Congrats Megan!
On Friday I posted a video to the private Arena Ready Facebook group of Megan D snatching her bodyweight (from the hang, plus an overhead squat), which is a pretty damn cool accomplishment. Congratulations, Megan!
What's the big deal, some of you may ask? The bodyweight snatch is a milestone for many CrossFitters, and even some Olympic-style weightlifters - a gold standard of proficiency and one of the hallmarks of the beginning of mastery. By my count I believe she is the fifth female athlete at Arena Ready to snatch her bodyweight (I think the mens count is somewhere around thirteen), which is pretty cool considering we are a fairly small gym that predominantly runs a CrossFit program in our classes (not a pure weightlifting program).
The snatch is (as just about all of you know) a very complex movement, and an athlete's ability to snatch relatively heavy weights can often tell a lot about said athlete's abilities in other areas of fitness. If an athlete can snatch his/her bodyweight it likely means that he/she is pretty darn strong, powerful, flexible, coordinated, agile, fast, and has a sound sense of both balance and accuracy. Coincidentally those are 8 of the 10 "General Physical Skills" as defined by CrossFit in their classic, 14-year old article "What Is Fitness?" and it's arguable that snatching relatively heavy weights can also help in building capacity with the other two skills they define, cardiorespiratory endurance and stamina (assuming the athlete is spending time training other modalities and domains, and not just weightlifting). In Megan's case I think the argument is pretty solid - not only can she snatch her ("fighting" ;-P) bodyweight, but I'm pretty confident she can run a sub-6-minute mile, do multiple strict pull-ups, pick up heavier objects than most men & women, run a decent half marathon time (if for some reason she wanted to do that to herself out of the blue), and probably embarrass more than a few people in a pick up game of her choosing. Last week it was clear that she could still do ring muscle-ups no problem, even though she almost never practices them (she would admit this herself so I don't feel bad saying it, haha).
What does this mean for many of you? Well, since we love to teach weightlifting at AR we have a membership base that generally likes to snatch (and clean, and jerk, and squat, etc) and appreciates spending time getting better at the movement. But there's always some folks who just don't quite understand the point of trying to learn how to do this awkwardly dynamic movement, and who may not appreciate what it does for herself/himself when they build proficiency in such a seemingly novel pursuit - the snatch. I can guarantee you that the better you are at snatching the better you will be at an overwhelming majority of physical tasks in your life - carrying your kids, moving your furniture, hauling luggage in an airport or on an airplane, skiing, surfing, running, jumping, playing catch with your grandchildren, chasing your dog, telling snot-nosed bag boys at the grocery store that "No thank you, I don't need help out... these aren't actually that heavy for me."
It'll be cool to see who will hit the bodyweight snatch milestone next.
WOD for 04-18-16:
Every 2 Minutes for 6 Rounds (12 Minutes):
3 Power Cleans
-then-
A) AMRep 4 Minutes:
400m Run
15 Power Cleans @ 135/95 lbs
Max Rep Wall Balls @ 20/14 lbs to 10/9 ft
REST 4 MINUTES
B) Repeat A.