Hungry Dog Barbell Podcast
Jenna & Richard
Jenna and Richard from CrossFit Hershey are back on to review the CrossFit open and Quarterfinals!
yeah, and then I would like read one book and then I would watch the movie, and then I would read like book three and then I would watch the movie. So I did it that way. Now I just listen to the audio books when I mop the floors of the gym and stuff like that good content so when there's so much more depth to the books.
Speaker 3:That's why like yeah, I don't do that person.
Speaker 2:But like that story is so integrated and there's so many details and things that make sense with the books but they just had to skip in the movies, because you can't have a seven hour movie and it's just you know it is what it is wait time out.
Speaker 1:Who says you can't have a seven hour movie? I would have watched it. Would you have watched it?
Speaker 3:that's why they're doing the tv show yeah, that's why they're doing the tv show.
Speaker 1:I don't love the tv show, but I think I I can't really answer that because I'm very new to the harry potter world. If this was something I got into, yeah, like it's, I don't want to watch that. I'm not going to yeah, if I was into it in high school or middle school, then it'd be different story.
Speaker 3:But it's funny you say that, because I think, like, maybe a little bit of the opposite, that like, if I had got into it more recently, like I might be more open to see the characters be played by someone else, um, but just the fact that, like, I literally grew up, I was the same age as, like, emma watson and them, uh like I had a crush on her when I was in, like middle school, you know.
Speaker 3:So, to see someone else playing that stuff, it would just be like feel a little bit weird, you know, yeah, yeah, I agree, but we've watched like other big properties being taken over, like I've watched six different batmans by now, you know, and, and ben affleck was maybe my favorite one yet and I think that everyone before him was my favorite at the time until the next one came out.
Speaker 3:Not everyone else gets it right like that, but you know, um, all right, let's dive into this now, speaking of one big property that we love and can also get upset with, let's move on to the next one. We are at the finishing point for most of the crossfit, uh, athlete world, I should say in the season right now, quarterfinals is wrapped up. The age, the individuals, they're all set age group finishes tonight. I believe amy just told me that that wraps up tonight and be official later on. Um, so so tell me, jenna, you go first, like based off of the open or the open, the quarterfinals, right, based off of things like running it at your affiliate, how you feel about the workouts and just like, I guess, the video review process, how do you grade the open and quarterfinals crossfit season so far?
Speaker 1:all right. Unpopular opinion. I thought the open was pretty awesome this year. I I really did. Yeah, we aren't an elite gym and that's okay. We're okay with that right. I felt like the workouts were so doable for our community and I realized we're talking about like the whole world, but I'm just thinking in terms of CrossFit Hershey Even the quarterfinal workouts like they were all doable for everybody that participated and I love that part of it. I do. I know again, unpopular opinion. When Adrienne listens to this, she's probably not going to agree with me and that's okay.
Speaker 1:She's on a different level and I know she wants the skill-based stuff. I know she wants to be challenged more, which I totally understand, like not I just think from a perspective of like where our affiliate is and the fitness abilities we have. I loved it, I really did, and I think I can speak for our entire community and kind of say the same thing.
Speaker 3:So that's the open right and quarterfinals too. You feel like it was a great process like through the whole thing there for your affiliate.
Speaker 1:I do. Yeah, we had 14 people that qualified. This is a little sore, sore subject Now. We had 14 people that qualified for the quarterfinals and two of us, three of us did it, four of us did it.
Speaker 3:So I'm a little upset about that.
Speaker 1:Qualified last year two, just no sorry adrian, myself and kate page. We qualified last year for the individuals, and then I had two people that qualified for age groups last year.
Speaker 1:All five of us did it last year, but last year it was two separate weekends, so yeah it made things interesting, like I had to pick one or the other because I wasn't doing both and I didn't want adrian to do it by herself last year. So I chose to do individuals with her last year and got my head handed to me, sort of, so I held my own. But yeah, um, this year.
Speaker 3:That was last year. That was hold on before you keep before we keep going on and talk a little bit more about um this year, because I think we were at a really good point there, richard. What about your perspective on it, jenna? It sounds like you're giving her like B plus A, like high praise for the season so far.
Speaker 2:Richard and a different affiliate so on the front end, I agree, I do like the open three scores could be considered. Maybe not enough for a well-rounded test, but the argument, I think, is that 25% moved on so so you didn't really need this extensive depth that maybe you needed in a 20, you know 14, 15, where people were qualifying directly to regionals and five, six scores met. A better breadth of fitness testing, right.
Speaker 3:But yeah, that had to be bigger before, so yeah.
Speaker 2:Right Cause you were trying to get 20 people in a given region. Right now you're taking everyone who is at least semi-competitive and so that first step doesn't have to be so intense. And one of my arguments and I joked with this about actually with Adrian as well was, if it seems easy, go faster. You know what I mean. Like you can always, whether it's the burpee dumbbell, whether it was that light deadlift, there's always an opportunity to show your fitness by increasing the pace, by increasing the intensity, and so on the front end there, I like that. You know I love the short weeks as an affiliate.
Speaker 2:We're a pretty big gym here in Milwaukee. We have, you know, ballpark 300, some members, and so running the open for five weeks or with really intense workouts with a ton of like different equipment and all this stuff, it's just, it's a headache and it doesn't really add a lot to what is, at its base, a community event. So I thought I liked that a lot. I mean we can get into quarterfinals a little more too. But as far as the open goes, I love it. I love the testing, I thought it was fun, I had good feedback from our members. So, yeah, big for me that was the open, wasn't there?
Speaker 3:And then, what about quarterfinals for you?
Speaker 2:Overall I like it. You know I've seen a lot of people argue like one of my favorite things is people. You know it's not heavy enough and as a guy who was, when he was a competitive CrossFitter, heavily skewed towards strength, like I won competitions because I'd win the lift all the time, right, I personally don't think that that's the only metric for fitness. You know, and we've seen year in and year out in the open in particular. But you know, with this new quarterfinals is a little different the idea that strength, that it needs to be this like foundational piece of quarterfinals programming. I don't know if I necessarily agree with that and again, like you know, I would certainly argue that if you can cycle 245 for reps, you have to be strong.
Speaker 2:You know, so that bar doesn't have to be 15, it doesn't have to be for the guys, it doesn't have to be 20, the guys, it doesn't have to be 205, mostly for the women. And then, same thing we saw a capacity test. We saw a gymnastics test that I think a lot of people underestimated the impact of the toes-to-bar, for example, later on in that workout. Yeah, I think there's this constant desire for the community to over-highlight strength.
Speaker 3:And when you look at, it's got to be sexy every single time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like I love to clean and jerk, don't get me wrong, but I don't think that's necessarily going to find us the fittest people on earth. And if you are that good that you can cycle, you know two, 45 or one, what was it? One, 65 for reps, then show it. You know, like the women did 30 plus reps, the men's were men, were up there. Like to me, that is still strength, but it's more crossfit strength.
Speaker 3:you know like we're showing metabolic fatigue doesn't limit us from high uh level lifting or heavier, rather, lifting yeah, I have a comment on the strength-based test that people keep asking for and like just wanting to see the very basic, like hey, just give us like a softball pitch to knock it out of the park. It when I program for competitions and the strength piece is like just show me a clean and jerk or a snatch, something like that, I kind of feel like that looks like lazy programming to me. I always look back on when I program stuff like that and I'm like I don't exactly love it. You know like it's like expected.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know I want to. I want to surprise people, you know like. And the yeah, you know I want to. I want to surprise people, you know like the little bit of negativity means you're doing something good Cause like that means that, like someone probably needed to train better for what you programmed to test them on, you know. So that can be a great thing. It may not seem like it on the front half, but on the back half it can be really good. So that's kind of like the programming aspect of quarterfinals. We talked about how it runs for affiliates. Tell me how you feel about that part for richard, like, did it pass the same test that the open pass? Like running at the affiliate quarter? Yeah, um.
Speaker 2:So same thing. We had somewhere in the ballpark of 20 some people qualified, about half did it 10, 15 people maybe did it a little higher, a little lower. Um, just because some people's schedules I didn't see everybody, we we were kind of like trading, who was judging and viewing and doing what. But you know, obviously we had somebody who was an elite level, uh, trying to make semi-finals and kind of seeing her side of it, and we had a lot of people there just for fun. And I think the two things that I latched on to were one a lot of people were excited about it who in previous years weren't, you know. So for some people, getting that opportunity was really fun and they enjoyed that and it was a chance to express their hard work, you know. So I liked the inclusiveness of the workouts as a whole and I liked that. You know it gave people who wanted to participate a chance.
Speaker 2:You know in the past that 10%, you know that that wasn't a special number. The fact that some people thought that that was like some, like a aspirational number was weird to me. That like 25 devalued, that I'm like, with all loving respect, if you're not in the top one percent, you don't matter to this at all as a sport. So why are we arguing that 10 is better than 25? This isn't. This is meant to allow people a chance to enjoy their season, to show their hard work beyond just that percentage. If you're not in that, not in that 0.1 to 5%, you could argue you don't deserve it, any more than 24% does. I thought it was weird that gatekeeping that initially some people kind of put out, but from my experience our members enjoyed it, they liked the opportunity to participate and we had more people do it this year than ever before.
Speaker 3:Jenna you were just talking about. You had a lot more people qualify this year, but not necessarily sign up. Tell us a little bit more about that, and how do you think that next year you can incentivize them to sign up and play in the quarterfinals?
Speaker 1:So there was an idea brought up by a member and friend of mine that we, um, we have a really tight knit community. I know Richard knows that too. Um, our, our people like to do things together. So, uh, the idea that they had was putting them in, putting the quarterfinals workouts as the class workout to get more people to do it. And I didn't change the programming on sugar, while I just made it another option for them to decide if they wanted to do it Saturday morning. We had, I would say, probably 20 people do that clean and jerk with us and the only two that well, dustin did it too. I think we had maybe three or four of us that did it that day, that qualified for quarterfinals and everybody else just did it for fun. So I think if we can get the community around us more, more people would do it.
Speaker 1:Everybody loves the open in our gym Again, richard can vouch for that. Like, we have a freaking party every Friday night during the open and I'm sure everybody you know everybody has their own way of doing Friday night lights. We really we, we, my 515 crew, they're great. They come back at night and they're there all night, judging for me, like everybody is just there hanging out the second week of the open. This year we probably had over 100 people there.
Speaker 1:We did a donation night for a previous member that's struggling with a sickness right now, but we get really, really behind the open and I think this year, being that it was the first year as an owner and leader, I didn't do a very good job of getting behind it for quarterfinals. Like we could have made it that way, but I think it was a little bit different because you know they they released the workouts on Wednesday. I can think of somebody specifically that he works four days on, four days off, or four days night shift, four days day shift, four days off. Like he couldn't come because he was working, like so it did. It did conflict with people's schedules and getting 14 people to do it together is a little bit of a nightmare. But we probably could have done another, like Friday night lights and got more people involved, and I think that may be the route we go next year.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Just extend the open, you know. And that brings me back to I know that five weeks in the open was a really long time, but if we're doing three weeks, taking two weeks off and then doing a weekend that you have increased the numbers on so that more people participate and you want to make it more valued at the affiliate level, If you're trying to make this about like the affiliates being able to be together, then is that two weeks off really worth it?
Speaker 3:You know is that is that helpful, Richard. What do you think? Would you rather just keep it five weeks of the open takeaway quarterfinals or stay in the format that we have right now?
Speaker 2:All right. To be completely clear, if we're're talking sport, none of this should be online all right sure absolutely none of it.
Speaker 3:But if we're talking about affiliate participation and fun um and in the real world, right, now because we're still like a few years away from, I think, being able to be in a full in-person model. I mean, like anyone that's kind of that has a little bit of like know-how, knows what it would take to do that. You have to have, essentially, think about the NFL, all the billion-dollar stadiums that are around the country so the teams can go and participate. Crossfit is still a little bit away from that, but yeah, in the real world right now, what do you think is better the five weeks of the CrossFit Open and then go on to an in-person stage, or three weeks with a little bit of a break? I like the three weeks with a little bit of a break.
Speaker 2:I like the three weeks with a break. I think mentally it's nice to not just slam yourself in the wall over and over, like I know, like you know, the intensity of the open isn't quite what it used to be, but people still go very, very hard and get very sore. Some people redo it, you know. So just a slightly different context. So I think having a week or two allows us to get just a little bit recovered. Make us to get just a little bit recovered, make a game plan and kind of focus on what's next For this participatory model. I like this. I think it makes it fun. You get the three weeks for everyone. You get an extra extension for those who both qualify and want to. I think it's a good blend.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Jenna. What about you up there? Stay three weeks or go back to the five.
Speaker 1:I like the three weeks. I think it gives you something to work towards. I also think for our, for us and I'm going to say this as best as I possibly can we have some people that think they're a little better than they are and I feel like I don't love the level thing. I think that. But it also kind of helps talk about the ladder and building. I know that helped a lot of our people understand where they fall on that ladder and a little bit of like real, like realistic kind of set in. You know, reality set in.
Speaker 3:Do they do that, do they get away with that this year, or is it going to be back after the quarterfinals or I don't even. It after the quarterfinals or I don't even it might be after the games. The levels are still there, but I think they've re-upped in power rankings after the games, but yeah that's, it's good.
Speaker 1:It's it's good to coach to that. You know, because, like for us, like we're really and hopefully every gym is like this I know for us we're really big on like technique right, and I don't want you jumping up trying to do a bar, muscle up if you can't even do a chest to bar, you know. So, like it's things like that, where when you see the open and you see the rx movements, if you can't rx the workouts in the open, then why are we trying to rx them in class? You know, and I know there's definitely great areas in that, but I did. I do think that helped our community kind of figure out, like again, that ladder of growth. So I love the three weeks. Again I think it's this year, the people that did qualify, even though some of them didn't do it due to whatever reason. Um, it gave everybody something to work towards. I think it makes it more fun yeah, I love the um.
Speaker 3:I'm not mad at the 25 either. I think that that makes it easier as a programmer for events that to like base your standards off of. Like last year when it was top 10%, it was like I didn't want to put in, like this is for people that make quarterfinals for RX division because like that's mostly the top of the tip of the spear, you know, like it's not the very tip but it's it's high up there. 25% is going to include everyone that goes out there and competes. You know, and at a local level, if you make quarterfinals you should be able to do most of the rx things. You might be at the bottom of the category, but we all know those people that are like the rx 90 of the workouts there and like maybe they're not the best at handstand push-ups but they crush everything else, like bar muscle-up, ring muscle-ups, handstand walking even, and they just have one hole in it. So they might have placed like in the 77s, you know, or like the mid 80s, but they should not be doing scales Exactly Like they would. They're going to, they're going to crush at a scale competition. If you program correctly. I'll go a little figured out there with the correctly.
Speaker 3:So I have this question for you guys. Right, I've been thinking about this. We talked about devaluing your fitness when it goes from 10 to 25%. Let's say that we are five years in the future. We've time traveled there. Right, the Open still exists, but it's no longer step one in the qualification process for the CrossFit Games. It's the yearly chest test of fitness, just like a physical Right Put out by CrossFit every year. You'll still have a leaderboard, you'll still get your ranking and everything. It's just that the people that are making it to the CrossFit Games, they have something else that they're going to start with. You know, does the open still hold its value right now? Is it still something that you guys, as like leaders of your communities, are going to motivate people to participate in? Is it something that you would still participate in yourself, richard? What do you think?
Speaker 2:As a standalone event.
Speaker 3:Standalone event, frosted. Hu still puts it on every year. It's just that it's no longer going to be step one to go to the CrossFit. Hu still puts it on every year. It's just that it's no longer going to be step one to go to the CrossFit Games now or in the future. They have like in-person events that everyone else could go compete in as their first process or they have whatever event. It's just the CrossFit Open remains without it being going on to the CrossFit Games.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's where it needs to go at some point, like you mentioned, when the logistics of that next stage could be more in person, because I think right now we have this weird mixture where we have a mass participatory event that needs to be appropriate for everyone, but it's still a feeder for an elite competition and I think those are kind of incongruent, overlapping themes, right. So we could separate that, allow people who want to compete a fundamentally different road forward. Where they are going to have video judges, expectations are much higher and then we can use the open as the fun, the explaining that was meant to be right. A yearly test. You could add on either financial prizes, just participatory prizes. You could obviously, as we do, have intramural fun at the gym, have a lot of things that make the community aspect better, without that pressure of making it still a test that's viable as a jumping point to something else.
Speaker 2:I think that opens it up way more. We can have much more fun with the programming. It doesn't need to be quite as perfect quote unquote to take that next step, because it could just be what it is. It could be an event, you know, and I think I think most people would still participate. I just did. I ran a distance race for the first time and the amount of people who show up for an average local half marathon or whatever is huge, and I think that still exists in CrossFit, especially if we market it to our people. Well, I don't think it needs to be a jumping off point to the games, because half our members don't even know what that is to be a great, you know couple of weeks of fun for your members and to test themselves.
Speaker 3:Yeah, jenna. What about you up there? Are you still doing the open if it doesn't lead to the games, are you still pushing it to your members?
Speaker 1:Absolutely, but we do that now. Like I said, you know we're not an elite gym and we're OK with that. We're a good gym. I said you know we're not an elite gym and we're okay with that. We're a good gym. Uh, we have people that like to compete and we have people that can compete, um, but at the end of the day, the way we sell the open to new people that have never done it before, people that have are nervous about it's, it's a way to test your fitness.
Speaker 1:It has nothing to do with what's going to happen in the future. We're just looking to see well, have you grown? Have you have you? Can you apply what you've learned in the last year? So yeah, absolutely, I think that would actually take. I can think of people specifically, I think, going that direction again, I speak for Jessica Ross with Hershey. It would take the pressure off, I think, for a lot of people you know and I like the idea that you can work towards. Well, here's my question Would it still be worldwide and there'd still be a leaderboard worldwide?
Speaker 3:Still worldwide, still leaderboard every year. You still get ranking where you rank and everything, and they still keep all the numbers up from years past.
Speaker 1:Yep, definitely, I would absolutely do it, because that's what most of our people do anyway. That's why they want to do the open, to see where they fall this year compared to the last, however many years.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and.
Speaker 1:I agree with Richard. I would be OK with that. If they went in that direction, I think it might actually be more fun.
Speaker 3:Do you think that it loses its value, like in an overall scheme, how people think about it and talk about it?
Speaker 1:I don't think in our community no, I can't speak for anybody else's community but I don't think it would be. It would lose its value. Like I said, I think it would. It would probably help a little bit.
Speaker 2:Honestly, I think more people would do it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can think of like Kim Richard never signs up for the open. She does all the workouts but she doesn't sign up because it's just too much pressure, you know, and taking that piece away from it. And it's just here's a yearly test, let's do it. I think that would.
Speaker 2:That would be huge for our crew yeah, I agree there and even too, like as a matter of right. Like most of the people who are doing the open, they don't even consider the competitive element of it, right? They're not interested in the quarterfinals, let alone semis or the games, right? So I don't think consider the competitive element of it, right. They're not interested in the quarterfinals, let alone semis or the games, right? So I don't think for most people it changes that. And going back to the handful of people who maybe think they're better than they are, then they can sign up for the next stage, right? Like, if you're only doing the Open for the next stage, it overlooks the real purpose of it. You know, like it was always meant to be this amazing opportunity where you know, no other, no other event, no other sport, for that word, whatever, uh, has something like that, right? Like no offense to orange theory or any of the people who rip off our methodology with a lesser version. They don't have this right.
Speaker 2:They don't have that, I'm just saying there's no orange theory at 45 that are such and such fit but don't actually do CrossFit, but do CrossFit without us. Right, and that, to me, is important. That is where we have our community actually participate. Come together, say we are here, we're part of this. This is unique and special. Nothing else exists and it doesn't have to lead to something else for that to be true.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I totally support that. What do you think? I I? I fully agree with you guys. I think that the, the, the next step, the next step forward at least, cause there's probably going to be a lot more steps in between now and when this becomes a viable option, is to divest and make the CrossFit Open a standalone thing. That does not lead to the world's fittest.
Speaker 3:We talked about earlier about the evolution of programming, and one thing that's happened is that, with more eyes on CrossFit and more people doing it and it becoming a more viable option for a career path if it is that for people, programming is just going to change, because before you were testing a much smaller group of people. Now you're testing thousands of people to see who could move on. So there has to be a shake up in what's going to be the test when they're online to in person. Over the years. You know you talk about something that's going on to almost two decades of being a worldwide global test, you know. So that's really cool to see. I want to talk about your guys' relationship in a remote coaching standpoint. How do you make it so that you guys feel like you're in person leading up to these virtual competitions. As a remote coach and athlete relationship, richard, what are some things that you do to check in with all your athletes at Hershey, all your remote athletes leading up to competition time?
Speaker 2:I think one of the biggest things is establishing that relationship like throughout the year in general, right? So Jenna and I talk a lot, you know, and different people have different needs for me. I've noticed I have a couple people who pop in, they'll post their scores. They're like, yep, everything's good, and then that's kind of it. And I have some people, yep, who are going to message me two, three times a week, who have questions on things, who want more guidance, whatever.
Speaker 2:And you know I as an athlete was, you know, had my own version of that too when I was working with other people. Um, so I think the number one is is knowing who you're working with on the front end. What do they need from you? You know, like I had one or two people that I wrote them detailed notes on all those quarterfinal workouts. We talked about every open beforehand, like I had recommendations, strategies, all that, and of course, you know we prepped for the expectations because the open is pretty predictable going into it. And then like, yeah, there's some people who they're going to kind of run their own race regardless and you just kind of hope that you gave them the tools to do that really well, even though you're not there to hold their hand on the, on the in the moment, I guess yeah.
Speaker 3:Jenna, how, how's it feeling prepping with a virtual coach for these?
Speaker 1:virtual competitions. Well prior to richard coaching me, he knew me as an athlete, so I think that definitely helps. Um, I think that there are days that richard and adrian believe in me more than I believe in me. So some things he throws, throws at me. I'm like shit, I can't do this. And then I do it. I'm like oh, hell, okay.
Speaker 3:Here we are.
Speaker 1:So it's nice having a coach that like pushes you Cause again, like there have been things that you have thrown he has thrown at me in the last couple of months that I never thought I would complete or do or handle and I or do or handle and I did. So it's been fun because again he knows me as a person and as an athlete, which again is super helpful for the virtual side of things. Um, I think it'd be a little bit different of a dynamic had he moved before I was here or whatever, and we didn't have that relationship prior yeah but I also know you didn't really know Adrian either, and I know you guys have a good relationship there too.
Speaker 1:So, going into the open, you can always tell when you're prepping for the open stuff. Like I would look at things and be like, yep, this is open stuff, this is open prep. You know, oh shit, here we go. This is open prep. Um, or even quarterfinals. Going into the open, which I this is what I love about Richard If I have a workout or the open, you know, whatever drops a workout, I say to him like give me a number, give me a number, give me a number of rounds to get to, or a time I can pretty much hit it spot on, or a little bit better. And that's happened the last couple of years, which has been pretty cool. So he again knows me very well. Quarterfinals this year was weird and I had very well. Quarterfinals this year was weird. Um, and I had a conversation with him last week about this. I feel like it's the end of the road for me. So, like I just have fun with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I left a lot on the table this year which kind of pissed me off thinking back, but I was. For me this year was about adrian, because she's got a pretty good future ahead of her with some things, um, in terms of competing and and I just wanted to be there for her and she wanted to do it with me. So I'm like, screw it, I'm not worried about me this year. I want you to have a good experience that way next year she could kill it in age groups. So it's, it's I can honestly think, was it? Um, I think it was the deadlift burpee one I literally said to you, richard, how far do you think I can get? And I think you gave me a number and I got further. Because it's just, I need a target and he knows how to give me a solid target. Every time Now our programming is different. Like day-to-day programming there's not really a target, but when it means, means something.
Speaker 3:He's pretty spot on with that when it's an actual test, because there's a separation and how you should approach things when it's a test versus a training piece, but whether it's just like zone two backed off, like just working on a little bit of fitness, you know in general. So I have two questions to that point.
Speaker 2:I just want to talk um, because this is that that's a fun one like part of why I always hated remote coaching like until I moved. I refused to do it because I wanted to be in person, I wanted quality control, I wanted to be able to speak to the moment in hand. One of the reasons why uh, for some people I'll do more of it, but I don't love to write targets or very specific outcomes, is because I've actually seen that really mess with my or with other athletes heads not just mine, but like people I know who have remote coaches. The coach will be like oh, it should take 10 minutes and they take 11. And they're like I'm a failure, I'm terrible.
Speaker 2:And on the flip side, if I give them a number and they crush it, they'll be like well, this guy doesn't know me at all and there's so many variables in a given workout that come with. Competition. In particular is to know how to run your race. You should be able to look at a workout and, at the very least, have a ballpark of like plus or minus this this is roughly how long the reps should take. This is my sticking point. I'm good at this part, you know.
Speaker 2:Whatever those variables are, I really want people to have that in themselves as much as from me, because me just saying it again, like I can very much get close, but what if I? What if I limit your ceiling by accidentally saying too low? Or what if I crush your confidence Cause I'm like, yeah, you should do this on broken and then you don't and you're like, oh my gosh, like what's going wrong? I'm not fit enough. So like I always struggle with that, like I want to give more specifics for some people, and then other times I'm like you should be able to like evaluate that in your moment and be like that was or wasn't a good effort on my part, and here's why. And then, if we talk about it, we can go over why or why not that, that feeling is, you know, appropriate, or perhaps skewed, given your own expectations?
Speaker 3:For sure I see a lot of people get shoehorned into stuff just because, like they've been given a suggestion from someone else. Like I am very cautious about telling someone like whether to go unbroken or hold on to this amount of reps If I don't really know them, if I haven't spent a lot of time like watching them and know how they're going to move. Because it's like this is what I want from the workout and you may avoid that, because I mean, people in crossfit classes don't always listen to stimulus. It's gone by the wayside a lot recently. People in crossfit classes don't always listen to stimulus. It's gone by the wayside a lot recently.
Speaker 3:This is what I want for the workout, or it's designed to be, like you know, like this is what your level is with what you are planning to use, and like this is what you could probably actually do if you listened. You know those are three different things, you know. So I wanted to ask you guys from last year going into this year, what were you like working on? Like big weaknesses from last year's quarterfinal and open into this year?
Speaker 2:So to reverse engineer it, it actually worked really well because she went from like twelve hundred last year in her age group to like three hundred. So definitely in progress, sure, regardless of what quarterfinals was, you know. For those reasons, but in the open one of the big things we see is that capacity and then your ability just to do everything are the largest determiners of your success. Outside of again, that like top one, two percent that has everything really well some inconsistent toes to bar and some inconsistent chest to bar and like kipping and like sort of couldn't do muscle ups, some handstand pushups. And one of the things that she did really well was taking all the accessory work, all the focus on that that I gave her, and really leaning into that Right, because when I write a gymnastic progressions in particular, it's a lot of boring stuff, it's a lot of eccentrics, it's a lot of accessory work, it's a lot of variations, it's a lot of repetition.
Speaker 2:You know, twice a week we're working on upper body pulling just that right, like with a focus.
Speaker 2:Um, it's not 21, 15, nine.
Speaker 2:Chest to bar, it's alternating e-moms at 50% of max capacity with a skier for interference, it's lat work to create strength, it's tricep accessory all those things.
Speaker 2:So for her in particular, the limiter although we've worked certainly a lot on her strength and her lifting technique, when I kind of looked at her scores over the last couple of years, the biggest opportunity was still to improve her gymnastics. So getting to the point where 10, 15, 20 unbroken toes to bar is not only doable but consistent, where she has all the muscle ups, uh, and not just one or two, but like again able to put them into a workout um, strict handstand pushups aren't a large limber. They might be hard but they're there, they're doable, you know. And and just putting those pieces together it takes that time. So we've spent a lot of this year heavily developing her upper body, in particular push, pull, um, along with the technical side of the lifts, more so than just hammering heavy, you know, power lifting and stuff, because she already was pretty strong coming into working together, it was getting her to be able to express that strength on either the barbell and the olympic lifts or in the gymnastic sense yeah, hell, yeah.
Speaker 3:That's all the stuff that everyone skips in their programming at the end of it. You know, it's like I'll say that for tomorrow, tomorrow's tomorrow and tomorrow's tomorrow. Yeah, all that stuff. Um, jenna, how do you feel about that stuff?
Speaker 1:I think it's pretty spot on. I mean, I could remember doing there was an open workout with 50 toes to bar and brandy was judging me. It might have been the first open that I did and I think I got to 30, 14.4 or whatever. Yeah, four, something like that. Um, there was like blood, like hayley adams style, running down my arms and like I was ripped up and I was like I don't cry, I'm not a big crier. I could remember standing there in tears Like I only got to 35 and I quit and like I can't, I can't do this. So for years they were in my head and then, you know, you throw shoulder surgery in there and two kids and that was the bar don't really matter anymore.
Speaker 1:Um and then, once I started to like we took over the gym, I was there a lot and was it 2021? Richard, I missed quarterfinals. It was the first year of quarterfinals. I missed it by 2% and I didn't even know that, I didn't even cause I don't, I don't care, I really don't, I do this, I do this shit for fun. And we were at the games and I said to him I missed quarterfinals by 2% and he was like, all right, we're going to fix that. And the next year I was, I made it and it was all about. I can remember, like the, the workout in brawl, the burbs actually helped the toes, the bar one.
Speaker 1:It was the bike, the wall balls and max toes to bar.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, yeah, I liked that one.
Speaker 1:That I'd sort of die, and that was the first time I actually was like I like toes to bar and now they're my favorite movement, like I think we did them so much that I love them now like they're one of my favorites, hell yeah I mean, there were days I would walk in and I couldn't pick my arms up, not in a bad way, but it was just like holy shit, like we did a lot of upper body um, and I just, you know, I'm a little bit of a gym rat, so I always was, even with basketball.
Speaker 3:So with that in mind, you guys want to get a little inside view of one of the brawl workouts here. Yeah, at the end of the episode. I really loved that workout back in the day, the one with the wall balls, the bike and the max toes. It was fun.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think that destroyed some people. You guys weren't at last year's brawl, were you? No Cheers, bro, where are you? I made people do like three rounds of 20 synchro front squats, two with barbells and two with dumbbells 35, 50, and I think 155, I think was the weight for guys, so 105 for ladies and it was absolutely destructive. So I was like I need to relive that. I want something bad. This is not the same thing. So here is what you can look forward to for workout three brawl on the burbs here. This hasn't been announced yet.
Speaker 3:It's going to be more time yeah, exclusive for time, I think. I put an 18 minute time cap with 60 wall balls, 20 and 30 pounds, 20 for the ladies, 30 pounds for the gentlemen. That's going to be to the regular height of 9 foot and 10 feet. That's going to be done in a 15 rep waterfall style. So partner one will go for 15, partner two, three, four until they complete 60. Then from there, 40 bar muscle-ups, 60 wall balls, again same style. 40 burpee box jump overs, ending with 60 wall balls. In the same style, 40 burpee box jump overs, ending with 60 wall balls in the waterfall style. That's version one.
Speaker 3:Version two I haven't decided fully what I'm going to go with yet, but we'll start off with 60 wall balls, again same style as above. This one has 20 burpee box jump overs, then 20 bar muscle ups, 60 wall balls, 20 bar muscle-ups, 20 burpee box jump overs, 60 wall balls. So I essentially split the burpee box jump overs and bar muscle-ups in half and put them in two different spots. Those are broken up however you would like and I think that's going to be around the same level of destruction as the wall balls from last year, a little bit less reps on the front squats in total for people Wall balls heavier, but I don't think it's as destructive as actual dumbbells and barbell is. You know. It's a lot less taxing on the body but I think, in the style that we're doing, the people are going to be feeling it uh after that.
Speaker 3:So there you go, you got a little bra on the burbs. Exclusive about that, you know. Um, I want to add, add some more more muscle ups in from last year and then work out to another little preview. There's gonna be strict handstand push-ups.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, at least two members out there in rx boom love it, it's gonna be great um heavy wall balls forever baby yeah, yeah, I'll do heavy wall balls.
Speaker 1:Richard, why don't you come in?
Speaker 3:you can I'm gonna post a picture of uh, richard in the background when I'm doing the briefing from 2022. I just found that picture. I'm going to use that again. I'll post that up later on today. What was I going to say there? That was Jenna, you were at Girls on Girls when I had the high wall balls. Right, it wasn't heavy, it was high. That time, tell me, what do you like better, high wall balls or heavy wall balls? Which one you pick?
Speaker 1:All of them.
Speaker 3:You love wall balls, I love wall balls, Richard.
Speaker 1:which one for you?
Speaker 3:Well, you're tall, I guess you're going to go with high right.
Speaker 2:Actually, yeah, one time I jumped in on one of Kelly our games athlete here one of her workouts and she had 12-foot wall. I'm going to go heavy. People just don't do wall balls really well In my opinion. I think their technique isn't good. People overlook how important the way you cradle the ball is, the support of it, all that.
Speaker 3:Oh my God, I talk about that so much in class.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know your legs will never fatigue with a ball, they just won't. And if you're struggling on wall balls, I don't care, if you're short, it's because your arms aren't doing the right thing. So I'm a big fan of heavy wall balls. I think it's a good separator and I think it makes people doubt themselves a little bit on the rep where otherwise perhaps they wouldn't. And that's a fun play on a competitive setting, like you know. Your workout, for example, like when you have to really throw that ball versus doing it mindlessly.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm always here for 30, 20, 20 wall balls.
Speaker 3:And it's like just 15. That's really not that many, like even for the heavier reps, and you have someone waiting behind you to be going for the next set. So, like whenever I'm programming for events, I'm like all right, like, yes, everyone's going to be coming with a certain level of adrenaline, it's going to push things up higher. But how can I make the workout add in intensity? You know, like, how can I build it in in? And knowing that you can't proceed with the workout until you're done with this set, it's going to be the thing. That's like all right, some people are going to leave with some fights going on for their four person teams. Um, from that afternoon there's gonna be a couple of arguments driving home that I, I like that, you know. That excites me as a programmer, you know.
Speaker 3:Um, all right, here we go, guys, at the end of the episode we wrapped up a whole bunch of stuff about the crossfit season. Here I usually ask people like what are they hungry for? We've done that a bunch with you guys being on the episode. I want to ask you, what are you looking forward next to in the season? Like whether it be something, something that you want to see. Workout wise at semis a test that we haven't seen yet or like an athlete that you're hoping to watch at semis of the games, jenna. What are you looking forward to next? She's like Orlando Harry.
Speaker 1:Potter. Yeah, my mind is in Hogwarts right now, I don't know. I mean, I hope Eamon makes it to the next round. He's gone through some shit this year. Five hours he should be.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Well, I mean he's made it to the next round.
Speaker 1:He's gone through some shit this year. Five hours he should be, yeah Well, I mean he's made it to semis. I hope they throw him some good workouts that play in his favor for semis and he gets to the games. He deserves it. He went through some hell this year. Yeah shout out to.
Speaker 3:Eamon.
Speaker 1:Looking forward to next year. I'm just so excited for adrian. I really am so hell yeah maybe we can get richard to come in for bro the burbs too. I'm excited for that.
Speaker 3:Maybe there's two shout outs right there. Richard, richard, what about you? What are you looking forward to now?
Speaker 2:um. So a couple things. I have a couple athletes still doing semi-finals. I have a master's athlete and a adaptive athlete. So I'm actually pretty stoked to see what wheel lot programs, because I don't have any insight yet whether it'll be comparable to the individual semifinal. It'll be a complete standalone test and I think it's going to be the latter, but I'm interested in that. So I'm really excited to help him through that process. He is an in-person client, so somebody I can actually like judge and help and stuff.
Speaker 2:So his progress he's a former like elite wheelchair basketball player at the highest levels for like team USA and he's so fit and he's tough and so just really getting him strong, I've been telling him just to eat and lift, like we've been doing so much lifting, because he just needs to get bigger against some of these guys in that below the knee division, that below the knee division. But on the other side of that, I'm definitely just excited, I think, to see what the semifinals programming looks like, because we've had so much conversation, so much controversy. There's so many negative voices in this space and I'm excited, hopefully, for a stage of this to be positive and fun. Have the visual. We get to watch the live streams. We're going to see the best athletes throw down.
Speaker 2:I'm always, always gonna root for laura um, she's the coolest person in this sport, for sure. So, um, I I mean good luck beating tia in person, but I still hope she can seriously, um. But yeah, I'm excited to see kind of how, you know, this next stage plays out and hopefully we can, you know, regain some of that positivity and happiness. No more freaking gray pictures of sad people talking about their, their penalties. I just want to see positivity. I want to see the people who qualified show up and how fit they are and hopefully we get a great games field, and and then that can lead into whatever you know texas is going to look like for the games oh, buddy, man, have fun out there with everyone that's going to be melting in that texas sun, um.
Speaker 3:Something that I want to say, then, based off what you just said, man we had a girl that's been working so hard over this past year, like she's been doing personal training with me almost every week since last year's open just to like pick up a couple of skills, like, and get a little bit more prepared for the open, and she made quarterfinals this year. She got her first bar muscle ups literally the week of that open workout you was this year. She got her first bar muscle ups literally the week of that uh, open workout you know like, and then got five in the workout itself. And that almost gets overshadowed because you're online, like reading everything about all the stuff that's like out there in the ether, I'll say, or out there on the cloud, you know, um, that, like I said, that stuff gets overshadowed and it sucks. So I'm with you, man.
Speaker 3:I'm hoping for a positive rest of the season. We get to see some games. Rookies uh do their thing this year. Uh, I think that I already said that I'm already wrong. I said that, uh, tia wasn't gonna lose anything from the start of the open through the rest of the year. But she hasn't won the open. But that doesn't really matter. It's all right, you know, with those weird power rankings there, uh, so I hope, I hope that it's a positive rest of the season, that that the magic of CrossFit comes back, even in the game season, you know.
Speaker 1:Oh man dudes.
Speaker 3:This has been a great episode. I love getting to chat with some other nerds CrossFit nerds, harry Potter nerds, all of that here and bring back some positivity, just like we were just saying, into the space. This episode will be.