A pit stop in Frankfurt

I'm sitting at a little restaurant in the Frankfort airport now (where I had a traditional German meal) waiting for my next flight to Budapest.  So far the travel has been pretty uneventful which is good.  We left DC a little late but ended up making up the time in the air and landed right on time.  It was a 7 and a 1/2 hour flight here and I slept for about 6 hours.  While it wasn't great sleep at least it was something.  I can guarantee I'll sleep pretty well tonight!

As I mentioned in a previous post, I have a 4 and a 1/2 hour layover here.  I didn't really want to just sit in the airport the entire time so I decided to try to figure out something to do.  Many of you know that Crossfit is a pretty big part of my life back at home.  There is a 5 week worldwide competition called the Open that is the way you could eventually qualify for the Crossfit Games.  Over 200,000 people are competing and even though 99% of us (myself included) have zero shot at making the games it is still a lot of fun and a good way to see how you measure up against your peers. Crossfit headquarters announces the workout for the week on Thursday night and you have until Monday night to complete it and submit your score online.  When I registered for the Open I knew weeks 4 and 5 would happen while I was at worlds and I was totally ok with not being able to finish it as hockey is my #1 focus and what I train for.  But then I had an idea - why not try go do the workout during my long layover?  What better thing to do after sitting on a plane for 7 1/2 hours than to get up and get moving?  I did a little googling and found that Crossfit Am Main was only a 15 minute cab ride from the airport.  I emailed the owner yesterday and he said he would be there and happy to count for me if I could make it.  As soon as I landed in Frankfurt, I went through customs and caught a really nice Mercedes cab there. After a quick warm up, I went after it.  A few interesting notes:

-All the weights were in kilos vs pounds.  Based on what they had, I actually had to do a little more than the "prescribed" weight.
-The owner Steve spoke pretty good English.  However, he would start counting in German then correct himself!

I didn't necessarily do as well as I would have liked but I'm going to chalk that up to the long flight, the kilos and not eating.  But it was a fun experience and I think it helped me to get up and get moving!  The Crossfit community kind of reminds me of the hockey community in that you can go just about anywhere in the world and be welcomed.  It was definitely a good use of my layover.  Now off to Budapest!