Wilmar is allowing me to write yet another guest blog, and I couldn’t resist :) It’s really nice to talk about competing in something that you LOVE and share your love with other people, even if the experiences have their ups and downs.
First, I would like to give a shout out to everyone on my team for their AMAZING performance this past Saturday at the Fortius Open/San Diego Weightlifting Championships! The Fortius women and men took first in the team competitions and several of my teammates PR-ed their lifts and/or medaled in their respective weight classes. Most importantly, for many of my teammates, this was their very first meet. It takes a lot of courage to get up on that platform and compete in front of a sea of unknown faces, and I couldn’t be MORE PROUD of everyone for having the guts to compete and showing the world how awesome our team is. I’m SO blessed to be a part of such a supportive, kind, wild&crazy, and TALENTED bunch. MUSH MUSH MUSH.

Fortius Women’s Team!!!!! SO PROUD OF THESE WOMEN :)
I would also like to thank Sonia Oh for taking all of the pictures I posted in this blog. She took over 1100 pictures the day of the meet, over the span of almost 12 hours. Thank you for capturing all of the special moments of the day :)
So this post will be a little darker than the last, but life can’t always be sunshine and roses. I obviously competed in this meet as well. It was my second meet, so I didn’t feel as visibly nervous as the first one. I think this hurt me because I failed to think about my openers and I was extremely stressed about this the day of. Also, I kept thinking about how amazing my first performance was. How could anything possibly top that? It’s only been a month, how could I possibly do better? [I know, I’m SO negative, it’s disgusting...]
Everything up until the meet went great. I PR-ed my clean the weekend before the meet, my cutting weight to 63kg was pretty normal (normal = stressful because I love eating candy and carbs haha), my lifts felt decent, and I felt pretty calm. Even the morning of, I felt some jitters, but nothing huge until I started warming up. I found out Wilmar was going to be coaching me and I kind of flipped out. As you may (or may not) know, Wilmar is my boyfriend of over 6 years. We have also been incredibly close friends for 9 years. I have no problem speaking my mind to him and in addition to me having my insecurities that I listed above, I was incredibly stressed out. This in no way reflected my beliefs of his coaching ability, he’s SO knowledgeable about weightlifting, has his USAW level1, and I’ve seen him manage his own warmups in the past; he definitely knows his stuff.
Before I continue, I should mention something about myself that many of you may not know. I am really hard on myself in all aspects of my life. I beat myself up on a daily basis and over analyze everything. I recognize that this is a problem, but it’s one that I’ve had since I was little girl and unfortunately, is very difficult to fix. I’ve been able to somewhat hide this problem because I haven’t been competing in anything seriously since high school, but this most recent meet, I even surprised myself with how I was feeling/acting and even Wilmar, who has known me forever, hasn’t seen this side of me. When I was in high school, competing in volleyball year round, a sport that I was in LOVE with, I beat myself up, both emotionally and physically. I look back on those times, and I wasn’t the best, but I was definitely better than I was giving myself credit for. I picked apart every single mistake and convinced myself that I sucked, I would slap my quads really hard, to the point of bruising, or slam my hands into the floor every time I made a mistake. It wasn’t productive and it wasn’t helpful.

Wilmar being a great and supportive coach.
So back to present day, we started warming up snatches and things felt pretty light, but I was feeling really angry. I was picking apart every single mistake I was making (sound familiar?) and I kept questioning everything that Wilmar was doing because I didn’t trust his decisions. I was a terrible athlete and I was taking out all of my insecurities with myself out on him. I didn’t know how to deal with all of my anger, so I didn’t. I went out on the platform angry and even after making all 3 lifts and PR-ing my snatch by 2 kilo, I was still pissed.

I do not look zen like the last meet, but at least my shrug looks cool, hehe.
We went on to clean and jerks and they felt light, but I was still in a terrible mood. By this time, I realized what was going on, but I couldn’t control it; it had been SO long since I had dealt with this. Wilmar was such a great coach, he wasn’t mad at me for having a terrible attitude and he continued to be incredibly professional and kept me in check. Clean and jerk warmups felt easy and I was feeling slightly better. We decided to move up my opener from 52 kilo to 55 kilo.

This picture perfectly captures everything that I was feeling while warming up/lifting.
I went out for my first attempt still angry. It was probably very obvious to everyone, because even my coach, Jesse, was telling me to smile, and I couldn’t. My first attempt for C&J was good, except for the jerk. I was trying so hard to stay on my heels and not jerk forward, that I caught the jerk behind and hurt my back a little. I was concerned/upset after the lift and so was Wilmar. He called 58 for my next attempt, which I did, and it felt decent.

My 55 kilo jerk where I hurt my back a little. Also, CUTE, look how concerned Wilmar looks, what a great boyfriend :)
Wilmar called 62 next and while I was nervous, as this would be a PR, all of the adrenaline/anger that had been constantly pumping through my body focused me for this last lift. The 62 was so easy that I could power clean, and the jerk was definitely my best lift of the day. I was so overwhelmed by everything I had been feeling for the past hour that I immediately ran into Wilmar’s arms and started bawling. Yes, I was crying in public, something that I NEVER do. I ran off and all I could feel was relief.

Bawling in public FTW.
After competing, for the rest of the day, I felt emotionally broken. I wasn’t even happy about PR-ing my snatch, my clean and jerk, my competition total, or getting a silver medal. I didn’t know how to handle all these FEELINGS, thinking I’m not good enough, not trusting Wilmar, thinking of how little time I have left with one of the best things that’s ever happened to me (CrossFit Fortius <3). It was a rough day for me, and I didn’t realize how many things I was feeling going into the meet. I brought all of that to the meet and it turned me into a scary, crazy person. The silver lining of the day was being able to cheer on my teammates and talk with friends all day, it really took my mind off of all of the negativeness I was feeling.
Looking back on the meet, I think it was a great learning experience. First, it definitely reconfirmed my love for weightlifting. I only get REALLY angry and hard on myself about things that I truly care about, and because I had expectations for myself from my first competition, I beat myself to a pulp. Second, I need to let go of all of the seriousness. While it is normal to be nervous, it is not normal to be so angry about something you love, and it can be detrimental to your sport. This is something I love to do, and I should try to be more positive and nicer to myself. Third, TRUST MY COACHES and don’t give them a hard time, their job is difficult! I was so flustered with my own crap and took it out on Wilmar, who was doing phenomenal at timing my warmups, calling my lifts, and dealing with my mood swings.
This meet really motivated me. To train harder. To be more positive and nicer to myself. To be nicer to Wilmar, who is quite possibly the most tolerant and sweetest boyfriend in the world and a fantastic weightlifting coach. To make the most of every situation and go into it with a good attitude. I was hesitant to compete in Cal State Games because my schedule is really erratic/I’m leaving for med school soon after, but I am 95% sure that I’m just going to do it. I’m addicted.
If you are anything like me and push yourself down because you aren’t 100% perfect, STOP IT. No one will ever be perfect at weightlifting, and that’s what’s so fun about it, just constantly having room to improve, watching yourself grow along with your teammates, and reaching your goals.
I can’t stress enough how wonderful competing in weightlifting is. Even though this competition was much darker than my first, I’ve only come out a stronger person (both physically and mentally), I’ve reconfirmed how much I love the sport, and absolutely nothing feels better than having a team that pushes you and supports you no matter what, even if you are an angry mess :)
Thanks for reading! I’ll leave you with this pic...

“Work hard, play harder” DON’T FORGET IT. #teamfortiusforever :’)