Name nickname – Bill A. (editor's note: also known as Mr. Amazing or Mr. A for short)

Relative age – 39 and holding for another 2 weeks (editor's note: now 2 days)

How long have you been CrossFitting, when did you start? almost a year – started April 2010

How did you find Field House Gym and CrossFit? Charles Gibbs and I heard about this crazy punishing workout place through word of mouth.  Since I had been sitting on my butt for 15 years doing absolutely no exercise, I decided to give it a shot.  We committed that we’d do it for 90 days, no matter what.  That was a tough 90 days….

How often do you make it to the gym and which class time do you prefer? 4 times a week at 6am – we get the WOD fresh off the press and are the guinea pigs to see if its too hard for the ordinary folks who can’t make the dawn patrol.  Usually it is so everyone else gets the watered down version.

What do you do for a living? More than just a job title, what do you actually do and what do you enjoy most about it.  I’m a lawyer, which despite all the negatives, means I solve problems all day long.  I’m kind of like a plumber for businesses.

Do you have a favorite skill/lift and why?  I like any of the gymnastic/body weight stuff.  Picking up something heavy is cool, but there’s something about being able to fling your body into some weird position, on demand, that is much more satisfying. 

What is your nutritional philosophy and why? Michael Pollan said it best – “Eat food.  Not too much.  Mostly plants.”  Eating things that your grandmother would recognize as food is critical – I don’t remember my Big Momma ever serving up a nice steaming bowl of high fructose corn syrup at Sunday lunch.  We also try to buy directly from farmers – I’ve got a guy I buy veggies, chickens and eggs from, another source for beef and am working on pork.

What 3 foods do you always have in your house?  Olive oil, eggs, bacon.  I can make anything taste better with these three.

Favorite physical activity outside of crossfit? Flexing in front of my bathroom mirror while singing “Sexy Back.”

Who do you use as a measuring stick/who inspires you in our gym?  Everybody inspires me because we’re all dealing with our own issues.  The guy finishing first used to finish last and the guy finishing last will, if he sticks with it, finish first sooner or later.  It’s the effort that really inspires me.  But I really do want to beat Soto’s ass, just once.

If you could trade places with any one historical person or live in any particular place or era, who, where, when would it be and why?  Any dictator of any relatively wealthy nation at any point in time would be fine with me.  People always say “if I were king…” – I’d like to put that to the test.

One thing most people don't know about you? I can read other people’s minds.  And I can fly.

What 3 songs would you like to see included in your ideal CrossFit playlist?  I’m too busy trying not to vomit to worry about what’s playing, but I could do with much less of that stupid song by Muse that sounds like “The Final Countdown”

What was the last book you read?  Empire of the Summer Moon – a history of the closing of the Great Plains and the Comanchee Nation.  Now those guys were crossfit!