Joy M.’s perfect front rack position

Memorial Day Musings

CFSBKer and author Jen Percy recently published a book called Demon Camp: A Soldier’s Exorcism. Last winter, before I (Kate R.) knew Jen was a member at the gym, I pre-ordered her book after reading a stunning excerpt of it in Harper’s magazine called “Voice in the Night.” Not only did I feel gut-punched by the beauty of her writing, but I knew what she was writing about was incredibly important. Demon Camp finally arrived at my apartment in January only a few days after it was published and I couldn’t put it down. I’ve already told a number of you to read it, and on the day before “Murph” and Memorial Day, it seems even more relevant.

Jen was introduced to CrossFit by a veteran and came to understand it as a scared space where military and civilian worlds tend to overlap. Below is our third and last installment of the Memorial Day Musings series, in which Jen shares a bit about her book and what compelled her to write it. 

I started writing this book thinking a great deal about American post-war amnesia, a kind of collective forgetting that takes place when atrocity is over. Here’s a quote by an American psychiatrist named Abram Kardiner, author of  The Traumatic Neurosis of War:  

“The subject of neurotic disturbances consequent upon war has, in the past 25 years, been submitted to a good deal of capriciousness in public interest and psychiatric whims. The public does not sustain its interest, which was very great after World War I, and neither does psychiatry. Hence these conditions are not subject to continuous study.” 

The quote is from 1941 yet the sentiment is evergreen. My book is, in many ways, a product of my longing to feel implicated in our foreign wars (these are wars that have gone on my entire adult life), but I also wanted to think about why this kind of forgetting happens. I followed Sgt. Caleb Daniels, a machine gunner on his way to save Marcus Luttrell, Mike Murphy, and two other SEALs stranded in the mountains of the Hindu Kush on June 28, 2005 when, last minute, Daniels was kicked off the flight. Their rescue chopper was hit by an RPG and all of his friends burned alive.

At home, in Georgia, Daniels saw the charred bodies of his friends in his room at night. He was also stalked by something he called the Black Thing, and the Black Thing wanted him to die. His dead friends wanted to save him. The apparitions created a kind of dialectic that’s common to those who have survived traumatic experiences. Daniels’ case was extreme. He spoke in signs and symbols, the language of dreams. The question that haunted him: should I live with terrible memories or annihilate them completely?  

To learn more about Jen, visit her website. Purchase Demon Camp at your local bookstore or online.

“Murph” WOD and BBQ is TOMORROW 

Are you ready for tomorrow?! The gym will be open starting at 7:15am. We’ll start grilling around 11:00am and be done around 3pm… maybe. There will be no evening classes. Please be ready to go at the time you signed up for. That means you’ll need to get there early and warm-up on your own. Here is a good mobility|WOD to check out if you’re not sure what to do. The gym will provide beer and meat for all who attend. If you can bring a side dish, it would be much appreciated!

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Do People Want to Know Where Their Food Comes From? The Atlantic
Why Don’t We All Have Cancer? Vsauce

Fitness: Clean Halting Deadlift + Clean + Jerk
If you have a hard time organizing the pull off the floor, perform the clean from the mid-hang, after the clean halting deadlift. 

Performance: Clean and Jerk 1-1-1, then Power Clean + Hang Clean + Jerk 75% x (1+1+1) x 2
Work up to a heavy clean and jerk in three attempts, then perform two singles of the complex at 75% of today’s best lift.

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Front Squat

Fitness: 3 x 5 Linear Progression

Performance:  85% x 4  x 4, then 87.5% x 4 x 4
Rest two minutes between sets. You’re already pretty warmed up from the cleans, so get to work weight within 2-3 warm ups so you can get all your work sets in. 

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Do you love cleaning as much as Coach Fox?

News and Notes

What Do I Need to Know for “Murph” on Monday?

“Murph” is a day where our community comes together to celebrate and honor our service men and women.  Whether it’s by completing the workout, or cheering on a loved one, or just hanging out for the BBQ, all are welcome! 

For Time:
Run 1 Mile
100 Pull-Ups
200 Push-Ups
300 Squats
Run 1 Mile

Partition the pull-ups, push-ups and squats however you’d like. Start and end with the run. If you’ve got a 20lb vest or body armor, wear it. 

Wow, that sounds crazy! Will there be scaling options?
Yes, folks will be able to do 1/4, 1/2, or 3/4 Murph to reduce the volume. Coaches will explain the scaling options before each heat. The scaling option for pull-ups are jumping pull-ups. Because of the number of people we expect, we will not be offering ring rows or banded pull-ups as a scaling option. The volume of jumping pull-ups will also be reduced.

You are expected to warm-up before your heat on your heat. A perfect warm-up would be some foam rolling or soft tissue work (here is a good mobility|wod) and some rowing or light jogging. If your ankles are tight, we suggest doing a calf smash on a kettlebell handle, too. Get loose and ready to go.

Ok, what time do we show up?
The gym will open at 7:15am and we will be starting the first heat exactly at 7:30am.  We’ll be starting new heats of up to 25 people every 45 minutes and recommend that you arrive 15 minutes early for whichever heat you’d like so that you can warm up and do some movement prep. 

The BBQ itself will start around 11am and will last until around 3pm. The gym will provide meat and beer.  Members are encouraged to bring a salad, snacks, veggies or any additional sides/beverages to share. If you’re going to bring a something, please post it on the event page.

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One Man’s Case for Jorts, and Durability Esquire
Can the Nervous System Be Hacked? NYT Magazine

Maggie warming up her cleans

• Happy Birthday, JB!

Memorial Day Musings 

For the second installment of the notes we’re running from some CFSBKers related to Memorial Day and leading up to “Murph,” we’re featuring an essay by Dr. Mike Cutaia, a past Athlete of the Month and faithful member of the gym for two years, along with his wife, Judy. Dr. Mike (also known as “that old stubborn horse that David and Noah try to whip into shape”) has done the majority of his work as a physician in the VA system. For the last nine years, he’s worked at the VA hospital in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn as Chief of the Pulmonary/Critical Care/Sleep Section in the Department of Medicine. He would like to begin his piece with a couple epigraphs:

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.”
—Dwight D. Eisenhower for the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953

“An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind.”
—Mahatma Ghandi 

Typically, our culture has a bad habit of commercializing and trivializing holidays to the point where we can easily forget the underlying reasons why they were established in the first place. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day come to mind. It’s a diversion to have to deal with all the nonsense in our culture surrounding these days. We can be lured so easily to forget the deeper message, the deeper meaning that is there. This meaning needs to be rediscovered and restored. Memorial Day is another important example.

Parades, flags, bands playing, hot dogs and barbecues, and a lot of hot air from politicians about patriotism and love of country is not enough. It has been said, “Old men declare war, but it is the youth that must fight and die.” One of my first experiences as a physician caring for veterans was to separate two veteran patients who were beating the crap out of one another with their crutches in a hospital ward over the politics of war. Welcome to this complex, confusing, and often complicated life. The task is to put the politics aside, and look just at the people. That’s where the gold can be found. Civil War general William Sherman reputedly said, “War is hell.”  And it is. In so many ways. Both when you go and when you come back to civilian life. 

That is why we need to remember the people who go to war no matter what the political issues may be. This is the deeper message and meaning of Memorial Day. It’s more about lives than flags. More about people. Those who are no longer with us and those who are alive and struggling to put their past in a healthy perspective. The latter group deserves our special attention. These are the people who are struggling to regain meaning and purpose after their wartime experience. It is important that we who have never served struggle to relate to that in some way. Can we sit in another man or women’s shoes for a brief moment and catch a small glimpse of the pain and agony of war? Often, one can’t truly comprehend what one has never been through oneself. So, some people say why even go through the pain of trying? 

Here is the reason. The men and women who went to war gave us their hearts, their blood, and often their lives. We should not forget that. If we do, we run the risk of becoming dangerously disconnected from the pain of many among us. No matter what we think about war itself.  No matter what we think about the motives for going. Some go willingly. Others have little or no choice. Just a way out of a bad set of circumstances at home. They all deserve our recognition. Especially when they face such huge problems on returning to civilian life like unemployment, homelessness, post-traumatic stress disorder, brain injury, chronic physical disability, substance abuse, and a high risk of suicide, which is three times higher than the general population. It is easy to forget that we are the community they are trying to rejoin. Our openness and receptiveness greatly influences their struggle in many ways. 

We must remember—because it is human to remember. Ultimately, life is short. We ourselves want to be remembered. It is human to want this simple thing. No one wants to be forgotten. I have five childhood friends who never returned from Vietnam whose names are on the wall in Washington. This is one of the big lessons my work with veterans has taught me. Not to forget. 

The links below are Dr. Mike’s suggested further reading about veterans.

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The Problems Facing America’s Veterans care2
Female Veterans More Likely To Commit Suicide care2
Suicide Among Young Veterans Rising At Alarming Rate The Huffington Post
John Walsh: Preventing Veteran Suicide Is ‘The Cost Of War’ The Huffington Post
Special Memorial Day Programs Tell the Stories of U.S. Armed Forces War Veterans YAHOO 

Eli getting his pull-ups in at Open Gym

Fresh Vegetables All Summer Long? Sign up Now!

Remember last summer, when those boxes of beautiful local produce showed up at the gym every Wednesday, and you thought to yourself, “Good heavens, I wish I could have a box of beautiful local produce delivered every week! Next year, I will sign up!” This is your lucky day. 

For the third year in a row, CFSBK is partnering with Sol Flower Farm to provide weekly deliveries of gorgeous, hand-picked vegetables from June through November. The season is about to start, so the time to sign up is now. 

The share cost is $670 through PayPal for the entire season or $650 if you pay by check. 

A vegetable share will feed a family of 2-4, so if you would like to split a share with someone, please post as such to the comments below or email Michele, who will help you find a buddy, at mignyc [at] gmail.com. Sol Flower also offers a separate flower share. 

All the specifics, including how to sign up, delivery info, and a detailed FAQ, are here. The season starts soon, so don’t delay!

Memorial Day Musings

Over the next week leading up to “Murph,” we’ll be running a few notes from some CFSBKers related to Memorial Day. Below is our first installment from Keith W.

Having come from a military family and being surrounded by many friends in the armed forces, Memorial Day has always been a day that is filled with fun and enjoyment, tempered with a bit of remembrance. There are others that have put themselves in harm’s way for the rights and freedoms we have here. From flying bomber escorts to Germany in WW2, moving ammo in the jungles of Vietnam, liberating Kuwait, to fighting insurgency and terrorism in Afghanistan, people have paid the price dearly.

“Murph” is a workout dedicated to Navy Lieutenant Michael Murphy, but this year I am also putting my efforts towards another outstanding person and his cause. I lost a very dear friend a few weeks ago to PTSD. His name was Kryn Miner and he was a father of four great kids and had a wonderful wife. When Kryn rotated out of duty after serving for over 22 years (including 11 deployments in seven years to Afghanistan and Iraq), he was a bit lost with what to do next and through my encouragement tried CrossFit. He became a Level 1 certified coach, Spartan certified coach, and recently received his CrossFit Endurance coach certification. Kryn coached in Burlington Vermont at CrossFit Burlington. 

Kryn was troubled and haunted by a lifetime of war. He saught help after an attempted suicide in September of last year with the Lone Survivor Foundation. This is a foundation started by Marcus Luttrell, who served with Michael Murphy, and the foundation’s aim is to help those suffering from PTSD. Kryn established the Forgotten Fallen Foundation to help raise money through CrossFitting to send returning and retired soldiers in need of help to the Lone Survivor Program. I hope you will join me in pledging a dollar a minute of your “Murph” time to the Lone Survivor Foundation in Kryn’s Name. 

More information about the Lone Survivor Program can be found here, and more about Kryn and and the forgotten fallen here.

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Perception is Everything. Or is it? The Simplification of Fatigue The Science of Sport
What Farm-to-Table Got Wrong New York Times
Learning Technique Through Imitation Catalyst Athletics
Man’s Insecurities Versatile Enough To Be Projected Onto Any Situation The Onion