He essentially says that if you are a bit of a ‘fraidy cat’ when it comes to hard work, you will naturally fatigue faster.
Short, intense metcons like Fran which is coming up in a few days, other challenges such as fast 800m runs, or 2km rows, are classic examples of physical efforts that require a certain level of mental fortitude. We don’t test these a lot because the ARE demanding, and it’s tough to step up day after day at this level. It’s not how you’re supposed to do it anyway.
For the best and broadest adaptation to fitness, we do need to do it sometimes though. And when your brain is screaming at you to drop the bar, to slow down a little, or to just have a little rest, it takes courage to ignore that voice.
The good news is that courage is not something you are only born with, it can be trained.
It’s up to you of course. Next time that voice screams at you, see if you can ignore for just ONE rep longer than you think you can. And then another, and then another, and before you know it, that voice will get quieter, drowned out the sound of you winning…..
That’s the first couple weeks of our new program phase down. How did you find it so far? Main changes are more classical strength movements, some extra accessory work in between sets, plus a little more intensity/puff in the conditioning pieces.
Sometimes I’ll hear from someone that “they are LOVING the programming lately!” Funny, because it always seems to correlate with a few workouts that they did really well at… 🙂
Everyone has workouts they love and workouts they’re not so fond of. And while we do run through different phases of programming throughout the year, the over riding theme remains the same. Because our main goal is well rounded fitness.
So you’ll always see skill practice, strength work, and short, interval or longer low intensity conditioning pieces. That works better than anything else we’ve seen. The science is pretty firmly behind that.
But science also likes us to stick to upper body on Monday, lower body on Tuesday, cardio on Wednesday and repeat……
And while that might work fairly well, it’s kind of boring……
Mixing it up requires a bit of art. We’re not trying to make things random, something that is often levelled our way. VARIANCE is the key. And to program in 20-30 different movements over the month, maintaining some balance is a tough ask. It takes a lot of time and thought to program 9 weeks of solid training for 100’s of people of different ages and fitness levels, all with different goals, strengths, and weaknesses. To be honest, there is no guarantee that it will work 100% of the time, for 100% of you. It usually takes a little trial and error, watching how you all go, keeping an eye on the PR Board, and adjusting if needed.
The aim is to ensure you all make the best progress possible, that we protect you from injury and overtraining and that you have fun of course! Sometimes that means you end up doing workouts you NEED rather than workouts you WANT….. But it’s the combo of both that works.
Eat more food that is conducive to your goals, than food which is not….
Train in a way that is more conducive to your goals, than not.
Sure, that sounds a bit vague… hard to evaluate exercise and nutrition the same way as an expenses spreadsheet….although people do try (counting calories, reps and kilos etc)
But how do you know if it’s working? Your body composition improves. That CAN be measured.
It’s often not even necessary to measure with dedicated methods, because it’s visible.
The key is, the requirement for each persons body composition bank account is different. You can only do what works for you, not what works for someone else.
So, whether it’s the 5/2 diet, or intermittent fasting, or high carbs or low carbs, 3 square meals, or grazing all day, wine on special occasions only, one glass a night, or a binge every Saturday….. it all comes back to YOUR bank account (goal) and whether YOU are seeing the change YOU want to see.
Results from some outstanding NuSI-backed studies came out this year.
The fourth and largest one, conducted at Stanford, randomised 600 overweight-to-obese subjects into either, low-FAT or low-CARB diets for a year, and also looked at whether or not their weight loss could be explained by their metabolism or their DNA.
The study found NO differences between the two diets and NO meaningful relationship between weight loss and insulin secretion (ie blood glucose rise in response to food).
The most significant finding of all……..was that it’s hard to stick to a diet for a whole year.
So the real secret it appears, is first finding what type of diet will get you the results you want.
And then following it.
And sticking with it.
Same would apply to exercise.
Yes there are important principles that should be followed – functional movement, strength elements, mobility, sustainable aerobic work. But apply that in a way that works for you – yoga, swimming, hiking, tennis, surfing, gym, soccer. Generally a combination of at least two is needed to tick enough boxes.
Then you have to stick with it.
Sticking with it is the hardest thing.
But if you can find elements such as accountability and support, challenge and reward, mindfulness, fun and of course results, you’ll get there.
It feels great to celebrate the victories we attain in the gym .
PB that deadlift…
Get a gold star for max. pushups…
Increase your 50 cal. airbike test by 30 seconds…
Get that first kick up to handstand!
However, think about all the other PB’s (personal best) you have to achieve that contribute to you achieving those gold stars.
I’m talking about the things that have a significant impact on how we perform throughout the day.
Sleep…nutrition…mindset…etc.
On those days where you normally average 6 hours of sleep but manage to get 7 … That’s a PB!
On those weeks where you normally buy your lunch, but this week the choice was made to set some time aside to make yourself a stir fry loaded with veggies and meat……that’s a PB!
What’s your mindset like? The hardest part is usually following through the process needed to reach our goal. Once we get into the groove (form a habit) we find the rest of the journey much easier.
What’s that?.. you stayed dedicated to coming into the gym 4x this week?…That’s a PB! You worked on your mobility every day for the last 3 weeks?!? … Wow, that’s a PB!
It’s all about the little things we do consistently. But we all gotta start somewhere right?!? Let’s start by acknowledging (followed by celebrating) the ‘personal best’s’ we achieve throughout the day, throughout the week, each month etc.
Be willing to acknowledge the victories regardless of how big or small you perceive them to be.
We encourage you to be aware of the positive shifts that contribute to your improved performance and pop them up on our PB board.
Because it all adds up.
Not sure if it qualifies as a PB? Ask any of the coaches. We’re really good at recognising virtuosity in its many forms. Plus we want to celebrate with you!
Miss a day, and you’re put up against the wall and shot……?
How do you ensure that the important things in your day get done?
Most of us tend to write ourselves notes, set alarms in our phones and make appointments.
Although we don’t require booking into class ahead of time, it’s a great idea to imagine we do……
Make your workouts appointments instead of intentions.
Just like the doctor or dentist.
Take it up a notch even, and make a rule with yourself that if you can’t make an ‘appointment’ you have let your coach know. Just FYI, we’d love to hear from you, and we’d love to help you ‘reschedule’….)
Consistency is by far the number one factor in your success in fitness, health and longevity.
You could even perform a less than optimal program and still see positive results if you did it regularly (lucky you don’t have that problem with us 😉
“In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and to make your everyday stance your combat stance.”
-Miyamoto Mushashi
Hopefully you are not encountering too much actual combat in your every day life, but no doubt there are other forms of, while not life-threatening, still fairly stressful situations dealt with on a regular basis.
Both mental and physical labour at work
Postural demands – either acute or chronic (sitting or standing for long periods)
Running for the bus/train, or across the street
Playing with your kids
Gardening and other home maintenance
Carrying all the groceries in one trip……
In The Gift Of Injury by Stuart McGill, world renowned spine expert, dealt with a world champion powerlifter, who had all but given up hope of rehabbing a devastating back injury.
Dr McGills advice? In a nutshell, fix your crappy posture and lift things properly…..
The exercises and habits that helped the subject of the book fight his way back to the podium, were in large part the simple dead bugs, bird dogs and planks that we perform here daily., along with the unyielding adherence to efficient and safe movement.
Despite writing The Book Of Five Rings nearly 400 years ago, Mushashi was spot on about posture.
Make good posture your normal posture, and then that normal posture will help you lift heavy things as though they are normal…. (not quite as eloquent, but more to the point….:)
“The point”, Bredon said grandly, “is to play a beautiful game……why would I want to win anything other than a beautiful game?” – The Wiseman’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
We train to be better.
To lift more.
To move faster.
To achieve endlessly more difficult feats.
Setting goals and reaching them is incredibly motivating and rewarding.
However, there is also incredible fulfilment in the doing.
The simple act of turning up.
Doing the work that matters, the learning, the practice, the failing, the persisting.
Always striving to move BETTER.
The act of moving well AND of striving to always do so, are a beautiful game, and it’s a game you can participate in forever.
Many coaches will tell you that hard work in the gym/on the sports field, teaches you life lessons and makes you a better person.
I concur.
As long as you aren’t learning how to:
avoid things you don’t like
use effort as a substitute for understanding
avoid failure in front of your peers
chase objective measures and ignore subjective ones.
create the appearance of working hard
Hard work should teach you:
discipline
deep practice
empathy
positive self talk
mental and physical flow
a beginners mind
humility
One of my favourite quotes is ‘how you do anything, is how you do everything’. Picture how you deal with roadblocks, difficulties, frustrations and failure in your life, then think about those same situations in the gym or sport practice.
Back in the early days of CrossFit, the goal was to be “dead” after each workout…
Doing more, going harder, and feeling like crap afterwards was standard practice and was considered pretty cool….
But eventually, people who trained this way found themselves starting to dread it. Finding it harder to hit top end intensity consistently, and tougher to get the enthusiasm up to try. Talking with other owners, we found that most of them were experiencing this with their clients too…..and we wondered if there was a better solution.
The answer was staring straight out of all of the classic strength and conditioning research, that showed that high intensity training sessions were most effective when separated by 48-72 hours. Now this doesn’t mean you can only train every 72 hours, we’re just talking about your hardest workouts. Still, the word ‘easier’ is not really in the vocabularly for the average CrossFitter! But also, what IS typical for the average CrossFitter, is about 3 years of hard training, trying to manage overuse issues, injury and loss of motivation….. before quitting!
That is not what we want for our community.
One of the simplest counters to the argument for training hard every day, is that the exact people that appear to be doing this, aren’t! The top athletes in the sport of fitness, follow a very systematised program of volume, intensity and skill work, that allows them to cope with the highest levels of sport. But of course they ain’t posting their Turkish Get Ups, Supinated Bar Hangs, and Half Kneeling Presses on Instagram!! Don’t be fooled by what they APPEAR to be doing.
Let’s dig further into the science of strength and conditioning.
It’s been categorically proven that a higher level of muscle mass and aerobic endurance results in living longer. Glycolytic and lactic system training (ie the high intensity stuff), while a key component of many competitive sports, doesn’t contribute much to long term health and longevity.
Additionally, most normal people are already chronically under-recovered and over-stressed. With high intensity exercise also being a stressor; and with our goal being fitness for life, we have to think hard about the stimulus we deliver on a daily basis.
Lower intensity aerobic work not only helps us improve recovery, it actually allows you to push harder on the high intensity days, and also lessens risk of injury or overtraining.
Thus, we include more strength and accessory work, more muscle building exercises, and more low intensity movements. This means that you see, ‘not for time’, ‘for quality’ and ‘Technique’ on the whiteboard a lot.
A pyramid is only as big as it’s base. Most people know this instinctively, but remember that once you have built a base, it doesn’t mean you should never build it further. So just because you have a strict pullup, doesn’t mean you now only do kipping pullups, and just because you have handstand pushups, you never do Half Kneeling Presses again. Continuing to build the base, will also allow you to continue to build your peak.
When we first started programming more single limb work, and accessory movements, we’d sometimes hear things like, “This isn’t CrossFit,” But if you take one look at the original crossfit.com website, you’ll see a huge focus on low intensity movement practice. What people are really saying is, “This isn’t like The CrossFit Games” and to that we say, “you’re darn right it’s not, we’re making awesome humans, not The Games”.
What’s interesting is that it’s this more intelligent, moderate style of programming that actually sends athletes to The Games year after year… and we have had our own proud track record of achieving exactly that with teams, individuals and masters going to Games, Regionals and high level competition using our in-house programming.
Some days these types of workouts can seem a little less exciting than you are in the mood for. It’s always a juggling act for us as coaches to deliver the best mix of what is needed vs what is wanted. But that’s why you came to us in the first place, you trust us to do the right thing by you!
Yes, it’s fun to tackle high intensity metcons, but if we ensure they aren’t performed too often, we’ll also ensure you will always be excited for (and capable of) doing them.
Training smarter, not harder, is ultimately the only way forward; both for the fitness of our community and the health of our business. When people get injured or burned out, they quit. As a business, we know that it’s simply foolhardy to provide programming that (even if it’s fun and exciting), in the long run can not be sustained.
What has been quite exciting for us over the past 2 years, is the support from other gyms, who have started to follow our programming, in order to provide a smart and sustainable fitness solution for their communities. We are now 10 gyms strong and growing!
The history of the gym goes all the way back to ancient Rome if you wanted to be pedantic. The ancient Olympic sports of running, discus, javelin and wrestling were practised at the ‘gymnos’ (which is actually Latin for nude, and is actually how the training was performed!) and were an important social institution.
By the middle of the 19th century, the gym as a commercial venture also began to emerge. Vaudeville-strongman-turned-fitness-entrepreneur Hippolyte Triat, is credited with being the first to open commercial gyms, in Brussels, and Paris in the early 1800s. We have a cool image of Ropers Gym in Philadelphia from 1831. You might even recognise some of the exercises!
Pullups, rope climbs, dips, and plenty of space…looks just like our gym….
From YMCA community centres, to the Golds Gym heyday with Arnold Schwarzenegger, gyms have continued to grow in popularity.
But it wasn’t till the 1970’s thatArthur Jones’ company Nautilus almost single handedly changed the face of commercial gyms from large open areas that utilised a lot of bodyweight movement and free weights, to corporate style operations crammed with machines that required almost no knowledge (and thus no coaching expertise) to use them.
They also didn’t create very much fitness…..
And thus we’re starting to see many of the massive commercial gym chains starting to shut down too. Many Golds locations in the US and Fitness First in Australia are closing, big USA chain Bally went into bankruptcy in 2007.
The micro-gym style business is not immune though. Plenty of CrossFit affiliates and similar micro-gym operations have been closing in recent years. We were the 540th CrossFit affiliate in the world in 2008, and now in 2019, we are 193rd on the list……
What’ s been interesting to observe about these unsuccessful micro-gyms however, is that generally, despite having so much more agility and potential as a smaller operation, it was squandered because the owners foolishly tried to run it the same as the big conglomerates.
If you are seeing;
one month free
half price
21 days for $21
six week challenge
join now and pay nothing until….
..and similar language, you might be in a facility that is thinking more about growth over retention, service and quality. And just like so many of the gyms that have come before them, they’ll discover why repeating the mistakes of others is……….well, a mistake…
With an average membership of 100 clients, any kind of deal or discount has a huge impact on the bottom line of a micro-gym. And that impact trickles down to the staff, the owner, and affects facility improvements and maintenance. Eventually, the rise in expenses and demands on time, outstrip revenue and passion, and then that’s the end of it.
After nearly 20 years in the industry, we’re more determined than ever to continue to foster a place that allows client, staff and owner alike to thrive. We know that this can only ever be sustained on the back of great relationships, professional coaching, strong culture and realistic pricing.
It’s not uncommon to hear these words occasionally, ‘I’m not really that competitive…’
Or, ‘I don’t care about my recording my scores I just want to come in, switch off and workout… ‘
While there is no doubt that in a facility like ours, that is coach-centric and movement focused, you can probably get away with training here for YEARS, with very little awareness or understanding of the why and the how behind our training principles, yet STILL get fitter.
But on the other hand, you might find that a disconnected and disinterested attitude to the why behind your training, means you’ll hit a plateau in progress or motivation far too soon.
Human kind has sought to understand the why behind everything from biology to quantum physics to the territorial behaviours of the North East African hyena…..
You don’t have to care about that stuff, but acknowledging it’s existence and understanding how it affects you is important.
Same goes for your training.
If you care about what you’re doing, you’ll get better at it.
“Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair.” — Nelson Mandela
Sports have a huge influence on our culture. We pay top athletes millions of dollars, in order to watch them play a game. A game however, which brings people from all walks of life together to share the experiences of triumph and failure.
The power of sports and “gamification” of tasks in the gym can be a powerful tool for building better athletes, people with better quality movement and stronger communities.
Now, we’re not saying you have to constantly compete with others in the gym, nor do you have to obsess over where you rank in the gym on a day by day basis.
But you should be aware of it at it’s basest level. After all, competitiveness is one of the traits most responsible for our emergence as the dominant species.
Ultimately we really do believe that your biggest competition is with yourself.
However…….. if you can be inspired by, and enjoy some friendly rivalry with, the others in your class, this exercise gig sure sure starts to seem like fun once in a while……
You might tell me (and try to convince yourself) that you’re not competitive, but I’m sorry, it’s in your DNA.
It’s a common theme that runs through the world of fitness, of burning calories.
It’s heavily promoted from marketing, every gym, bootcamp, and fitness class promising more calories burned in less time.
And in general, we’re all guilty of feeling like that is the approach we need to take, it almost feels obvious. Of COURSE if we do more, we’ll expend more energy, and if we expend more energy we’ll burn more calories and if we burn more calories, we’ll burn more fat, and if we burn more fat…….
You can burn more calories by doing more exercise, or you can burn more calories by building more muscle. Using some very rough and unprovable math, we could speculate that adding just 2 to 3 kg of extra muscle could increase your metabolism to a point roughly equal to taking a 40 minute walk every day.
That’s free exercise!
*remember that your basal metabolic rate, is the amount of energy you burn at rest, and then metabolic expenditure is the total amount you burn going about your day. – walking, gardening, chewing, exercising etc.
Our programming is biased towards getting stronger and building muscle. Yes we also want to build some capacity for endurance and mid-range stamina type activities, but for overall health and fitness increasing your strength, increasing your muscle mass and increasing your metabolism is the way to go.
Chasing an immediate outcome such as burning a certain amount of fat/calories in a given workout, will never offer the kind of results and reward that is possible from instead aiming the focus towards building muscle, which in turn increases metabolism, which in turn increases the amount of fat/calories burned during exercise, during rest, during sleep!
We’ve spoken before about the famous marshmallow experiment, where patience and focus on a longer term outcome was better rewarded. It applies here too.
Focus on that longer term, but more rewarding outcome.
Also, if your focus every time you exercise, is tied up in how much fat you burn, you are missing a valuable opportunity to learn, to enjoy the feeling of what your body can do, to play, to have fun!!
Finally, when your metabolism is higher, not only do you burn more fat, it is harder to store it. The wins just keep on coming!
Tim Ferris led the way in finding work life balance way back in 2007. And the hosts of other authors, public speakers and life coaches that followed in his wake, shouted it louder than ever.
The multitudes of time and energy saving tools at our disposal in the 21st Century, have also allowed us to never stop working, if we so choose.
Same applies to training. It’s not uncommon to speak to people who say their main goal is to be fit and healthy, and then they schedule six class workouts per week, plus strength/accessory work, private weightlifting coaching, a gymnastics specialty class or two, then squeeze in some engine work at the track and finish every day off with an extra metcon.
Don’t get me wrong, your goal may require some or all of the above. But if it doesn’t, are you being busy just for the sake of it?
Let’s be clear; if you love love LOVE this stuff, go for it I say. Doing what you love is the best thing ever. You’ll need to be mindful of the volume however, and double down on your recovery, if you want to survive such a high frequency of training. And this is where it gets counter-intuitive; why add more training, if you need to add extra recovery work, JUST to handle the increased volume?
Also, it’s important to point out that the standard ‘take a walk 3 x week’ government recommendation is woefully inadequate, you CAN and SHOULD move physically in some way EVERY DAY.
But I challenge you to be highly effective with every minute of training, and purge any wasteful sessions.
Note: Add as much extra outdoor activity, play and adventure as you want, you can’t really over do that…..
If you haven’t checked out our PLUS Accessory programming, it’s an extra 10-30mins of work, prioritising engine, strength or gymnastics, and designed to fit before, or after the group class.
I have talked a lot about how intensity should be a relative thing, ie applied to suit your current level of fitness, ability, injury status, restfulness and mental wellbeing.
Likewise though, so is moderation.
“Everything in moderation”
Right?
We’ve all heard it before. We’ve probably said it before.
But like anything relative, it’s important that you take the time to regularly audit your perceptions.
Before you know it, moderation can become much less than that.
It can also go the other way, and become the only focus.
The stories we tell ourselves to convince ourselves that we’re right can be complex and all too believable.
But if your version of moderation isn’t working then it needs adjusting.
And it’s ok to take baby steps!
Because progress is yet another relative term….. 😉
Gamification Apparently it really is a word. “the application of typical elements of game playing (e.g. point scoring, competition with others, rules of play) to other areas of activity, typically as an online marketing technique to encourage engagement with a product or service”
In the context of this is the act of making your workout into a game. Games make any activity much more interesting, challenging, and competitive.
AMRAP, For Time, EMOM, Max Effort, there are various structures to our daily workouts. Some are quite clearly a competition of sorts, eg a 5km run, or a classic CrossFit benchmark workout. Others, not so much; when the intent is ‘for quality’ or ‘Not for time’ etc. you might feel a little lost, if you’re used to always putting a target on someone else’s back to help you make your best effort.
Ultimately, and in the long run however, we are playing or competing against ourselves. Having the state of mind that whatever you do in the gym today, will make you better than yesterday allows you to grow. You can burn fat, build muscle and get stronger by putting in the work every day. That is winning.
It’s really easy to get caught up in the negative. Yelling at yourself because you missed that lift. Throwing your skipping rope down because your rhythm is off. Ending any workout feeling defeated because it didn’t go the way you wanted/expected. And not buying in to a workout that is by design a non-competitive effort.
But that is losing. We have to remember that the method to our madness is meant for positive reinforcement to get more fit and have fun doing it.
You can be winning in your fitness or losing. It’s up to you to make the most of your time in class. Keep it simple:
During my post graduate studies, I was fascinated by research showing that (despite what your mother told you when she caught you drinking) new brain cells CAN be made.
On a recent flight, which is always a chance to consume a bunch of TED Talks, there was a great video from the enthusiastic and contagiously happy neuroscientist Wendy Suzuki, that reminded me about this often overlooked fact in our body obsessed but psyche negligent society.
Exercise releases ‘good mood’ neurotransmitters.
So why do some people still go home unhappy? If you’re constantly worrying about how much you lift, what the others are thinking about you then you’re literally going to override those happy ‘neuro-T’s’!
Maybe it’s tough to ditch the baggage accumulated from a tough day, and you’re already too deep in the hole for any happy hormones to pull you out?
Think about that. Exercise equals happiness.
Guaranteed.
It’s simply a chemical reaction. Just show up, work out and go home happy.
EXCEPT you went and neutralised it, by getting all up in your own head……
Hey, to be fair, that’s our lot as humans, it would be nice if we could live in the present like a dog or a cheetah but we can’t, and it’s a big part of why we evolved as the dominant species.
But maybe, just maybe, we could practice not caring about how good we are, and also practice how much fun we can have, learning, interacting and exploring.
And with a little practice, maybe we can make this one hour at the gym, the best hour of our day, instead of yet another form of stress?
