First off a big thanks to Stephan, James, Kirk, and Ryan. They were all super knowledgeable and helpful this weekend, and also a big thanks to Sami at CF NH for hosting the event.

Saturday: I got up at 5 AM, cooked up a big meal for breakfast, and was off to CrossFit New Hampshire for the weekend to attend the CrossFit Olympic Lifting Certification. I arrived early, as I do when I go anywhere and despite getting little sleep the night before I was amped for the day. At 9 AM once everyone had arrived we were introduced to our coaches, the students gave a quick introduction of each other, we got the run down of what we were going to be doing throughout the day, and we went outside. Things started off with some cool warm-up drills which I take were from Stephan’s basketball coaching, those who had olympic shoes laced up, and we began the day. Day 1 was all about the snatch, with the key being if you can jump, you can snatch. While it might not be just that easy, there is some truth to it. The next 3 hours we went over foot positions, how to get into them, grips, grip width, upper pull positions and the first half of the Burgener warm-up (Mike Burgener warm-up and system of teaching the olympic lifts). After about 3.5 hours in the hot sun we were finally let off for lunch break. Holy hell, I was already cooked. Although we were only using the PVC pipe, there is something to be said about drilling different movement for 3+ hours in the hot sun. I was already feeling dehydrated so I pounded a bunch of water and got a solid meal of veggies, fruit, nuts, and meat, all the good stuff. Unfortunately at this point my knees were in almost unbearable pain. At this point I think part of my problem is my shoes. The pain I experienced was very reminiscent of my Level 1 cert. Decided to ditch my training shoes, Nike Free Sparq’s, and put my clunky Gravis high tops on for the rest of the day which at the very least were solid and stiff, but didn’t fit to great. After lunch we headed back outside, this time with a few bars in tow. We quickly reviewed everything we had done that morning, and then started working snatches with the PVC and bar from the upper pull positions. After that we then went through the second half of the Burgener warm-up learning the skill transfer moves. Again these were all done with the PVC pipe. After that it was on to the lower pull positions again with the PVC pipe, and then we worked for a while with the barbell. Throughout all of this we were working in small groups of 8-10 everybody group with a coach, and breaking out with a partner to coach each other. After a couple hours of this we headed inside to do some lifting. We got on the olympic platforms, and worked our way into groups that were lifting similar weights. No one got going really heavy, we were drilling 3 snatches one from the pocket, one from mid-thigh, and one from the ground (these were all done as full snatches, none of that power or muscle snatch stuff) I think I stopped at around 105lbs. After this we were left with a quick talk and the day was over. I was exhausted and my knees were in a lot of pain. A few things I found throughout the day, when I squat I’m not pushing my knees out enough, and they are caving slightly when I come up, very possible another cause of my knee pain, going to make sure to work on this a lot. In regards to the snatch I have trouble opening my hip completely and I float too much when I jump, so I’ve got two big and very important things to work on. Despite those flaws I was very happy with my overall performance considering I’m completely self taught, and while there were people attending the certification who had their act together better than me, there were others who were considerably worse off.

Sunday: Much of the same on Sunday. With Saturday being dedicated to the Snatch, Sunday was all about the clean and jerk. We pretty much went through everything that we did Saturday, but adjusting it accordingly for the clean and jerk, grip width, reviewing the front squat, foot position, and changing the Burgener warm-up to fit the clean and jerk. We spent a lot of time working on the front squat, and the position we want to receive the bar in. The other point we spent a lot of time was the actual jerk, and I mean the split jerk not the other variations. Like the snatch, again I was having a little trouble getting my hip to full extension before jumping, and I was floating a little too much when jumping and not getting under the bar quite quick enough. So again I know what I need to work on, and I have a much better knowledge of how to teach these movements. An interesting personal note, I worked out all day in my Gravis sneakers, while my knees were hurting, they were considerably better than Saturday, and more lifting today reaffirmed ques and my thoughts on needing to push my knees out more. All in all the certification was great, I learned a lot, but more importantly feel much more competent in how to teach the movements. I’m already working on putting together a 2 day a week, month long, olympic lifting class syllabus for when I get the gym open.

– Jade