Social Styles

For her post tonight, Jocelyn talks about social interaction and personal characteristics.

It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon and open gym at the box was hoppin’ with firebreathers.  The echo of heavily loaded barbells being tossed could be heard bouncing back from the neighboring gymnastics building across the lot.  Our newest live wire, Chris, was working some heavy clean technique after finishing his first Helen in just 8:32.  Juggernaut had just finished King Kong in 8:53 (Golden you killed those cleans!). Kyle- Queen Kong in 2:58 and was now contemplating his second workout.  Desmond was helping Julie with her OH Squats and working some technique of his own.  Sam was in the corner doing his keggles on the yoga mat, periodically cueing his athletes to tighten up their mechanics in one way or another (Ha, I just love saying that.  But that’s because it’s the nature of my social style.  Plus, I know Sam appreciates my tendency towards being a wise ass.)  And when I realized that it was already almost 2 o’clock and I had yet to start my Caity Matter workout, I was overcome with a tad of anxiety, so in a mini panic I summoned Sam to start the stopwatch for me.  After all, I had been anticipating this workout for 2 whole days. 

Days like this I love sitting back and watching the interaction between everyone.  It’s the little things about people’s actions that intrigue me.  Desmond, for example, is very quiet.  He seems to slip in the door without drawing much attention to himself.  He will sit and patiently watch the others complete their workouts and with a raise of the eyebrow and a nod (this indicating that he was, in fact, impressed) he will turn his attention to the benchmark workouts written on the board.  As he studies the WODs, rubbing his chin between his thumb and forefinger, a look of consideration will take over his face.  It reminds me of a person choosing out a movie at the rental place. Various people will call out their opinions about which “Girl” he should attack, and after a few minutes of deliberation he will quietly begin to load up his barbell.  But then there is the countdown, 3,2,1, go! The stopwatch starts and suddenly a burst of utter intensity is unleashed. 

Then there is Golden–the Juggernaut.  Golden is not exactly the quietest of folk.  At CrossFit West, we have grown to count on him for a regular good laugh.  Golden is basically the strongest person we have at the box, a hell of an athlete, and is starting to have good form on most lifts.  In fact, he no longer plie squats with his toes pointing outward at 180 degrees in either direction, but actually gets those toes and femurs to about 30 degrees, lowers his hips deep into the hole while maintaining a (mostly) flat back.  He makes fun of himself (and others) about bad form.  He jokingly asks us coaches to take a look at his donkey kick just to be sure he’s getting it right and works hard to see if he can do a box jump without moving his head vertically at all, really reaching for minimal hip extension, and is genuinely upset if he can’t mimic a terrible jump.  He finishes his 500+lbs deadlifts with a calf raise and practices bodybuilding poses for everyone during class. Golden is a goofball.  But he is also an animal.  And when he completes his first 3 squat cleans at 250lbs during King Kong (previously his 1RM) you can see the excitement and pride in his eyes.  And even though he will only make jokes about it later, you can tell he is incredibly stoked.

Kyle, one of the 1^st ever members of CrossFit West back when Sam first started a year and a half ago, is quite modest.  Most people around here have either witnessed or heard about Kyle’s transformation.  I, myself, have only seen pictures.  Pictures that brought me to tears, collapsing to the floor in laughter.  As the legend goes, Kyle was overweight and un-athletic when Sam twisted his arm to start CrossFit.  He would only be allowed to work a specific job (one that only Sam could get him) if he would try CrossFit.  This job was very important because there was a special girl who worked there, so he decided to give it a shot.  According to Kyle, on his first day of CrossFit, Sam was not in the best of moods.  While he was attempting ring dips, he vividly remembers Sam saying, “Kyle, you look like you have epilepsy.”  [Sam’s note—I have no memory of this and seriously question it’s validity.]  But he kept with it.  He had a deep burning desire to be better, and just as most people experience, it started to have that amazing domino effect in all areas of his life.  Now Kyle is on his way to becoming a competitive CrossFit athlete.  He holds many records at CrossFit West, and at the young age of 22 finished in the top third at the NorCal Qualifiers.  But even so, Kyle is very humble.  He doesn’t draw much, if any, attention to himself when he is preparing to workout.  In fact, Kyle tends to be in a zone of his own most of the time.  He spends time analyzing various workouts from different affiliates and then creates his own based on a wide array of information he gathers from books like Starting Strength, Olympic Lifting, internet sites, Ed, Sam, and other coaches and athletes.  He’s got a sort of scientific approach to the way he does things and unlike many CrossFitters, does NOT thrive on not knowing what the day will hold workout wise.  He comes with a plan.  And you only realize that he’s about to start his WOD when he sneaks over and quietly asks the first person available to start his timer.  But just like all of the great athletes here, when the timer starts, his power is unleashed.   

I tend to notice stuff like this all the time and recently I got to thinking about an interesting book I read a while back about Social Styles.  It’s about the four basic personality types and what their tendencies are.  It then goes on to explain how to identify the different types, as well as understand the way in which they interact, etc.  Kind of goofy, I know, but interesting none the less.  But then I started to think about these social styles and how they show up in CrossFit.  When I first started to coach softball years ago, my dad told me, “Joc, you gotta figure out what makes ‘em tick.”   It was some of the best coaching advice I ever got and I try to use it to this day, even in CrossFit.

Understanding personalities is useful in any group setting really.  Whether you are an athlete or coach, part of a team or not, having good relationships with the people around you will always be important, especially when we have such a unique community like ours here at CrossFit West.  Having said that, take a look at the list below.  It’s fun to see where you and others fall.  There are four basic social styles: Analyticals, Drivers, Amiables, and Expressives.