RX THE WOD

After a week on SealFit my 14-year old held her own in all aspects except the weights. It goes to show us that CF Teens can seriously upgrade its programming and step up the workload for today’s youth. I always believed that compared to youth track, gymnastics or crew – CF Teen programs were too light and not rigorous enough. While CF adult programs could be the most demanding (like SealFit) the teen WODs underperform the local gymnastics or athletic programs. If we want to bring up a stronger next generation, CF Kids/Teens programming needs to step up.

Baseline:
Bike 4K then 20x burpee pull ups.
Work Capacity:
3 rounds
– Run 1,000m
– 20x pull ups
– 30x walking lunges
[25:14]
Strength:
Deadlift
75% x 5 reps, 85% x 3 reps, 95% x 1+ reps.
Stamina:
Chipper, not timed:
40x deadlift 135#
Tabata squats
800m farmers carry 55#
Durability:
100x sit ups, 100x superman’s

The best part of traveling in Europe in the summer is the endless variety of cultural events ranging from rock festivals, through massive open air theatre productions to athletic events.
After a great family WOD in the scorching heat we settled in an evening stroll through the city. At night we watched a french musical version of Gone With The Wind in an open theater quite far from Georgia. Another great summer day in Europe.

Baseline:
Warrior Yoga
4K bike ride

Work Capacity:
– 10 pullups
– 30 muscle snatches
– 50 TRX rows
– 70 air squats
– 90 rope jumps
– 1200m run

Durability:
– 100 flutter kicks
– 100 good morning darlings
– 100 superman’s
– 100 situps

In some sports like tennis, track, golf and chess the handicap index gives us the ability to have a fun game between athletes or players with vastly different skills. I have written before about one possible way to do a formal CF handicap index based on work capacity calculations in benchmark WODs like Fran.

Recently as I have been training with my 14-year old daughter and also athletes who can string 30 muscle-ups or others who cannot do a single pushup – I realized something.
While there may be a few grades of athletes between Froning and your box’s newbie – Crossfit may just have a built-in handicap mechanism after all: Constantly Varied.
My daughter may not match me in Oly lifts but can handily beat me on sprints and maybe longer runs as well. Over the course of a workout with 3-5 WOD components the strengths and weaknesses bring athletes a lot closer on the scoreboard than just judging by one movement or benchmark alone.

Compared to tennis or track, improvement and skills are not linear in CrossFit. If you get much better in running gives no indication what improvement you made in strength, balance or stamina.
So a 2-year Crossfitter will likely triumph over a beginner overall but may be lessoned in running or agility. Like I was today by a fire-breather 14-year old.

Baseline:
Bike 4K, then complete 30-20-10 reps of front squats, lunges, push ups.
Work Capacity:
For time…
– Run 1 mile
– 75x partner KB swings
– Partner row 1,000m
– 60x partner front squats
– Run 1 mile
– 45x partner pull ups
[29:30]
Strength:
Power clean – 80% x 3 reps, 85% x 3 reps, 90% x 3+ reps.
Stamina:
2 rounds, not timed:
10x power clean, 20x KB sumo deadlift high pull, 25m walking lunges
Durability:
– 60x GHD sit ups,
– 45sec/45sec side bridge
– 4K bike ride