Guerilla Fitness

On October 18, 2011 I did something I’ve been considering doing for, probably the better part of 2 years, but never had the courage to try. I finally tried a Crossfit gym. Guerilla Fitness in Montclair, NJ to be precise. I didn’t walk into this totally blind, however, I wasn’t 100% sure what exactly I was getting myself in to. My friend Bridget Murphy and her husband Ray own a Crossfit gym in Atlanta. I would always read about it on her facebook, blog, and read any and all articles she posted. I always felt crossfit was WAY out of my exercise league. I remember reading one article in particular about a guy who thought, what’s the big deal with Crossfit? It can’t be THAT hard. He went to his local Crossfit, did the workout…and promptly threw up at the end of it. I’m guessing he went in cold and did like a super intensive version of every workout and I’m also guessing the trainers were purposly trying to get him to that breaking point. However, as I walked into my first fundamentals class on October 18, looked around and realized I was the only chick with five pretty fit dudes, the only thing I could think was “DO NOT THROW UP CRYSTAL!”

The first thing I appreciated about Crossfit was, as opposed to a typical gym, they don’t just take your money and throw you out there to figure it out. They have you take a two week fundamentals class to teach you how to do everything they’re going to ask of you, and they teach you how to do it right. The second thing that struck me about Crossfit is the community. I have NEVER seen a group of strangers band together the way the Crossfit community does. For a while I thought, maybe Bridget & Ray just have a really awesome group of members at their location. But, the more I read about Crossfit, and after watching the class before my fundamentals class, the more I realize, this is who these guys are. They are a community that supports. They support one another, as well as support amazing causes such as cancer research and their popular Fight Gone Bad.

I’ll be honest, when I walked in to sign up last week, I didn’t go to the free trial class they offer. I didn’t ask, what do you do? I walked up and saw what looked like an open garage with gymnastics mats covering the floor, steel pipes running from one side of the gym to the other, gymnastics rings hanging down, and what I could only describe as odd torture chamber belts hanging off the steel pipes. I am guessing soon I’ll know what those are for. So, I walked in, and started talking to a coach, who as it turns out, was the owner. We discussed what I was looking for, the goals I wanted to accomplish and maybe I wouldn’t have been so quick to sign up had I never known about Bridget and Ray, but I said, let’s do it. I signed up right then and there. Should I have done more research? Maybe. But after two years of thinking about it, I was finally ready to just do it.

After my first class last night, let’s just say, score one for Crystal I didn’t throw up. Score another for Crystal: I figured I’d be last in the group and I was ok with that. I just kept telling myself do not let the guys blow you away too hard core. They didn’t. For that I was proud. I don’t expect to be able to keep up with dudes, however, I don’t want to get blown out of the water by them either. What can I say, I’m a competitive b*tch. So, that was fundamentals class one. Oct. 20, fundamentals class two. I have to say, it sure didn’t take me long to drink the Kool-Aid. I totally dig this place. It was hard, but I think what I liked about it was it reminded me of when I was playing softball. The workouts our coaches used to make us do didn’t always make sense to me but they always made us better softball players. And they made us closer because we were always pushing and supporting one another. For someone who’s so not a joiner, look at me, I joined.