If you were at the Outlaw open you can tell your friends how awesome and correct I am.  If you didn’t go there, you probably watched the live feed.  So you probably know a little.  If you did neither I am ashamed of you.

In ascending order of great things to happen at the 2012 Outlaw Open.  Actually, the order is not really that important.  I just kind of wrote shit in the order of how it came into my mind.

10.  Natalie McLain establishes that she is the fastest woman in the world.  At about 5′ even and maybe 110 pounds, Natlie McLain is not the type of person to clock back to back to back sub 6 minute miles.  Oh, and it wasn’t a straight line run, nor was it on a track.  The path required her to run through a building, on various surfaces, dodging spectators, and she was required to start with her hand on a pullup rig.  Not only did Natalie run fast but she also was required to do a max 5 rep set of deadlifts between the first and second mile (she did 250×5, roughly 2.5x her bodyweight), a max set of pullups between her second and third mile (she won that event with 53), and a 1RM bench after the third mile (140 pounds).  Other phenomenal athletic accomplishments from Natlie include a 2nd place finish in the WheelBarrow/HSPU workout and a fourth place finish in the Agility Test.  Natalie is an amazing athlete.  Here is a link to more of her awesomeness, including a recap of her 2:11 Diane.

Really god damn fast

9.  Brandon Jackson Almost totals 300kg on his openers.  Brandon Jackson is not new to weightlifting, so it was not really a surprise that he won the snatch (140) or second in the C&J (155).  But these were openers for him (I think he missed 165 and 170 due to soft elbows).  And these were not crossfit rules lifts either.  It was USAW judging.  Other remarkable men’s weightlifting included Danny Nichols and his amazing 171 C&J

8.  Lyndsay Valenzuela totaling 193 and not even using all her attempts.  The reason this is so low on the list is because it is a surprise to absolutely no one that Lyndsay can lift pretty well.  She went 88 and 105.  I know a lot of 200+ pound men unable to match these weights.

7.  The live scoring that worked most of the time.  Listen up… if you run crossfit or lifting competitions and you don’t use Breeze Scoring you are punching the fans and athletes right in their fucking faces.  Breeze scoring is relatively new so you probably haven’t heard of it yet.  I can attest that it is the easiest and fastest way to get the results to the athletes and the fans.  Sometimes the results were live on a website before the heat was even over.  Take a look at the scoring sheet here.    There were some complaints that peoples’ phones or ipads were not able to see the scores update, but I am pretty sure this was not a problem with Breeze Scoring because we were always able to see it with the laptops.  I am in no way affiliated with the people who own this either.  So if you want it you have to track down the creators.

6.  Rebecca Voigt wins the final chipper.  Check out this video.  Lyndsay made it to the final portion of the chipper with over 2 minutes to go.  Becca got there much later, yet still managed something like 15 bar muscle ups.  We brought her judge to the scoring table because we could not believe how many muscle-ups she ripped out in such a short period of time.

Before this weekend I kind of hated Becca.  She is actually pretty fucking awesome.

5.  The Final Chipper.  Rudy had kept this a secret until the very end.  When he briefed it to the athletes I lost interest because it was so fucking confusing.  It was 380 total repetitions.  I can’t even remember what the fuck it consisted of.  I know there were two handed KB snatches (awesome).  I also know there were a fuckton of front rack step ups (not awesome).  There was something like 200 double unders.  A 20 minute time cap meant it wasn’t a race meant to be finished.  Oh, and trying to judge it and score it was a nightmare.  That said… it floored some of the best athletes I have ever seen.

4.  Matt Hathcock fucking dominating the Front Squat/Muscle up workout.  It wasn’t really a surprise that he won.  It was going to be him or Tyminski.  But the fact that he completed 12-9-7 Muscle ups / 250# front squat in 4:38 is simply amazing.  Oh yeah, he also won the 10k grand prize along with the fastest third mile (6:08), and tied for the second heaviest C&J (155).  Keep an eye on this kid in 2013.

3.  Steve Pinkerton and Daniel Tyminski win almost win every event.  Steve finished first in the row, mile 2, and the final chipper.  Daniel won the wheelbarrow/HSPU and the first mile.  But these guys finish near the top in almost every event.  The mens competition was so close going into the final chipper it really could have gone to either of these guys.

A long, long time ago I made fun of Dan for what he was wearing in this very picture.  I take that back.  He can wear whatever the fuck he wants.

2.  Sean Waxman and crew totally running the show.  If you don’t know Sean and his guys you are missing out.  I met Sean after I blew out my achilles and since then he has been nothing but supportive to me.  He further displayed how awesome he is at the Outlaw Open.  Sean volunteered to direct the Olympic lifting portion of the Open and provided both the judges.  He was right there over my shoulder at every second to help me coordinate the TWO PLATFORM MEET.  Yeah I fucking bolded that.  Have you ever kept score, MC’ed, and displayed overall awesomeness for a one platform meet?  Probably not.  Try that shit with two platforms going at once and being about two hours behind schedule.  Sean was right there to assist, overrule angry fans/coaches, keep things running smoothly, and he even coached a bunch of the athletes.  Sean Waxman is a hero of mine.  If you are in the LA area and you don’t stop in and see him for some coaching/advice on life you should shoot yourself in the face.  He also does a thing like Rudy, but with a lifting focus. 

He coined “Shut up and Lift”

1.  Functional Equipment guys working their fucking asses off.  I am in no way affiliated with Functional Equipment.  I say this again…  I am in no way associated, in business with, or related to Functional Equipment.  I am not even a huge fan of their gear (although I like their racks).  I started my garage gym with their gear but have since moved up to Pendlay shit (Sorry guys, its hard to top Pendlay).  With that said… The people from Functional Equipment were 100 percent instrumental in the Outlaw Open.  They brought like 10 guys or something to the meet.  That was probably 80 percent of the volunteers.  They did all the set up for the workouts, all the tear down, and most of the judging.  They stayed until the wee hours of the night every night and arrived early.  They also showcased some new gear.  The wheelbarrows are pretty creative and also look like hell on earth to push.  They also introduced a new bearing bar that retails for around 400 bucks.  I want to get my hands on one to do a review.  But I am really in no shape to be doing pulls for another couple months.  I hope they get some business after all the hard work they put in on the Open.  Here is the link to their shit.  And if anyone buys their bearing bar, please send me your review of it.

Honorable mention/anything else I left out.  There was of course a copious amount of other awesome shit to happen.  Becca Voigt nearly flattened a spectator on the mile run.  Andrea Gibson Cross PR’ed her deadlift whilst pushing the wheelbarrow, The USAW folks next door told us we were too loud, Jen Zebley competes in her first major competition even though she has never been coached, Gary Carpenter somehow does not pull all his hair out whilst coordinating everything, fans did not attack us with torches and pitchforks, let me know what i missed.  I was unable to watch the live feed cause i was there.  So give me some feedback on how that looked.

Extra Special Mention.  Kris Clever didn’t run the third mile due to injury.  She still almost won the whole god damn meet.  Seeing her workout is pretty god damn amazing.  And she is a really awesome person besides her athletic talent.  There is something in the water at Valley Crossfit.