Don’t Forget Skills Training
Sometimes, as CrossFitters, it seems we can get so caught up in the benchmark workouts and improvement of our times, that we can sometimes neglect skills training.
This week, I am purposely taking some time away from HQ workouts and working directly on my olympic lifting skills. It’s important to me to get stronger while also getting faster, and I’ve noticed that my cleans, presses, deadlifts, squats and snatches have all sort leveled out. …at lower weights than I’d like I might add.
WOD - Oly Skillz
- Double Bergerner warmup
- Lots of snatches from bar to 85lbs
- Lots of clean and jerk, from the ground, up to 105 and 135
- Push press 5×5x5×5
- 135 lbs
- 145 lbs
- 155 lbs - 2 reps, stripped to 145, 3 reps
- 135
- Lots of overhead squats with weighted bar
- Turkish get-ups 35, 45 - Max 60 lb kettlebell
Fight Gone Bad - Went Well
Christian Griffith of CrossFit Metro and Jason Tanner of CrossFit Norcross united for the Nationwide Fight Gone Bad workout. This was Jason’s first attempt at Fight Gone Bad as RX’d and he did great with a 226.
Christian, your humble narrator, improved on his 226 from the FGB Atlanta Affiliate Challenge with a 266.
Fight Gone Bad workout consists of three rounds of:
- 1 minute wall ball (20 lb ball)
- 1 minute deadlift high-pull
- 1 minute 20 inch box jumps
- 1 minute push press
- 1 minute rowing machine
No rest between movements - 1 minute rest between rounds.
Lastly, the 2009 CrossFit Games has been announced - Check it out!
Mike Boyle vs. CrossFit
I am not trying to start controversy; but I am concerned, from a public perception, about the angst developing around both the sailor’s case against Ruthless Training Concepts, and more recently, the Mike Boyle comments regarding CrossFit.
Below are my thoughts as posted to the CrossFit HQ forums:
We are CrossFit
I hesitate to type this, but I can’t help but have some issues with the negative direction that seems to be developing.
Using Mike Boyle’s interview hoopla as an example, it seems we are getting a little aggressive in a negative way. For one, a lot of what Boyle said makes sense - especially with regards to QUALITY technique training and starting newbies out scaled until they have reached a level suitable for more advanced workouts.
…and yea, he was off-base a little on some things, but I’m not sure creating live, argumentative debates is necessary. Takes the genre into a sort of WWE-type trash-talking forum.
I dunno - I love the new CrossFit journal. It rocks. I also enjoy listening to the CrossFit radio on the PC, …but I can’t help but shy away from the Boyle vs. CrossFit thing.
I am perfectly content, both as a trainer and an enthusiast, to let him think and train the way he believes, and leave me (us) to train the way I (we) believe.
Like him, we have real-world results and examples from which to prove our case.
That’s good enough for me.
As CrossFit grows, these battles will constantly be waged against the CrossFit methodology, workouts, and everything else possible.
Why?
Because it’s hard and shakes up an industry - it’s going to make more and more ‘established’ fitness groups uncomfortable and they’re all gonna want a piece of us — to try to shake us …to try to shake the foundation of the methodology. To discredit it somehow because it threatens their status quo and change is uncomfortable to them.
I was drawn to CrossFit because it works. I like the black box concept. Sure, I like to know and understand the science, but history has proven ‘professionals’ from all sides of the fence can be both right and wrong and many times in comes down to simple errors in context.
Let’s just keep proving the ideas and concepts behind our methodology with example. The ever-improving athletes that we are becoming, training and developing.
We don’t need to ’set anybody straight’ - let ‘em think what they want, while we keep open minds, open ears, and train like animals.
Isn’t that “CrossFit”?
The Lovely Nicole
Ah, treadmill sprinting combined with pull-ups - a well contructed workout forcing pull-up numbers with sweaty hands. Coach, you’re evil.
WOD - Nicole
As many rounds as possbile in 20 minutes of:
- Run 400 meters
- Pull-ups
WOD Summary
- 9.6 mph - sorry ass ~8 pull-ups
- 9.7 mph - ~7 pu
- 9.8 mph - ~6 pu
- 9.9 mph - ~6 pu
- 10.0 mph - ~5 pu
- 10.1 mph - ~5 pu
I swear I made seven rounds, but the numbers above only show six. hmmm…
This workout is a VO2 Max builder and if you are running hard, tougher on the lungs and heart rate over anything else. Managing pull-ups with sweaty hands is a challenge. I was sans chalk which didn’t help my PU efforts.
Last 1/4 mile was 1:45 which I think was the fastest of the workout.
Virtual Shovel - Dig It!
Virtual shoveling. Get some!
WOD - Dig It
30, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5 of:
- Virtual Shovel over 24″ barrier
- Pushups
CrossFit Metro completion: 21:26
* Virtual Shovel is a movement that mimics shoveling snow, filling sand bags, etc. Trainees add weight to one end of an olympic bar and lift, in a shoveling motion, up and over a 24 inch barrier, touching the ground on the other side. Over and back counts as one rep.
Men RX - 45lbs plate, Female RX - 25lbs
WOD Training Notes
“This will bust yo’ ass. Period.”
Some folks on the CrossFit HQ web site dismissed it as stupid, and perhaps that’s due to the video example provided where the femal doing the training did not look like she was working hard. Trust me - this is hard - and will tax you so badly by the end that you’ll be lucky to make it that far.
30, 25, 20 are the hardest and where you will most likely want to quit. DON’T DO IT! By reps 15 on down, you will start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Get some!
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CrossFit Metro Information
CrossFit Metro
CrossFit Training in Metro Atlanta, GA
4007 Ancient Amber Way
Norcross, GA (Peachtree Corners area)
Phone: 404.934.7428
email: christian@crossfitmetro.com -
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