My family and I moved to Temecula last year back in mid-November. In the time since then, it’s been amazing to watch (mostly over the internet) the continuing evolution of CrossFit Intrepid. Seeing that growth firsthand two weeks ago was even more inspiring. I can’t help but swell with happiness at the community that my friends have created. In the weeks leading up to my family and me moving away, I found it harder and harder to find the motivation to work out. A change in training dynamic and the confusion of getting ready to move left me in an absolute rut. That is, until I began attending some CFI’s first park workouts. I couldn’t quite understand why but I always felt an extra push in that environment with my old and new friends beside me. Leaving was bittersweet and in a way I felt a bit like Pete Best stepping off the ride just before it got good.

For a while after the move, I found myself headed towards another lull in training but this time I looked to you, Intrepids, as my salvation. In my garage, I pretended I was squatting at the power rack I saw in CFI’s pictures or pressing beside Jake and Nick as I went through a similar linear progression that you all were experiencing. Again, that unexplainable rush of motivation returned. Two weeks ago at the Grand Opening, seeing the friendly old faces of CrossFit past alongside the new faces of CFI present it all made perfect sense. I recently read a passage called Unseen Influences and a particular quote stuck with me that summed it all up:

“How do you know there is a kite in the air?” said a man to a boy who was holding a string leading skyward. “I see nothing and you see nothing.” “But I feel it pull!” was the prompt reply.

I realized that you all were a huge part of my ‘pull.’ You all exert some form of influence on one another in the gym as well. Make sure that it’s one that makes your fellow Intrepids better. Being around those that make us better emboldens us to stretch our boundaries and do hard things. It’s why you train where you train, hang with who you hang, and why I married who I married. While stepping into CFI places a huge influence on your very own personal quest for improved strength and conditioning, understand that it also weighs heavily on those around you as well. It can even reach as far as 93 miles southeast of El Segundo where some guy is squatting under a rusty bar in his garage.

REST DAY 04.04.10