I really appreciate this topic. I coach at a very small affiliate and also do our programming, I am a nerd for programming and try to continuously learn more. I take a lot of inspiration from Pat Sherwood and he shares these views on programming. However my members very much prefer the two a day style, they feel like they don’t get enough “work” in otherwise. It has been a battle getting them to buy into things like a proper warm up and cool down so I feel like I am taking baby steps with them. They don’t believe they can get fitter doing just a metcon or just a heavy day. When in reality the reasons they are not seeing more dramatic results are due to their nutrition choices and lack of consistency. As well as things like mobility and proper scaling. I’m sure other coaches struggle with this as well. Thanks again for your thoughts
Thank you for doing these weekly talks. Very informative and it keeps us everyday/average crossfitters a sense of being directly involved with crossfit corporate.
I can personally attest to the volume/burnout theory. From 2014 to 2021 I was consistently making it to Regionals/semi finals with the goal to make it to the CrossFit Games (by a miracle I made it in 2020). In the earlier years (I was younger…), I would do 2-a-days and there would be little to no “off-season” after Regionals. I would enjoy getting right back into the gym! In the later years it seemed sometimes I was doing 4-6 workouts/day and by the end of the season I wanted absolutely nothing to do with training for months on end. I am currently doing 1 workout per day and splitting the time between dot com and my affiliate programming. My body and mind feel great and I am motivated every day to get back into the gym. Part of me always wants a little more at the end of my session but if I cut myself off then I am quite juiced moving into the next session. Also, really enjoying the challenge of being smarter with programming to embrace the idea of minimum effective dose. It’s a great challenge and takes an expert programmer to create maximum adaptation with minimum volume versus casting a big net and programming 5 workouts to hit every stimulus imaginable in a day. Re: affiliates programming 2-wod classes. IMO many gyms have gotten comfortable with a class that lacks coaching and requires little skill to execute except an attempt to keep everything within the timeframe. It is easy for owners to fall into this trap because little resources are needed to keep staff coaching skills sharp - all they have to do is hand out the timeline. It takes a great coach to look at a single workout from crossfit.com and work it into a 60-min class with a well thought out warm-up, teaching portion, workout, and cool down. As you said, the magic is in the movements, however I think many affiliates would see more results for their members from the simple addition of more coaching as a byproduct of less volume. Let me know what you think…
I agree that it takes little coaching skill to run the two a day class, most of your effort is spent keeping people moving fast enough to complete the work
I agree, super common to see a white board littered with exercise and then you look at the class and almost no one has fundamental movements mastered, or a knowledge of the standard for each. It isn’t CrossFit methodology, to avoid instructing those effectively. Over programming doesn’t allow coaches to coach and instead they become people herders and the methodology goes out the window.
The Spartan race opportunity is so cool - I hope that lots of people take you up on it because CF is great training for Spartan racing. I’m doing the APAC championship race in Phuket next weekend (I’ve done a Sprint and a Beast so far this year). My primary training has been following CrossFit Linchpin. Have a blast!!
Dave these thoughts are super important for everyone to hear, especially the conversation surrounding elite athletes diet & the major differences between them and everyday CrossFitter. And same goes for programming. Simplicity is missing for a lot of online, pay for programming subscriptions.
Thankyou for bringing this up. I have to look at the program each day and decide if I want to give 100% to the strength or to the metcon.. I usually can’t do both.. I found out the hard way 😂
Agree with everything you said. As we age the third leg of the stool that becomes increasingly important is recovery and consistently practicing recovery techniques so we are ready to train again the next day. 1) Appropriate programming to support the athletes needs 2) Appropriate nutrition to maximize the results of the training 3) Appropriate recovery to allow the athlete to train again at maximum effectiveness. Thanks Dave - love the series!
I liked the days that would have an A) strength program then a B) metcon.... When the metcons were about 10-20m intervals or emoms. But now when the metcons are 15-25m constant work for time as a standard, im too old to recover enough for 5 days a week. 44yrs. Crossfit for 8 years.
People just think volume will get them fitter faster, but they just need to be consistent in their work outs and nutrition. I agree it leads to burn out and sometimes injury. One is enough in my opinion too.
The gym I was apart of did the warmup, strength, metcon, cool down. Many of the gyms around here still do. Now I’m in my home gym. I’ll say this, I find if someone goes in to be intentional with their workout and it is only strength, they’ll get just as much out of that as they would the two workout version. You still have to warm up your body and then warm up to the lift and go over movement. It is quality, not quantity. Also, you’re not in a rush to get it all done in an hour so focus can be on one or the other and not all of it. If I’m getting ready for a comp, and I need to train twice a day, then I can split it up if I need to. But, I have found, personally, that I don’t have to kill myself trying to fit so much in if I work with intention on my focus. And nutrition is the biggest part of all of it.
For me it depends on the intensity of both: For example, if the strength portion is heavy, doing a quick wod with less complex movements (i.e. Cindy) I find works so you can improve on general physical/muscular endurance.
Also, on "heavy days" athletes should rest longer between sets! For 5 sets of 3 heavy deadlifts, rest should be at least 3 minutes or so between the work sets. Which means the class will really only have time to warmup and lift.
Carbs are the way for the majority of athletes training at a high level. Most research (albeit mostly focused on endurance athletes) supports optimal performance coming from a higher carb intake, as opposed to low-carb high-fat. Now for optimal health and the everyday athlete, sure, a more moderate carb intake coming from whole food sources is probably the best approach for most people
What do you think about affiliates providing "Advanced" classes for those that would typically do 2 sessions or prefer doing open gym only? At my box, for example, those pack quite a lot more volume and less teaching within one hour.
For programming... why should affiliates use the CrossFit Affiliate Programming (CAP) versus the mainsite workouts? One is $125 month, other is free since forever.
Dave, Main site follows the 3 on 1 off model while a lot of the affiliates tend to follow 5 on 2 off or a variation. Do you have a preferred model of the two, or another variation? Also, do you think following the guidance (m-gw-mgw-gm-w, Etc...) in the programming template from the L1 is the most effective for beginner programmers and crossfitters? Thanks as always.
I have a question, what do you think if you break up the session say in a garage gym setting… Like a morning CrossFit workout, and then in the evening a Power lifting session???
I’ve been wanting to ask this question about programming for a long time. I think a lot of gym owners are self-conscious about a more minimal programming approach as well. If somebody is paying $200 a month for a gym membership, and the only thing on the board is seven sets of heavy deadlifts, then someone might be inclined to get a cheap membership at a Globo gym, and do the same. I haven’t been to a CrossFit gym yet that just did one piece regularly a day. What percent of gyms do you think are doing one a day and not the two a day strength and conditioning model?
Dave!! Your series is very cool appreciated. I would love to hear your prescription for a “tactical” aspect. A how to get to, get through, and maintain performance within the tactical space. Maybe nothing changes in the crossfit programming or maybe there’s something we haven’t talked about that would be beneficial for LEO/MIL
Greg Glassman question: I’m 2-3 years into CrossFit. Why does it look like Greg doesn’t practice what he preach? He seems to be something of a fitness genius but I just wish he looked the part (fit). Anytime I tell anyone about Greg they immediately note “he doesn’t look like he does CrossFit”. What is the story here? I’ve never heard anyone discuss this. No criticism of Greg, I’m honestly curious how to think about this. Thanks
I’m no expert like Dave maybe on Greg, but I understand he was and had some major injuries. Now we preach, adaptability abs scaling after injury… and yes here the point does stand. But I don’t know what his injuries were specifically.
From memory I think he had Polio as a child and also suffered a serious leg injury from gymnastics leaving him with a permanent limp. He is fit and lean. What do you expect him to look like? A jacked 25 y/o on steroids?
We use @spealprogramming at our gym. Great organized warm up, METCON, Organized cool down. All in 1 hour. Of course we run over some times but it's mainly me talking or laughing with the athletes. Love the programming on the GPP track. We only do one day a week dediated to heavy lifting,
I really appreciate this topic. I coach at a very small affiliate and also do our programming, I am a nerd for programming and try to continuously learn more. I take a lot of inspiration from Pat Sherwood and he shares these views on programming. However my members very much prefer the two a day style, they feel like they don’t get enough “work” in otherwise. It has been a battle getting them to buy into things like a proper warm up and cool down so I feel like I am taking baby steps with them. They don’t believe they can get fitter doing just a metcon or just a heavy day. When in reality the reasons they are not seeing more dramatic results are due to their nutrition choices and lack of consistency. As well as things like mobility and proper scaling. I’m sure other coaches struggle with this as well. Thanks again for your thoughts
Very common issues for sure. Explaining to them what you pointed out is holding them back, with love of course.
Appreciate your insight, some great stuff here, thanks brother.
Thank you for doing these weekly talks. Very informative and it keeps us everyday/average crossfitters a sense of being directly involved with crossfit corporate.
Excited for the Spartan Race for our community! (I have to be in LA that day, dammit)
I can personally attest to the volume/burnout theory. From 2014 to 2021 I was consistently making it to Regionals/semi finals with the goal to make it to the CrossFit Games (by a miracle I made it in 2020). In the earlier years (I was younger…), I would do 2-a-days and there would be little to no “off-season” after Regionals. I would enjoy getting right back into the gym! In the later years it seemed sometimes I was doing 4-6 workouts/day and by the end of the season I wanted absolutely nothing to do with training for months on end.
I am currently doing 1 workout per day and splitting the time between dot com and my affiliate programming. My body and mind feel great and I am motivated every day to get back into the gym. Part of me always wants a little more at the end of my session but if I cut myself off then I am quite juiced moving into the next session.
Also, really enjoying the challenge of being smarter with programming to embrace the idea of minimum effective dose. It’s a great challenge and takes an expert programmer to create maximum adaptation with minimum volume versus casting a big net and programming 5 workouts to hit every stimulus imaginable in a day.
Re: affiliates programming 2-wod classes. IMO many gyms have gotten comfortable with a class that lacks coaching and requires little skill to execute except an attempt to keep everything within the timeframe. It is easy for owners to fall into this trap because little resources are needed to keep staff coaching skills sharp - all they have to do is hand out the timeline. It takes a great coach to look at a single workout from crossfit.com and work it into a 60-min class with a well thought out warm-up, teaching portion, workout, and cool down. As you said, the magic is in the movements, however I think many affiliates would see more results for their members from the simple addition of more coaching as a byproduct of less volume.
Let me know what you think…
I agree that it takes little coaching skill to run the two a day class, most of your effort is spent keeping people moving fast enough to complete the work
I agree, super common to see a white board littered with exercise and then you look at the class and almost no one has fundamental movements mastered, or a knowledge of the standard for each. It isn’t CrossFit methodology, to avoid instructing those effectively. Over programming doesn’t allow coaches to coach and instead they become people herders and the methodology goes out the window.
The Spartan race opportunity is so cool - I hope that lots of people take you up on it because CF is great training for Spartan racing. I’m doing the APAC championship race in Phuket next weekend (I’ve done a Sprint and a Beast so far this year). My primary training has been following CrossFit Linchpin. Have a blast!!
Dave these thoughts are super important for everyone to hear, especially the conversation surrounding elite athletes diet & the major differences between them and everyday CrossFitter. And same goes for programming. Simplicity is missing for a lot of online, pay for programming subscriptions.
Thankyou for bringing this up. I have to look at the program each day and decide if I want to give 100% to the strength or to the metcon.. I usually can’t do both.. I found out the hard way 😂
Agree with everything you said. As we age the third leg of the stool that becomes increasingly important is recovery and consistently practicing recovery techniques so we are ready to train again the next day. 1) Appropriate programming to support the athletes needs 2) Appropriate nutrition to maximize the results of the training 3) Appropriate recovery to allow the athlete to train again at maximum effectiveness. Thanks Dave - love the series!
I liked the days that would have an A) strength program then a B) metcon....
When the metcons were about 10-20m intervals or emoms.
But now when the metcons are 15-25m constant work for time as a standard, im too old to recover enough for 5 days a week.
44yrs. Crossfit for 8 years.
Really appreciate this talk Dave. Such great points!
People just think volume will get them fitter faster, but they just need to be consistent in their work outs and nutrition. I agree it leads to burn out and sometimes injury. One is enough in my opinion too.
The gym I was apart of did the warmup, strength, metcon, cool down. Many of the gyms around here still do. Now I’m in my home gym. I’ll say this, I find if someone goes in to be intentional with their workout and it is only strength, they’ll get just as much out of that as they would the two workout version. You still have to warm up your body and then warm up to the lift and go over movement. It is quality, not quantity. Also, you’re not in a rush to get it all done in an hour so focus can be on one or the other and not all of it. If I’m getting ready for a comp, and I need to train twice a day, then I can split it up if I need to. But, I have found, personally, that I don’t have to kill myself trying to fit so much in if I work with intention on my focus. And nutrition is the biggest part of all of it.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on these gyms that are doing A) B) C) D) all in an hour long class.
For me it depends on the intensity of both: For example, if the strength portion is heavy, doing a quick wod with less complex movements (i.e. Cindy) I find works so you can improve on general physical/muscular endurance.
Also, on "heavy days" athletes should rest longer between sets! For 5 sets of 3 heavy deadlifts, rest should be at least 3 minutes or so between the work sets. Which means the class will really only have time to warmup and lift.
Thanks Dave.
Carbs are the way for the majority of athletes training at a high level. Most research (albeit mostly focused on endurance athletes) supports optimal performance coming from a higher carb intake, as opposed to low-carb high-fat. Now for optimal health and the everyday athlete, sure, a more moderate carb intake coming from whole food sources is probably the best approach for most people
Great video!
What do you think about affiliates providing "Advanced" classes for those that would typically do 2 sessions or prefer doing open gym only?
At my box, for example, those pack quite a lot more volume and less teaching within one hour.
Thanks Dave!!! 🙏
Hi Dave, do you consider that Sleep should be added alongside Nutrition at the base of the pyramid? why, why not? why hasn't CF done this?
I just hear Dave saying “follow the methodology” in other words, coach more, program less, do the common uncommonly well. Hold the standard 💪
For programming... why should affiliates use the CrossFit Affiliate Programming (CAP) versus the mainsite workouts? One is $125 month, other is free since forever.
Dave, Main site follows the 3 on 1 off model while a lot of the affiliates tend to follow 5 on 2 off or a variation. Do you have a preferred model of the two, or another variation? Also, do you think following the guidance (m-gw-mgw-gm-w, Etc...) in the programming template from the L1 is the most effective for beginner programmers and crossfitters? Thanks as always.
I have a question, what do you think if you break up the session say in a garage gym setting… Like a morning CrossFit workout, and then in the evening a Power lifting session???
I’ve been wanting to ask this question about programming for a long time. I think a lot of gym owners are self-conscious about a more minimal programming approach as well. If somebody is paying $200 a month for a gym membership, and the only thing on the board is seven sets of heavy deadlifts, then someone might be inclined to get a cheap membership at a Globo gym, and do the same.
I haven’t been to a CrossFit gym yet that just did one piece regularly a day. What percent of gyms do you think are doing one a day and not the two a day strength and conditioning model?
My gym does. And any heavy day that doesn’t tax you or turn into a fun day just means the coach needs work.
@@TacticallyFitOfficial That’s great to hear! Do you like it? Everyone else seems to like it?
@@doctortoddanderson yeah dude. If the coach is fun, the class is constantly moving and people are being coached it’s always fun!
Respect the heavy day
Dave!! Your series is very cool appreciated.
I would love to hear your prescription for a “tactical” aspect. A how to get to, get through, and maintain performance within the tactical space. Maybe nothing changes in the crossfit programming or maybe there’s something we haven’t talked about that would be beneficial for LEO/MIL
I love the nutrition stuff
You should call out Sevan and have him come do the spartan! 😂
A way, not, THE way
👍👍
Greg Glassman question: I’m 2-3 years into CrossFit. Why does it look like Greg doesn’t practice what he preach? He seems to be something of a fitness genius but I just wish he looked the part (fit). Anytime I tell anyone about Greg they immediately note “he doesn’t look like he does CrossFit”. What is the story here? I’ve never heard anyone discuss this. No criticism of Greg, I’m honestly curious how to think about this. Thanks
I’m no expert like Dave maybe on Greg, but I understand he was and had some major injuries. Now we preach, adaptability abs scaling after injury… and yes here the point does stand. But I don’t know what his injuries were specifically.
From memory I think he had Polio as a child and also suffered a serious leg injury from gymnastics leaving him with a permanent limp. He is fit and lean. What do you expect him to look like? A jacked 25 y/o on steroids?
We use @spealprogramming at our gym. Great organized warm up, METCON, Organized cool down. All in 1 hour. Of course we run over some times but it's mainly me talking or laughing with the athletes. Love the programming on the GPP track. We only do one day a week dediated to heavy lifting,