Misfit Podcast
Misfit Athletics provides information and programming to competitive Crossfit athletes of all levels.
Misfit Podcast
Mad Jack: New Misfit Affiliate Phase - E.384
In this special Affiliate Edition of The Misfit Podcast, Drew is joined by Hunter Wood (Misfit Gym Portland owner) and Paige Semenza to break down everything coaches and affiliates need to know as the Mad Jack Phase kicks off — just in time for the CrossFit Open.
This seven-week General Physical Preparedness (GPP) phase is built around versatility, strength, and adaptability, inspired by the legendary “Mad Jack” Churchill — a true jack-of-all-trades. The crew dives into how affiliates can best prepare athletes for Open season, from coaching heavy squat cleans and front squats to managing gymnastics progressions, cardio days, and movement efficiency in real-world class settings.
They also cover:
- How to coach front squats and squat cleans more effectively
- Teaching gymnastics to mixed-ability classes
- Scaling bar muscle-ups for large affiliate groups
- Why monostructural conditioning still matters (even when it’s not “fun”)
- How to communicate Open strategy to different athlete personalities
- Keeping coaches aligned across large staffs
- Creating better buy-in and consistency during Open season
Whether you’re an affiliate owner, coach, or athlete, this episode offers practical insight into smarter programming, better coaching communication, and how to help your community thrive during the Open.
Mad Jack Phase starts Monday, January 26th.
Get in the Telegram, grab your free trial, and sharpen the axe (or sword 😈🗡️)
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Good morning, Misfits. You are tuning in to a special edition Misfit Podcast. The Misfit affiliate programming Mad Jack phase starts one week from today, tomorrow, yesterday, somewhere around there, Monday, January 26th. It is a seven-week-long phase. We will be in the midst of the open, and a lot of what we're doing and what we're talking about today is centered around that idea of what does a gym do during that time of year? How can you get your athletes ready? What coaches should be thinking about, all that good stuff. I personally like episodes like this where we are potentially talking about more broader range education and coaching, as opposed to going through specific movement by movement, because it just gives us an opportunity to let you guys know how we think about coaching, how we think about communicating with our coaches, all that good stuff. We have Misfit Jim Portland, owner Hunter Wood back on the show today. Hello, Hunter. How are you? Oh, what's up? We will, by popular and unpopular demand, do live chat at the end of this episode so that all the crybabies can listen to all the information and then all of the fans and all of the fans are with the chuckleheads.
SPEAKER_04:End of your surveys.
SPEAKER_05:No, when we do program when people hop in just for programming episodes, there's like a few people, and honestly, Hunter, they might be your people that are like, Can you guys shut up and tell me what I need to know so I can leave? Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:It was actually just me. I just created 18 different usernames.
unknown:Fuck.
SPEAKER_05:He's signing up for nine affiliate programming accounts just so we can.
SPEAKER_04:How many free trials? That was all your sales calls. They're actually just with me.
SPEAKER_05:Yep, they're all with Hunter. Uh so we'll do that at the end of the episode. We'll check in with Hunter. Can give you guys a little bit of update on life in Colorado and Pages, got all kinds of new stuff going on. So we'll put that right at the end. Before we jump into the details of the Mad Jack phase, we've got a little bit of housekeeping here. Because we have more affiliate athletes and affiliate owners and affiliate coaches listening to this podcast. Get your ass in Telegram. It's the place where you can communicate with us. You can communicate with the other coaches that coach this program. You can communicate with other athletes that are at the affiliate. You can also kind of swim into the waters of what are the competitive athletes doing, all that good stuff. So get into Telegram. All of the emails that I send out related to Mad Jack will have Telegram links in them. It is free for everybody, so everyone can jump in and see what that's all about, whether they are signed up for the program or not. As always, we have four ways for you guys to support the show, to support what we do at Misfit Athletics. The easiest one is head to teammisfit.com right now. Click on sign up now, and you get a two-week free trial of Mad Jack at StreamFit, Sugar Wad, or Push Press. Or if you would like to see the first two weeks of the program, you can email me coach at misfitathletics.com. That is the type of programming that you will receive if you sign up directly on TeamMistFit.com. Individual programming, link in bio on Instagram. Camp. We are one week out from camp. Three quarters of your staff is on this podcast right now. Caroline Spencer will also be there January 30th through February 1st. CrossFit Roots. If you are an affiliate and you didn't know that we were having camp, remove yourself out from whatever rock you've been under. Shoot me an email if you'd like a little bit of a discount for you and your staff. We'd love to see you guys there. We've got like four, I don't know if it's a coincidence or not, but we got like four or five affiliates in the state of Colorado now. Three of them are new. So join us. It's probably the best place to come and learn from us, especially as coaches. So that's in the link in bio as well. You can also head to sharpentheaxco.com and snag yourself one of the remaining Rain or Shine collection shirts. And as always, this podcast is brought to you by GorillaMind. I've gotten into the bodybuilding world a little bit lately just because I can't do a whole lot with where my back is at and it sucks not to feel strong, but I have to go to a Globo gym in the afternoon, which means I need a non-STEM pre-workout, which they have. And there's definitely a difference. Derek from More Plates More Dates, the Gorilla Mind guy is a bodybuilder. So he's got a the type of pre-workout that you can really notice a difference when you're going through like your final sets and pushing for, you know, controlling these eccentric phase, getting a few extra reps, that sort of thing. I notice a difference when I take it. So gorilla mode and go for the non-STEM. It's great. Use the code word misfit at checkout or head to gorilla mind.com forward slash misfit. Okay, Mad Jack. Where does this name come from? It is Mad Jack Churchill. And I was looking for a Jack of all trades because this is a very GPP-esque phase. This is a one of my favorite side quests that I do, maybe a couple hours in a day looking for the right person for this, and then maybe another hour or so going down a rabbit hole of who this person is. So let's read a little bit about Mad Jack. All right. Mad Jack Churchill was a musician, an athlete, an actor, an explorer, an archer, a surfer, and a widely read, highly articulate man who was interested in engineering and philosophy. But he was famous for leading his men into World War II with a bagpipe, bow and arrow, and a sword. By the way, there were machine guns in World War II, if you want to think a little bit about that. The exploits are not PG. And as we know, this is a children's show, especially with Hunter on here. Definitely. But this dude was wild. And I watched another video this morning that talked about his life sort of after the war. And he's just like old school renaissance man. Like he built remote control boats in his spare time for fun. Like there were I didn't know there were RC boats in whatever 1950 or whenever this would have been. But a fascinating gentleman and the kind of person that is a deserving of the name of an affiliate where we are going after all the things. What do you guys think of Magic?
SPEAKER_04:Like or if you're not going to go into the exploits, I would say that I mean, even just listening to the bio, right? Like what what did you say? Like art surfing.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, musician, athlete, actor, explorer, archer, surfer, um, and was into engineering, philosophy, building boats and all this stuff once he was out of the military.
SPEAKER_04:Guys, get it? Like, okay, GPP, here we go. Yeah. Sure. But then add the the second half.
SPEAKER_05:He shot arrows at Nazis when he he could have shot them with a gun, but it was a psychological warfare tactic. A lot of people think that some of Inglorious Bastards is based on Mad Jack, some of the like lore behind it. Because he, like, for fun one night, him and another guy snuck in enemy territory and took 40 prisoners and made them carry all of their stuff back so that they'd be tired and not want to attack him. So like carrying their bombs. Crazy. Okay. That's not why you guys are listening to this podcast. Maybe we'll talk about Mad Jack a little bit after. So again, this is a seven-week-long phase. And so much of what we're going to talk about today is being a better coach when you have a more wide-ranging, you know, sort of menu to choose from when you when you are coaching throughout the weeks. But we do begin with a the heavy days bias is going to be squat, clean, and front squat. Our heavy days, what we have found works best at the affiliate level is alternating between a standalone strength session and putting it in an actual workout. So you'll notice that, say, we'll squat, clean, heavy week one, and then week two, you'll have heavy front squats within the workout. Then you'll have front squats alone, and we sort of go through. I've talked about this maybe too many times, but I will say I love the pairing because it's very high skilled, especially at the affiliate level, with the potentially lack of mobility within the front rack and the front squat position and the ability to work on it both in its dynamic form and the squat clean and then go back and really have someone set up coming out of a rack and move through space much more intentionally. I think it's a really good way to be able to teach. And obviously heading into the open, you're looking at, you know, front rack is a is at a premium in a lot of instances when it comes to the open and quarterfinals. So my question for you guys is when you think of the squat clean and or the front squat, what are the things that come into your head in terms of queuing and stuff that seems to work really well? Say if you're gonna do the like focus on one thing style of class and try to work athletes through that. You want me to?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I'll go. I don't know. I feel like it's hard to get people to understand sometimes the like similarities of catching a squat clean and what you should look like in a standard front squat, you know, like getting your your butt between your heels and making sure that you're really trying to keep those elbows up and that nice upright position. Sometimes when we go for strength, I feel like that can get lost in the mix when you're just doing front squats. So really just trying to having them continue to think about the way that they're moving in their front squat and in their squat clean when they're catching a heavy barbell. Like, do we see similarities or do we see drastic differences and how can we start to get the two to look more similar?
SPEAKER_05:One of the ways, too, that that can be done is muscle clean, front squat complex, power clean, front squat, lower catch, you're kind of working your way through and like, can we figure all of this out? Which for me, like my number one cue with the clean, whether it's the power clean or the squat clean, at honestly most levels is just that idea of that it's a continuous movement to kind of move your feet and pull up and then under versus the like heave and catch and have it crash down on you. And not just because it's technically correct to do that, to do it that way, but it also forces someone to keep more of a grip on the bar and to maintain some of that tension in the upper back. And the first time you actively pull and kind of do the thing where you're, you know, cueing to point the knuckles down and then turn into this position, you just feel so much stronger. But I think as you're working your way through the mobility aspect of all of this, when you have a position that feels uncomfortable, there's like a warning sign for a lot of athletes because at some point maybe it was like, I'm gonna dislocate my shoulders or my elbow if you tell me to hold on to the bar here. And then we get to a point where it's not, and it's like it you have to tell people like tight is strong. I want you to, I want you to be uncomfortable in that bottom position as long as it's safe.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, my my note was actually gonna be what you just kind of referred to, Drew, is the like, so because we're doing both of these lifts in the phase, the front squat, front rack positioning is so relevant in like CrossFit in general. But once we get into the open, the amount of times we see a front squat, a thruster, we haven't seen as many shouldered overhead in recent years, but like certainly irrelevant movement have gone heavy overhead. Getting athletes to understand the hand position and the grip is super important. And when we take lots of times, you get affiliate athletes who are more than happy to front squat out of a rack because you can skirt around a little bit of mobility by just presetting in that sort of fingertip type grip, right? And it doesn't work super well when we try to translate that over to a clean. You're not going to advocate an athlete starts with a hook grip and a really tight back position. They extend, they jump, and then they bring the elbows around, and then you're saying, like, hey, I oh, I want you to try to catch the bar between your collarbones and your index and middle finger, right? Like that's not a not a cue you would give an athlete. Instead, it's like, hey, like we need to, we need to like we want that high elbow position, but also like a stronger catch position is going to be a little bit fuller of a grip. I've personally relaxed my stance a little bit on this, mostly just because for for me, I interact almost exclusively with the affiliate level athletes. And you can only, you know, someone who has spent 10, 15, 20 years sitting at a desk is not going to undo their thoracic spine and pour, you know, external shoulder rotation over the course of a of a class, but we can try to emphasize those positions. And like everybody here knows that like the best mobility is going through like the range of motion, you know, weight is weightlifting effectively, right? It's like it's not we can do plenty of front rack distractions and mobilizations and stuff like that and thoracic spine extension, and that is absolutely has a place at the kind of front end of the class to try to get athletes in the best position they are capable of. But from there, it's trying to communicate kind of the common themes that apply to you know 95% of people. It's like, hey, I want a hook grip. I want you to receive the bar with the fullest grip you can. Fingertip grip is reserved for like your mobility is really, really tough. And honestly, those athletes, like you don't see too many athletes whose mobility is extraordinarily poor, but they are like wildly strong in the clean, for example, right? It's like maybe they can get away with it and especially the squat clean. But when you exactly, but when you add the dynamic element and the skill portion of the squat clean, like a lot of that falls apart. So what you said, Drew, the active, you know, a muscle clean does an excellent job of training that kind of continuous active pull. And it also helps athletes get comfortable, kind of I, you know, we tell Mark gives a great or gave a great cue. You you meet the bar, you don't beat the bar, right? It's like we want to pull the bar to the height that you are going to receive it. Lots of athletes, myself included, are are more than happy to dive under that thing and let it let it bury us and and you know, inevitably gets dumped forward at a heavy enough weight. So trying to connect the dots between that pull, the turnover, and then getting it onto the shoulders in as similar of a position as you could as if it was coming right out of the rack.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, and I like tricking people, not because it's fun, or maybe like 10% because it's fun, but I like tricking people because you can remove that mental block of like one of the ones with the the people saying they can't get into a certain position in the split jerk is like, all right, barbell in the front rack, bottom of a lunge with your knee on the ground, stand up a little bit, press the bar overhead, F off. Take swear counter, take that. With the clean, I can't get into this position. You just did a muscle clean, and that looks pretty good, that front rack. For sure. Yeah. That looks pretty good right there. So it's like, okay, pause. Can we work on this? And the overcueing of that front rack position is really what we're after. Like, I want you to try to get to that point because the further the bar comes down into your hand, whether your thumb is wrapped around it or not, the more tacked down that position is, the more leverage you have to get yourself into external rotation. Yeah. Like at the affiliate level, overcueing can be really helpful because you can ask someone to go do that and then their thumb slips off and they're frustrated and you're like, no, no, no, pause for a second, right? Like that's a pretty good position you're in right now. It doesn't need to be perfect. I'm just not looking for your hands because you heaved and your hands were out wide and now your fingers are near your chin. Like, that's not a good position. That's not a good position at all. Like your upper back is is gonna cave because it doesn't have anything to push or pull against.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and I think with the when you when you get a day where it's just a front squat lift, um, I can't remember how many there are. There's at least first ones in, yeah, first ones in week three, some heavy fives, threes, and ones, like it's a really good time to emphasize like that's one thing that we'll talk about in a class. Maybe it's like the one thing we're gonna focus on is the the upper back position and how you were able to set your upper back actually starts with like your grip on the bar, and then how you kind of like set yourself underneath it before you even stand up out of the rack. Um, lots of folks tend like to because it's a comfort thing, maybe it's a mobility thing. They need they bring their hands in. The further in you bring your hands, the easier it is for that that kind of turtle shell position to to like show itself. So getting trying to work with athletes to find almost like the maximum width that their mobility allows, where we can still keep the elbows relatively high, we can still keep a relatively full grip on the bar, and then all of a sudden my upper back position uh it doesn't become the limiting factor as much as you know, maybe it's hips, maybe it's maybe it's just strength. That'd be pretty cool if it was just a strength that was a limiting factor, but but for most it's a mobility thing.
SPEAKER_05:If you're listening to this and you're an athlete that follows Misfit affiliate, congratulations, you're a hard o. We love it that you're listening to this podcast. I know there's a few Misfit Jim Portland folks. Well, so this this this podcast gets the most listens because the audience, the potential audience is the most broad.
SPEAKER_04:We had a few folks in the survey ask saying end of your survey, they were like, Oh, keep doing the affiliate podcast. So um cool, very cool. There's folks who who like listening, they like I mean, mostly just they want to know what's going on, but hopefully they take some nuggets out of there too.
SPEAKER_05:I still believe this is one aggressive belief that I've held on to for a lot longer than other ones, that the front squat is a skill movement, that you deadlift and you back squat and you do all of these movements and you do the greatest strength accessory program ever created in CrossFit in your Metcons. If you can get into really good positions in the front squat, you can pretend you're one of the strong people in class. And it's cool. Coming from someone who started CrossFit, like, you know, maybe 20, 30 pounds lighter than most of the people I was lifting with, just obsessed over, like, wow, well, that guy can front squat a lot. Look at the way he's doing that. Now, the sad thing is front squat holds is probably the like extra credit I would give over a competitor extra.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Be like, get get there early and see if you can like set a 10-minute clock and see if you if you can accumulate five minutes of front squat holds. Now, front squat hold means front squat hold, not like I'm in this crumpled up, terrible, terrifying position. So you might need I just have a barbell near me. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So so holding shitty positions is gonna do the thing that Hunter talked about in the reverse, in the negative connotation, right? Like if you want to get really bad at movements, perform them regularly in the wrong way. And you're, you know, you're like from a neurological standpoint, you're just your body's gonna want to move that way, especially under fatigue. So, like if you need to raise your heels, if you need a box to to sort of cue the position and then come up, whatever, but I that's that's one of those things. Or maybe you just don't start with the bar in the front rack and you get squat holds in a really good position and that at least gets you loose for classes.
SPEAKER_04:It's a skill-based movement. Do you so I I don't disagree. I think of it more as mobility. How do you are you using that interchangeably with skill, or are you saying like because when I when I hear skill, I think of a level of like athleticism, and like everybody here knows like just because you're a crossfitter doesn't mean you're an athlete, you know, sure to a certain extent.
SPEAKER_05:Mobility wouldn't be enough because there's we have our hypermobile and we have our not so strong individuals, so there's a level of stability there, and you can still watch someone that could be in the right positions, and there's just something weird mechanically about the way that their hips and knees and torso moves throughout a front squat. Like we get the bounce and the Ass comes up and then they're in this really weird position. So they can get into that position. So I feel like skill is a catch-all for mobility, stability, movement pattern, something like that. But yes, it's definitely like very much mobility based. But like obviously, we we know a ton of hyper mobile people that move in a very weird way because the stability is just not really there, which is why it would be like please go back squat, make sure your front squat stays good. And then once those two come together, they'll be good.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. And that's part of the reason that we just came out of uh the Texas method, the back squat phase, and now we're going into a clean and a front squat.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, because it's like yeah, you front squat and then you don't front squat, you do the back squat, you get some real power put into it, and then you are front squatting again, and that where that sticking point was, you just stand right up through it, and you're like, what? I don't, I don't really know how that happened. And we've I've run a lot of experiments on front squat stuff, and it just does not, when you do the, you know, say you did Texas method front squat, um, unless you're great at back squatting, it doesn't really have the same benefit in it because there's such a fight to hold position that using like that leg strength that you can by slapping a barbell on your spine is just not necessarily the same thing. All right. Um, so we have the heavy day rotation on in-between weeks. This is very similar to other phases. I don't know that I would say that this is crossfit biased because there are things like back squat in there. I don't think I need to tell you guys after what I just said why we would back still throw a back squat in there, but we've got deadlift, we've got some Olympic lifting that's in there. And essentially, we are just making sure that we are continuing to express power and movement efficiency in those other ones. I don't know that there's really a whole lot to to kind of talk through with that stuff. I always like to mention it just because there's there's often new affiliates listening to this podcast.
SPEAKER_04:No, I think the only like thing maybe just kind of peek inside the the programmer's mind is like, so as a, you know, I'm generally pretty focused on the Monday through Friday. Saturday for you know, everybody who follows knows, but if you're if you don't, Saturday is typically like a partner workout. And just because most affiliates around the world have a much a far a much more reduced schedule on Saturdays, so we're really primarily focused on the Monday through Friday days. The lifts, like, so if we're gonna front squat and or squat clean throughout the week, we have to be mindful of one overall squatting volume to pulling from the floor volume, and that doesn't limit us, but it it provides some constraints as far as what other movements that we're going to plug in, which is why you know you alluded to the back squat, and it's like we're we're talking we we heavy back squat once kind of toward the end of the toward the end of the the phase, whereas, you know, in week two, you're gonna see the overhead squat. So something that's arguably less of a squat and more of like an upper body lift. But from the programmer perspective, like when we set a movement as the focus, that again kind of constrains us as far as, you know, well, if I front heavy squat cleaner, front squat on Monday, I'm less, I'm pretty unlikely to put athletes in a front rack on Tuesday, make them squat on Tuesday. And and that's kind of how like the programming kind of helps to build itself a little bit. So the heavy day rotation in a lot of ways is like we still want to get a heavy stimulus if it's not found in a conditioning piece at some other point during the week. We'll make sure it gets plugged into like the lifting only day that you see in the week.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. I think I think if I were to close that out, like the squat clean and the front squat, it's like if you're going into week one and you have a focus for your affiliate, for your members, make sure that stays consistent throughout the weeks. Like don't let that intention get lost anywhere and you know, kind of bring that same excitement or that same intention every single time so that they get consistency with what you're looking for throughout those seven weeks. And I think you can see a lot more progress that way just by keeping those reminders kind of at the forefront of the class.
SPEAKER_05:And that would be more of a challenge too, depending on the size of your staff and the level of give a shit across the board. Yeah. So we do, I'll do a sales call with an affiliate, and it's like I coach most of the classes. And in that instance, what you're saying is very controllable by an affiliate owner, affiliate manager, a head coach, that sort of situation. But if you do have an extensive staff, which I have some calls and they're like, I have 11 coaches, like, oh my God. And making sure that, you know, in your coaches' meetings, all of that stuff, that people, your coaches know that, like, hey, we can we can get a lot more buy-in when there's a narrative and you're excited at 5 a.m. because it's squat cleaning, that sort of thing. So so putting that out there to the whole staff, I think is super important. All right. So I want to take the opportunity to talk about things like education, how much we care if a coach is actually crossfitting and doing the movements, things of that nature related to gymnastics, because normally it's like, hey, we're doing bar pull, Hunter, let's talk through, you know, toes to bar and you know, how does that translate hollow arch and all of this stuff in this phase? Hunter, do you remember what what did what did Dave Castro say? Our our affiliate programming was for big boys, like or something like that, where it's like you you need to be a good coach.
SPEAKER_04:Crossfit for big boys, yeah. Uh you need to be a good coach.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. And when you are a really good coach and you get this kind of variety over the course of seven weeks, it is exciting because you get to pull out however many different bags of tricks. If you are new to the game or your givea shit level is lower, not so fun, right? Like I gotta research, I don't know, like if we looked at the movement counter, 10 plus different gymnastics movements that require, you know, if if if we're doing Metcon only in class, a lot of times the higher skill movement is what the skill breakout session is gonna be based on. You gotta be ready to to give people that and have it not just be like, okay, everyone do toast to bar, I'm gonna walk down the line and be like, that looks good. Stop swinging. Like, you know, like giving that generic advice. So I don't necessarily want you guys to explain how you coach a particular movement. I'm hoping for some advice for coaches on like, I want to learn, I want to know more about this stuff. How do I get started? Or I'm halfway there, how do I keep going, etc.?
SPEAKER_04:Um, I I would say that, well, I'm not a I'm not a gymnastic expert. Here's here's what I'll say. This kind of answers your question. It kind of doesn't. When I when I look at a workout and let's say, man, let's see if I can find one real quick.
SPEAKER_05:Hunter knows more about CrossFit gymnastics than most coaches. I'll throw that out there.
SPEAKER_04:But so week week three, day one, 16-minute AMRAP, four bar muscle ups, 12 wall balls, 16 slash 14 calorie C2 machine, or a 200-meter run. That's gonna fucking be terrible. Gonna be sick that day. 40 fucking power cleans the next day, too. This is that's poor premiere. I'm just kidding. Um so I look at that workout and we say, like, okay, so bar muscle up is is clearly the movement in that in that workout. We do, we got running in machines, great. We do that in the warm-up, wall balls, we'll do some air squats, we'll do a little quarter extremity breakout on the wall ball, but for the most part, we're gonna prioritize the bar muscle up. How many people in my class in a given class are going to do bar muscle ups? More than likely, you affiliate coach are gonna say it's probably well under half, right? If you get half of your class doing bar muscle ups, 25%, that's pretty good, right? And it might, and there might be an instance where it's actually zero. And I've had I'll I'll coach a 5 p.m. class where it's like half of them are doing bar muscle ups or some version of it. And then the 6 30 p.m. class, it's like, we're not, I'm not even worried about someone getting over the bar. It's like we're doing ring rose, jumping pull-ups or something similar. So the question then becomes how can I warm up a group of 10 to 20 people in such a way that like communicates, well, what are the common themes of this movement that apply to everybody, regardless of where we're going to end up on this journey? And by end up, I mean, are you going to end at bar muscle ups? Are you gonna end up linking bar muscle ups? Are you gonna end up with bar muscle up singles? Are we gonna end up at kipping pull-ups, or are we gonna end up at a burpee pull-up or maybe a jumping bar muscle up or something like that? And then it's like, okay, well, hollow and arch, super common one that applies to it. That's that's essentially a gymnastics universal, right? We can talk to that. We can come up with a drill or two in which we're asking athletes to hold these hollow and arch positions on the pull-up bar on the ground or whatever, and we get the entire class working on this same positioning. And even your bar muscle uppers, I guarantee, are not doing these things perfectly. So they're gonna benefit from that. We go over to the pull-up bar. It's like, well, we can get everybody hanging. And what tools now do I have when 100% of my class is hanging from the bar that about 100% of them can do? Do we can do scat pull-ups, we can do a hollow body hold, we could do like a borderline L sit hold. Again, all of these things are contributing to like the overall one, we're like continuing to warm people up for the workout just from like a class like flow perspective. And then two, we're we're just reinforcing like that theme that we want, like, hey guys, this like whether you're doing bar muscle ups or you're doing like jumping bar muscle ups, we need to understand that keeping your rib cage and your belly button close together in this hollow body position and an active shoulder, which is a cornerstone of functional movement and also gymnastics in general, like this is relevant for all of us. And we continue to build a class plan that tries to incorporate as many like common themes as possible for everybody. And then towards the end, it's where we break off and say, okay, if you're gonna do kipping pull-ups, and you know, maybe even the whole class, it's like, okay, well, most of my class can do kipping pull-ups, and maybe they can't do bar muscle-ups, but everybody, if you can do a bar muscle up, you can do a kipping pull-up. But the reverse is not necessarily true. So we can work on some kipping pull-ups. Maybe we do a two or three minute em of some kipping pull-ups and we can observe the hollow and arch position in everybody, and then we can start to break off and say, like, you know, if you're doing bar muscle ups, let's warm those up. Maybe you even take out the whole group through like how to jump into the first rep, which is a common thing that we'll do, kind of, you know, it's like a borderline glide kip sort of thing. Um, and even like your non-bar muscle uppers can do that, and there's a skill acquisition element to that. So the key, the key on these gymnastics days is to try to find the maximum number of things that apply to all of your athletes and that reinforce like the commonality of the gymnastics movement that you're teaching. And it it's like also like just most gymnastics movements in general, especially upper body ones.
SPEAKER_05:So if I am a novice coach with a high level of give a shit, and I spend an hour the night before figuring out the perfect bar muscle up technique, I show up to 6 30 p.m. class and no one's doing bar muscle ups. There's an instance there where I've tried to educate myself and haven't thought through a high skill movement in the setting of an affiliate class, right? Sure.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I mean, I think that like, you know, that is that scenario realistic because that would imply that the coach didn't assume that 100% of their class was doing bar muscle ups, right? Instead of looking at like a the typical group at XPM class is like, well, these guys are actually not bar muscle uppers. So what drills do I have? Like the jumping bar muscle up drill is is excellent. You know, setting a box up underneath pull-up bars to get people, you can get them doing kind of a kipping motion. We can get the concept of using the lower half followed by the upper half. Okay, here, here, hey guys, here's a teaching point, core to extremity. What does that mean in CrossFit? Da-da-da-da-da. Let's try to like reinforce that. And fuck, even like I could do bar muscle ups, like I jumping bar muscle ups are are tough and they're an excellent warm-up movement for me ahead of that workout. So trying to like at that point, we're thinking, like, well, what are what are drills that you know, what sort of drills are relevant to the bar muscle up? And then how can I, how are they scalable for everybody else? And I think at that point it's you know, it's to the YouTube rabbit hole, it's the Dave Durant. Is he is he power monkey?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Power monkey guy. There's a whole bunch of old K Star and Fuck, what's his name? No, Carl Paoli and Pamela too. P Pamela Gagnan, Carl Paoli videos on YouTube that whole bunch of those that talk about, and the the K-Star ones are really relevant for like positioning and whatnot. So um that's probably the yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, uh I'd I'd follow up right on that. I think like the question I like to ask myself before every class is how would I approach a movement if I had a brand new person? And how would I approach the same movement if I had someone who's high level and elite? Um, and I try to think of every layer of that movement between. So, like you said, like I have the the novice coach who has a a huge give a shit factor and he wants to get to that extreme, like high-end movement. Well, like, okay, what happens if you have a beginner walk in a class? How are you gonna approach it with them? So just kind of having both sides of the spectrum with every movement, just like you know, Hunter kind of hit right there the nail on the head for me as well. You know, you can think of movements as getting upside down as well. You know, you have people who have a fear of getting into a handstand hold. How are you gonna approach that versus how are you gonna warm somebody up who's actually getting ready for handstand walking? So yeah, I'm uh I'm in agreement there.
SPEAKER_05:For me, my mind always goes to the commonality between the movements and really understanding, like we do the, you know, we Hunter and I three times a year have the 30 to 45 minute hollow arch conversation. Because if you understand that, you understand almost all of it. Like when I think of that coach, I think of the midwit meme, and it's like hollow arch is on this side with the Neanderthal, holl hollow arch is on this side with the genius, and then the confused novice, high give a shit level is like glide kip, knee to bar, extend. Did you use your lats? Did you kip your muscle up dip? Like that kind of thing. And it extends out in so many different places. You know, the the handstand push-up thing for me, the way that it clicked for me, like I'll back up a little bit. Understanding movement on a personal level helps for sure. And I know that there are a ton of good coaches out there that can't do whatever deficit, strict handstand push-ups and sets of muscle ups and things of that nature. But immersing yourself into that world in some way physically, I think is incredibly helpful in terms of how you understand the movement and watching people that are good at handstand push-ups just stay in this beautifully stacked position all of the time in every variation. It's like, like, why is that person dragging the back of their head on the wall and then trying to hit their chest with their nose at the front? Like, I'm not sure exactly what's happening there. It's like a kipping strict kind of situation, upside down bench press. But like, once you understand the basis for the movement, you can start to make these connections and you can start to understand more in more general terms about how humans move their bodies through space. Like most of our kipping handstand push-up cues come from telling people to go grab a barbell and then let's talk about the insane things that you do to quarter extremity yourself when you're upside down, and then we'll do it with a barbell and see how well you generate power in that position. So that piece of understanding the movement, understanding how they go together, and then watching people move. That's the part that drives me crazy from a coach's standpoint that will remind you of what we talk about for competitive athletes. You have a mountain of data that is delivered to you every single day when you work out. And then you forget you did that workout, you forget what your pace was, you forget how you broke it up, not just gone from your head. As a coach, oh my goodness, like the amount of human movement you see, you see every variation possible of a toe to bar, right? Like the person that's George, George of the Jungle and their feet are back behind the back wall, and then every part of their body is now somehow curled up under in this position here. You got the scoopers, you get the people in these great positions, but they're piking. You see all of these things happen in real time. You see the things that are efficient because in a 20-minute AMRAP, they just keep looking the same. Every time they jump up to the bar, it's like, oh my goodness. Then you see the people who rely more on being powerful and the way that they move falls apart over the course of the workout. So you got to teach them how to be efficient. But just watching people move in your gym when you're coaching class can teach you everything that you need to know about movement, especially related to gymnastics, but obviously as you extend out into other things. So if I see a coach that's like a little bit too much, like three minutes left, you can do it. And like with the music a little bit too much and not kind of in it, you're not going to get that education on a daily basis from class to class. All right. Cardio days. So with the open, there is a lot of, and this is across the board, what I refer to as sports-specific movement. Obviously, the CrossFit open, those movements are, you know, fundamental and what is the word I'm looking for, functional and part of a good program, anyways. So it depends on kind of what hat you're wearing when you're thinking about this. But when you guys are thinking about coaching athletes in the open, how much of it is like, do you have to like know the person and know, like, hey, stop talking to me about strategy because I literally don't care, versus like this person's world's gonna crumble if they come in 10,000th place? And the same with things like movement efficiency. Like, what place does that sort of stuff have in an affiliate, especially during open season?
SPEAKER_02:Man, I feel like I could talk about the stimulus of the workout, and members are just like Yeah. It doesn't mean a thing. There are it depends on how curious they are, right? For me, it's you're gonna get buy-in from them if they're if there's a curiosity factor there. And then those are the ones that's like, all right, let's actually talk pacing. Let's let's break this down and take that into just an affiliate class outside of the open and see how it goes. Um, so I'll let Hunter, you can Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, like on a broad level, I don't I don't know that there are that many affiliate athletes who are like looking at this workout and like, okay, I'm gonna crunch some numbers here. We're gonna get, you know, this thruster is gonna take 1.5 seconds per rep. I'm gonna do, you know, so I'm gonna get looking for nine rounds. Rich Froning did eight. I feel like my nine round pace is good. Like, here we go. You know, so I don't think there's as much of that. I think like it in almost a similar way that we talked about the gymnastics. It's like, what are the common themes of this workout? Like, hey, it's 20 minutes long. If you do your first round in two minutes, congratulations, you are on pace to set the world record. And with respect, you are in no danger of setting the world record. So stop that. So So it might be a like, hey, let's do a practice round and get a feel for what, you know, the correct pace for use feels like. But I think it's again, it's sort of like the gymnastics in that like, let's go super high level, broad guidance that doesn't set you up for failure. You've more than likely done a workout with maybe the identical movements and weights before, just in some other combination, or a workout that at the very least it's going to feel very similar to. So trying to connect, you know, a past experience to what you're about to experience, and then the high-level bullet points of like, you know, this is a longer workout. So don't go fast to begin. Like, this is a short workout. You should go really fast and try to hold on. Like we're talking super broad. That weeds out, you know, it's like a whiteboard brief. Give like 75-80% of scaling options here. The other 20% are going to be done at the personal level. Give the high-level bullet points of the workout and then talk to the athletes individually about like, hey, yeah, I know you actually like really want to perform your best. Let's talk about like, you know, what the best strategy is for you based on your goals, strengths, weaknesses, and like how to leverage, how to, you know, how to get the best score in this workout. So um much certain certainly not presenting like an entire group of affiliate athletes with like the nitty-gritty of like, here's how you should approach this. You know, it's it's a broad overview. And then the individuals who want the nuance, more than happy to help them out with that. Sure.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I think I'm, I don't know, it's like I want to like put propaganda out there, or I'm like too entrenched in the like, my job is to get people to have better scores in the open. So my devil's advocate for the idea of movement efficiency and thinking about the way that you're executing a workout is a conversation Paige and I had recently, and then one that we've joked about a bunch hunter is like when we did that workout with the row double under deadlifts at our affiliate, like we just saw, I mean, I want heart rate monitors would have been awesome. Cause it's like at the end of the day, that's 20 minutes, probably 16 minutes in zone five. Like something good's happening there on a physiological level. Your score sucks, and that's a bit of a bummer. Yeah. But the other side of it is the person who like wants to look a little bit different and perform a little bit different that doesn't take that advice, they only do 40 deadlifts and 175 double unders in that workout. And one of the reasons we talk about CrossFit being the greatest strength accessory program ever is because in that workout, you should be getting, you know, 80, 90, 100 deadlifts somewhere in that range. And what that does to your body from a like muscular standpoint and what that does, you know, in terms of strength to body weight ratio over a given period of time. So you could continue to go into the gym and just smash your head through a wall and never really get the like muscular benefit that you could be getting if you slowed down a little bit and got 60 pull-ups in a workout instead of 32.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. So so to maybe take try to take your approach, then maybe it's talking to the athletes about like, hey, we've spent an entire year training. We are now testing. So there's a conversation to be had about what the differences are there. And like you have developed a lot of fitness over the last year. The the goal with the open is to express that in the most the broadest, most efficient way possible, right? And you know, in that example, the most efficient way to express your fitness is not to row at a 140, right? It's like, like, well, what about how about we challenge ourselves to row at like a two-minute pace? You know, how how difficult is it for an athlete who who like pins themselves mentally, be like, I never want to see two zero zero on the monitor. If you're, you know, maybe a a male athlete, a fitter male athlete. And it's like, yeah, I'm I'm telling you to do it, man. Here's the math, here's how it works out. Trust the data here, trust me. And like, if you want to see if your fitness has like, you know, the training that we've done over the last year has really moved the needle on you, then like this is the way to see that. So I think maybe that's the that's the route of the conversation you might have. Because the tough part is, is like, well, you know, in a way, you're kind of making an assumption that like you've never, when you talk movement efficiency, it's like, like, I've seen this athlete move every single day for the last year. Like, I it doesn't fucking matter whether I tell them to squat with their feet.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, over the course of seven weeks, you know what I mean? It's like, like, can we nudge people that way during this period of time? For sure. Like, can we be can we obsess just one day over the wall ball? And like, what do you do and jump? Can you stop jumping? Like, do you jump when you back squat? Please stop. And I understand, I'm sorry, Paige. I don't I didn't mean to make short comments or anything like that.
SPEAKER_02:I don't care.
SPEAKER_05:The like you jump when you back squat, Paige.
SPEAKER_02:Explosive.
SPEAKER_05:Um, I just and and again, it is a little bit of propaganda because of my world, because of my background and where I come from. But at the same time, I see the benefit in it. I think what I struggle with because I haven't coached a ton of hours in the last six or seven years at the affiliate level is the packaging, right? It's the same message. How am I delivering this message? Because I'm giving some heartfelt speech about your open standing to someone that's not even signed up for the open, then I'm not necessarily that that sales pitch isn't as good as wow, we could actually get you some more reps and we could get you fitter and we could blah, blah, blah. So that could be.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, I think the if if we're talking then again from that perspective, the sales pitch is more like, hey, like if you pay a lot of money to join this CrossFit gym, right? And like if I pay for something, I'm hoping to receive the product, right? Or receive the service. And if I don't get that, I'm not happy about it. And I want to ask why I'm not. But like for me, someone comes to me and says that, and it's like, well, we've got some of the best coaches on the planet here. Like, and you're saying you're not getting fitter, you're not getting anything out of the class. Like, is it is it you, or is are we really actually not delivering on something for you? When it comes to the open, it's like, hey, you want to actually be able to say that you've made objective progress in something. I had the conversation with someone new who doesn't um a new member, new CrossFitter, brand new, doesn't fully understand the concept of like observable, measurable, and repeatable. And it's like, hey, well, how how do you know you actually got better? And it's just like, well, I kind of feel it. It's like like, I don't I don't want to get political here, but like facts don't care about your feelings, you know. It's like I I love that it was said to you specifically. That it was, too. It was go, it was golden. Well, the best part about it was is the next day was was like one of our last five by five back squat days. And I was like, hey, did you get stronger? She's like, Yeah. It's like, how do you know? Because last week I did 150 and this week I did 155, and I was like, fuck, like it's work. Yeah. So the in the it's the same thing in the open. And the the open can be tricky because you, you know, maybe one out of the three workouts you repeat, but that's the incentive to do it every year, right? It's like the more data points you have, the more relevant your actual information is. And again, if you're somebody who cares about like like what the purpose of CrossFit is and why it is the best strength and conditioning program for the general population in the history of the world, it's like, well, because we have objective definitions and facts, and you can actually, I can tell you that you got fitter because of this empirical data. It's not a feeling, it's not my my heart rate was in the orange zone for like six and a half minutes in class. So, like, I'm a fucking war hero. It's like, no, last year in the open, you were this place. This year in the open, you got here. Or it's like, you know, two years ago when we did this workout, you got this score. They repeated it. This year, you got this score. And it's like, there's the objective information that says what we've been doing has been working. That's the the the sales pitch for me at the affiliate, is is to the athlete. It's like, this is why CrossFit is what CrossFit is.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. All right. A few program highlights here. I just had to bring this up because I saw it and I was like, okay, day one of Mad Jack is Cindy. Welcome, bitch. You know how if you know how to do Cindy, Cindy's tough. Cindy is the most beautiful illustration of increasing RPE over the course of a workout, right? Because like there's the element of the push-up, and I get that part, but that's not really what I mean. Do you want to start your squats and your pull-ups and drop down and get back up as quickly as you did at the beginning? The answer is probably not. But there's just like, I just remember when I was younger and a little bit smaller, that idea of staying under that emom for as long as possible. And the pain of that, more mentally, honestly, than anything, when you get into the like 12-ish round range, somewhere around there, it's just like, yeah, I'm over halfway, but like, holy crap, like it's really starting to fall apart. The push-ups are now a problem, like that kind of thing. So I just, Cindy is if you're an OG or if you execute properly, honestly, for anyone, it's just such a good workout. And I love those ones where it's like a one, a one minute round, a 50-second round, that kind of thing isn't that crazy fresh. So, like, then what is that? 22 more to go. Yeah, what does that like turn into? That sort of thing. So that being the first day is great. Um, if you know what a a cube test is, that is four minutes on, four minutes off for four rounds. At the affiliate level, there are cube tests in disguise somewhat regularly. So there is a, I think it's what is it, four rounds of 75 cals and then one-to-one rest. Like, okay, listen, did you that sounds like something to me, but it's so cool because the stimulus is like you gotta go a little bit harder than you think you want to because you do get that full recovery. And once again, just hurts a little bit more every round to hold that pace.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And for me personally, that third round is just real special. Yeah. Third round stuff.
SPEAKER_04:Cindy, Cindy kicks off the first Metcon Monday of the of the phase. I don't know if we were gonna get there, but every every Monday is like I don't want to say open prep, but it it's open prep. It's like not open prep. Hey, yeah, hey, like I hope you enjoyed your weekend and I'm gonna punch you in the face with respect.
SPEAKER_05:Because it's Cindy and then it's what a bunch of burpees and heavy front squats the next week.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, burpees and increasing weight front squats. It should be pretty easy. It's a couple of thrusties in there somewhere, but yeah, every Monday's got just a little bit of extra kick to it to welcome you to the new week.
SPEAKER_05:So we do Cindy, we do a not cube test in quotes, and then you get to basically max your squat clean. Cool format, really working through some good positions, really good class to coach, that sort of thing, but just you know, an old school kind of body weight burner, hard rowing, heavy squat cleans. Like I just think that's a that's a hell of a start. That's a hell of a three-day start to that phase.
SPEAKER_04:I think that whole week's pretty that look whole week looks pretty fun. Yeah. Yeah. Gymnastics heavy triplet on Thursday.
SPEAKER_05:Yep. And you could even you could let it ride. Like I know it's a whole three on one off situation, but you're only lifting the day before. So why not let it ride?
SPEAKER_04:Getting old by Thursday. I'm just so fucked up. I just do the just try. I just don't, I just don't, it's just hard for me to get up and work out on the weekend if I'm not gonna take the class. Like 'cause you rode five on two off for quite a while, right? Yeah. It's I still like do it. It's become like like four and a half on, two and a half off. A lot of times one of those days has to be like zone two or I don't know, paint the bathroom or some shit.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Um, we have Hunter can speak to this a little bit more than me, but we've got some customer feedback on like the amount of straight up monostructural conditioning workouts. Now, if there are an extra 100 people listening to this because you go to the gym, I'm gonna need you to go earmuffs right now. But there are very easy ways for programmers to turn a monostructural conditioning piece into a couplet or triplet and have the bulk of the effort and time be monostructural conditioning. But I will say mentally, for me, I can put myself in the other shoes. We did a one of my favorite ones, we did this terrible mixed machine workout. Actually, did it with Hunter in Open Gym, where just every once in a while you just got off the machine and went and climbed the rope once and you look forward to it, you know, maybe you're walking that far away as well.
SPEAKER_03:Isn't that bad?
SPEAKER_05:Exactly. Yeah. So workouts like that to like devil's advocate, me saying that it's a trick, when I'm in the athlete's shoes, I enjoy those mentally a lot more. And I actually push harder and I think I get a better stimulus in those workouts. Because, man, true monostructural is a mind fuck, um, especially in an affiliate setting where you're usually dialed up a little bit more than you would be, you know, hanging out by yourself.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. And and to be clear, some of the the feedback, this is like internal from our gym. And I'm always like feedback, so it's a it's a fickle bitch because it's like I get in the same survey, for example, get I wish that we did fewer lifting only days. I don't feel like I get anything when I come to the gym and I only lift. And then like four comments later, it's like, I wish we did more structured weightlifting with percentages. We used to do that more. Can we do it again more? So if I'm getting both ends of the spectrum, I'm just going to assume they zero out and we're doing a really good job. But to the point of the cardio days when it's like monostructural, whether it's a single modality, maybe it's two machines or something, but it's it's repeats, they're long, it's like it's for lack of a better term, it's not fun. And the like on the one hand, it's like, okay, you own a business, you or you know, you're subscribed to the program and you are pro you you are providing this to your members. You need to be able to talk to like why we're doing this and what the value in it is. My job, my role is to like, let's make sure that like the training pieces are fun. There is an element of like, you don't pay me for what you want, you pay me for what we think is best for you. Like a member, you know, you don't pay for membership at Misfit Gym Portland to do whatever you want. You pay for the service that is provided and the assumption that what we are providing has a level of experience and expertise behind it and there's a reason for it. Balancing the fun aspect and the like, here's why we do, you know, it's it needs to be fun, but it's also like, yeah, but my job is to also make you fit. That's literally what you come here for. You're not always going to like the method by which we do it. That being said, we can always, there's always ways to improve that. Like you said, it's like, is there a difference between 20 minutes on a machine and 20 minutes on a machine, but every two minutes you get to hop off and do a rope climb? It's like at the affiliate level, no, there's not a there's probably not a difference from like a metabolic perspective, and that's a way more fun class. People are way more excited to do it, and we can do more of that for sure. The other side of the coin is as I'm like getting ready to coach 5 and 6 a.m. tomorrow for Mark, and it is bike sprint day, it's four bike sprints, and it's like it's like assault bike C2, assault bike C2. It's I think it's gonna be one of the worst bike workouts that we've had in a long time, but we'll see. And I've already thought to myself, like, what how do I communicate this effectively to athletes? And and it's it's kind of what I said at the beginning. It's like, this is actually what you pay for. Any Tom Dick or Harry can put together three movements in a triplet and attach a 20-minute clock to it and be like, CrossFit, and people are gonna like it because it was a sweat, whether or not it benefit them, like it depends on where it was placed in the broader program. But it's like, you know, it's a lot easier to write just like a couplet or a triplet and just throw random shit together than it is to occasionally say, like, hey, we're gonna sprint as hard as we can. The reason for it is is like, again, this is the stuff that you pay for. You would never in a million years wake up and say to yourself, you know what I haven't done in a while? Absolutely fucking buried myself with three by 400 meter run with like 10 minutes of rest in between because I hate myself. It's like you would never do that. You would never think that that was a good workout. You would never think to do it. And if you did manage to think it was a good workout and think you should do it, the odds that you actually go and execute are basically zero. And even if you got to that point, the odds that you executed as hard as you could compared to what you would have done if you were racing five or six other people in an affiliate class, it doesn't exist. So when you come in and you're like, okay, it's monostructural rowing intervals or it's bike sprint day, as a coach or an owner, I'm saying, like, hey, this is like, this is what people pay for. They don't like it, but like, you know, every once in a while we have to remind people that like this is actually what separates CrossFit from everything else out there. Because again, find me any other, find me an F5, an Orange Theory, a commercial gym, anywhere on the planet where you get someone who is voluntarily on their own just hammering themselves with machine intervals at maximal intensity like that. It doesn't, it doesn't fucking exist. And so, like putting the context of that into the broader program, I think is really important. And when it comes to like those cardio days, like I said, we can do all there's always ways to improve that and make it more engaging for athletes. The other side is the responsibility of the coach and owner to communicate like, hey, this is super relevant to your fitness. It's arguably like more effective than the 20-minute AMRAP that you did the other day. But, you know, we do constantly varied functional movements at you know, relatively high intensity. So we're gonna mix these things up. But like, this is what you pay for. You could you could go to a 20-minute casual workout at home or your home gym, you could do Cindy at home and half-ass it for 20 minutes. Like, this is what you come to a CrossFit gym for.
SPEAKER_05:After this podcast, I mean I have to put this on my schedule. After this podcast, I have cold tub and then three can echo bike sprints. Good first time I didn't echo bike sprints at elevation, I did 29 calories in the first one, and I was in real trouble. Yeah. Like I told I I told Paige, I might even said it on the podcast. I don't know if it was in a meeting or a podcast, but like the the sensation in my body was so weird and new that like I was kind of laughing because I didn't know what was happening to me. It felt so weird.
SPEAKER_04:Like sprint you did.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, because I always start at because I need the 30 seconds. I need the 30 seconds more than the 10. So when I start a new progression, I start at what I need more and then work down and then. And so yeah, on uh Christmas Eve, I did three by thirty seconds rest for 30. So every five minutes, dude, that was something, and it's back. And like the funny thing is, what's that?
SPEAKER_04:Nine twenty-nine cals, six calculations.
SPEAKER_05:I think my last I think I one of the issues with the Echo Bike is it doesn't reset calories during intervals. Yeah. So your rollover and your rest calories are in there. When it gives you your averages, it is average speed during just the working window, but it doesn't do that for you. I think my last one was like 20-ish, 20, 21, somewhere in that range. And then I had to correct to when I did the 20 seconds, I did 16, 16, 17, 21. I was like, okay, so I held I was I I like give myself a limiter until the end, that sort of thing. So it's coming back around, and I'm currently riding the Echo Bike three or four times a week. Um just hazing the shit out of myself. I've gotten so used to riding it that the only workouts that I dread are the power output ones. Yeah, same. Nasty. It's today. It's I don't know.
SPEAKER_02:After Hunter's rip right there, I'm like, I'm kind of motivated to go send it somewhere.
SPEAKER_04:That's what you pay for, Paige. Paying for you forgot you forgot about more bike sprints than anybody listening to this has ever done. So, you know.
SPEAKER_05:My goodness. All right. Uh, last but not least, we have the program changes during the open. Make sure again that you're in the telegram group. I will email you the changes. Make sure that everybody has those. They will be in the telegram group. Um, but if you have questions, a lot of times other people have the same questions, a lot easier for us to answer and give everybody the information in Telegram. So please join Telegram when it gets sent to you via email. I want to talk a little bit about the competitor extra before we do live chat. So um we have continued weekly open prep, basically an open simulation type workout. The people that have been doing those seem to be enjoying them, quote unquote enjoying them. So we'll keep that rolling. There is one open retest in there. It just sort of happened that we needed what was that workout? It's wall walk, box jump. What's the other? What's the third movement? Dumbbell smash. Open retest. Is it dumbbell snatch? Dumbbell snatch. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:That retest is in there. Those were some of the remaining movements. Um, and I just remember that being a good workout. Remember that being the kind of thing that teaches pacing on the the box jump over specifically. And then in February, specifically, I will not tell you whether this was on purpose or a mistake. There are six days a week of competitor extra. We left them all in there on purpose because this time of year, if someone is kind of locking in on a competitor extra, I think about it more from the like reps category that we have at Misfit Athletics, where if you need practice on something, you should get exposure to it. The big thing here, and this will be in the emails, it will be in the phase overview that I send out. Do not tell or let people do six days a week of the competitor extra. It should be two days, three days, four days. And then we are still expecting that if someone's taking it seriously that they're doing a zone one or zone two session and actually resting during the week. So that will be in notes and in different places, but just something that's a little bit different for you guys.
SPEAKER_04:So before we hit live chat, yeah. I just want to hit on the engine program as well, real quick.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Yep. So we have the the I'll tee that up for you, Hunter. The benefits basically, if you're new, if you're, you know, just starting to follow the program and you're thinking about it, you get daily warmups, you get workout notes and scaling, you get strength and skill notes, you get that competitor extra, which I often refer to as a retention tool. Keep the people that want to compete, open gym gang, and your classes, and then have them do that extra thing. And last but not least, Hunter, if you want to talk a little bit about the engine program, which is a free add-on for everybody.
SPEAKER_04:Yep. Yep. So, like broad overview, same, same concept. You get a warm-up, you get a workout, you get the feel, pacing, target scores, notes and scaling, all that sort of stuff. It's a three-day-a-week program that our one of our resident coaches writes, and we execute one of those training days on Sunday. Lots of, you know, lots of subscribers have mentioned the fact, like, hey, we're open seven days a week. What do we do for that seventh day? The competitor extra is always an option. I'd say, I'd say, like, just based on like, I don't know, I can't imagine that our gym is all that different from others in this regard, but like it's Sunday. I love members love like, I want to come in, I want a long grind of a sweat. I don't fucking care about a squat snatch or a burpee ring muscle up totabar. Like, let me grind for 20 or 30 minutes. And that's kind of what the engine program gets you, at least on that third day. For this phase, the Mad Jack phase, the day one focus is on jump rope variants. I I I would not be surprised that we see a single under. I'm just saying in the in the CrossFit open. Single under, double under, crossovers, your various, your various jump rope styles. So an excellent kind of day for folks to get comfortable with that leading into the open. Day two has a little bit more of a focus on anaerobic threshold on machines. So very much a monostructural machine day. I just went on a tirade about the benefits of that. This might be a program where you offer, you provide it to members. We basically plug it into our programming software and remind athletes like, hey, you want to get something extra done in open gym, you need a little more structure, you want some machine work, you want to improve your cardio pacing, that sort of stuff. The day two engine stuff is typically that across most phases, and this one's no exception. And then I kind of hit on the day three, which is a little bit more of kind of like say crossfit engine. So plenty of variants in the movements and stuff like that, but it's all relatively simple, low skill dumbbells, kettlebells, farmers carries, sandbag carries, that sort of thing, your your grunt work, all that, all that type of stuff. But one of our most popular classes at the gym for sure is that Sunday engine class where people can just come in and and get a good sweat on at the end of their weekend.
SPEAKER_05:Team Misfit.com. Click on sign up now. You get a two-week free trial at StreamFit, Sugar Wad, or Push Press, or you can email me coach at misfitathletics.com and I will send you two weeks for free so you can see what the PDF version looks like if you sign up on our website. Hunty, it's been a month and a half ish. Yeah. Not only since the people have heard from you, but also since you've been an affiliate owner. How you doing? What's going on? Did I tell you I lost uh an airpod in the toilet? No, I think the last malfunction you had was your laptop that I heard. Okay, man, fantastic.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Well, shortly after that. Did you have to call Roto Rooter to come get it out for you? Yeah, owner uh owner uh fucking rite of passage number 812 was goes in on Saturday to do very, very deep clean of the bathrooms, final bathroom. I'm listening in the podcast, I'm listening to the White House press briefing because this is the morning after uh the raid in Venezuela. I'm listening to it, I'm listening to it, I'm scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing. I've got that thick motherfucking rubber glove on. I feel the airpods start to like loosen out of my ear and I'm like, fuck. And I like reach under to catch it, but because that fucking glove is so goddamn thick and I have no dexterity, I like bounced it around a couple of times and then I tried to like swat it out of the way and it bounced off of the toilet paper holder and directly into the bottom of the toilet paper. Yeah, bank shot for sure. And I'm just like fucking looking down at that thing like god fucking damn it. So, and this was this was two two days after I had visited the Apple store to be told that it was either$900 to repair your MacBook for the coffee, that the tablespoon of coffee that you spilled on it, or you buy a new laptop. So we had a new laptop, go in, spend literally like six or eight hours deep cleaning bathrooms, and the the last the last bathroom was the the site of the casualty for my right airpod. That's so good. God damn it. Yeah, you know, I'd like to think that there is uh there's plenty of other good stuff going on. That's just the uh that's the one that stuck out in my in my mind immediately. But yeah. Now we got the uh the office is looking a little bit more like an office, been doing some like renovations, like actually doing some bathroom improvements and whatnot. So that's that's wrapping up. Kyle and I have taken the reins as far as maintaining cleanliness in the gym. So um I think really for the first month and a half, I've actually just become a tradesperson. I'm now an HVAC technician, electrician, painter. That's right. Uh yeah, so all of those things. And I it's you know, it's at the level that's just enough to be dangerous. It's like I flipped around.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, especially with AI now. AI and YouTube, like come on. Yeah. Like I'm I fixed a boiler the other day. I don't I don't know how, but I just asked a robot what was wrong with it and it told me. Yep. Yep. How about you, Paige? What's going on? What's going on in your life?
SPEAKER_02:I mean, I also all of us had some pretty big life changes in December. So I moved to New Jersey. I'm working at a new gym. It's called Great White Conditioning and Fitness. They de-affiliated de-affiliated earlier in December. So it's been fun. It's been awesome. Just kind of learning. I'm I'm also kind of learning more of like the the business side, you know, I guess you could say the sales side of and marketing of of owning an affiliate, but doing a lot more of the hustle of trying to, you know, see if new m people want to come in and check us out and see if they're a good fit for for the program and see if they like it, all that kind of stuff. So um learning a lot of like people skills in in my like current, I guess, life right now. So, but I feel like I have a pretty good foundation with that being an affiliate coach, having traveled all over for CrossFit, stuff like that. It's been pretty, it's a challenge, but it's been fun. And then, you know, with Hunter taking a step back from the competitive side has opened up more responsibility for me with Misfit on the hatchet pro, all that stuff. So that's been also a new exciting challenge. So again, a lot of a lot of new and challenging things, but in a really, really good way. I feel like it's just the right fit.
SPEAKER_05:That's cool. Yeah. Same. Um, I haven't really talked to people or posted on social media about like Colorado, because you know, you you work and parent do your stuff, and like, oops, I didn't tell everyone in the world about what I was doing. But I I'm pretty locked into my routine here. I joke about the uh severity of my my ADHD regularly on this podcast, but I need I need structure. I thrive in that kind of environment. It's just something you kind of learn as you get a little bit older. But I brought a curse here. There's no snow in the mountains. I was like, I need to get out there and get away from it.
SPEAKER_04:I got plenty of that shit over here.
SPEAKER_05:I actually do. It was funny. The first week I was here, it snowed three times in Grand Junction, and I was like, this is bullshit. The funny thing is it like wasn't cold when it was snowing and then it just was gone. Weather in the mountains can get a little, a little dicey and then all of a sudden be sunny. Like, if even on cold days, if I go for a walk with a hoodie on, normally I have to take it off because I get too warm. There's just no clouds and it's dry. So like you would think you got to get all like dressed up to go for a walk when it's 30 degrees out, and here it gets hot in the sun, which is just bizarre. But I'm hopping in that cold tub three, four times a week. I'm going to the Globo gym and doing my bodybuilding and getting in the sauna and staring at this stupid computer screen a lot. I am riding the Echo Bike three and a three and a half to four times a week, adding an RPM to each gear and each zone two session basically every time I do it. It's got a little beginner gains going on there. Finally desensitizing myself to that stupid machine. I try not to look at other people's scores. Especially, say, you know, five foot three, five foot four woman who's biking a lot faster than me. Not on power output work. So yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Challenge accepted. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:We got a snowboard. I haven't been yet. I have a funny and um very Drew story related to that. I was gonna go last Wednesday and I couldn't find my jacket or my snowpants. That is the most interesting I've heard in on literally. I blame the movers partially because of they moved as if they were on some kind of substance, and I'm pretty sure they were on said substance.
SPEAKER_02:Nice.
SPEAKER_05:I think that's I feel like that's just part of the job. That's just part of the job, yeah. Um, I think it might I don't know. We don't need to get into that. I haven't been yet. One of the the main reason I haven't been yet is because there's no snow. So there was one night where Aspen got a foot of snow and I was gonna go and I went to buy a lift ticket. It was$254. Um, and it's like they got like four lifts open and like 20% of their trails. And it's like I'm not drive, I'm not getting up at, you know, five driving for a couple hours to pay$254 to pay$70 for notching. Luckily, I can like obviously have the the ability to swap like a workday from weekend to weekday. So I could go on like a Wednesday and there wouldn't be very many people there, that kind of thing. But there is a local mountain here that's smaller that's I think like 45 minutes away that I'll start going to somewhat regularly, but there's basically no snow. My goal was to live in a place that didn't have snow, but I could drive to snow very quickly, and that's not happening so far. So we'll get there. I am gonna go on the way to camp and on the way home from camp. So at the very least, I will do that. Because if I'm driving across I-70, I gotta. That's like the Mecca. That's where all the mountains are. So I have to. Yep. Adjack starts Monday, this coming Monday, January 26th. Again, you can get a two-week free trial on StreamFit, Sugar Wad, or PushPress. If you're gonna sign up on the website and you want to see what that PDF looks like, make sure you email me. There is no two-week free trial. Um, it says that there's no two-week free trial on the website, but sometimes people get a little frustrated with that. So I'll just throw that out there. Your two-week free trial would be emailing me and getting the PDF. And yeah, get into Telegram, start having conversations with other coaches. That's definitely a goal of mine over the next couple of years is to try to create a community and a hub for the affiliate stuff. And I know that, you know, us putting the content out there is the beginning of starting that conversation. But when you get that sign-up link in your email related to Mad Jack, please head into the head into the group and start a little bit of a conversation. Did we do it? Yeah, sir. Thank you for tuning into another episode of the Misfit Podcast. If you want the best supplements in the game and you want a discount and you want to support the podcast, go to gorilla mind.com forward slash misfit or just use the code word misfit at checkout, sharpenheaxco.com to get your misfit athletics gear. And if you want to join us at camp, link in bio on Instagram, January 30th through February 1st, coming up very quickly in Boulder, Colorado at CrossFit Roots. See you guys next week. Later.