Road to Regionals – TWL Athlete Interview Steph Ortiz

Finishing fourth in The Open in Australia this yer, Stephanie Ortiz is one strong woman to watch! Stephanie grew up in Orlando, USA starting out her fitness career in a gymnastics gym. She moved to Australia after College and starting training in a CrossFit box and has never looked back!

With her programming and preparation handled by her coach Ben Norman and prior experience at Regionals, we expect Stephanie will go well at this years Regionals!

Read on to find our more about her preparation this year:

Steph, you finished 4th in Australia in this year’s Open. What as your favourite workout?

The Open was really well programmed this year. My favorite workout was 15.1, I really enjoy toes to bar and getting a pb on the clean and jerk was icing on the cake! I enjoyed having the muscle ups in the beginning of a workout too in Open workout 15.3.

What was the major challenge for you in the Open?

The Open is a fun time in the CrossFit Season; its definitely a roller coaster of emotions, watching the computer screen to see what Dave Castro will pull out of his bag of tricks, then mentally going through the movements in your head, wondering what kind of set numbers you can hold, doing the workout, and wondering if your score will hold up. That whole process is a challenge for everyone who competed in the Open, top 30 or not.

We noticed a little bit of leader boarding among the top athletes during the Open. Do you think this will be standard affair now that more is on the line?

I think in general a little bit of leader boarding is going to happen. I only re-did 2 of the workouts but submitted my score right away. Once its submitted, Ben approves the score and thats when it pops up on the screen. A lot rides on your consistency throughout the five weeks so those first couple of workouts are important I think.

Last year, you qualified 31st in the Open going into Regionals. You became a bit of a surprise packet, blowing everyone away with an 8th place finish overall. Did you expect this at all?

I surprised myself last year so I am glad I wasn’t the only one that was! Last years Regional was the funnest competition I’ve had the pleasure of competing in. During the open, I treated every workout as a one-shot deal, that strategy has worked for me since then. Last year before the open started, I did not have the goal of qualifying for regionals, so it came as a bit of a surprise when I did qualify. I went into the competition with no expectations and to give every workout my all. With an 8th place finish it fueled my training regime for that next year.

Do you think it is more challenging to qualify for your first regionals, or qualify for a second time?

With the switch-up of the Super Regions, I knew qualifying this year would be extremely difficult compared to last year (especially qualifying low last time) and I took the Open very seriously. Qualifying for any Regional in any year is challenging-but with the Open workouts this time around, it definitely got stepped up a couple of notches.

What does it mean to you to get Regionals this year?

Qualifying for Regionals is a huge honor for every individual athlete, as well as the teams that qualified-but you definitely have to keep it in mind that, while you did qualify, everyone starts at zero once you get to Wollongong, its anyones game, so you have to be ready for everyone to step it up.

What has your preparation been like for Regionals this year?

My preparation has been seamlessly handled by my coach Ben Norman. The man is a programming genius when it comes to what type of movements he thinks will pop up-so luckily I’ve been doing a lot of strict handstand pushups, handstand walking and GHD’s. There are a lot of things that I need to dial in on, and the past couple of weeks those things have been clicking for me and my training partner Emma Hissey.

Is there anything you’ve done differently this year to previous years?

I wouldn’t say that Ive done anything different from previous years, I still have a lot to learn. Dialing in on longer workouts, pacing and high rep squatting have been things Im still continuing to work on as well as a laundry list of other movements!

What is something you have learnt from Regional competition last year, that you can take into competing this year?

The Regional competition was a lot of fun for me, seeing the talent in the female field here in Australia is truly inspiring, and it showed me that I could “hang with the big guns”.

Every time I compete; I treat it as a learning experience, go back to the drawing board and list things that I need to work on. Again, Ben helped me with those holes and while I am improving, there are still a lot of things I need to work on. I’m under the frame of mind that “coach knows best” and its been working for me.

Tell us a bit about you diet and your lifestyle.

I enjoy food. I don’t measure what I eat, sometimes I finish my plate, sometimes I don’t. I enjoy eating a delicious home cooked meal, my favorite thing to have is a hamburger and my favorite snack of choice is an apple with peanut butter. I work hard in the gym everyday so food is my reward! I love my veggies, and I eat peanut butter like its going out of style.

What about your role as a Coach?

I am very fortunate to have the lifestyle that allows me to train other people in CrossFit, seeing improvement at CrossFit Adelaide is so cool, seeing someone get their first pull-up, or their first muscle up makes it all worth it. (Even if it is at 5 o’clock in the morning).

And out of the gym?

I like to go rock climbing and enjoy trail running and love to nerd out on Avengers, X-Men and Harry Potter.

You competed with James (Newbury) at the Orange County Throwdown games in February – placing 21st overall – tell us about that experience?

The OC Throwdown was one of the bigger competitions I’ve competed in, and it was an experience to say the least. After I stopped staring at some of the big names that were there, I put my head down and worked. That part of the year was a re-building phase for me, I had just been in Hawaii to visit my sister and brother-in-law and was on my way back to moving to Australia.

It was good to compete with U.S. women (as well as some bad ass Aussie chicks as well) just to see where you stacked up. It was unfortunate that so many athletes injured themselves on the hurdle event, I too fell, but was lucky to walk away unscathed.

For those wanting to improve at CrossFit day-to-day, what is your number one tip to improve?

Improve on your strength i.e.; work those strict pull-ups. Squat and when your done squatting….squat some more! Squat, press and deadlift at least once a week. Also, its cool to be upside-down, so be upside down at least once a day 🙂

 What are three items that you can’t live without / are always in your gym bag?

• My cool WOD Life Lamb Tape
• TWL wrist wraps
• And a headband (for those longer workouts)

AMRAP Quick stats:

Age: 28.

How long have you been ‘cross fitting? 2 years

Back Squat: 115kg

If there was a WOD named after you, what would be in it? Handstand walk into a Static Handstand Hold with toes to bar into bar muscle ups. Oooooo I might have to try this!

Affiliate: CrossFit Adelaide

Coach: Ben Norman