Also, the Boyson boys are hosting a CFS Super Bowl party. Paleo foods and finga hugs strongly encouraged. The more the merrier. Post to comments if you want in.
Who out there has stared at the whiteboard or when a coach said “the RX weight is…” and wondered, what the hell is RX? Is someone sick? Is this some weird CrossFit medicine?
Well, the answer to question #1 is no, no one is ill and the answer to question #2 is yes, it is kind of like medicine…just with barbells, burpees, and other movements performed at high intensity that will leave us breathing heavily once completed.
Think of the “RX or prescribed weight/movement” as how a doctor would prescribe a treatment to a patient. As coaches, when programming our WODs, we “prescribe” a weight or movement to the most elite athletes; believing they will be capable to move specific loads and/or cover certain distances in an established time frame. Yet, many CrossFit athletes have not reached the ability level to do so and that is totally fine. In CrossFit, we scale down the weight and/or movement to each athlete’s ability level in order to build the skills, strength, and movement patterns needed to someday be able to uphold the RX standards.
However, when we scale, it is important to understand the purpose of the workout. As Justin Bergh from CrossFit HQ talks about in the above video, he does not have the same physical capabilities of Jason Khalipa and Neal Maddox (two CF Games veterans) to complete the WOD with the RX’d weight as fast as they can…so he scales it down in order to meet the same intensity level. For example, in a WOD like Fran, the objective is to complete the 21-15-9 rep scheme as fast as possible; maintaining the same intensity level throughout. Simply put, its an all out sprint. The most elite athletes complete Fran RX’d in under 3 minutes. So being able to complete Fran RXd but finishing in 25 minutes probably isn’t doing much to improve that capacity we will one day need to do it RXd is it? Then again, we shouldn’t be scaling the weight so much that we are finishing faster than the top athletes. For example, when we can complete Fran scaled down in under 6 minutes, then we know we need to up the weight or reduce the assistance on the pull-ups. If we ever find ourselves unsure of how to scale, a coach will always be available to help out and give the purpose of the WOD.
As athletes, we should always push ourselves to reach the RX standard. So we must work as hard as possible to perfect the level we are at in order to move up to the next tier; meaning scaling to the appropriate intensity level. Just know, that once we reach “as RXd” the work does not stop there….we always must push ourselves to move faster and more efficient.
Skill
Pull ups
WOD
50 Power Cleans (115,80)
50 T2B
50 Thrusters (115,80)
50 C2Bs
L3 – 40 reps each
L2-30/30/30/30 (95,65)
L1-20/20/20/20 (65,45)