UWS Write up from a coaching and organizers view. So, after a crazy weekend of competition and a week to get back in to the swing of things I have finally managed to sit down and write up about UWS 2014. I’ll get to the event side of things but firstly I would like to write as a coach. A very proud coach of the 6 teams we had from our various boxes. Our competitors get the rough end of it. They get Dean and myself running around hectically for the build-up months to UWS. The programming got tough and we weren’t always there to oversee personally but I just want to say a big well done to you guys. You stuck with it and our plan came together. You trusted us and I honestly felt you guys were in top shape going in. Thank you for dealing with our schedules. We had 3 teams from Durbs, 2 from DBN and 1 team from our newest box DBN West. Our placings were Team Zero – 32nd - Durbs West Mustangs – 60th – DBN West DBN Wolves – 62nd - DBN Viciously Delicious – 75th - DBN RCFD Trojans – 103rd - Durbs Team Sasquatch – 116th – Durbs We had a great first day with 4 of our teams in the top 5 for the swim event which held them in good stead for the rest of the weekend. Unfortunately some of the events on day 1 played havoc with some team members which meant they went in to day 2 with a man down or below par. Placings for the swim were 1st – Team Zero - Durbs 2nd – DBN Wolves - DBN 3rd The News Team – CrossFit Fetish 4th – Viciously Delicious - DBN 5th – West Mustangs - West Day 2 saw the teams get back to work with more traditional CrossFit movements. The max cluster and AMRAP thruster wod had initially been an event a number of our team members were dreading. Weights were outside of their normal and in cases more than their old 1 rep max. BUT as with these things they adapted in the build-up weeks and all got involved. In fact event 5 which was the 100s and 50s wod was also out of reach of some 2 months out but again they all worked the weaknesses and it actually became an ok event for most of the teams. Stand out for me (I maybe missed bits due to judging) were seeing Debs and Sam hit the pistols, Warren Peechey hitting multiple bar muscle ups and pretty emotional heats from Sasquatch, Trojans and Mustangs as they each had team members out. We had 5 teams make the first cut for event 6. Emotions ran high as Mustangs could only go as far as the second male due to injury but amazingly their work up to that point saw them make day 3 in 60th. Team zero also made the cut for day 3. Event 7 the burpee/deadlift ladder just blew my mind and watching our girls and guys hit that workout near brought me to tears. Such heart! Team Zero made the cut for event 8 and performed out of the socks to finish that wod in 27th and the week end in 32nd. The support our guys got was incredible and we thank you for making the effort to come and support. On a personal level I have just been so proud of everyone and how they have progressed in the training up to competition. These things can either make or break a person and we are fortunate everyone has taken it positively and from all accounts everyone is even keener to push the limits. Respect! Organisation Now, from an organiser’s perspective. I felt the weekend went off very smoothly. We were lucky with the weather somewhat on Friday but it got the better of us on Saturday. Luckily we had the tent and it was incredible to see people still filling the stands even with the rain coming down. I need to say a special mention to a few people who really allowed UWS to operate so well. To my wife Jen and Sarah in our office, thank you so much. They dealt with ALL of the registrations, parq’s, indemnities and anything else that cropped up. You cannot believe to imagine the admin that goes with 720 competitors and they worked late nights and weekends to make sure everything ran so well. There were a lot of comments about how the admin side of things ran so smoothly and it’s down to these girls. To Lauren, Dean’s wife who dealt with the online waivers and updates – thank you. Again everything synced well and allowed for smooth registration and admin. Jen Stephens and her daughter– without a doubt the most smooth scoring updates to date in any year of UWS. Jen also dealt with the judges and acted as a buffer between heats. Late nights over the weekend and all out of willingness to get involved. Reebok, were incredible this year. No one really knows their involvement but they did a shed load of work organising seating, tent to name a few things. To Xite who without them we wouldnt have had the kit for the weekend. It’s a huge ask and cost to supply kit for an event of this size and we are extremely privileged to have them work with us. RxIt ran an incredible scoring system and were on hand whenever we needed them to update or change anything. Real professionals. MD Chiro provided great support for the athletes over the weekend and I heard great feedback from athletes. The divers from the pool. They gave us a hell of a deal and having them there made for a much safer environment. BrandBoom did an incredible job of filming and live streaming the weekend. I’m not a techy but form all accounts it was pretty special and was a nice touch for those not able to make the trip Now to my opinion on the weekend! We learn year on year with this and other events. This year I learned to just relax. Each year we have used an offsite venue to run elements that will test CrossFitters outside of the normal stuff we do. This year we really pushed the boat and took a risk with Mother Nature to run the beach and pool day. We were smashed with bad weather leading in to the weekend and I actually didn’t care. Obviously I cared about what else we would do but it was out of my hands. We made a few changes due to the risk of rain and the day ran perfectly. This alone taught me to just run with it. We make a plan, always! As with all CrossFit competitions we utilize kind and caring members of our gyms to help judge, score, move kit around and generally allow the rest of us to enjoy the weekend. OPT mentioned that out of 10 workouts you must plan for one to not go your way with judging etc. I would go as far to say you must just deal with every rep. I had a conversation with someone over the weekend and it came to me as I told them. Just think about the number of repetitions everyone does over 9 workouts. EVERY team member will have got caught on a few bad reps and gotten away with a few. It WILL even itself out over the weekend. There will always be human interpretation of everything in life. I felt we did well in making the movements more uniform and easier to judge. I felt the judging standards were high and in most cases the teams were respectful of their judges and their calls. I unfortunately was so involved with the arena and judging that I failed to pay enough attention at times to the warm up area. Personally I thought we had enough in place and it would take care of itself. I was wrong and I learn from that. We had people congregating in the area that weren’t warming up which made the area crowded. I felt we had enough kit for the area but needed a bit more space. The rain didn’t help us as people started to use the warm up area for cover. Not much we can do about the weather. For future events it will be a more targeted area. My mind naturally goes to making sure the arenas are running perfectly but we need to assign someone specific to the warm up area. With an ever increasing number of affiliates popping up our challenge will be accommodating our faithful as well as the new breed that come through. We are already in plans for 2015. I felt this was a best year yet. The build-up was less frantic even with more competitors. We are learning all the time how to deal with organisations and when to off load specifics to more experienced people in that field. The weekend ran incredibly well. We were on time pretty much all weekend and even with a small hick up at the final we still finished on time.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 13:36:41 +0000
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