Who is Elizabeth Sparks?
I am a wife, mom, sister and daughter. I have a job doing medical sales, and my kids are busy doing everything they can between the hours of 4:00 and 9:00pm! Finding balance is sometimes difficult, but we manage to do it.
What is your CrossFit SPT testimony?
CrossFit is really such a perfect fit for me, although I didn’t think so at first. I was working out in the adult fitness program at Velocity when SPT first started, but had decided that I was not going to try it because I was continually nursing a hurt lower back, and I had a list of reasons why CrossFit wasn’t for me…I was too old. I had nothing to prove to anyone. I promised myself after I hurt my back deadlifting too much weight with bad form, that I would NEVER deadlift again. I had my glory days of competing in fitness…had won a national fitness competition and didn’t need to take this on. All of those reasons kept me from CrossFit for about a minute! HA!! My husband, Joel ventured down to check it out first and then talked me into just giving it a try because he knew that it was right up my alley as far as the competitive nature of the CrossFit community…and he said he thought I would really like Shannon…which was true too!
What was your first day at CrossFit SPT like?
I don’t really remember specifics about my first day at SPT, but what I do remember is that Shannon never pushed me to do more than I felt comfortable with in the beginning. She was (and still is) so good about making sure that my form and technique were spot on, and that I wasn’t going to hurt myself. My biggest fear was hurting my back again, and Shannon was aware of that and really helped me to feel comfortable with the lifting that we were doing.
What is your greatest memory at CF SPT?
I don’t know what it is about getting a pull-up for the first time, but it is a BIG DEAL! For as many years as I had been working out, pull-ups were my absolute nemesis. I could not do them. I had never learned how to kip, and a strict pull up was definitely not happening. Shannon and Casie worked with me, and taught me how to kip, and eventually just told me I was done using a band! The day I got a real pull-up was very exciting! And then after that, my first Open rolled around, and I got my first chest to bar pull-up during one of the Open workouts. I remember it was only 8 CTB per round, but it took me forever!! I probably did 20 pull-ups just to get my 8 CTB, but I did it and it was VERY EXCITING.
What is your “why”, when you are in the middle of a tough workout?
Easy…to try and beat whatever the fastest score or time is on the board. That’s just part of the fun of CrossFit (in my opinion).
What is one of the biggest misconceptions of CrossFit in your opinion?
I think people think you have to be super athletic to do CrossFit. I don’t think people really understand that there are ways to scale and modify everything to fit your own personal fitness level. I was saying earlier that I was afraid to do CrossFit because of my lower back, and that was due to my misconception that I was going to be doing crazy things that would injure me again, but I can honestly say that my back has never been better. I have had NO low back issues since I started CrossFit 2 1/2 years ago, and I think that is due to my core being stronger than it has ever been and the great coaching that we get at SPT. We are very lucky to have such great coaches who care whether we are doing something properly.