From the CrossFit Brand X forums on how to approach today's WOD:

Everyone is a Big Dawg today. It is just a front squat with a ballistic press.

http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/CrossFit_BBThrusters.wmv

http://media.crossfit.com/cf-video/CrossFit_BBThrusters.mov

or for some stupid one arm thruster stuff you can check this out:

http://www.crossfitbrandx.com/index.php/forums/viewthread/6010/

185-195-205-210f-210-195-195

135-145-155-165-175-185-195 PR+25

Thought I started heavy enough, but I surprised myself.

Black Box (110,110)

Slow today, so I figured I'd put my mind to work. The other day my father gave me the Gym Jones article from a recent Outside Magazine issue. Overall I thought it was a great article, not only for paying a lot of tribute to CrossFit, but also for giving exposure to the anti-globo gyms in general.

Mark Twight makes no mistake that his current fitness regiment started with CrossFit, and most of his current stuff is derived from CrossFit workouts. But I start to get touchy on the following paragraph:

"After a couple of years, however, Twight says he began to grow disillusioned with the program. CrossFit thrived on a regimen of unstructured daily workouts, but Twight discovered that, while this bolstered his overall fitness foundation, it came at a cost in terms of sport specific performance. Twight soon found that his power output had increased in certain areas but his long-range endurance had faltered. He noticed the same thing surfacing among his athletes... CrossFit, he said, conditioned people for CrossFit. "But the gym is not our sport," he says. "Everyone here trains for something else.""

Now, obviously the first thing that sticks out is calling CrossFit unstructured. Granted, Coach has a bit of Wizard of Oz thing going on creating these workouts, but I think it's far from him throwing a dart at a wall with girls names on it. It doesn't take much to notice when we are in heavy lift intervals, running, or met-con heavy workouts (like now for instance). At minimum, he is taking care not to overload muscle groups in consecutive workouts, I like to believe it is a lot more complicated than that.

Secondly, CrossFit conditioning for CrossFit. I don't think this even needs to be argued on this board. No one ever promised me I was going to be a competitive marathon runner at the same time being able to enter lifting competitions. For people where fitness is part of their job, whether it be a pro football player, fireman, a Marine, or a mountain climber, CrossFit is a SUPPLEMENT. Sport/job specific training is ALWAYS going to be required for these people.

But then there's people like me, a desk jockey, which I think accounts for the vast majority of crossfit.com readers and affiliate members. I spend 9 hours a day sitting at a desk, being able to back squat 295 press 180 and dead lift 395 doesn't really apply to my job (I had to throw those in as they were all PR's yesterday!).

So when do I put this fitness to use? Well last summer I traveled to Ecuador after quitting my old job and climbed mountains for a week. Although I do have some mountaineering experience, my recent high altitude climbing is limited to Mt. Washington. But with only a few days of Acclimation, I powered up 19,300 foot Cotopoxi, obliterating all other groups that started their summit that night. Then this winter I went on my annual one week ski trip out west. With my improved fitness, I avoided fatigue and made more headway on my skiing technique in one week than I had in the past four years. Mind you, this is after having done CrossFit on my own for a year, outside, with minimal equipment, and no instruction. And now I get to toy around with roadie warriors racing around central park. At 185 pounds, I'm a stronger cyclist than I've ever been.

So if CrossFit makes me good at everything but great at nothing, that's fine with me. Because, before CrossFit I was good at nothing.

See you at the box.

Well said, Josh. I even feel inspired to do some thursters. And that is no small feat on your part.

Didn't go all out today, don't want to make my shoulder (issue) angry, so I'm building it up slowly.

135, 155, 165, 165 ,175, 185(F), 175

and spent 30 min at the pool.

oh and 7 burpees. Lemme find out ashleigh quit.

135 175 225 245 255 260 fail. 260 fail.

185x1
205x1
215x1
225x1, PR by 10lbs
235xfail
230xfail
230xfail

185x2

125, 135, 140, 145, 150, 155 (PR), 160F
(68,54), (32,25)

135, 145, 155, 165, 170, 175, 185 PR

congrats hari! happy early birthday! from ur biggest fan!

Josh - I haven't read the article you are speaking of, but based on this article on the Gym Jones site, I think Twight's larger issue was the premise, which is definitely a core component of crossfit, that short, high intensity workouts will prepare you for endurance efforts:
http://www.gymjones.com/knowledge.php?id=42

I think you are right, too, that Crossfit does not promise to make us competitive marathon runners and/or powerlifters. But Gym Jones was based on the promise of improving sport/work-specific performance of competitive athletes and life/death professionals. His (and their) goal was not to get into better shape, have a higher CFT, lose some weight, or have more active vacations. It was to get better at their sport/job; if Crossfit was not achieving this stated goal, then of course they would leave crossfit.

[Note: my stated goals are to lose weight and improve my CFT, which is why Crossfit is great for me and I have no complaints with the results so far]

I most certainly did NOT quit! I lead the charge tonight with the burpees...besides, if I was going to quit, I'd do it at day 45, not day 7. Give me some credit!

Dang, good thing I checked the main site just now. I missed all the WODs because of late work so I was just going to do 30 muscle ups for time at home. That would've been about the third time I've done a ton of muscle ups at home the day before a MU wod.

So I can (maybe) thrust the bar without throwing out my back.

But on another note, I need to publicly applaud Dan for conducting a beginner's class that may have resulted in my boyfriend drinking a tiiiiny sip of the Crossfit Kool-Aid. Thanks, Dan!

Ashleigh definitely was all about the burpees in the 7pm class... but you'd be way too close to the finish to quit on day 45, only 200 something more to go at that point!

185x1
195x1
205f
205x1
215f
215f - so close on this one
215f
210f - just fatigued here

155x8

Worked on some power clean form afterwards. Max, thanks for the feedback on these.

(32,27)

I second KJ's comment and thank KJ for chatting up my ex-girlfriend after the class...sounds like she enjoyed herself and was ready for more--another sip of the CrossFit Kool-Aid :)

105, 115, 125PR, 130F, 130PR, 135PR, 140F

Thanks Court for the help!

(41,26)

8 AM class

first time with this WOD, so everything's a PR, I guess!

warmup: 20 burpees, 20 wallballs (10# ball)

thrusters
45 X 5
65 X 3
85 X 2

95
100
105
110 (f)
110 (f)
105
110 (PR) --> sorted out grip so it was exactly right and had great coordination of hip drive and push
110
115 (f)

so, yup, that was 9; but I wanted to give 115 a whirl after the succession of easy 110s

135
155
175
195
200 (f)
200 (pr)
205 (f)

finished with some light guys

Bad knee. I was not happy with load and form.
135, 155, 165, 155, 155, 155, 135

+ 7 burpees.