One of the basic tenets of crossfit is to play new sports or engage yourself in atypical ways. This could be a confusing principle for someone relatively new to the activity, especially after reviewing the hype from the games and seeing some of the crossfitters who train for specific wods to post freakish times and numbers. On one hand we should do anything and everything that produces benefit yet the other sets an appealling trap for benchmark recognition. The truth is that a person should define their goals and decide how crossfit should be integrated in one's life. We frequently admonish the specialist and praise the generalist but crossfitters are evolving into crossfit specialists. Incorporating other activities such as the one I'm doing this week will do nothing for my fran time or any of my one rep max lifts on any lifts. Years ago I learned a valuable lesson from powerlifting; that is, the more skilled/stronger/faster/whatever at any activity demands less and less of a deviation therefrom. This is why, as powerlifters peek for their meets, they slowly trim the excess from their routines to include auxilary exercises and walks in the park. This is the cost of moving too far in one direction. To some, its worth the price. The benefits of being a crossfitter and engaging a panoply of activities is that the fitness part is generally not an issue, new movements are learned fast, and recovery is almost instant.
The point of all this is that crossfit is either a sport in and of itself or it's a tool used as the foundation for another activity. Only the user can decide. The exception to sacrificing the highly sought after and dialed in routine is that, with elite fitness, the body should respond in no time to adapting anew or regressing to its foundation. It would be nice to get enough sleep every night, eat the perfect diet, train at the same time every day, and enjoy the qualities of the athlete's perfect world. A flying pony would also be nice but without it we must make do with what we have or make changes to get what we want.
Wods will more than likely be limited this week as it serves little or no purpose to try and squeeze more juice from an already depleted rock.
Well, the 275# SQT CLN. remains elusive. I went 225, 245, 265, & 275. The objective: Keep the total number of attempts low. No misses through 265, but 275 becomes a mind game, I know it. I really had only one good attempt. It's no longer a strength issue, I just need to commit. The saga continues...
ReplyDeleteI'm at the same place with 295 but even more demoralizing is that I've done it so I can empathize. The bottom line is that, in order to get over it, you have to either stop training the movement or train it exclusively. It's the difference between a goal and a preference. I would prefer to have a faster fran time but it's not a goal so I'm not going to train for it. You might want to just blow past it with 280/285. Sometimes this strategy works.
ReplyDeleteYour post sums it up nicely. Thanks for concisely putting into words the debate and discussion we all have with ourselves and others regarding the definition of training and why we all do it. In the end it all depends on one's goals. We don't all have the same goals so why should our training look the same from person to person?
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, this is what makes running a box so challenging, i.e. programming for anyone who walks through the door. Should each client recieve a different prescription? What if the doctor wrote the same prescription for everyone in the waiting room regardless of why they were there? This is what made crossfit so appealing initially, that everyone could do the same wod and get fit just the same. It was ingenious. Now that we are evolving the same programming that was used three years ago is no longer sufficient. It's still better than the globo routine but, just like everything else, it could be better. It certainly makes for an interesting brainstorm.
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