Greetings, readers. I'm going to use this space here to ask for your money. Not because I'm broke, but I thought some of my loyals would like to help me and a great cause. Is that enough or do I need to tell you more? Ok, then.
As most of you know, I'm an avid crossfit enthusiast and have been for about six years now and the time has arrived again for the annual "Fight Gone Bad" charity fundraiser benefiting the Special Operations Warrior Foundation. The SOWF is this:
"The Special Operations Warrior Foundation was founded in 1980 to provide support and assistance to the U.S. Armed Forces special operations community, which includes:
Army Special Forces (Green Berets),
Army 75th Ranger Regiment,
The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment,
Navy Small Boat Teams,
Navy SEALs,
Air Force Combat Controllers,
Air Force rotary and fixed wing squadrons, and
Marine Corps special operations personnel.
There are two major aspects to the Foundation's mission:
- If you are serving in the U.S. military special operations community, and you lose your life in an operational mission or training accident, the Warrior Foundation will provide a full college education to your surviving children.
- If you are severely wounded while deployed, the Warrior Foundation will provide immediate financial assistance and support to ensure your loved ones can be at your bedside during your recovery.
While the Foundation has bestowed college scholarships since 1980, they began providing financial support to wounded special operators in 2005.
Although there are other charitable organizations that give financial aid to wounded personnel and their families, SOWF saw a need for immediate financial assistance. Therefore, the Foundation provides $2,000 in cash to families of special operations personnel hospitalized with severe wounds; which the recipient(s) may use for travel, child care, food and lodging."
So, it's no joke and I'm quite honored to be helping out the cause. I, as I think all of us, can't begin to appreciate enough the difficulties that the soldiers and families of soldiers have to endure. Can't. Even. Begin.
Oh, what's Fight Gone Bad? Well, here you go:
"Fight Gone Bad is one of the CrossFit benchmark WODs. It was designed to simulate the time domain of a mixed martial arts bout of five minutes of work followed by one minute of rest. It has been used in 3 and 5 roundversions. The workout first appeared on CrossFit.comon 1 December 2004, although a hint of the workout appeared as just a snapshot image on 7 October 2003. It was so named after BJ Penn, a professional mixed martial artist, remarked that it was like a "fight gone bad" when asked how it compared to a real fight.[1]
In this workout you move from each of five stations after a minute. This is a five-minute round from which a one-minute break is allowed before repeating. We've used this in 3 and 5 round versions. The stations are:
- . Wallball Shots: 20 pound ball, 10 ft target. (Reps)
- . Sumo Deadlift High-Pull: 75 pounds (Reps)
- . Box Jump: 20" box (Reps)
- . Push Press: 75 pounds (Reps)
- . Row: calories (Calories)
The clock does not reset or stop between exercises. On call of "rotate," the athlete/s must move to next station immediately for good score. One point is given for each rep, except on the rower where each calorie is one point."
Taken from Athlepedia.
Everyone at this point knows that I have cancer and have been hanging out with chemo for a bit. With that said, there's NO WAY I'm missing this opportunity, not only for the cause, but to see if I can walk through what is arguably the most grueling of all Crossit benchmark WOD's...while on chemo. I'm pretty certain I won't be besting my score this time since I haven't even picked up a weight in about a month but that doesn't matter -- I'll get to be around some Balance Gym Crossfit love and support which, if you guys haven't experienced that, it needs to be on your list.
Now, back to asking for you hard earned monies. I have a lot of subscribers to my blog here, many Facebook friends, and even more Twitter followers. If everyone gave me a dollar, I'd be set. Well, more than set since my fundraising goal is only $500...and thank you to everyone who has already donated, I owe you dinner. Here's a link to my donation page in hopes that you will follow it and give me that dollar.
Thanks, guys.