CrossFit Athletic Group

This is a picture that means so much more than what a picture like this would normally mean.

On the surface this is two college soccer girls and a future college soccer girl hanging out after a track workout on a beautiful Summer morning at 10 am.

There was another morning at 10 am, and many others like it, at this very track, that was on all of our minds. It was not even remotely beautiful.

Well, actually it was. It was beautiful in the same way my neighbor Mrs. Vickie says "beautiful dogs you got there, Chris" as they're trying to rip each other's faces off. Like, what we're seeing on the surface looks horrible, but the memory of it will one day be beautiful.

Fix your feet Lira!

Driving out to the track yesterday I was thinking about how dumb it was that the Champions Club literally shares a fence with my alma mater - an alma mater with a perfectly useable track - and yet the grounds are off limits. We are also within jogging distance of another track - Lamphere/the Hill - that is off limits. While I knew where we could not go, a brief, embarrassing thought came into my head that morning of a place we could go: Royal Oak High School. All side streets. No construction. A little "nicer" side of town. I'm not proud of letting that thought escape the molded synapses of my brain when there was a place on the other side of 11 mile that had been calling us back for two years.

...........

When the lockdown crew woke up to a "10 am at Madison" text message, a geological divide occured: they didn't want to go and any and every possible excuse was explored in their minds, but they couldn't avoid the inescapable fact that I knew damn well nobody had shit to do. Apparently Jessica made a TikTok about it she hasn't shared with anyone.

So unwillingly they all went. Every single day.

Literally every single day.

...........

I have a confession.

I miss the lockdown.

Maaaaaaaaaaaannnnnn I miss the lockdown.

It's the most proud I've ever been of myself as a coach. And more than that, those three months proved to be... umm... something... definitely something... for a group of 15ish people. Maybe that word will come to me later in the post.

When all that chaos was going down at first I intended to document everything (I still have the folder in my laptop). I ended up doing the exact opposite; I wrote about, recorded, and photographed basically nothing, leaving only A Post About What I've Been Up To in the website archives. I'm also really glad I did it like that; you just simply had to be there.

...........

We went to the track at Madison High School yesterday because that place means more to me than any other track could possibly mean. And over the next weeks, months, and years, we'll visit Exchange, Dorchester, and other places for that same reason. Even though we need to keep our eyes looking ahead, it's important to respect our history.

I also plan on doing a semi-private workout every year with that small lockdown group; I hope everyone else can see that with understanding rather than detachment. The connection made there to me is permanent and the changes in us are enduring. In fact, maybe "enduring" is the word I was looking for; I don't think it's a particularly cool-sounding word, but the Banet boys still haven't cut their hair, so it fits.