All the right moves

Selinda Davies is fighting for her life, hanging from a bar and swinging her entire body weight up as she competes with her partner in the pull-up section of a Crossfit competition.

Suddenly, to the shock and horror of everyone cheering from the sidelines, she loses her grip and flies backwards off the bar with her arms stretched outwards and her legs up in the air.

Her backside lands with a thud on the wooden boards beneath her and her upper body smacks against the wall behind her.

There’s a second that lasts for an eternity as her pull-up partner and the competition officials quickly gather around Selinda, and all her supporters hold their breath.

It was just a second though, before she grabs the hand of one of the staff and quickly gets on her feet — literally shaking off the fall — and jumps back on her bar to complete her workout, met with a chorus of bystanders cheering her name.

It was only the first event of a two-day competition, and Selinda had to immediately do a weightlifting exercise afterwards before a mountain bike and swimming event.

Selinda said if it wasn’t for her nasty fall her duo might have been able to win, as they came second in the competition.

“The adrenaline definitely kept me going; I had to get some needles into me and strap up for the next day,” she said.

Moving from the Mornington Peninsula to Shepparton, Selinda never expected to come top 5000 in an international competition.

Fast forward five years, Selinda has stayed a part of the same Crossfit group and gained the experience of being a trainer at Nemesis Strength and Conditioning.

She had always enjoyed being active and said she would try pretty much anything, having participated in netball, tennis, boot camps, circuit training, Pilates and yoga.

After the birth of her daughter Billie, Selinda wanted to get active again — but needed something she could attend during the day and bring Billie along, too.

“When I first started [Crossfit] she was only little, so she could be in the pram and just sit there and watch while I would do it and if I needed to stop to look after her for whatever reason I could do that,” Selinda said.

“She was just comfortable there, she was as comfortable as me and that made it a lot easier.”

Selinda has qualified for the quarter finals of the Crossfit Open for the third time, a worldwide competition.

The first year she competed she was almost in the top 30,000 and last year she came in the top 5000.

“That’s out of like 130,000 in the world, so it may seem like a big number but there’s a lot of good people,” she said.

Selinda has come first or second in every competition she has competed in.

After having her son Jesse, Selinda said it was a slow process to get back into training but she had lost 18kg since then.

“We’ve got so many mums that are in the same boat, you just want to start moving your body again,” she said.

“We’re all in different places in our life, different ages, different fitness levels, and none of that matters.

“We all want to do the same things, to get our fitness up, be healthy and fit so we can chase after our crazy kids and feel good about ourselves.

“There’s all these people who say ‘oh no I don’t want to go to the gym’, ‘I need to lose some weight first and get fitter before going to the gym’.

“I don’t know how they’re going to achieve that if they don’t actually just come to the gym and just give it a go.

“We’ve made so many friends — the kids have made friends, I’ve made friends, it’s just great.“