Y'all, I Did Crossfit And Did Not Die

Tried something new yesterday: crossfit.

My sentiments of the evening.

When I agreed to go, I did not realize how tough of a workout this was. I know it  was a challenging workout, but I honestly didn't know to what degree.

Sadly, I agreed to this workout with the same flippancy I did when I agreed to run my first half marathon. Let me just say, I was not as worn out after the half marathon as I was this nearly 20-minute workout. Wish I was joking about that, but I'm not.

Fred, a member of our local running group, has been doing this program for several months, and a few of us were intrigued so we went to check it out. Actually, Chris - the head of our running group, was intrigued and roped a couple of us in to suffer with join him.

I fully admit to being naive. That won't happen again.

During the day, I slowly began to worry how much this was going to hurt me as I told a few of my Twitter running and fitness friends what I was doing. They said final rites wished me luck.

Then as we drove done to do the workout, I asked Fred if we were going to die.

Fred's response: "uhhhhhh ..."

Not going to lie, I wanted out right at that point. But I wasn't driving and it would've been a 15-mile run home in the summer heat, so I decided to just suck it up and deal with it.

The group we were meeting with is affiliated with Trinity Fitness, a faith-based fitness group. They meet at a church where all the fitness equipment is available for the workouts in the gym.

Class began with a brief devotional, and then it was go time.

Following a warm-up jog and stretches, we did a skill workout which was 3 sets of 7 of ring dips. Nearly all of the group avoided the rings and did these dips on boxes. Being a novice with very little upper body strength, I did them on the 20-inch boxes. A set of 7 doesn't sound very hard, but I was feeling through rep No. 5 on my first set.

After that, the torture fun commenced!

The workout consisted of a 400-meter run followed by 30 reps of push-ups, squats, lunges, sit-ups, sprawls, back extensions and mountain climbers. After all that, another 400-meter capped things off.

Being a runner, the first 400-meter run was no biggie. It is what I do after all. I started off with the push-ups, which I stink at, and then did the squats, back extensions and lunges. I saved the sit-ups, sprawls and mountain climbers for last and did them in 3 sets of 10 to mix it up ... and to help me survive.

It was during the first set of sprawls (which by the way are burpees without the push-up) I began feeling the workout. My thighs were sore already. My body had been pushed harder than it had been in some time.

Having made it through all the various exercises and reps, I headed out for the final 400-meter run. Arguably one of the slowest runs ever, and I was glad it was only 400 meters.

My time for the workout: 19 minutes, 12 seconds.

And I felt like I just finished a marathon.

Afterward, like true idiots, we went to a local state park where Chris wanted to show us a good trail to run. It's only .7 of a mile long, and we were glad for that. We ran a mile in total, taking us 11:56 to do so. Absolutely the hardest mile I've run.

And yet, I want to go back for more.

I know crossfit will only make me stronger and fitter. It can only help improve my running.

Have you done crossfit? What are you thoughts about it? What do you like about? Doesn't it hurt so good?

If you've not done crossfit, I recommend it. It's a great change of pace and a good barometer to see how fit your really are.

Happy Running crossfitting!