Dottir

by Katrin Davidsdottir

  I have arranged my life in a way that allows me to block distractions and keep my focus on training to be the best in the world 365 days a year. Still, it’s different at the Cape. We can take that lifestyle and multiply it. This is our version of Rocky in Russia. It’s an opportunity for Ben to tailor every hour of every day to tweaking areas of personal weakness that could help me succeed at the Games.

  From sunup to sundown, we operate in a vacuum and immerse ourselves in training. Long-term this would be a formula for burnout. For a month, however, it’s the main ingredient to our secret sauce. Members of our team push pause on their personal lives to focus on the holistic process that has led to our success over the course of the previous nine months.

  We train all year with the intention of peaking at the Games. It’s no use to peak during the Open or Regionals. The Games are where everything needs to come together. The ax has been sharpened. Now we want it to split a strand of hair.

  Many of the improvements we see come in the form of work capacity. But the largest gains arguably come in mind-set. Here, digging into that pursuit of excellence is the difference maker. When we wake up in the morning, we contemplate reading selections that Ben has given us; they focus on the mind-set that lends itself to greatness. We put a lot of time into examining why we are working so hard, what’s important to us as people, and what kind of changes we want to make in our lives. We focus on our core values and we share them in a very intimate and vulnerable way. We are constantly calibrating our True North: the guiding set of principles upon which we base all our decisions and actions.

  Some exercises may seem gimmicky, but I believe they give me an edge in competition. If you know who you are and why you’re doing what you’re doing, you will have an easier time digging deep in the fourth round of a five-round workout. If you have ultimate belief in something, you have higher purpose. If you have higher purpose, you are able to accomplish amazing things. It’s easy to quit something as hard as the CrossFit Games, especially without a firm grounding in why you are working so hard.

  At the Cape, I shared a roof with Cole Sager and—for the first time in 2016—Brooke Wells. We are starkly different athletes but benefit from hearing the feedback Ben gives to each of us. Ben calls it “the overlapping effect,” and it happens whether he’s giving technique advice or critiquing a lapse in mind-set. What he tells one athlete can resonate with all of us.

  Living in a small house with other world-class athletes under Ben’s constant tutelage makes excellence the norm. When I’m at home, there are external pressures. Although I’ve done a good job of surrounding myself with people who are helping me work toward my goals, they can still be distracting. Even the mental pressure I put on myself to be present for a birthday party or participate in a get-together can steal time from training. On the Cape, there is no pressure to be anywhere else. The focus can be placed squarely on myself and what I need to work on. When living, breathing, and training like a champion is all you do, it becomes your version of normal.

  Ben will tell you training is the easy part. Programming workouts to challenge our bodies is easy, but training us to recognize the thoughts that will make us successful is far more difficult. We spend a great deal of time there. We talk about what we are focusing on, what we want for ourselves. We do things I had never associated with training before in order to accomplish that. Ben creates a binder that acts as a syllabus for our month. We focus on a vision and what it looks like, and we watch videos that solidify messages.

  We will incorporate worksheets that pose deep and direct questions, then go spend an hour with ourselves to reflect on our answers. I thought about Amma often. Talking about it was the last thing I wanted to do at first. I was scared of my reaction, and I worried how others would react. It made me feel guilty for two reasons. The first was that I felt that by not talking about her, I ran the risk of forgetting her. The other was simply that she deserved to be recognized. I wanted to tell stories about her and share her light with the world. It took me a very long time, but eventually—only recently—I have started challenging myself to speak about her. I’ve started to find it therapeutic, and it makes me happy to think and speak more about her.

  My grandmother’s death is the single biggest adversity I have ever faced and I needed to wrestle with my feelings. I can find a positive takeaway in nearly anything else. But not this. I will never make sense of this loss. I felt an empty disregard for everything around me. I missed my best friend, as I’m sure I will continue to do every single day for the rest of my life.

  Any time I wanted to quit, thoughts of how much Amma had supported my goals kept me going. I thought about her looking down on me, probably cheering her head off. I know she would want me to continue following my dreams. She would want me to do even better. Amma was a large part of my “Why?”

  With a strong grounding in my purpose, I can suffer through almost anything. Our mental exercises at the Cape helped us understand our purpose. Self-knowledge allows instinct to take over in competition. When it gets hard—in the last thirty seconds of a workout, or in the middle of a ten-rounder—the answer for why you are working so hard will dictate what you do next. Stomp the gas, or hit the brake. Anyone who has trained hard for something knows what I mean.

  Ben can help with this, but he can’t take the field with me. Once you leave the warm-up area, you can’t rely on your coach. The ability to dig deep has to be grounded inside of you.

  Cementing these concepts was done in the gym, not just the classroom. As has been the case in my life, the most impactful lessons often came on the heels of failure. When those failures presented themselves, Ben was masterful at jumping on the opportunity to teach. The most dramatic example of this involved Cole Sager, overhead squats, and muscle-ups.

  While the Cape is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been, the training environment is less refined than at CFNE. The bars aren’t great and the rings are different. There’s a degree of grit built into the training. I was already tired and not having a particularly great day to begin with and the workout of overhead squats and muscle-ups was not going well for me.

  Cole was just crushing me, literally just cruising while I was hanging on for dear life. The rings felt slippery in my hands. It was all-around awful and I wanted no more of it. When it was clear that Cole was going to lap me, I gave up on my effort. I put it into cruise control and let him pull away. I furiously stomped outside. I was basically throwing a silent fit. I was so disappointed in myself. Not because I had lost—that would have been fine. I had given up and everyone knew it.

  Ben followed me outside. I couldn’t even make eye contact as he began to speak.

  “Kat, this is gonna happen. It’s not always gonna be a wheelhouse workout.”

  In moments like this, Ben’s empathetic side shines through. You can tell he cares about his athletes. He wasn’t trying to embarrass me. He was excited to help.

  “Let’s say I gave you hang power cleans, handstand walks, and running. I know the look in your eye when I give you that workout. You are going to crush that workout. You’re going to be a tiger. You’re going to give everything you want to that workout.”

  He was right. At the mention of my dream workout I perked up, hopeful we might actually do that next. But then he revealed his punch line.

  “Then I’m going to give you a workout that’s overhead squats and muscle-ups and you reel it in. You don’t give it all you’ve got because you’ve convinced yourself that it’s not a great workout for you. I don’t care about the results. I know that’s Cole’s wheelhouse workout. I also know there will be workouts at the Games that you’re not going to win, but I want you to bring that same mind-set to the workouts that aren’t good for you.”

  He was right: This was going to happen, I knew that from my experiences in competition—both good and bad. There are countless times at the Games when you don’t feel good. There are times when things don’t line up as you want them to. Those are the
times when champions pull away from the pack. The ability to work hard and give everything when the deck is stacked against you is what we call “going green.” It’s a champion’s mind-set

  Ben turned what could have been our worst training session into a lesson. We used it to our advantage, and in fact we still talk about that day. I realize there are no such things as wasted days, if you use them to your benefit. This day could have ruined me mentally going into the Games. Instead it became a practice scenario that benefited me. Your response is what dictates the outcome of your situation.

  I learned that we always fight—regardless of if it’s our favorite event or not. We always give it our best.

  14

  WARRIOR

  BARDAGAKAPPI

  Think gold and never settle for silver.

  —JIM AFREMOW, THE CHAMPION’S MIND

  Friday nights have long been celebrated at the CrossFit Games. But I love Mondays the most. For me, that’s when it feels like everything really starts. We get our first chance to separate ourselves from the noise and distractions of fans, media, and coaches. We can catch up with old friends, meet fellow competitors, and get ready for the week to come.

  Monday is also the night of the athlete dinner, which has evolved since my rookie season, though the outline is the same. Tradition now dictates a revelation about how and when to expect the start of competition. The mood always begins on a lighter note. But when Dave Castro starts talking, we listen. In the months leading up to the Games, organizers will leak tidbits of information insufficient to formulate a plan. On this Monday night at the start of the 2016 Games, we filed off a Greyhound bus and into a fancy restaurant at nearby Hermosa Beach. Dave entered the room like a shot, then shushed us like a stern father preparing to deliver punishment.

  “This year is a special year for a number of reasons. Most notably we are celebrating the ten-year anniversary of the CrossFit Games,” he began. “I don’t always get excited for these announcements, but I am really, really excited for this one, and for what we have in store for you all this year.”

  With their quirky personalities, never-ending one-upmanship and surprises, the Games own a unique brand of pageantry. They ride the line between reality-show drama and science-class geeky. Announcements like this one can feel like a rose ceremony on The Bachelor. Events are kept secret—sometimes until the very last second—and announcements are drawn out and playful. At first, I thought the theatrics and secrecy were all gimmicks for the fans watching from home. But now I know they are tools Dave uses to test athletes’ mettle.

  In my fourth year as a Games athlete, I had finally stockpiled enough wisdom and experience to keep a cool head in the midst of Dave’s mental assault. I believed him that this year would be different, and I was ready for the challenge. There were no jitters like the ones I had experienced in my first two seasons. Tonight, Dave set the tone more aggressively than in years past. His words were carefully chosen and he presented them more as a warning than a welcome.

  “This is not a local competition,” he continued. “This is not the Regionals. This is not even like any of the previous CrossFit Games. This will be the most challenging year—physically and mentally—that you all will encounter at the CrossFit Games. This ten-year anniversary will push you to limits where you never thought you could go, and that you have never taken yourself.”

  I was more than unafraid. I was glowing as the words left his mouth. Dave promised that the athletes who succeeded this year would have to be masters of their bodies and minds. In my first two years at the Games, this speech would have shattered my confidence and sent my mind reeling. Now I was chomping at the bit.

  I had trained to thrive on adversity. The more brutal, torturous, and painful the weekend, the better my chances were of winning it all. Everything Dave said was music to my ears. I could hardly contain myself. I was smiling ear to ear. I want the Games to be as hard as possible. I want more adversity. I want more volume. I want the events to be more difficult. I thrive on that stuff. It’s where I can set myself apart.

  “There will be times this weekend when you’re gonna get really scared,” Dave continued, “where you’re not gonna want to be doing the stuff that we’re doing. You’re going to question what we’re doing and you’re going to question why you’re here.”

  Nothing makes me happier than hard work. It’s almost as if the worse I feel, the better I feel. I literally love when the workout gets hard and starts to hurt. The cue that tells others to take their foot off the gas pedal is my cue to go faster.

  “If at any point you feel unsafe or you’re questioning what we’re doing, please feel free to come up to me or one of my staff and say, ‘I don’t want to do this anymore.’ And we will gladly pull you out and make you comfortable. We will take you back to the bus and your competition will be over.”

  This was about to get real. I felt bad for the rookies. I remembered how scared I was my first year when Dave had delivered a speech that didn’t even compare to what we just heard.

  “If you’re not here to crush the people next to you and win the CrossFit Games,” he said, “then you should leave now.”

  I surveyed the room to see who might be second-guessing themselves.

  He went on to announce sparse details of the events we would face over the course of the week. There would be an ocean swim. This time, it was just a swim: 500 meters with the promise that there would be no surprises. I was hopeful my practice in open water at Cape Cod would be there on game day. Murph would make another appearance as well—this time partitioned into 5 rounds of 20 pull-ups, 40 push-ups, and 60 squats. We would also face a Squat Clean Pyramid that riffed on the snatch pyramid from Regionals earlier in the year.

  The athletes around me giggled or gasped. Some were furiously mashing the keyboards on their phones to share the events with their social media followers—perhaps hoping for some external reassurance that they would thrive in these events.

  When Dave was finished, he exited the building as fast as he had entered it. Dinner with Dave Castro is never dull, and we were all on edge after he had finished. We knew there was much more to come, and based on Dave’s statements, we suspected surprises could be around any corner. The bulk of the action at the Games focuses on the weekend, but any veteran athlete worth their salt makes no assumptions about when, where, or how the competition will start or stop. In other words, we keep our shoes tied. Some athletes even came to dinner in their uniforms—just in case.

  * * *

  The real surprise came the following night at a reception for the teams in the Manhattan Beach Marriott courtyard.

  After a brief outline of other challenges individuals and teams would face, Dave came through on his promise from Monday night.

  “We are meeting in the lobby tomorrow at 3:30 a.m. If you are not there at that time, the bus is leaving without you and your CrossFit Games are over.”

  We were ushered over to a hotel meeting room, where we were given a note.

  Athletes, Report to your assigned judges at 3:30 a.m. in the Marriott lobby. You must bring VALID PHOTO IDENTIFICATION.

  It went on to list gear and equipment Reebok had assigned us upon check-in, all of which we were to bring with us.

  “It’s a great year to be a veteran,” CrossFit analyst Pat Sherwood said. “Some of these rookies were walking around with saucer eyes, but the vets looked excited.”

  He was right. I was excited and relaxed. I knew I would perform well—as long as I could make it to the lobby on time. I’m not known for my punctuality, so Ben and O’Keefe were pounding on my door at 3:15 to make certain I was on time. When Dave greeted us in the hotel gym, I was still half asleep. I snapped out of it when he told us we would be getting on an airplane. We needed to make our bags ready for a flight. We wouldn’t be able to take food and our coaches would not be following us where we were headed. From the lobby, we loaded onto buses that took us to LAX. There was immediately widespread speculation about where we we
re going and what we would be doing once we got there. Eighty athletes, forty judges, and a handful of medical and support staff shuffled through the airport in our brightly colored uniforms. To an outsider, it must have looked like a school for Spartan warriors was going on vacation.

  The athlete liaison, Tim Chan, shouted our names one by one as he handed us boarding passes. When I received mine, I finally saw the destination: San Jose, California. I knew immediately we were headed to Aromas, the birthplace of the CrossFit Games. This was going to be unlike anything we had ever done. While other athletes stressed and speculated on what we would face, I settled into my seat and went to sleep. I was prepared, no matter what awaited us in Northern California.

  * * *

  When we got to Aromas, Dave announced that we were going to repeat the first two events of the 2009 Games: a 7K trail run through the surrounding hills followed immediately by a deadlift ladder. The finish order in the run would determine the starting order of the ladder—last place in the run would begin the deadlift ladder. The third event was a variation on what many of the most veteran athletes called the Games’ most punishing event. It features a sprint straight up the most prominent hill on the property.

  The town of Aromas is tiny: less than 5 square miles. As we drove from the airport along Highway 101 through California’s North Central Valley, the landscape was familiar. I had never been there before, but I had watched countless videos of former Games events. The landscape was mostly barren, but abrupt hills dotted with ancient and wiry oak trees stretched out on the left side of the bus.