Welcome back to seeing your workouts before checking the 6am’s Facebook posts.
Something I want to clearly state: “With great power (output), comes great responsibility!” – Uncle Ben
Over this past year I have seen athletes in this gym have earned huge amounts of progress in their fitness. Remember CrossFit’s definition of fitness: Increased Work Capacity Across Broad Time and Modal Domains. Intensity is going to be our gateway to success, and will always be an indicator of the magnitude of our results. Intensity is our power output, and is expressed from our scores on each workout. It can be visually seen, mathematically equated, and physically felt for a few days. And that last point is really the focus of this post. It’s time to look at a classic week at the gym:
2 couplets, 2 triplets, 1 heavy day, and 1 mono structural day. Sprinkle in some fun, and games along the way.
Couplets are set up to be elegant, short, and almost always the ones that open our eyes to the idea of doing less better. Movements with different motor patterns help us move from movement to movement, and descending rep schemes trick our minds to keep working. They are meant to increase your intensity.
Triplets are inherently longer than couplets, mostly, and tend to make us have that feeling of “I think I’ll take one more breath before I pick up that wall ball.” Instead, of course, we pick it up and then move on to the next grind while looking at the clock and hoping the AMRAP is almost over.
Heavy Days have ben primarily back squats and deadlifts, alternating each week to the reps schemes of 3-5-7. While everyone has done an amazing job of bettering their movement during this process, it seems obvious that their numbers have also been going up: increasing intensity.
Our mono structural day, typically seen as cardio days, look a little different than they might seem. Instead of just doing 5k runs, we bite our lip and crush 400m repeats. Hold on to finish 1k, and 2k Rows. And of course a workout soon to repeat: 25s on the airdyne. Anaerobic conditioning does not feel good, but it is the best way to whip us into shape. It is the foundation of our athletic endeavors in the gym filled with intensity.
Does anyone see the trend? Intensity followed by intensity, and topped with intensity. So now it’s time to bring up what has guided us this entire first year: M.C.I. > Mechanics, Consistency, and then Intensity.
We are only capable of this intensity if we have been able to earn it. Gone are the day for some where we keep a pvc pipe over our head, and decrease the number of wall balls in our sets. It has organically occurred where we can work harder than we thought we could, and as a positive consequence we see incredible results! But is it possible to come to the gym 6 days a week, and keep the intensity, safely?
You want the workouts to be posted? Awesome! Use the information to start a decision process for your health. On a day that involve snatches and burpees decide if you need to be working on the mechanics of the snatches. If it’s a monday and you feel great, then decide if you need to manage your body for the rest of the week, or if it’s an opportunity to have an incredibly intense day. On a heavy back squat day, figure out if that new teaching point you saw Louie Simmons say in a video is something you want to try. Is a PR even going to make you better at the expense of the mechanics you’ve been working on? Or are you ready to express your capacity while displaying beautiful movement patterns honed by consistent training?
I want to be working out with you in 5 years. Lets take the necessary steps for longevity, together. Here’s a stupid simple approach to this. If you come to the gym 5 days a week. Pick 2 days to be all in for intensity. The other three have a mindset to improve your technique and understanding of the workouts to better prepare you for the days ahead. Intensity will be waiting. If you’re body is hurting, then it’s high time we put mobility classes at the end of every single class in some way, or another. But even more important is to bring up a topic that I have intentionally skimmed over: nutrition. That can no longer happen. And I am excited to put together ways for us to start discussing what our body is made of, and what it needs to sustain.
Here is a beautifully simple approach to discussing nutrition.
http://journal.crossfit.com/2012/07/ecnutrition-01.tpl
Final point, I didn’t think I was going to regionals this year. I did not train with the intention of placing in the top 20. I just wanted to do CrossFit, and help the gym learn how to follow it’s prescription. Turns out… doing CrossFit makes you good at CrossFit. Thank you all for helping me become better. 😉
Have a great day,
Nick