In about two weeks CrossFit is hosting its annual worldwide online competition. This year, more than previous years, the open will mean almost nothing to just about everyone… but I still want you to sign up.

Most people do not want to sign up for the open because of an unnecessary performance expectation in each workout. I don’t just mean this for those firebreathers that dominate their boxes whiteboards but also for the everyday CrossFitter who is afraid that they can’t do something.

To those firebreathers (not signed up yet) let me give you the hard truth right away, you are not as good as games athletes. To the everyday CrossFitter fearful of failing at something, you probably will, as we all have. Failure is not a bad thing. As cliche as it is, failure is an opportunity for you to get better. Failure is a roadmap to improving skills or levels of fitness that you currently lack.

The open is a yearly fitness checkup. For people who take CrossFit seriously, you may look at your ranking and try to better your place each year, but for the everyday CrossFitter (which is most of us), the focus should be to get better each year. This could mean doing each workout as prescribed, getting a muscle up, or merely doing something you couldn’t do the year before.

CrossFit has a simple, yet effective method to get you more fit. CrossFit’s theory is that if you are more fit from year to year, you are probably getting healthier along with it. Most people don’t get fitter and at the same time become more unhealthy.

At the gym, we do a twelve-week test to see if we are improving, but those are short term. The open allows for an annual test for you to see just how much you have improved over the course of the year.

The open allows us to create an event that builds comradery, fellowship, and support. It will enable us to develop our community in a positive way. It allows our members to meet people they wouldn’t normally see because of the classes they attend. We split everyone into teams where they work together on strategy and team spirit ideas.

The community feel is something that we get from every class. It is something that is special to a CrossFit gym and plays a part in BWCF even more than most. The open is a chance for all of us to create a lasting bond that is more than the everyday workout. It allows for a community to be built with the purpose of bettering your team rather than solely on the ‘self-interest’ aspect of fitness.

By the end of the five weeks, everyone is running on such a high from the excitement that the open has brought them, it’s all anyone can talk about. The way we do the open here, it doesn’t matter if you can do a pull-up or row 500m without taking a break. It is about coming in and working hard for one workout each week and supporting your gym mates.

Each year we grow as a community, and into a great community at that. We can then help build each other up with this community, and hopefully better each others lives through it.

By signing up for the open and participating with us, you are committing to five weeks of betterment. Not only in a test to improve your fitness and in turn improve your health, but also improve your life through community and fellowship.

Sign up, participate and enjoy.

Richard