RX THE WOD

Far away from the glitter and posh of Mayfair is the unlikely mix of barges, artsy restaurants and rows of skyscrapers of banks among the waters of Canary Wharf. This is where we found our third London box, Crossfit Thames. An equally fun and eclectic group of athletes is led by a head coach/owner transplanted from California. This turned out to be the most friendly group of CrossFitters I ever had a chance to visit. Cool location in an old warehouse at the foot of the new finance district of London. Their programming has a great 3-tier structure where beginner, intermediate and advanced athletes follow parallel programs with different movements instead of scaling one daily WOD. We did the intermediate program today.
Gymnastics
3 rounds:
– 12 strict pullups
– 12 ring pushups
– 20 sec Hollow rock
– 12 hip thrusters
Mobility
– Hip airplane 3×2 reps
– Squat mobility
– Front rack mobility
MetCon
4 rounds:
– Run 400m
– 15 Thrusters 40kg/95lb
– 15 pullups
[TIME: 19:15]

Continued our visits to London CF boxes by going to the first European CF gym I ever visited, CrossFit London. As usual, an outstanding drill and skill day and probably the most thorough review of overhead squats and kipping drills that I’ve ever seen. The unusually sunny day for London drew us out to the Olympic Park after the WOD for a morning coffee and watching the swelling work crews as they prepared the final touches for the onslaught of athletes and fans. After work, in the evening hours London was run over by Italians celebrating their victory over Germany in the football semi-finals to the locals’ chagrin who got eliminated a round ago… Piccadilli Circus has never seen this many red, white and green flags…

Warmup
Overhead squat and kettlebell progressions
Skill
Kipping motion
Strength
Overhead Squats 5-5-5-3-3-3
Cashout
3 rounds of
– 1 minute plank
– 1 minute hollow rock (dish)
then
2 minutes maximum unbroken kettlebell swings

After losing out on the European Soccer Cup, London is back to obsessing about the Olympics. Today the Tower Bridge got crowned with a massive display of the olympic rings to get the final push in motion towards the Games. While CrossFit is not (yet) an Olympic sport we will turn the rest of the week into a sampling of the local boxes stopping each day at a different gym at CF Central London, CF London and Thames CF. Knowing full well that the local boxes tend to dish out some serious beating…

1st Stop @ CF Central London
Warmup
3 rounds:
10 KB swings 35#
15 goblet squats 35#
20 KB presses 35#
Strength
5×3 High hang cleans [135+]
+ 1 split jerk per round
Conditioning
AMRAP in 12 mins:
– 8 clean pulls (135#)
– 12 situps
– 16 hand release pushups
[SCORE: 6 rounds + 6 reps]

We had an investor meeting in a quant Bavarian village near Frankfurt which presented us with the dilemma of fighting the infamous german traffic jam in the morning for a city CF gym or make do on our own. So we discovered the endless running and biking trails in the German countryside. We jumped on one of them along the Main river and turned it into our own CrossFit Bodyweight Box…
Bavarian Village WOD
For 16 rounds:
run 1 minute then
complete one of the following movements randomly:
— 20 pushups
— 20 situps
— 1 min handstand hold
— 1 min plank (2x)
— 10 burpees
— 10 box jumps (2x)
— 10 clapping pushups
— 10 broad jumps (2x)
— 10 tuck jumps
— 20 walking lunges (2x)
— 20 squats
— 10 dips
[TIME: 29:00 mins]