Motivation's Source: Find Yours
Here is a thought, a quote, and a piece of training to consider this weekend.
Thought
The immediacy of competition ignites motivation. Which warrants a moment of reflection to acknowledge:
What sits behind that motivation?
Do you have great clarity behind what drives you to compete, to test yourself physically and emotionally?
Are you clear on the value you gain from the self sacrifice?
How will it benefit you and your current life’s quest?
These are all great questions to sit and reflect on before you hear 3,2,1, go.
When you are maximally stressed, hard truths will be revealed.
The more clear you are on what is driving you, the more willing and enduring you will be in the face of maximal stress.
The integrity of your intention is the gatekeeper to your effort.
Quote
"One of the great gifts of sports is learning how to fail in public.
People never go to the gym because they're scared of looking stupid, never share their writing because they're scared of judgment, never open their heart because they're scared of rejection.
Sports train you to face your fear."
Training
20 minute AMRAP:
25 Box Jump Step Down @ 24/20”
25 Alt DB Power Snatch @ 50/35#
25 Burpees to 6” OH
25 Thrusters @ 65/45#
Intention:
With the CrossFit Open being roughly a month away, this is a perfect piece to test your sheer work capacity. The simplicity in movements along with low load allow for work capacity and a desire to succeed to thrive. The main pieces I’m looking for in this test are the following:
Work Capacity (Low Skill & Low Load environment)
How bad do you want it? (You can always do 1 more repetition with these movements; no forced rests necessary)
Sport Specific Volume Tolerance
Movement Efficiency
The low skill and low load environment allows for a better opportunity to showcase one’s work capacity. As such, you inevitably will face the question, how bad do I want it? In order to push for a great score, a firm disciplined cadence must be held throughout. This will get uncomfortable. The volume of work falls within sport specific volume for all movements. Combining them will add another layer of fatigue and challenge and gives us great insight on how well someone can handle this amount of volume with these movements. And as I’ve discussed before, one’s ability to express high levels of work capacity will be dependent on movement efficiency (economy requires efficiency and vice versa).
Top scores: 4 rounds
The Crafting Fitness Podcast
Episode 11: How To Turn Your Arms Into Legs (Listener Q & A)
In this week’s episode, I tackle a listener Q & A.
The question revolved around how to turn your arms into legs, meaning, how do you make your arms very enduring and very strong for the sport of Crossfit?
I briefly spoke about this idea in a previous episode where I said the higher you climb in this sport, the more important your arms become.
Some of the pieces I covered are the following:
● Potential for improvement
● Limitations
● Strategies
● Training Principles
● Programming Considerations
If you have questions or topics you’d like for us to discuss on future episodes, feel free to respond to this email with that topic or email me directly: sam@OPEX RC.coach
Click here to give it a listen.
Please help us out by rating and sharing a review on the podcast app. Thanks!
Onward,
Coach Sam Smith
