. That is a huge drop off from doing a couple of sessions a day at times only a few months before.

Then it was with work, I used to write and email out quite regularly, I even had a column in the now defunct Armidale Independent. This too, went by the wayside.

So, the CrossFit Open, some people will say, ah why waste your money, I can do the workouts for free, or at a non affiliate, I just won’t put my score online. Yeah, you can, and well, you can then collate your scores etc and see how you fare each year, but I would rather pay someone to do that.

The Results

So here are my results, from all of the Open competitions since going into the masters category. Now with the percentiles shown, the closer to 100, the better.

2016- 84th Percentile

2017- 91st

2018- 91st

2019- 85th

2020- 76th

2021- 68th

2022- 78th

2023- 77th

2024- 78th

In 2019 to 2021 I had a lot of things I let get in the way of being consistent.

And my results here showed that.

From 2016 to 2018 I trained really hard and you can see that I worked up to some decent performances. 2019 to 2021 there was one thing really lacking, consistency.

In 2021 I began to find joy in exercise again, I started to remember that training a few days a week was fun, and injuries and stiffness and soreness subsided with some decent consistency.

And then this year to make the quarterfinals, I put it down to one thing. Consistency.

For the last two and half years or so I have done CrossFit, here at CFA, with everyone else in the classes and I have managed a gradual climb up the leader board.

I didn’t chop and change programs, I stuck to ours, I did a few extra runs, or the odd lifting session that you could count on one hand as extras here and there to refine some technique.

But this was it, I just stuck to the CFA program here, because I know it works. I know that I can get the most out of your three or four hours a week that you dedicate to yourself and I put it into practice myself.

Being consistent with your Movement, Eating, Sleep, and Headspace work is the biggest thing you can do to make massive improvements in all areas of your life.

Hyping It Up

It might sound like I am overhyping what we do here at CFA but I don’t just have a belief what we do works, I see it, day in day out.

My results there show you what can be done with just a bit of consistency. There are more case studies here at the box day in day out that will show you too.

If you are ready to start taking control of those areas of your life and want the same consistency that others here already have, hit me up for a FREE intro and we will sit down and see if we have what you need to get you there.

Wed 20/5/2020

A few years back I was confronted with sleepless nights, with concern, with stifling anxiety, and depression was playing ridiculous games with me in among all that.

But I came through that and while I did CrossFit Armidale became bigger, stronger.

Now in 2020 we have been dealt probably the most difficult set of circumstances in business I have ever seen.

It has allowed me to see things from a different perspective.

I could do without the sleepless nights and ridiculous nausea and butterflies that come with the anxiety right now. But it has let me see what I was doing wrong. Where I had lost myself.

For a good portion of the last five or six years I was happily going about being a business owner. I was doing the accounting stuff, the government reporting, the marketing, the liaising with other businesses, the learning, the programing, the cleaning, the tidying up loose ends, the staff meetings, the vision work, the admin tasks, the marketing, and, well, anything else that popped up along the way.

When I started writing that down I realised how thinly I was spreading myself. In the last six months or so I began coaching a few sessions at different times and I began to remember why I had gotten into this. Why I wanted to help people. Now the thing with business is that cash flow is its lifeblood, but the main thing for that is the relationships with the people. I know now I stuffed up in a few places here, I was too worried about the bottom line and keeping afloat than I was about the important things.

At times I got out of my lane. And even though I had the best intentions in mind for people I more than likely came across as the villain in their story. If any of you are reading this, I am truly sorry I ever did anything to hurt you, because I try to live by, be good, do no harm. So while I never intend to harm anyone, I do understand that my actions can and more than likely have. So again, I am truly sorry to anyone that I have had that effect on.

So what am I getting at here?

I have made mistakes, yeah, more than a few. At times I have lost sight of who I am and have not been the most honest with myself, which in turn leads to misleading others. This period in time has showed me that I needed to take a lot more personal responsibility again.

My health, my relationships, my work, my business, my social responsibilities, I needed to get back to them and be responsible for them. I Make my own destiny to a degree, sure, things like global pandemics are outside my control, and that can feel bloody overwhelming, but I can control how I react to these scenarios.

I have remembered we aren’t in high school anymore, people won’t pick on you because you aren’t in the popular crowd, they won’t desert you when you are at your lowest, and you will be able to pick yourself up and go again.

Something I have helped other people with that I had forgotten was that people are seldom out to get you, they are just trying to look after themselves and those they love. Look there are the odd narcissistic sociopaths out there that will do shit to try to bring you down, but they are the exception to the rule. So for me I was forced to get away from the box, and with that I realised that I needed to be what I set out to be back in 2007, and that is a guide and coach.

I have started doing one on one coaching calls with people and it has emphasised how much we need that contact, we need to feel a part of something that is more than just us. And we do truly love when someone guides us and helps us be accountable for our actions, especially if those actions are leading us to be better people overall. Physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually.

So this means that for me there have been, and now, will be more changes. I have seen where I was going wrong, and I know what I need to do to rectify it.

My actions are mine and mine alone. I choose where I want to go and what I want to do.

I never set out to be a business owner. Why? Because it always seemed so damn impersonal, businesses owners were portrayed as greedy, pretentious people that had forgotten where they came from. I just wanted to help people.

So yeah, I had forgotten where I had come from. I forgot what I wanted to be and what helped the most.

I am a CrossFit affiliate, a CrossFit coach.

I am CrossFit Armidale.

And if you want to be a part of that, if you want that to be part of your story, come with me, I will show you the way.