The CrossFit Open is only ten days away. I hope you’ve been doing your burpees. I’m excited to announce I’m going to join y’all with a live broadcast. I’ll kick it off about 30 minutes before the start of the 20.1 Open workout announcement, talk shop, gossip, strategies, and more. When the Rogue live stream starts, we’ll cut over to them, watch Rich Froning and Scott Panchik go head-to-head, then hang out for another 30 minutes or so to digest it all and answer any questions that came up in chat.
I’ve put a link to the stream in my show notes at WODDITY.com – you can go to it today, click the “Set Reminder” button for an alert when the stream goes live, and hop on for a thrilling kick-off to the 2020 CrossFit Games season.
Morning Chalk Up has presented two opposing op-eds about rep cutting. What’s “rep cutting”, you ask? Well, I’ll you the story of a little imaginary gym go-er named Ted. Upon walking into the gym for his 6AM class, Ted sees the workout is something miserable. Let’s say ten rounds of ten thrusters and ten burpees over the bar. Yuck. Right around his fifth miserable set of miserable movements, Ted notices the coach isn’t watching him very closely. He decides he has miraculously completed eight rounds, effectively cutting a third of the workout. Rep cutting.
Here’s the argument: on one side, Ted is cheating himself out of the physiological adaptation he’d get if he did all the reps. He’s artificially making himself look fitter than the other members of his class, like poor Mike who did all ten rounds and finished only a minute behind Ted.
The counter-point says Ted may not be that evil. Maybe we’ve failed Ted by programming workouts too tough for his skill level. Maybe we should celebrate that Ted was able to complete seven rounds of a tough workout and build an environment where he feels comfortable reporting the work he actually did.
I see merits to both arguments. Let me know what you think in the comments at WODDITY.com, or join the discussion at Morning Chalk Up. I’ve put links to both editorial pieces in the show notes.
- What Rep Cutting Says About Your Character (OPINION), by Jeff Tincher
- What Complaining About Rep Cutting Says About Your Character (OPINION), by Rachel Binette
Craig Kenney, Paul Tremblay, Carol-Ann Reason-Thibault, and Jenn Smith have all been confirmed as Team Nation for the CrossFit Filthy 150 in November. What nation? I dunno. But that’s one heck of a team.
And that’s it for news about CrossFit on Monday, September 30th. Thanks for listening. Be sure to rate, review, and subscribe. It’s the best way to give back to the show, because it helps more people find us. I’m Ben Garves.
