When entering the doors of the above said box, I must admit it all felt surreal. Gila and I came from Israel after I conned her into coming all the way to London so I could participate in the course. The 'official' reason was her 40th birthday, which I have to admit is as good as 'official' gets. That's how I convinced her to join, but when I booked the sucker, I did it after signing up for the cert. She grudgingly bemused agreed to the whole charade.
It all started when I talked about this new training method, and I just wouldn't stop. She suspected that it was becoming more than a passing fad when I was actually trying out the bizarrely intense exercises and enjoying them. This is after becoming a fully fledged marathoner and even sweeping my neighbors into the process of running long distances.
I was immensely impressed with Coach Glassman. His somewhat rough and coarse demeanor only made me appreciate the lack of pretensions when discussing what was evidently passionate for him… fitness. Then there was the community. That was even more impressive. From the 'Nasty Girls' to 'Death of the Fat Man', this was a vibrant, positive, caring community, almost too good to be true. But that was all over there, overseas, in the far far land of the States. In Israel things were picking up in major cities like Herzelia and Tel Aviv, but when I came across Josh's Crossfit Jerusalem I couldn't believe my eyes, a bona fide box right in my back yard. All the rest is history, and with Josh's help I came to realize I want to specialize in this thing.
At the Cert everyone was as I hoped and expected, even more so. Jami and his crew were approachable and genial, and very professional. I was impressed with the efficient use of time, with the didactic use of the board and the genuine effort to make everything clear and understandable. I must admit that I didn't come expecting this to be an introductory course but more a summation and conclusion of a year of training and reading about Crossfit. I tried coming prepared and aside from reading the Crossfit Journal as usuall, I tried reading the handbook a couple of times. That of course did not prevent me from being nervous about the test and anxious about passing.
London in general was fabulous. The weather turned out to be better than we expected and aside from the Cert, we also got to see quite a lot. When getting back, we were more than happy to reunite with the kids, and although I was a little tense until I got the mail claiming I passed, I couldn't help feeling that this was actually a beginning of a new chapter in my Crossfit experience.
רצי גוש עציון 