State of Fitness Address 22-2

The State of your Fitness

It’s that time—summer is upon us and our second mesocycle is complete! Our goal this cycle was to change things up a bit from the Open programming, while at the same time get a sweet pump going for our upcoming summer months…or in WA weeks/days/hours?? 😂😩

The Numbers:

You Weightlifted— Tempo Snatched, Super Set Squatted and Clean Complex and Jerked—1268 reps at an average intensity of 77.2%! That average intensity is a bit lower than your previous two cycles but this was by design. All of your work in these lifts was in the form of tempo, complexes or supersets. These types of movements create a ton of demand on your systems, so it was necessary to back off the intensity some.

You accessorized/bodybuilt — Weighted Rowed, Romanian/Sumo Deadlifted, Bench Pressed, Front/Back Lunged, and DB Press/Push Pressed — 2430 reps at an average intensity of 90%. If you’re thinking that intensity looks a little high you would be correct, but this is due to the fact that many of the lifts listed above were performed as RPE efforts or building to a heavy. While you may have indeed worked to an RPE of 9, it was often done at higher rep schemes in pursuit of hypertrophy. And of course not every set and rep was 90%! Because we were constantly adjusting the volume and the types of lifts we were performing were not of the norm, it only made sense to let you all set your own efforts for the day.

You Metconed an average of 13:06. Your WODs were geared towards a change of pace from the Open prep. This included an emphasis on Running in preparation for Murph, Odd Object and Dumbbell work, and a reintroduction of the Kettlebell.

Last but not least, your aerobics were bolstered by MAPing 23:00 to 13:00 at a time for a total of 9 hours and 9 minutes! This is nearly double the last cycle and were the longest MAP intervals of the year.

How did we get there?

Weightlifting:

This cycle was about Hypertrophy. Hypertrophy is simply training to build muscle mass. We do this by increasing the time our muscles are under tension in resistance training. This generally means lighter weights and more volume (reps) per set.

Monday: Tempo Snatch and Squat. The Tempo Snatch Pull and Pausing Snatch were broken into two, 6 week blocks. The first saw the pause take place at the knee while the second was from the 2” mark. This was a win win. First, it allowed us to bump our time under tension up on a lift that would normally take place in a matter of a few seconds. Second, the slowing and pausing of the lift allowed/forced us to pay attention to every excruciating inch of the pull. While you may not have been psyched to slow this one down, it will definitely pay off in the future as both your muscular resiliency and movement patterns will be much improved.

The Squat, too was programmed with the hopes of scoring a win win. The split allowed for a good dose of volume, aka hypertrophy, while still getting touches at the higher intensity—a nasty combination, but one that you all gutted out. Those first few weeks of heavy lifts topped off with a big leg pump can be brutal, but your bodies adapted and we saw some excellent lifts at the end. Maybe even some tight jeans/jean shorts, too??

Tuesday: Clean High Pull + Hang Clean and Jerk and Weighted/Horizontal Row. Where the Snatch was slowed down to increase our TUT, the Clean and Jerk was kept at the same speed but turned into a complex to wring out every ounce of leg hypertrophy we could. Even though we didn’t pause your cleans, you still had ample opportunity to practice the pull. There is great benefit in performing a pull prior to your lift. It allows you to think of nothing but the pull and to create as much drive as you can without having to think about the turnover. It helps get you out of your head. This is also why you went directly into a hang version of the Clean after—in hopes that your mind would allow your body to move back through the pull pattern quickly and efficiently. All before finishing it off with one more lift from the floor.

After your Cleans, we worked on a couple versions of horizontal pulling. With the goal of muscle building in mind, we wanted to create high volume work for your lats while giving your shoulders a break. That meant hopping off of the pull up bar and hitting some good old fashioned rows.

Wednesday: Romanian/Sumo Deadlift and Bench. The Romanian Deadlifts were an effort to more directly target your hamstrings. Because we can’t load them as heavy as a regular deadlift, they lend themselves to a higher volume, which in turn gives us the muscle building pump we were after. The Sumo Deadlift, on the other hand, was a great opportunity to introduce a lift we’ve never completed before; plus, they target the musculature of the glutes, quads, and hamstrings more directly than a conventional deadlift. This allowed us to push the intensity a bit higher, all while producing slightly less strain on the lower back. I would imagine some of you may come to prefer the Sumo Deadlift. This could be due to a number of things, one of which is that the Sumo allows a more upright pulling position = less strain on the lower back. Or, it might be that you are a quad-dominant lifter. The Sumo puts a bit more emphasis on the quads. Whatever the reason, we hope you enjoyed trying something new!

How much ya Bench? Well now you have an answer. Our Bench cycle was split into two, 6 week blocks. The first was spent pausing in the hole, while the second was just a good old fashioned bro sesh. The pause, like the Snatch above, was in an effort to help us strengthen the weakest part of the lift while simultaneously forcing us to improve our positions and mechanics in the lift. Of course it also bumped up our time under tension…hypertrophy, anyone?

Thursday: Midline and Pulling. All of the “exciting” gymnastics movements you see in CrossFit start here. Creating a solid midline, one that you can control, is the bedrock of gymnastics movements. Achieving dynamic, injury-free movements on the bar or rings starts with building resiliency in your shoulder in the form of strict pull up work. If you came on Thursday, you got a healthy dose of these building blocks. This was the first 12 weeks of a 24 week cycle working on Pull Up type strength and movements.   

Saturday: Lunges and Pressing. Nothing makes getting off the toilet a Hurculean effort like some high volume Lunges. We split the cycle between 6 weeks of front and 6 weeks of back rack lunges at a meaty 10 rep max. Lunges + high volume = super leg pump. Beyond the muscle building, we also need to include unilateral work like this to keep our bodies injury-free and to help highlight any strength imbalances.

Finally, we finished our week of strength training with a Dumb Bell Press to Push Press superset. This was in the same lane as our Back Squat superset. It lets us push beyond what we could do strict and hit the hypertrophy range of volume by adding in some assistance from the legs at the end. In addition, we used Dumbbells vs a Barbell to add a bit of stabilization and imbalance work.

CrossFit

Monday: Murph prep followed by running! We spent the first 8 or so weeks dialing in both the movements and volume found in Murph. The goal was to not have it sneak up on us this year. In addition, theoretically the weather was supposed to warm up so we put a greater emphasis on everyone’s favorite form of cardio: Running! I hope you all enjoyed the fall running conditions that this late spring/early summer brought us.

Tuesday: Odd Object, DB and AMRAP day. As discussed in the last SoF address, this cycle would be about getting outside of our Open prep box and hitting some movements we don’t normally see during the Open. In addition to the beloved sLB we touched on a variety of implements and movement patterns that hopefully prepped you all for a long summer of yard work! Tuesday was also a designated AMRAP day. AMRAPs help to test both your mind and your body because you choose your own fate with the added benefit of letting us test our pacing skills.

Wednesday: Kettlebells, kettlebells and more kettlebells! If you couldn’t tell, the third day of the week was highlighted by the use of our kettlebells. The KB is just different enough from the DB that you can perform the same movement but get an entirely different stimulus. Maybe one day they will find their way into the competition season of Crossfit, but until then they are a great off season implement.   

Saturday: High skill. As you’ve likely come to expect by now, Saturdays carried on the tradition of higher skill and higher weight movements. From Legless Rope Climbs to Muscle Ups to Handstand Walks, it was all there. If you are looking for an extra challenge, don’t miss these end of week WODs.

What’s next?

The next cycle is a hybrid. Not quite a volume cycle and not quite a raw strength cycle. It is one where you will get a taste of everything.   

The lifts, Snatch and the Clean will make use of the blocks. I think some of you may find this is your favorite way to execute these lifts. Lifting from the blocks takes out one of the major fault points, the first pull. It allows us to really concentrate on nailing the second and third pulls, which can lead to some to some all time PRs. Personally, both my heaviest Snatch and Clean came off the blocks. Once you’re used to it I think you’ll really like it. Your Squats will be at a much lower volume than last cycle, but will include a pause to help you strengthen your positions for our top-end strength cycle that comes next. In addition, there will be some specific strict pressing work to help bolster your jerks, some barbell rowing exercises to build up your backs, a couple different varieties of Deadlift, and something we’ve never worked before, a Thruster cycle!

Metcons will touch on just about everything. There will be a mono structural day, a Push Jerk specific day, a horizontal pressing day to help keep the gains from your last bench test from going to waste, and of course a high skill day. In addition, your MAPs will continue their march towards shorter and shorter intervals. These shorter time domains allow us to work in more barbell and higher skill movements.

Thank you from the Town Team and congratulations on another successful cycle!

P.S. Please please please continue or start to log your scores on Zenplanner. These numbers really do help dictate the programming!

Stay Rooted,

Coach_ARK