It all started when...

I first heard about CrossFit around 2008 or 2009 from a friend who was starting his military career and had told me to look into it. Nothing happened back then since I shrugged it off and continued to train for triathlons at that time. At that point, I thought this would be the fittest I would ever be. An hour and a half of swimming before work, an hour bike ride after, followed by a decent length of a run was a typical training day for me. Needless to say, I started getting burnt out after years of doing the same thing.

At the same time, another friend kept urging me for over a year to try CrossFit. So after trying to figure out better ways of training smarter and not longer, I finally  gave in and tried CrossFit in early 2011. The moment I first walked into a class at LAX CrossFit, I was hooked.

The first official wod was the following:

3 rounds:

400m run

10 push-ups

20 airsquats

It nearly killed me. My running game was on point during that time, but I couldn't squat for sh!#, and I think I had to do knee push-ups?! I had the endurance, but how could something that was so bodyweight-centric kill me so much? I was out of breath and knew I was out of shape (in strength) and had to do something about it.

From that day on, I knew that eventually I wanted to become a coach and help people lead healthier, more productive lives.

Fitness being just one of those attributes to becoming a well rounded, productive person of the community, I wanted to learn everything I could about CrossFit. As I learned more and got better at each movement, the more fulfilled I was. The one thing I hated and I couldn't get over was anything that had to do with oly lifting. I hated it because I sucked at it and couldn't get the form down. (This becomes a relevant a bit down the line)

One random day after leaving the gym, I felt a weird sensation in my knee. Couldn't tell you exactly what, but the next day, I couldn't walk or get out of bed and my left knee was swollen like I had never seen it before. Long story short and with a surgery on my left knee followed by my right knee a few months later, made me slow down a bit.  I hated it then, but now realize that this ordeal was a blessing in disguise. Not only could I empathize with people who had gone through surgeries and worse, but I first hand have learned ways of rehabbing.

At the encouragement of another friend, she said to try joining Waxman's gym as a form of rehabbing my knee. Remember, at that point, I hated it, and was also thinking to myself, "rehabbing my knee through oly lifting? Sounds strange to me."

I was incredibly disappointed that my physical therapist had given me less than ideal results on how I had healed which is why I decided to give Olympic lifting a shot to see what would happen.

Oly lifting and coach Adam gave me a new sense of what Olympic lifting essentially was. I not only improved leaps and bounds on my mobility and stability in my knees, but I also started loving to lift. I would be there 2 days out of the week but for 3 hours each session lifting and focusing on mobility and form. Not only did my mobility improve, but so did my lifts, my attitude toward injures and my expectations of myself.

Fast forward a few years and I've become even more passionate about helping people, and especially those who have battled ailments and injuries. I also love to see those people who are committed to practice and make an effort to be better than they were yesterday.