2012 has been a year’s worth of change for Lindsey Smith and it’s only February. The biggest change for Smith is that she and her family have moved to Columbus, Ohio making her a new addition to the Central East Region. The very same Central East that happens to be home to CrossFit Games champions Graham Holmberg and Rich Froning.
Not only has Smith changed states, she’s changed methods. For the first time in her CrossFit career, Smith has enlisted the help of another CrossFit coach to improve her game. Now, Brain Mackenzie of CrossFit Endurance is calling the shots for Smith. 2012 also brought Smith her first sub three-minute, “Fran.” Something she has been fighting for the last few years.
The day I met with Smith was like every other day for this wife, mother, and top notch CrossFit athlete. It was 7:15 p.m. before she arrived at her box to train. Smith already put in a full day of work, officiated a basketball game for the school she works for, and managed to wrangle time with her four-year-old daughter.
Smith entered the gym a few paces behind her daughter, greeted her husband, changed her clothes, and put on her headband … classic Lindsey Smith. All that remained was a look at her phone, where her workout awaited.
“Since I started with Brian my training has increased three-fold from what I used to do. He makes me work on my weaknesses more than I ever had, but at 29, I am surpassing my three-sport college athlete days both mentally and physically,” Smith says about trainer Mackenzie. “I record all my workouts, send them to him, then he tells me what I need to be doing … you think that you are doing a movement great, then you watch yourself and it’s like my college basketball coach would tell us, ‘The eye in the sky doesn’t lie.’ So me recording my workouts has made Brian my eye in the sky.”
Since moving from Austin, Texas to Columbus, Smith has had to make adjustments to the change. “It has taken me a little while to find that groove I had in Austin with my training since the move, but once you put all your eggs in one basket you make it work,” she says. “I do feel like there is a target on my back, being here and being in the Central East now,” says Smith. “I feel like there are more people watching to see what I do and I need to not worry about that.”
The entire time Smith trains, she is followed by a camera, and watched by her daughter, Alexis. “If I didn’t bring my daughter with me to train, that would be another two or three hours a day I would not be able to see her, and that is unacceptable,” Smith says. “If that means potty breaks between sets and pushing play on the DVD player for her to be here with me and experience this, so be it. It’s my life and so is she.”
Smith’s husband, Web Smith now works for Rouge Headquarters in Columbus, which is what put the move to Central East in motion to begin with. He says the move does not affect her training. “Whatever it is she does, she aims to be the best at it,” he says. “It just makes the most sense to place her in an environment where she can have the best resources to display the talent she already has.”
Smith will hold her own in one of the toughest regions. She remains a competitive athlete, while also being a dedicated wife and mother. She seems to welcome the pressure.
When all eyes are watching, some fold, while others flourish. With a target now on her back as big as Smith’s, you can bet everybody will be waiting in the wings to see what she has to bring in 2012. Welcome to the Central East.