Why Does Fitness Hurt So Much, Is CrossFit Good For Physiques and The Future Of The Fitness Industry - Jordan Wallace, Paul Warrior and Tim Briggs - #006

This week I'm sitting down with CrossFit coaches, athletes, programmers, nutritionists and all round good guys Jordan Wallace, Paul Warrior and Tim Briggs. I absolutely loved recording this, despite being behind one of the UK's top CrossFit Programming Companies, the guys do not take themselves too seriously and it really shows in one of the funniest episodes so far. Expect to learn the key differences between good and great athletes, how your body type can be used to play to your strengths in fitness and how to get blood and semen out of joggers. Find out more: www. ReebokCrossFitTyneside.com www. WarriorProgramming.com www. WeDominateNutrition.com Check out everything I recommend from books to products and help support the podcast at no extra cost to you by shopping through this link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/modernwisdom - Episodes You Might Enjoy: This Is How To Master Your Life - David Goggins - #577: ⁠⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Goggins⁠⁠⁠ How To Destroy Your Negative Beliefs - Dr Jordan Peterson - #712: ⁠⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Peterson⁠⁠⁠ The Secret Tools To Hack Your Brain - Dr Andrew Huberman - #700: ⁠⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Huberma Get in touch. Join the discussion with me and other like minded listeners in the episode comments on the MW YouTube Channel or message me... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ModernWisdomPodcast Email: https://www.chriswillx.com/contact Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:06Chris Williamson?

  This is a problem because we've done it late on a Red Bulls main. We're gonna do that, we're gonna fill you full of blue Smarties. We're gonna do, this isn't tonight, it's too late.

• 0:16Speaker 01

  We used to do it late, I'll be late programming.

• 0:18Chris Williamson?

  Some liquid days in there.

• 0:19Speaker 01

  I've cancelled programming for this.

• 0:20Chris Williamson?

  We've gotta go back and programme. Get that liquid, Zed. Get whatever you want mate. I think there's some tequila in there as well.

• 0:26Speaker 01

  Can we just put a coffee on?

• 0:27Chris Williamson?

  There's some Syrah in there.

• 0:28Speaker 01

  That sounds really nice.

• 0:29Chris Williamson?

  Pineapple Syrah.

• 0:31Speaker 01

  Your trainers as well, Tim.

• 0:33Chris Williamson?

  Mate, stacked up, I need that.

• 0:34Speaker 01

  Tim's got everything, mate. Made more money, made too much money, mate. You two between us, honestly, you two between us got more money than he has nothing to do with.

• 0:43Chris Williamson?

  No.

• 0:44Speaker 01

  He's rubbing a brand new hat this morning.

• 0:45Chris Williamson?

  Was he dropping the mud?

• 0:47Speaker 01

  When we were dogs, he dropped it in the mud and he almost looked at it and he almost didn't pick it up.

• 0:52Chris Williamson?

  We found out, I found out today, you've got a pair of joggers that have got semen and blood on them.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  As a picture?

• 0:59Chris Williamson?

  No.

• 1:00Speaker 01

  They're not actual semen and blood, that's a print.

• 1:03Chris Williamson?

  Let me say, is this sentence correct or not? Paul has a pair of joggers that have got someone else's semen and blood on them.

• 1:10Speaker 01

  That's correct. That's a right phrase, but it's a false statement.

• 1:14Chris Williamson?

  It's a serious fact though.

• 1:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, but it's the cover off the Metallica album, the one that's like a weird graphic.

• 1:20Chris Williamson?

  Mate, don't bore me with the details. Details, details, don't bore me with the details.

• 1:27Speaker 01

  Fucking you over there.

• 1:30Chris Williamson?

  Didn't you have some dodgy in them as well? Didn't you, what dodgy? Dodgy didn't you have a dodgy to store them in?

• 1:42Chris Williamson?

  So there might be three things in there. What else was in there that was worse than the blood and semen? Just add it to the list. Add to the body fluids.

• 1:51Speaker 01

  I messaged him, he said I was a bit worried because I'd had the dickie tummied and I'd had my good pants on.

• 1:57Chris Williamson?

  I think your good pants.

• 1:58Speaker 01

  No, so see, they're not really that, because they're supreme ones, so they were like, they were quite...

• 2:01Chris Williamson?

  300 quid, mate, we checked them out one night.

• 2:03Speaker 01

  You guys are full of shit. They were 154.

• 2:06Chris Williamson?

  I've just Googled them.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  300 quid. I've just Googled them. 275 quid, RRP. Not RIV, resale.

• 2:15Chris Williamson?

  Resale, I thought it got worse with resale?

• 2:18Speaker 01

  No, they get more expensive with resale, I didn't pay that for them, I bought them brand new.

• 2:23Chris Williamson?

  Fucking hell.

• 2:25Speaker 02

  Too much money, man.

• 2:25Chris Williamson?

  We're just not in the, we're just not in the

• 2:27Speaker 02

  Not in the right game. You're not in the right game.

• 2:30Tim Briggs?

  I'm not quite in that game. Gotta put myself out there.

• 2:33Speaker 02

  Tim's getting there though.

• 2:33Chris Williamson?

  You are wearing more hats.

• 2:35Tim Briggs?

  Just wearing more hats makes me really happy.

• 2:37Speaker 02

  That's a thing, that's a thing.

• 2:37Speaker 01

  You were ignoring the fire safety officer's lecture to, so you try and cop some, cop some Supreme the other day.

• 2:45Speaker 02

  Sitting on the fire, well, that's the fire safety thing, right? And these two, they're sat there on that, watching the fire safety guys talk building and they're both sat there like this going, yeah.

• 2:56Chris Williamson?

  Browsing the Supreme, bro.

• 2:57Speaker 02

  Like, we're browsing, like, you don't have a time to browse, that's what he's doing.

• 3:00Chris Williamson?

  Supreme job, definitely. You don't get time to browse. In Supreme, you just buy.

• 3:05Speaker 02

  You just buy, first thing.

• 3:06Chris Williamson?

  You either buy or don't buy.

• 3:08Speaker 01

  You've got about fifteen seconds.

• 3:10Chris Williamson?

  Fucking hell.

• 3:11Speaker 01

  You should know this.

• 3:12Tim Briggs?

  But no shit, mate. Fire safety, I told Hope what the difference between foam and water was the other day.

• 3:17Speaker 02

  Incredible.

• 3:17Tim Briggs?

  He's like, what is the difference between foam and water? Well, foam's a lot better.

• 3:23Speaker 02

  Axer's blanket. Starts in oxygen, doesn't it?

• 3:26Tim Briggs?

  Exactly.

• 3:26Speaker 02

  Fuck's sake. So we did learn, obviously I learned more than these because these were on the foam bags, but

• 3:32Tim Briggs?

  We learned a lot. Ben Kennedy knew it all, anyway.

• 3:34Speaker 02

  Ben Kennedy actually knew it all.

• 3:36Chris Williamson?

  Ben is like a fucking walking Swiss Army knife, isn't he?

• 3:39Speaker 02

  Yes, he knows everything, mate. Actually, everything.

• 3:42Chris Williamson?

  Between him and Stu Morton, I reckon I could survive almost any environment on the planet.

• 3:47Speaker 02

  I'd probably take Stu outside, like, rather than Ben.

• 3:50Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. Ben's more like of an inside dog than Stu's an outside.

• 3:53Speaker 01

  I think Ben would be really good at making a tent, but then he'd get really angry and tear it, that tent down when you're out with something.

• 3:57Chris Williamson?

  I think he would, wouldn't he?

• 3:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:59Chris Williamson?

  Ben's, Ben's got a really, like, his emotions are like a pane of glass. And he was doing some massage on me once and I said like, it's, are you, was someone pissed in your porridge today? And he was like, is that obvious?

• 4:15Chris Williamson?

  Yes.

• 4:15Speaker 02

  Yes, it is.

• 4:16Chris Williamson?

  Yes, it is, Ben.

• 4:17Speaker 01

  Or it's punching your back. Punching your glutes.

• 4:20Chris Williamson?

  And that was it, yeah.

• 4:21Speaker 01

  Sorry, my glutes is my shoulder.

• 4:23Chris Williamson?

  I, I, I mean, I guess we've kind of, we've kind of started.

• 4:26Tim Briggs?

  That's not how we've started it, by the way.

• 4:28Speaker 01

  We haven't started it with that, have we?

• 4:29Chris Williamson?

  It'll just

• 4:29Tim Briggs?

  About blood and steam. That was the only

• 4:31Chris Williamson?

  At some point, it will start.

• 4:33Speaker 02

  All right, that's cool. Let's do a little intro now.

• 4:36Tim Briggs?

  Mate, Volvic, we're all Volvic sponsorships, yeah?

• 4:39Speaker 01

  Turn it around.

• 4:39Chris Williamson?

  Thank you, Karen.

• 4:40Speaker 02

  Product placement, uh, six layers of volcanic fluctuation.

• 4:43Chris Williamson?

  But that's not Volvic, is it?

• 4:45Speaker 02

  Uh, it's my little sponsor there, Robinsons.

• 4:49Speaker 02

  Fruit and balm, they go together.

• 4:52Chris Williamson?

  They really do.

• 4:53Speaker 02

  Steph has posted it. I did. She's hammering it. Do you follow Steph on Instagram? Scottish version of me. Um, but anyway, I bet she's bit. No, no, I should take that as an insult, no offence. So basically, she's like, she's hammering all the people in, not just CrossFit, but in like fitness who have got all these sponsors.

• 5:16Chris Williamson?

  Right, like just shooting them down.

• 5:19Speaker 02

  Thank you for this, it makes me like so much better. What a brilliant, she's going on about training 36 hours a day and that. It's all about Aldi.

• 5:28Chris Williamson?

  Aldi tuna chunks. Powers. She's just like a ma- like a massive trough.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  Basically, yeah, but it's funny. Yeah, but she's an athlete as well.

• 5:35Chris Williamson?

  So she can like back it up with.

• 5:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, she's good. She's good, she's okay.

• 5:41Tim Briggs?

  Didn't our Ness confuse her with you?

• 5:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, she did.

• 5:45Tim Briggs?

  Irrelevant.

• 5:47Chris Williamson?

  Confused her with you? Because she's got short hair?

• 5:50Speaker 02

  She's got short hair.

• 5:51Chris Williamson?

  Right.

• 5:51Speaker 02

  But, yeah. She's probably more jacked than you. She's more jacked than me, to be fair. She's stronger than me.

• 5:56Chris Williamson?

  Is she?

• 5:56Speaker 02

  Yeah. She's got like a, she's got ridiculous numbers. She's definitely stronger than you.

• 6:02Chris Williamson?

  That's also true.

• 6:04Speaker 02

  And Paul.

• 6:07Speaker 02

  That's like everyone, I swear.

• 6:10Chris Williamson?

  Fucking hell. Um, so. I guess by way of introduction, what would be probably quite nice would be to hear, I'm gonna guess that out of the three of you that are on the table, you've been involved in CrossFit the longest?

• 6:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, the longest, so me and then Paul and then probably Tim in that, in that one.

• 6:28Chris Williamson?

  So can you tell us a little bit about your introduction to this sport?

• 6:31Speaker 02

  Yeah, so I started back in like 2009, like late 2009. Um, I did like running before that, so for about six to eight months before running CrossFit, I used to do like longer distance running, so not super long distance like what Stu did, but um, like 10 milers, half marathons, things like that.

• 6:48Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 6:49Speaker 02

  And basically, I had like a goal that I wanted to achieve, um, which I did, and then.

• 6:54Chris Williamson?

  What was a goal?

• 6:54Speaker 02

  Uh, so I was running the Great North Sub 120. Um, so I ran it in one, I ran it in 120, but I was a lot younger.

• 7:02Chris Williamson?

  How old were you then?

• 7:03Speaker 02

  I was like 17, I was a lot smaller though, um. Smaller than now. Smaller than now, it's hard to imagine. But um, so I did that and then I just, I was just bored of it really, I kind of. Obviously training for like that sort of distance, you have to put loads of miles in, it's loads of time. Yeah. So I just got bored, so I was looking for something else to do. So I was, I was messing around with a bit like kettlebells and stuff. And then I read an article, which I think was in like Men's Fitness on Men's Health. What year were you talking about? Like two thousand and nine, two thousand, like late two thousand nine, early two thousand ten. Mm hmm. So I read an article in, I think it was Men's Health or Men's Fitness, about the three hundred. The, the, um, the three hundred guys. Yeah. Like how they're training, CrossFit was mentioned in, I thought, oh, what's that? Right.

• 7:48Speaker 02

  So I Googled CrossFit, um, and just found those two, there's two gyms in the North East. So there's one called CrossFit North East England. Yeah. Which is just up in, um, Wigan View and then there was CrossFit Tyneside. Yeah. So, um, I went to both of them. The CrossFit North East England guys were great, but it was just too far for us to travel. Yeah. CrossFit Tyneside was based in, uh, North Shields, it was a lot closer for, for me. So I went there, um, after about a year, uh, not even that, after about six months, I actually ended up buying the gym. So I ended up buying the affiliate, just through circumstances. Obviously at the time, it was, it was a lot different to, um, what it is now. So there was like no equipment, like literally like one bar, some bumper plates and some kettlebells and some matting. And that was it, so it didn't cost a lot of money. Mm hmm.

• 8:33Speaker 02

  And, um, that was it, yeah, just bought that and then just kept on training and kept on kind of trying to grow the business. And then we moved to Benton, um, uh, we had a, had a unit in Benton and then, not to kind of interrupt, well, continue on what Paul's gonna say. But back in like two thousand and thirteen maybe, two thousand and fourteen, Paul came on full time as like our head coach. Yeah. We bought CrossFit Tyneside, so, and then that's been him since then. So for me, really, back, got back in, got into it back in two thousand and nine, um, started kind of competing in two thousand and ten. And then just competed all the way through that and.

• 9:08Chris Williamson?

  When you say start, sort of started competing, what you mean is made it to regionals like however many years in a row.

• 9:14Speaker 02

  But it was a lot different then though. So like the first year that I went to, like, there wasn't an open, so it was a sectional.

• 9:20Chris Williamson?

  Right.

• 9:21Speaker 02

  You just put your name on the hat. You literally just paid and you put your name on the hat and you turned up and competed. So there was no qualification process for the sectional.

• 9:29Chris Williamson?

  This is like, this is kind of like a, like a seeding would be for a local competition.

• 9:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, so, yeah, so you basically paid your money, you rocked up. It was like three workouts in one day. And, and then from there, it was like, at the time, there was three sectionals.

• 9:45Speaker 02

  So it was like one in the UK, UK and Ireland, then there was one in like Western Europe, one in Eastern Europe. And then all those three, there was three people from each, I think, went, no, sorry, twenty people from each went to a regional. And then from the regional, I think there was three people from that then went to the Games and then.

• 10:03Chris Williamson?

  So this was before the open?

• 10:03Speaker 02

  That was two thousand and ten, yeah. Then after that, two thousand and eleven, the open came along. So this was like pre-open. So that was the first proper competition I did with sectionals.

• 10:12Chris Williamson?

  Wow.

• 10:12Speaker 02

  So I think it was twenty qualified for regionals and I think I was, came like twenty first, so just missed out on the regionals that day.

• 10:18Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 10:19Speaker 02

  Um.

• 10:20Chris Williamson?

  So you must have taken it to, taken to it pretty quickly.

• 10:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, again, at the time, like, it was super low skill. So like, that year, that two thousand and ten, was the first year that GHD sit-ups and chest bar pull-ups came up in the workout. So I went to that competition. I didn't have chest bar pull-ups, so I was basically doing strict pull-ups in the middle of the workout. Um, like strict pull-ups and it was, it was, we had, we're doing it on a basketball court with like, in the middle of a park.

• 10:45Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  It was like totally different to what it is now. We're in a proper stadium, make up judges and it's all online and all that stuff. It was like a completely different world.

• 10:52Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 10:53Speaker 02

  So back then it was like li- literally just on a school field in a park. It was cool, but it's obviously totally different to what it is now.

• 11:02Chris Williamson?

  A lot less polished.

• 11:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, it was just make it up as you go along, trying to get it in before it went dark.

• 11:07Chris Williamson?

  So Paul, how about you?

• 11:08Speaker 01

  Um, actually, some of it's a bit same in Jordan in the sense that, um, probably the three hundred.

• 11:13Chris Williamson?

  Yep.

• 11:14Speaker 01

  I think that's probably a pretty big moment for. Most people in fitness. Mm hmm. Um, when it all wasn't CGI, I think a lot of people. Yeah, Matt, Matt's thinking Gerard, Gerard Butler's formed the basis for a several hundred million. Yeah.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  Business.

• 11:26Speaker 01

  Business. And he wasn't even done really did the crossfit really, it was, um, so I'd done that, I'd kind of watched that film. I'd already realised I was pretty overweight and I'd already started trying to like go to global gyms and things to try and change that. And as a result, got into the fitness side or like got interested in the fitness side. Um, lost quite a bit of weight and then, um, I think when the three hundred went like, you know, I don't know. Whether it was in the internet or the DVD with the extras or something like that, there was an interview with Mark White, who was, um, Jim Jones. Yeah. Um, at the time, he did it and he started talking about functional training and functional movement. And training with kettlebells and ropes and sleds and all that kind of, all that kind of stuff. So from that, um.

• 12:08Speaker 01

  I actually bumped into a friend one night, um, a guy called Finn, who was doing some strongman training, kind of with Jordan at the time or like in the facility.

• 12:15Speaker 02

  In the facility.

• 12:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, in the same facility and, um, he was like, oh man, I was like talking about cowbells and he was like, oh, you should, uh, come down and try this gym. Ah, so I kind of went on the internet. So it was run by this little kid. He was like doing double unders with an Infidel T-shirt on. I was like, all right, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, right, I'm gonna go see what this is about. Dropped him a message. Um, and that was it, went down, um. Got through a, put, put through like a seven minute workout, which like.

• 12:41Speaker 02

  Ruined his life.

• 12:42Speaker 01

  Behind, behind my arse totally. Um, like signed up the next day, signed up there and then actually, I was like, I was like, I've got the money in the bag.

• 12:49Speaker 02

  Just been paid the money.

• 12:50Speaker 01

  Just been paid, I gotta do it.

• 12:52Speaker 02

  This is pretty supreme as well, so.

• 12:54Speaker 01

  He actually had some money, yeah. Yeah, I had the money, yeah, I had the money in my bag there and then. I literally was just like, I pay for a month. Um, and, um, kind of just went, went from there. Um, again, like, like he says, I eventually just kind of got more involved. He was really involved in the competitor side. Yeah. And, and I think, like he says, like, it was easier to get into the competitor side at the time and even I did okay in the first ever open.

• 13:16Speaker 02

  Fucking four hundred in Europe first year.

• 13:18Speaker 01

  Um, so. Got that title for the rest of time. Yeah, I know.

• 13:21Speaker 02

  Four hundred fitness in Europe two thousand and eleven.

• 13:23Speaker 01

  So, uh. Get it in the Instagram bio, mate.

• 13:27Speaker 02

  You gotta be done.

• 13:30Speaker 01

  It's going in. Um, and then, um, as like the guys got more interested in that, I got more interested in the coaching side and like listening to the Mark Twights and reading and all those things like that. So. I just kind of, kind of naturally wanted to go across that, okay, how do we program for people? Um, so we just kind of like, as he grew as an athlete, I kind of just focused more on the coaching side. That interested me a little bit more than being an athlete personally. I wanted to train, I wanted to do it, but I just wanted to, I was interested in how things went together and what people were doing.

• 13:59Chris Williamson?

  So how are you?

• 14:00Tim Briggs?

  So mine's a bit of a weird one. So my friend started it, just started doing CrossFit in a global gym and his garage. So I started just doing it with him. Right. Taegong joined in and, um, I was like 18 at the time, so 2012.

• 14:16Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 14:17Tim Briggs?

  There wasn't really much going on, like we couldn't do any wall balls, we couldn't really lift heavy, we couldn't go overhead, especially in the garage if it rained, we couldn't snatch. So we'd never done a wall ball or a snap tree. We'd done some cleans, but like horrific cleans. And, um, then he started to open his own affiliate. Then we kind of travelled from there to Teeside every now and then, until he opened up his own. 2013 came to Tyneside for uni and from there it's been like history.

• 14:50Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 14:51Tim Briggs?

  So just started training, trying, trained twice a day between uni, between lectures, came here and there, then, um.

• 14:58Chris Williamson?

  Just tumbled straight in.

• 14:59Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, got along with Paul quite well, did my level one, so I could train at my friend's gym back home.

• 15:05Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 15:05Tim Briggs?

  Then the year after, just kind of stuck here, started to train, started to coach at Tyneside. Every Wednesday.

• 15:13Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, Wednesday night.

• 15:15Tim Briggs?

  A little bit with Paul on Mondays.

• 15:17Chris Williamson?

  Tim, Tim Wednesdays.

• 15:18Tim Briggs?

  Tim Wednesdays.

• 15:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, so you started off in there, you just kind of like, you just kind of co-coach for me for a bit, didn't you? And then it was like, okay, Wednesdays.

• 15:26Tim Briggs?

  Wednesdays are it.

• 15:27Chris Williamson?

  I think one of the things that struck me when I started was CrossFit has managed to brand itself so effectively. And I think when anything's that polished, there's an element that people have got that makes them feel. feel reserved about something, you know, the, the, the style looks so good that the substance can't be up to scratch. Does that make sense? That people are sometimes a little bit suspicious when it looks and using the tag the fittest on earth. Like it sounds, it sounds impressive and also unbelievable in the same sense.

• 15:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:56Chris Williamson?

  So in your opinion, are CrossFit athletes the fittest athletes on the planet?

• 16:00Speaker 01

  No, I do think it, I do think they're kind of like trying to produce the fittest on earth in the sense of it's such a broad, broad spectrum. And it's the only thing that's really challenging or testing this broad, broad spectrum. There isn't anything else that is.

• 16:12Chris Williamson?

  It's a middle ground, isn't it?

• 16:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:14Chris Williamson?

  It's a middle ground of everything.

• 16:15Speaker 01

  And I think the people it's producing who are like, you know, pretty damn awesome weightlifters and pretty damn, we're pretty, pretty strong powerlifters and can run, and can run half marathons.

• 16:24Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 16:25Speaker 01

  Can do all of that stuff. I mean, there just isn't a test.

• 16:27Speaker 02

  When you're talking about, sorry, in the rugby, probably talking about like tier player two who last, not this year, obviously, which one, but the year before. Like did the CrossFit Games, came second and then went and competed in Rio, the Olympics.

• 16:38Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, the weightlifting, right?

• 16:39Speaker 01

  Within two.

• 16:40Chris Williamson?

  Weightlifting, yeah.

• 16:40Speaker 02

  So she's competed at the highest level in two sports within two weeks of each other. She hasn't, she obviously hasn't peaked for the, for the, for the Olympics, you know what I mean?

• 16:48Chris Williamson?

  You know, she's just been there for a full week.

• 16:51Speaker 02

  Just puts herself in the face for a full week. Like Dave Castro just went, right, what can I do to make you feel like you want to die?

• 16:57Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 16:58Speaker 02

  So like when you look at it like that, from that point of view, yeah, they're probably all the fittest on earth. But it depends what you define fitness as, because, you know.

• 17:06Chris Williamson?

  I think the, the, the definition of fitness that CrossFit has used seems quite appropriate to me.

• 17:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:14Chris Williamson?

  Like it's work capacity across broad time and multiple domains, right?

• 17:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:19Chris Williamson?

  Um, I suppose that based on that definition of fitness, and I can't think of one that's better, like not that it's really my area of expertise or.

• 17:28Speaker 01

  He chose the terminology, you know, you could have like, you know, you can argue semantics or whatever, or you can be one of these people who can just delve into it and try and pick it apart. He's just making a point about. You should be.

• 17:37Tim Briggs?

  Different time domains, different law domains, different movements, you know, uh, different planes of movement. Functional stuff, I mean, that's pretty, I mean, it is pretty broad. I mean, it is a broad description and you can argue it and you can go into it. And you see people all the time trying to pick it apart. I think that's what it is.

• 17:54Speaker 02

  I think the main thing was that there shouldn't be anything that you can't do.

• 17:58Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 17:58Chris Williamson?

  Like. I think that's where the broad thing comes in.

• 18:01Speaker 02

  I think like with Dave Castro, obviously at the Games, like he's constantly trying to test that.

• 18:06Tim Briggs?

  Hmm.

• 18:06Speaker 02

  And then it like blows the lines of like.

• 18:10Speaker 02

  Competitor in terms of you don't necessarily have to be the, the, the fittest to be the best at the sport. So like, what I mean by that is like Catherine. In two thousand, whatever, when, when there was the pegboards.

• 18:19Tim Briggs?

  Mm hmm.

• 18:20Speaker 02

  Like everyone was on the pegboard smashing themselves trying to get to the top and failing. She just rested.

• 18:25Tim Briggs?

  She sat down.

• 18:26Speaker 02

  Cause she knew she was, she wasn't gonna make it.

• 18:27Tim Briggs?

  Took this high as like.

• 18:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, took, took a rest.

• 18:30Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 18:31Speaker 02

  So it's like.

• 18:31Tim Briggs?

  Then crushed the last working.

• 18:32Speaker 02

  You'd look at it and go, well, she's not actually the fittest because she can't do it, but she won. So, you know what I mean? It's like, it, it, it blows those minds a little bit.

• 18:40Chris Williamson?

  I think what's interesting, watching from, um. The Open to Regionals to the Games is that there's actually a lot less CrossFit that goes on the higher up you get.

• 18:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, completely.

• 18:50Chris Williamson?

  It's, it's a lot more CrossFitty at the local level than it is at the top level.

• 18:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 18:56Chris Williamson?

  Which is interesting, isn't it?

• 18:56Speaker 02

  I mean, at the Games, at the Games as well, they're so like lucky. Obviously for the, for the Open and. Regionals in some respects, you're pretty limited with what you can do. Cause like in the Open, you can't expect people to be like carrying D balls and.

• 19:10Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 19:10Speaker 02

  Running up hills and stuff like that, cause you just can't.

• 19:13Tim Briggs?

  How can you measure that? Like, how can you measure a run in the Open?

• 19:15Speaker 02

  You're limited by what you can do within those four walls and with kit as well. And then Regionals, it gets a little bit more kind of. Out there, but still, I mean, this year they had like the D balls.

• 19:26Tim Briggs?

  Hmm.

• 19:26Speaker 02

  But in the past, it's really just been.

• 19:28Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 19:28Speaker 02

  Dumbbells, barbells, cowbells.

• 19:30Tim Briggs?

  Rig.

• 19:30Speaker 02

  Um, rig, yeah, ropes, you know what I mean? And then the Games, it's like, right, anything's there.

• 19:36Chris Williamson?

  Hey, there was this year, people, even a lot of stretches, we cycle across.

• 19:39Speaker 02

  And I think with the new, with the new arena, I think it's only gonna get like more out there. I think the stuff's only gonna get better.

• 19:47Tim Briggs?

  Mm hmm.

• 19:47Speaker 02

  Cause obviously they've moved from LA to West continent, isn't it?

• 19:50Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 19:50Speaker 02

  So I think, I think it's gonna get even more out there and different things that we're gonna do.

• 19:54Tim Briggs?

  I think it will drop down as well. I think it will feed down to Regionals a little bit more. I think swimming's gonna be in there pretty soon. More objects and. It's kind of gonna challenge everything.

• 20:05Chris Williamson?

  How, how heavy were the kettlebells, those kettlebell deadlifts, or originals this year?

• 20:08Speaker 02

  Uh, ninety, ninety kilos.

• 20:11Tim Briggs?

  Pretty heavy, yeah.

• 20:11Speaker 02

  Ninety kilos. Two or five, I think, each one, so ninety-three. It's heavy, one and a half me's.

• 20:17Chris Williamson?

  No one wants to pick that up.

• 20:18Speaker 02

  No.

• 20:18Chris Williamson?

  Neither. So, there's a question.

• 20:20Tim Briggs?

  Prepping you for shopping, though.

• 20:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:22Tim Briggs?

  Made the winter.

• 20:23Chris Williamson?

  Functional, isn't it?

• 20:24Tim Briggs?

  Functional, it is better.

• 20:25Chris Williamson?

  You know, that, you know, that number is actually the exact same and as the bag for life.

• 20:28Tim Briggs?

  Oh, without that, yeah.

• 20:30Chris Williamson?

  Load. You can say. You can put your mum can still lift it.

• 20:34Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 20:35Chris Williamson?

  Um, so, anyone that's tried CrossFit or has done a few of the workouts, like, hey, regardless of whether or not people like or don't like CrossFit, I don't think anyone can deny that it's really, really fucking hard. Like, yeah, like, there's some of the workouts that want to end your world. And what I'm really interested in, that we've got three guys who understand the physiology and understand the training methodology as well. I wanted to see if you guys can try and explain why CrossFit is so hard. Like, why it hurts during a workout to the level that it does. And if you can try and take us through maybe some of the workouts and what it is about them that just wreck your world. Because obviously, people can go and run a marathon.

• 21:17Chris Williamson?

  And they can come out the other side of it, and maybe the next day they have their aches and pains and this, that and the other. But during a marathon, that's a lot of people would perceive as, you know, a pinnacle of realistic.

• 21:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:26Chris Williamson?

  Local level fitness. Like, you know, I, if you gave me the option of doing that, or doing a couple of the really nasty hero workouts, and I'd give me the marathon. Do you know what I mean? Because although it's all.

• 21:38Tim Briggs?

  You see?

• 21:38Chris Williamson?

  I don't know, I just think, because it's.

• 21:40Tim Briggs?

  As a non-runner.

• 21:41Chris Williamson?

  It's just chubby, oh, yeah, okay, maybe not, maybe not me. But you, you understand my.

• 21:45Speaker 02

  I know what you're saying.

• 21:45Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 21:46Speaker 02

  Think from like, not from like a sciencey point of view, Tim's probably best to do that, he's the one with the.

• 21:50Tim Briggs?

  No question.

• 21:51Speaker 02

  With the degrees. Um.

• 21:53Chris Williamson?

  With the degrees.

• 21:54Speaker 02

  Degrees.

• 21:54Chris Williamson?

  Got there.

• 21:55Speaker 02

  For the reason.

• 21:55Chris Williamson?

  But.

• 21:56Tim Briggs?

  Like from a, from a.

• 21:59Speaker 02

  Degree. But from like a, from like a practical point of view, I think it's just the fact that it's like so, there's so many different aspects of it. So like you said with the marathon, it's one foot in front of the other. That's it. Like if you can keep putting one foot in front of the other, even if you're walking it, you know you're going to finish it.

• 22:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:14Speaker 02

  Whereas like with some of the wards, some of the hero workouts, like some of the stuff in there is pretty challenging. So, um, for example, like a lot of them are combining movements that a normal person in the gym wouldn't combine. So like there's one called Mr. Joshua, which is like running, um, heavy deadlifts and then J H D setups. And it's, it's a pretty simple workout. I think it's like five rounds, 400 metre run, 15 deadlifts at 115 and then 30 J H Ds. It, it's like, it's a world beater. It kills you. It's like the extension of the deadlift and then the deflection of the J H D setup just brutalizes it.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  Then you've got to stabilize.

• 22:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're like all of that.

• 22:52Speaker 01

  As you run, as you get into the run, then you run long.

• 22:54Speaker 02

  And then you're all of that. And it's like through a full range of motion. Um, and then obviously the running after that. So you're out of breath coming in, picking up a moderately heavy load. And then jumping on the, the J H D setup, which in itself is a pretty brutal movement. Like it's a massive range of motion. And it's not really something that a lot of people have done before anyway. And it's a great way to get rabdo. Um, but I think those types of like combinations of movements are just brutal. Just brutal. And then to same with like, there's another one called Bull, which is like a mile run, 50 overhead squats. I think that's 60. 200 double unders and then 50 pull ups, I think. Like all that overhead work and then double unders and then running. So your shoulders are going to be tired on that.

• 23:36Speaker 02

  And your legs, obviously for the squats, it's like the combination of movements are just brutal. Horrific.

• 23:42Speaker 01

  Throw that in with like the attitude of the environment you're in as well.

• 23:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:45Speaker 01

  Even if you're not training with other people, it's the environment of you know, other people are doing this workout or have done this workout. So you know, there's times to beat, there's scores to beat. You're not going to drop your 400 metre running pace. You're going to keep the intensity there. So psychological aspects of it thrown in with. The sort of like that competition environment. You know, and I'm not saying that the competition is good or bad and people have a comment about that, but it is is you will maintain a high level of intensity during that workout. As a result of like external factors.

• 24:14Chris Williamson?

  It's irrelevant of whether or not other people in the class are doing it. There's a heritage of other people that have benchmarked.

• 24:19Speaker 02

  Also as well.

• 24:20Tim Briggs?

  And when it's a hero, someone's died because of it.

• 24:23Speaker 02

  That's like paying, you're paying tribute to somebody, you know what I mean? It's a hero workout and even if you don't believe in that type of stuff, you're still gonna go hard.

• 24:30Tim Briggs?

  Because you know the reason.

• 24:32Chris Williamson?

  I call it a tribute workout, call it whatever you want, yeah.

• 24:34Speaker 01

  So CrossFit does do long runs, but when I'm doing that long run against somebody, you're doing it against your previous score. You know, you're doing a 5K, you're doing it against your previous score, doing it against Timmy in a super wide running gate and like, do you know what I mean?

• 24:47Tim Briggs?

  Straight up a horse.

• 24:48Speaker 01

  You're doing it against, you're doing it against like the 6pm class. Um, so your intensity is gonna be high, like your intensity on that 5K, you're gonna apply yourself.

• 24:57Chris Williamson?

  But we could argue, we could argue, people that run 400 metres, I think, I'm right in saying, I'm right in saying that 400 metres is quite commonly known as one of the worst running distances in terms of.

• 25:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:07Tim Briggs?

  Then you've got to go pick a bottle up.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:10Chris Williamson?

  Right, okay. But my point is that if someone's going to exhaustion on 400, on a 400 metres, like obviously you can add load and you can do all the rest of the things. Is it, is it the combination of movements? Is that what makes it so terrible? Is it, is it the fatigue with the muscular endurance with the whatever like?

• 25:24Tim Briggs?

  I think, let's put it out there as well, like newbies go anaerobic quick. And trying to breathe when you go anaerobic, it's not gonna happen.

• 25:32Chris Williamson?

  Explain what happens.

• 25:33Tim Briggs?

  So you just go off really hard and um, heart rate's through, through the roof. Trying to hold something on the front rack, compressing your breathing and for you trying to breathe when you're anaerobic, it's not gonna happen. Like Jordan, he's like a master at pacing, he doesn't go anaerobic at any point.

• 25:51Speaker 02

  All aerobic.

• 25:51Tim Briggs?

  All aerobic.

• 25:52Speaker 02

  Can't go anaerobic.

• 25:53Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 25:54Speaker 02

  Kills me.

• 25:54Tim Briggs?

  So he saves himself, like oxygen's flowing through his body. He's not restricted at any point, so he can move throughout it, whereas. Say your first session, I put you on the soft bike to start off with.

• 26:08Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 26:09Tim Briggs?

  You're probably gonna go out the gate pretty hot.

• 26:11Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 26:11Tim Briggs?

  Then you've got your deadlifts, then you've got your burpees.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  Cause you have no idea, like Tim said, you have no idea, like what, what, you don't know what's coming?

• 26:18Chris Williamson?

  But I think the thing is, is that you don't even know what. Going anaerobic means.

• 26:22Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 26:23Chris Williamson?

  Like, it took me six months to find out that you're supposed to, I'm right insane, you're supposed to try and ride, unless you sprint, you know, finishing, right?

• 26:33Tim Briggs?

  Aerobic.

• 26:35Chris Williamson?

  Right, okay. So what, in, in, for anyone who needs advice on how to pace, what is the aerobic threshold?

• 26:42Tim Briggs?

  I'm definitely the wrong person.

• 26:46Tim Briggs?

  So, so for me.

• 26:47Chris Williamson?

  But I was thinking physi.

• 26:49Tim Briggs?

  I got anaerobic in a, in a while.

• 26:51Chris Williamson?

  So what happens? What, what is it that causes you to go anaerobic and what is it?

• 26:55Tim Briggs?

  So anaerobic is literal definition without oxygen. So your body doesn't have oxygen. So it's trying to contract your muscles here and there.

• 27:04Chris Williamson?

  So this is when you've done, this is when you've done too much work in a short space of time. And you're now working instead of being aerobic, which is more efficient?

• 27:12Tim Briggs?

  Yes.

• 27:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:13Chris Williamson?

  You're now being.

• 27:13Speaker 02

  In the presence of oxygen, now you're working anaerobics, you, you basically don't have.

• 27:16Chris Williamson?

  You're in emergency mode, so to speak, right? So how, how is it, what is pacing and how do you do it?

• 27:22Speaker 02

  I think a lot of it is like knowing what you can do. So like.

• 27:28Speaker 02

  In a lot of the open workouts, people will be like, with, with me, especially in the past, like, go faster, go faster. I'm like, no, I know what I'm doing. I'm going at my pace. I don't wanna go at your pace, I'm going at my pace, cause I know at this pace, I can go hard for thirty minutes.

• 27:41Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 27:41Speaker 02

  Forty minutes, whatever it may be.

• 27:43Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 27:43Speaker 02

  If I go a little bit faster, I know that, that, that's the workout. Like, let's talk, uh, let's take, what, seventeen point fours at the deadlift one?

• 27:51Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 27:51Tim Briggs?

  The fifty five.

• 27:52Speaker 02

  Me and, me and you did that opposite each other.

• 27:54Chris Williamson?

  You, you put me in the same heat, just on a side point, John put me in the same heat as in the three out of the five.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  You're giving it big legs, you're giving it big legs, so.

• 28:03Chris Williamson?

  Did not give it big legs.

• 28:07Speaker 02

  So, give me big, give me big legs, saying we're gonna beat this.

• 28:10Chris Williamson?

  So we were, and I, I've got a funny story about this that I'll dip in very quickly. I got off the, uh, fifty five deadlifts at a hundred.

• 28:18Speaker 02

  Hundred and two.

• 28:19Chris Williamson?

  Hundred and two kilos.

• 28:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:20Chris Williamson?

  And you programmed this to me earlier in the week. Fifty five deadlifts at a hundred and two kilos and then straight on to the wall balls afterwards, fifty five wall balls at nine kilos. And I broke on the wall balls at thirty. To hear your judge going to you, twenty eight, twenty nine, and I was like, oh my god, what have you done? Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, like just.

• 28:42Speaker 02

  Also, you picked me up for deadlifts as well, you were my, I think you just get them like unbroken.

• 28:46Chris Williamson?

  What the fuck have you done? And I was like.

• 28:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:48Chris Williamson?

  I love, you know like where.

• 28:49Speaker 02

  That's anaerobic.

• 28:50Chris Williamson?

  You just allow, so it was like, oh, go past, go, like, you waved him through, I'm like, right, kid, do not pace ahead of Jordan, fucking idiot. So, yeah, you were saying in that.

• 28:59Speaker 02

  So it's like, like on those deadlifts, obviously I've done that workout before. Uh, three times before, cause it was a repeat, I did it twice in two thousand and fifteen, I think it was, two thousand and sixteen. And then I did it once in training on the build up to last year's open.

• 29:13Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 29:13Speaker 02

  So I'd done that workout and I knew how to pace that workout, so I knew that the fifty five deadlifts, you need to do in a certain amount of time. The fifty five, like, I'm not very good at wall balls, so I, I can push a little bit harder on the deadlifts and I can pace it on the wall ball. And then the classic thing with George trips people up, which is one thing that where I was trying to communicate across to people is the row. So like, on the rower, you could sit at say like eighty percent effort and pull say twelve hundred calories. On the, on the, on the monitor, twelve hundred calories, so that might take it, let's, this is not the exact number, let's say it takes you.

• 29:47Chris Williamson?

  Three minutes or four minutes.

• 29:48Speaker 02

  Let's say it takes you two minutes thirty to row fifty five calories.

• 29:51Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 29:51Speaker 02

  Or you could sit at ninety five percent effort and have it at fourteen hundred calories and finish it in two minutes fifteen. But then you need to take forty five seconds after to have a rest before you get on the handstand push up, so it's like knowing where to push and where to not.

• 30:05Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 30:05Speaker 02

  Does that make sense? So there'll be like certain movements within a workout where you can go hard and where you can relax, basically. And it's just through experience, just like anything, uh, through experience of knowing where to push and where to relax. So like, in that workout, that's actually quite a good example to use for me personally, so the deadlifts I'm quite comfortable with, obviously small, like short range of motion. The weight's not that heavy, it's quite, it's moderate, um, the wall balls kill me, cause I'm a midget and a tight target. The row, not great at, cause I'm small and I've got small range of motion again, so obviously I can't move the, the handle as well as someone who's taller. Then the handstand pushups are really good, because I'm, it's a short range of motion again.

• 30:45Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 30:45Speaker 02

  And, and I'm light, so it's like there's two out of the four that are good, and two out of the four that are bad.

• 30:49Chris Williamson?

  And you need to know where you can capitalize.

• 30:51Speaker 02

  Exactly, where you can capitalize and where you can't.

• 30:52Chris Williamson?

  But again, with that, there's two, should be, there's two elements on that, that you can catch your breath more by going more easily on the movements that are easier to you.

• 31:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:00Chris Williamson?

  And not pushing as hard, or do you need to compensate?

• 31:02Speaker 02

  There's two ways of doing it, there's like, it's like, you've got to find it for yourself though.

• 31:07Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 31:07Speaker 01

  This is, this is like stimulus, like based on, based on, like, that's competing.

• 31:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:14Speaker 01

  You know, like, we do workouts that are anaerobic on purpose.

• 31:16Chris Williamson?

  Yes.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  Because we're trying to tra- train all domains, right? So, that's, we've got, we've got, we've got strength workouts, we've got the power workouts, so we've got those anaerobic efforts, those sprint ones.

• 31:25Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, I've talked on that.

• 31:26Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 31:27Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, it sounds like a punch and something.

• 31:29Speaker 01

  That's all right, I am.

• 31:30Chris Williamson?

  Fuck. So, let's, so, so, let's take it from the start, this, I wanted to ask this question. The, the workouts that are in CrossFit, as far as, from what I know, are split up into broad categories.

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, they break it down, they break it down into three, we break, probably break it down into four.

• 31:48Chris Williamson?

  Take, take, take it through that.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  So, we're talking like strength work, so we've got like your maximal efforts, usually like a compound movement, or we might train Olympic lifters that. So they're talking like your heavy back squat days.

• 32:00Chris Williamson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  Um.

• 32:02Speaker 02

  There's your ATP and foster creativity as well.

• 32:04Speaker 01

  Side boy. Side midget.

• 32:07Speaker 02

  Let's move on.

• 32:08Speaker 01

  So then we go with our, um, so our power work, our sprint work, our, um, glycogen work.

• 32:16Chris Williamson?

  Glycogen.

• 32:17Speaker 01

  So there you go, right, there you go, so our anaerobic capacity work, so these are the short, sharp workouts.

• 32:22Chris Williamson?

  Sub five minutes, sub three minutes?

• 32:24Speaker 01

  Um, sub more than, like, sub less than that even, like forty five seconds type work, like mini work. This is those.

• 32:30Chris Williamson?

  No, this is just training.

• 32:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, this is just training, so this is training adaptation. So these are, do you know on Fridays when we put you in teams, and you get, we guy, we like, we try and force you into breaking it down, and there's these ridiculous little sprints, which. Ruin you.

• 32:41Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 32:42Speaker 01

  You know, I've done it with you before a couple of times.

• 32:43Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, it's like anaerobic development. I mean, it just looks like camaraderie and good fun. But it's actually aimed at.

• 32:49Tim Briggs?

  So you're talking about max effort in the goals there.

• 32:51Speaker 01

  Not definitely.

• 32:52Tim Briggs?

  It's like underneath.

• 32:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. And like the more you're in your team, the more people in your team, the more rest you get, the more, the more maximum your effort can be.

• 33:01Tim Briggs?

  On each one.

• 33:02Speaker 01

  So the better adaptation we get. Then we've got the power endurance work, so that aerobic, kind of like high end aerobic work, which is more like your four minutes, your eight minutes, your 12 minute workout.

• 33:10Speaker 02

  It's like a workout, like that.

• 33:12Tim Briggs?

  What's that?

• 33:12Speaker 02

  So it's 400 metre run, 20 one kettlebell swings, 12 pull ups, three rounds at a time. So it's like really quick, no excuse to break, really. And should be like sub eight minutes.

• 33:22Tim Briggs?

  This is what we call sport as well.

• 33:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, so we call this sport because like playing CrossFit, but that, because in the open, typically workouts are between five minutes and 20 minutes long.

• 33:30Tim Briggs?

  I was gonna say, so.

• 33:31Speaker 01

  So, so, so, so we, we treat that to a mixed modality, four to like five to, I think there was a workout that was five minutes clean in Jerks, wasn't there?

• 33:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 33:40Speaker 01

  The 70 kilos, like.

• 33:41Speaker 02

  2010, 2011.

• 33:43Speaker 01

  First over. And then workouts typically now like 20 minutes kind of vibes. Um.

• 33:47Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 33:48Speaker 01

  These are where you're like 80%, you're working aerobically. I think if you go like into anaerobic in those workouts, that's when you've gone off too quick and you spend the next.

• 33:55Tim Briggs?

  So if this one, the ones where pacing would be super.

• 33:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, this would be good, but obviously, but then you're not going to be pacing if you get to a barbell. And it's at 80% of your warm up max clean, because you're doing a sport that's, you know, they've scaled it away, aimed at a half, like, you know, the top tier athlete.

• 34:11Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 34:12Speaker 01

  All of a sudden, you're going to hit that barbell and you're not going to be tapping into the same energy system as the big, strong guy who's got 120 kilo snatch. You know, you're going to be tapping into something a little bit different. The workout's going to feel different. You know, that's when it's like game overtime. And then we've got our aerobic development work. So that's pure aerobic. That's our, um, Jane Fonda long workouts, kind of like, you know.

• 34:34Tim Briggs?

  Long the knee on.

• 34:34Speaker 01

  Big long runs and things like that. So we've got these domains that we're hitting all the time. So to say pacing is, is relevant to where you are. Does that make sense?

• 34:42Tim Briggs?

  Yes. And that's when we program as well, like with what we program that we do, um, we just have like a tick list. Yeah. We just tick one of those off.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:52Tim Briggs?

  Depending on the periodization of the year. Now we're getting into the sport. Neck of the woods with the open seven, eight weeks away.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  So we're totally biasing that like 80 minute work, that 12 minute, that 20 minute work.

• 35:03Chris Williamson?

  Cause that's zeroing people in.

• 35:05Speaker 01

  Well, that's because, that's because we're approaching the open now. We're approaching for the people we're working with who have like decided that they're competitors.

• 35:10Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 35:11Speaker 01

  They're the people where they're like, okay, you guys need to be practicing your sport. We need to be working in that domain that you're going to be using because we get you to just before the open and we've never had you hitting that high end like aerobic work. And you don't know what that feels like. Then you know, you're going to go into the open, super wrapped up, super excited on Friday night live. So everyone cheering for you. You're going to try and beat Jordan. You're going to get the deadlift before him before you hear it, you know?

• 35:36Chris Williamson?

  I think what's really interesting point you said there about the multiple body types thing. And I think this is what for me makes it a really interesting spectacled sport. That it kind of feels, you know, a little bit like when you used to play Mortal Kombat at Tekken and everyone had their special move. Each, each character had their own special move that they came in. So each character was equal and also unequal in different ways. And I think that watching the games and watching it generally as a sport and also even you have the guys in the gym. There's the levels of, there's the characters within the gyms, within everyone's local affiliate that have got these, oh, he's the strong guy. He's the.

• 36:11Tim Briggs?

  Burping ninja, yeah.

• 36:12Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, you know, I mean, he's the, he's the gymnastics, yeah, for sure.

• 36:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:16Chris Williamson?

  And I think what's really, really interesting is the fact that you have these people, because the sport is still relatively young. That are coming to it from so many different disciplines that some people have got unfair advantages in some areas. That lead to chronic weaknesses in others.

• 36:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:31Chris Williamson?

  And so at the moment, like, you know, watching Zach George, who is a UK athlete that's winning sort of local comps at the moment. But he's fucking huge. He must be what 220, 230 pounds, something like that.

• 36:44Speaker 01

  I think he's like 100 kilos, big lad.

• 36:46Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, he's got to be 100 kilos.

• 36:48Speaker 01

  But he's tall, he's tall as well though. So he's like got long limbs. So things like handstand pushups and stuff, they're not going to be great for him.

• 36:54Tim Briggs?

  I'm going to put this out there. We programmed a workout at the comp. He, he was at last. It was um weighted bar muscle ups with a vest.

• 37:03Chris Williamson?

  Yes.

• 37:04Tim Briggs?

  I still cannot do one of these.

• 37:07Tim Briggs?

  Throw that out there as well.

• 37:08Chris Williamson?

  I've done this sport for like six years.

• 37:10Speaker 01

  And I've done one.

• 37:10Tim Briggs?

  He's done one.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  Ever.

• 37:12Tim Briggs?

  This, this, this, this lad put one on and I stood, stood to the side. I was thinking, fuck, fuck. It's not gonna make nine unbroken.

• 37:21Chris Williamson?

  Shit.

• 37:22Tim Briggs?

  With the best, so that say he's a hundred kilo, so that's one ten.

• 37:26Speaker 02

  Strong boy?

• 37:27Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, strong boy, so.

• 37:28Chris Williamson?

  So, so here, here, here was my point, right? That we've got these people that are coming into the sport from multiple different disciplines.

• 37:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:35Chris Williamson?

  As the sport develops, what's going to happen is that people are no longer going to be transitioning from a background. Their background is going to be CrossFit. There's now a, like a under fourteen's club, basically, there's like a juniors at the Games.

• 37:48Speaker 02

  Like, well, to, to touch on that, like, I did strength and depth earlier in the year with Reebok. There was a guy, a young lad who we competed with called Reece Mitchell, who went to the Games. I think he's in the four, fifteen to sixteen age category, I think. I think he came second or third.

• 38:03Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 38:04Speaker 02

  Legit, like ridiculous, like thirty-three bar muscle ups, unbroken, like snatches seventy kilos, cleaning jerks, one oh five, sixteen. Like, when I was sixteen, I was like running, just running, you know, this kid's got like so much potential to get to where he wants to be. But he's also so far ahead of like loads of CrossFitters, you know, you think about.

• 38:25Chris Williamson?

  Normal guys, yeah.

• 38:26Speaker 02

  About people in the gym. You know, someone in our gym was snatching seventy kilos and cleaning jerk, one oh five, a pretty decent athlete, you know, got pretty good capabilities. This kid's sixteen, so imagine what he's gonna be like when he's my age.

• 38:37Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 38:37Speaker 02

  He's twenty-five.

• 38:38Tim Briggs?

  What you've got to think about coaching as well, like when I started eighteen, it was just jump up and do it. I'm sure it was the same with you guys, it was more just go do it.

• 38:46Speaker 02

  When I look back, yeah.

• 38:47Tim Briggs?

  Now, now the coaching above this guy is just huge. Like he'll have a dedicated Olympic weightlifting coach, his CrossFit coach, he'll have programming on the side, he'll have everything on the plate for him.

• 38:58Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 38:58Tim Briggs?

  Which is gonna make him even better.

• 39:00Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 39:01Speaker 02

  I mean, I think back to some of the stuff that I used to make Paul do, oh my God, I'm surprised I'm still alive.

• 39:06Chris Williamson?

  So this was something else that I wanted to really touch on, so I've seen like some, some of your Throwback Thursday images and stuff from like two thousand and ten. Can you give me a rundown of some of the most CrossFit stuff or some of the most stupid CrossFit stuff you've done? Because what's happened now, it feels like two thousand seventeen, two thousand eighteen, where the sport's in maturity now.

• 39:28Chris Williamson?

  Feels like the sport's in maturity.

• 39:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:30Chris Williamson?

  And although that's fantastic, because you can live stream the games on Facebook and it's it looks like the Olympics. And there's a, I'm sure that there will be a full opening ceremony pretty soon, there's gonna have to be. Do you know what I mean? Like, there's gonna be all manner of different bits and pieces. But what you don't get are the mad funny shit mistakes.

• 39:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:49Chris Williamson?

  That occur during the adolescence of a sport.

• 39:52Speaker 01

  I think, I think we were super lucky. We were super lucky that you, no, like you met like.

• 40:00Speaker 01

  No, we were pretty lucky, cause like, you know, the stupid stuff we've done, we did it ourselves.

• 40:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm actually pretty like, I've, I've been really lucky that I've been surrounded by a lot of really good people. So like, I had a coach called Carl Stedman. I had him for like four, I think he was my coach, like four and a half years.

• 40:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:14Speaker 02

  Him and James Jowsey, both super knowledgeable guys. I learned a load of stuff off them too. And that has helped me so much, like a lot. Like, one thing I was gonna say was, I used to just think that more was better. Like, the more you did, the better you'd be.

• 40:30Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 40:30Speaker 02

  And then I remember like.

• 40:31Chris Williamson?

  Volume, volume is volume.

• 40:32Speaker 02

  Volume, volume is king. And I remember like, probably about six years ago now, Carl said it was like, more isn't better, more's just more.

• 40:39Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 40:39Speaker 02

  Like, intensity always trumps volume. So you're better doing less well than doing loads crap.

• 40:45Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 40:45Speaker 02

  And that was one thing that stuck with me for like quite a, well, a long time. And, but I mean, I think back to some of the stuff that I used to do, like, I don't know how I did it.

• 40:53Chris Williamson?

  So tell, tell, tell me, tell me, tell me some of the, the stupid CrossFit stuff, tell us that.

• 40:57Speaker 02

  I did like all of the girls in one day. So there's like fifteen female workouts. So it's like Nancy, I'm a, uh, Nancy, Kelly, all those things. Did them all in one day.

• 41:06Chris Williamson?

  How much work, volume was that?

• 41:08Speaker 02

  Made too much. It's like a thousand pull-ups, like ridiculous.

• 41:11Chris Williamson?

  So I was like twelve hours?

• 41:12Speaker 02

  Like all day. Yeah, I was, I just started doing all day. It was just stupid.

• 41:16Speaker 01

  By yourself?

• 41:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was on my, on my own. I'd, I mean, my.

• 41:19Chris Williamson?

  So no one doing it with you?

• 41:20Speaker 02

  I'm sure I've seen you do a lot.

• 41:21Speaker 01

  I think I had three members at the time. Did you do, did you say I was doing one every hour or something?

• 41:25Speaker 02

  I did one every, I can't remember. It was like one every hour. All the short ones, I think I did every half an hour. So like Grace, Isabelle, stuff like that. Um.

• 41:31Chris Williamson?

  And this isn't, this isn't the.

• 41:32Speaker 02

  I mean, just for the crack?

• 41:33Chris Williamson?

  Literally just because.

• 41:34Speaker 02

  Just for the crack, yeah.

• 41:35Chris Williamson?

  Did you, did you and Alex Younger not do a ridiculous number of burpees once?

• 41:39Speaker 02

  Did a thousand. Tim does that every year.

• 41:42Speaker 01

  Four years running, mate.

• 41:42Speaker 02

  Tim does it every year, Christmas Eve.

• 41:44Chris Williamson?

  You did a thousand burpees on Christmas Eve?

• 41:46Speaker 01

  Christmas Day, this time.

• 41:47Chris Williamson?

  Christmas too.

• 41:48Speaker 01

  Let me look back a post.

• 41:50Speaker 02

  Me and Alex did it on Christmas Eve once, um but I mean we've done some

• 41:53Tim Briggs?

  That, that, that Clovis was retarded.

• 41:55Speaker 02

  Me and Paul and Alex Murdaugh did um half marathon row, straight into Clovis. Clovis is a ten mile run, hundred and fifty burpees pull ups.

• 42:04Tim Briggs?

  That was pretty bad.

• 42:04Chris Williamson?

  Unpartitioned as well.

• 42:06Speaker 02

  No, I, I did it unpartitioned, Paul did it partitioned, Alex did it partitioned. How far to, how far to half marathon row? Uh.

• 42:13Tim Briggs?

  Twenty one ninety seven.

• 42:14Speaker 02

  Twenty one ninety seven, yeah, there you go, twenty one thousand ninety seven meters. So that took like an hour and twenty five or whatever.

• 42:20Tim Briggs?

  We did bring a TV into the gym and we watched, we watched Galaxy, Galaxy while I was doing it.

• 42:24Chris Williamson?

  Finished it.

• 42:25Speaker 02

  But that was great, but then when you go on a ten mile run, obviously you're hanging out your arse.

• 42:28Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 42:28Speaker 02

  Cause you've just rode half marathon, um.

• 42:31Tim Briggs?

  Someone saw me running down the street and started saying that you, you went well. So I had to listen like, like about eight miles in. And then I had to go sit in, I sat in the office for ten minutes and I ate all the battle hot bars and then ran back out.

• 42:43Speaker 02

  Alex Murdaugh came in, got in the shower, we had one shower at the old place, just sat in the shower with the hot water on him. And then realised he didn't bring a towel, so had to dry himself a blue robe. Complete state.

• 42:53Chris Williamson?

  Well, I'm glad, I'm glad to see, me and some of the guys who went to Vegas, my business partner Stagdo, and we created, or we thought we created, the sit down shower there.

• 43:02Tim Briggs?

  Oh, I do this a lot, mate.

• 43:04Chris Williamson?

  The sit down shower, it would appear, is so versatile.

• 43:07Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 43:07Chris Williamson?

  It is applicable for Vegas hangovers.

• 43:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:11Chris Williamson?

  For doing half marathon rowing, stupid, stupid CrossFit workout. I mean, if, if anyone is feeling bad at the moment, all they need to do is sit down shower. And then you can level up from that, which is the lie down shower, but it needs to be face down.

• 43:24Tim Briggs?

  Face down, which end?

• 43:26Chris Williamson?

  Face down, so you can get the shower on the back of your head, face down, face down shower.

• 43:30Tim Briggs?

  Isn't that a level of torture?

• 43:32Chris Williamson?

  No, no, it's not hitting me in the face, you're face down, face down.

• 43:35Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, yeah, but I'm sure that's.

• 43:37Chris Williamson?

  It's fine, it's fine, don't worry, it's, it's nice.

• 43:39Speaker 02

  It's strange, man.

• 43:39Chris Williamson?

  It's nice. Did you do your, did you do your burpees?

• 43:42Tim Briggs?

  One, one hour, three minutes, forty seven minutes. I can't believe you couldn't have took three minutes off that. That's the slowest I've ever done it.

• 43:49Chris Williamson?

  It is.

• 43:51Tim Briggs?

  I've, I've gone, I've got like a, I've, I've got less fit every year.

• 43:54Speaker 02

  Don't be like one day. Put it in perspective.

• 43:58Chris Williamson?

  Think about your training methodology, coach, your traditional advisor.

• 44:02Tim Briggs?

  We've got worse, everyone's got worse.

• 44:04Chris Williamson?

  Wow.

• 44:05Tim Briggs?

  Stupidest thing I've ever done is um trying to do a clapping, strict handstand push up.

• 44:16Tim Briggs?

  Nearly made it mate. Nearly made it.

• 44:21Chris Williamson?

  A clubbing strict handstand push-up, but I'm sure that everyone can imagine what happens when you don't make that.

• 44:28Tim Briggs?

  Oh, there's the element of risk involved.

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Oh, it's broken neck if you don't do it right.

• 44:31Chris Williamson?

  It's you're landing on your head.

• 44:33Tim Briggs?

  I'm pretty sure I lost an inch of height.

• 44:37Speaker 02

  I'm speaking now as well.

• 44:38Tim Briggs?

  We've been lucky, I think like injuries and stuff in the gym have been minimum.

• 44:42Speaker 02

  Minimum, yeah, we've been like, CrossFit does get a really bad name for like injuries and stuff, but I think it's like anything, like any training in the gym, like I could take you to any commercial gym and show you loads of crap PTs who don't know what they're doing.

• 44:55Tim Briggs?

  People wearing braces, left grand centre as well.

• 44:58Speaker 02

  It's the same with CrossFit, like there will be coaches out there that are crap, but you're gonna get that in everything. We like to think that we're decent, we're good, you know, um, obviously there's always things that we can improve on, but we try and do our best with everything and I think we do a good job, but.

• 45:14Chris Williamson?

  I'd agree.

• 45:14Speaker 02

  It's just, it gets a bad name through.

• 45:17Chris Williamson?

  So here's my sort of two pence on it, as someone who's now been in the sport for a year and I did around about 10 months ago, so just as the open started, after I'd been doing it for two months, I went and did a podcast with the guys from Proper Fitness.

• 45:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:29Chris Williamson?

  And we kind of reassessed everything from there.

• 45:32Speaker 02

  Chris Fit, yeah, that's where Chris Fit was.

• 45:33Chris Williamson?

  That was where Chris Fit was born.

• 45:35Speaker 02

  Chris Fit was born.

• 45:36Chris Williamson?

  I'm really tempted to call this one Chris Fit, but we'll see.

• 45:38Speaker 02

  I think you should.

• 45:38Chris Williamson?

  Um, and.

• 45:40Tim Briggs?

  Rename your podcast, mate.

• 45:41Chris Williamson?

  Just Chris Fit. I'm so tempted, you know.

• 45:43Speaker 02

  Just do it.

• 45:45Chris Williamson?

  Anyway, so I went in and they, as a bodybuilding and powerlifting background, a bunch of questions and you, you are right that CrossFit gets such a bad rep and we tried to dissolve down what it is that we think makes CrossFit first so polarising in terms of opinion and then kind of what, what gets it a bad reputation and.

• 46:09Chris Williamson?

  We came with a number of conclusions. One of them is the fact that I think a lot of people that go to the gym now, especially the guys that are in global gyms, they're conflating an interest in exercise and sport and fitness with going and doing bodybuilding. They think that the only thing that they can do is to go in and do the curls and do the rest of it. Because that has been the prevailing training methodology for the last thirty years. And the other side of that which makes it super attractive is it's got mega low barriers to entry. So I'll bring this back to my industry. It's like club nights. If you have a thousand pounds and a DJ and a venue that's prepared to let you in, you now have a business. Like you cannot go and start the new iPhone with a thousand pounds and a contact of someone who wants to license you.

• 46:54Chris Williamson?

  Whereas you can go in with a PT for five minutes in a global gym and you can master a super native bicep cut to eighty percent of the the uh standard that someone has been doing for three years can do. However, when you go into a CrossFit gym and someone says, right, okay, we're going to try and do a snatch. And it is such a technically complex movement that the barriers to entry are so high that people's egos get shot down very quickly. People don't like to go and do things that they're bad at, right? They don't want to go in and have uh do something that's difficult. They're they're happy with difficult, but within the parameters of not necessarily feeling silly, feeling like it's unachievable.

• 47:30Speaker 02

  I think a lot of that though comes down to there's several factors. So first of all, the person's attitude. If you've got an ego, CrossFit's probably not the right sport for them. If you've got an ego where they where they think that they should be able to do everything, that's never gonna happen. Look at Olympic lifting. There's people who just do those two lifts, snatch and clean and jerk. They spend their entire life getting better at the snatch and the clean and jerk.

• 47:53Chris Williamson?

  From the age of like four as well.

• 47:54Speaker 02

  Perfect. So how does Jimmy, who's fifty three and an accountant, think he's gonna walk in and be perfect at that snatch? It's not gonna happen. You've got to accept that you're never gonna be, you're never gonna be perfect at it. Like I've been doing it, what, nearly eight years now? My clean jerk and my snatch, still crap. You know what I mean, still needs work, everything does.

• 48:11Chris Williamson?

  I think that, I think that that's, that's what's interesting, the fact that, uh, I think there's a CrossFit documentary from like two thousand and fourteen. And I can't remember who the narrator is, I want to attempt to say it's a voiceover from Dave Castro where he says that very, very soon we're gonna see someone who's got like a five hundred pound deadlift and a sub five minute mile and this and the this and the this and the this. And what he's explaining is the fact that the sport in terms of progression for athletes reaching their ceiling is still in its infancy.

• 48:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:35Chris Williamson?

  Which, which, which I would absolutely agree with. Um, but yeah, I think the, that, that was one of the first things that I was like, I, I think that it gets a little bit of a bad rep or from some people because it's daunting. Because there's a sense of elitism associated with the people that can do it because there's a little bit of jealousy. And there's this, there's a, quite rightly, like if someone can walk into a gym and do a muscle up. And you've been training bro splits for six years. And all you can do is a really well consol- controlled eccentric on a seat into like shoulder press.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:10Chris Williamson?

  There is an, an element of you thinking, you fucking can't, like you look cool.

• 49:14Speaker 02

  That looks good.

• 49:15Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, that looks cool and irrelevant of how you look.

• 49:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:18Chris Williamson?

  You're like, fuck, that looks like, that looks really cool. And you know what it is, for me to, to look at CrossFit as a training methodology, last year if you told me at the start of the year that I would have seen the progress I saw physically from a bodybuilding program.

• 49:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:32Chris Williamson?

  I would have told you that you were lying.

• 49:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:34Chris Williamson?

  And I don't know exactly what it is that was the difference because I've been training for ten years before that. Round about in varying degrees of, um, cerebralness and getting it wrong an awful lot. But you know, I mean, you, you, you, there's a weight in your hand and you're going, you're going and lifting things moderately regularly and you're trying to eat some protein. Like it just gets.

• 49:54Speaker 02

  Bro-scented.

• 49:55Chris Williamson?

  Bro-scented.

• 49:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:55Chris Williamson?

  Moderately better as you move towards it a little bit and. I think what was interesting was that you now have formalized progressive overload. You have a formalized amount of intensity. Like you have in a basket, all of the things that everyone's trying to achieve on the other side of the gym in any case.

• 50:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think like our gym in particular is quite a good example of it because we have obviously like three areas of our gyms. We have our global gym, our regular gym, the boxing, we also have our bootcamp area, which is like, you know, it's like CrossFit but not as much, kind of, yeah, not as much like complex movements. So we're not doing.

• 50:34Chris Williamson?

  So pretty simple.

• 50:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, we're not doing sexy cleaning jokes, not doing kitten muscle ups and stuff like that. But if you look, the CrossFitters look the best. They do. The lads are big, they're shredded, they're jacked. And they're not doing bicep curls like the guys in the global gym. Um, but they look the best and ultimately that's everyone's goal. Everyone wants to look good.

• 50:55Chris Williamson?

  Man.

• 50:56Speaker 01

  And the guys who were sneaking in the bicep curls and they're better than, like, too much bench press. The guy who was still CrossFitters are the guys who come in and they're sulking because the snatch is a shit.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  And they can't do muscle ups.

• 51:06Speaker 01

  You literally go up to them and you're just like, dude, you've been bodybuilding, haven't you? And he's like, oh, well, you know, just a little bit, just a little bit. And it's always the same thing. And like, that doesn't mean they can't be compatible. You know, there's a lot of people who are doing that now and that's like the new trendy thing, isn't it? It's like everyone's like.

• 51:21Chris Williamson?

  Functional bodybuilding. Well, I mean, there's, you know, look at, look at, um, fruit strength, fruit body program. That's been really popular. Yeah. Um. Mark's feeling.

• 51:30Speaker 01

  I just think as well, that's like the evolution of that is that people have, are starting to admit that the fact, it's okay again to say that I want to look good.

• 51:38Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  Because I think over like CrossFit and like people working their way through CrossFit, I think a lot of people were, I haven't quite nailed it all yet. And a lot of people were like, oh, I don't look good, but I'm fitter than you. Oh, I don't look great. And I think, and I think, and I think now.

• 51:50Chris Williamson?

  What's your front end?

• 51:51Speaker 01

  I think now a lot of people are saying, look, like, maybe I don't need to be, maybe I'm not going to be like rich front end. And maybe I need to just step back on the volume and I do want to just look better and functional. But I still want to train and I still want to actually be able to do the bullshit.

• 52:07Chris Williamson?

  You're able to capitalize on the methodology whilst not wanting or necessarily having to have the competition. Like outside of necessarily a class, like within class to class, it'd be competitive.

• 52:16Speaker 02

  That's also a common misconception, I think, with CrossFit. Everyone thinks it's competitive. It's not. It's only competitive if you want it to be competitive. If you. Do a Chris Williamson and give a Big Licks, it's gonna be, I'm only joking, I'm only joking. But no, if you, if you want it to be competitive, you know, and you seek out like any competitions, you can make it competitive, but if you just wanna turn up, train and go home. It can't just be that as well.

• 52:41Chris Williamson?

  That's why we don't let people look at the whiteboard either.

• 52:43Speaker 02

  And that's why we don't post workouts like the night before, because we don't want people being like, oh, tomorrow I'm gonna smash on that workout. It's like, turn up, do the classic.

• 52:50Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 52:51Speaker 02

  That's it.

• 52:51Chris Williamson?

  No, I understand.

• 52:52Speaker 02

  And also nobody cherry picks a workout anymore.

• 52:54Chris Williamson?

  I agree. And so, yeah, I think, I think what's really, really interesting is that you've got this, you've got this training methodology which appears to be producing guys that have got bodies year round that are better than the physique competitors, or at least on part. The only difference is the fact that they maybe need to go through, like to step on stage, if you had to take...

• 53:13Tim Briggs?

  Just need a water cut.

• 53:14Chris Williamson?

  Just literally, you literally need to do a little bit.

• 53:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, James Scott.

• 53:18Tim Briggs?

  James Scott is probably four weeks out all year round.

• 53:20Speaker 02

  But he's like out, ain't he?

• 53:23Speaker 02

  If you talk to him, if you talk to him.

• 53:29Speaker 02

  Boy shredded. I mean, like Lauren, for example. So when Lauren came and trained with us, like, what, eighteen months ago, she literally just got off the back of doing all the bikini stuff on stage. She's in good nick, don't get me wrong, but she was lean, but she was like weak. She wasn't weak, but she was nowhere near where she is now. She's lean all the time, she's a lot stronger. Yeah, she looks jacked, in a good way, but you know, like, she looks better now than what she did then, and she's not even doing a physique sport now.

• 53:56Chris Williamson?

  So look at, look at someone like Dan Bailey, like if you peeled Dan Bailey down a little bit and did a two, and did a two month cut on him, a hard two month cut, he would step on stage, he'd step on stage at classic bodybuilding. He wouldn't step, he'd be too big to step on stage at physique.

• 54:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:09Chris Williamson?

  And you're like...

• 54:10Tim Briggs?

  I think many people are like that now.

• 54:12Chris Williamson?

  And this guy is well renowned as the fastest man in CrossFit at the moment, in terms of like straight line speed over short distance.

• 54:18Speaker 01

  The memes are still, CrossFitters lose your gains. Like, do you know what I mean, which is...

• 54:23Chris Williamson?

  So here's the thing, right, this is what we drilled it down to. There is not a brand. Behind push pull leg split. No. No one hashtags. Push pull. Push pull legs today. Yeah. Like in the Instagram thing and people love to hate on something that has an identity. Yes. And this is, this is what we think it is. And it's different as well. It is, it is different and yeah, like it's, it's definitely high visibility. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like people can see when you're doing it and the clothes. Even by Reebok, neon.

• 54:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, people buy it as well. Like people love it, but people love it because it's cool. It looks good.

• 54:59Speaker 01

  But it, it, it came from as well, though, the whole thing, like, like they totally caught the wave, right? I mean, they've been doing it a really long time, but with the social media thing.

• 55:06Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 55:06Speaker 01

  So they did it all, all their websites went, all this went online. Think you found it out through like a chat room or whatever.

• 55:12Speaker 02

  I found it out through, I found it out through, um, I just went online.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, but chat rooms and stuff, wasn't it? Like those people were talking about. So all this stuff, so all, so all this stuff happened. And, and off the back of that, that means that a lot of people post stupid shit on Instagram and tagging in CrossFit.

• 55:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 55:26Speaker 01

  Do you know what I mean? And, and then all of a sudden that's the stuff that gets the attention.

• 55:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 55:30Speaker 01

  Do you know what I mean? Not the, not the thousands of okay but mediocre, like loaded snatches that like people have done really well on or PB'd or improved their technique. But the one where the last gets a ponytail caught in it and gets dragged across the gym.

• 55:42Speaker 02

  Like CrossFit now are doing a really good job. I think of bringing that perception of it back around. So they're not really on, on crossfit.com now posting like elite level CrossFitters. They're posting your everyday CrossFitters.

• 55:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:54Speaker 02

  They're posting, like I said, Jimmy who's 53.

• 55:56Chris Williamson?

  Very, very inclusive, isn't it?

• 55:58Speaker 02

  Who sits at a desk like for eight hours and then goes and does a little workout. That, that's what they're posting now. So it's making it, it, it's showing people that it is accessible. And that, that it is achievable for them to be able to like go and do a class. Whereas in the past, it all used to just be, um.

• 56:14Chris Williamson?

  Games, games.

• 56:14Speaker 02

  Games, games, games athletes.

• 56:16Chris Williamson?

  Elite, elite guys. And again, look at what we're talking about now. It wouldn't surprise me. In, in five or 10 years' time, could you see there being different stratas of CrossFit gyms? Would there be ones where you've got the guys that are. CrossFit compete kind of thing. CrossFit physique, do you know what I mean? Like CrossFit house and stuff or maybe classes that are, you know, you guys at Reebok CrossFit Tyneside have got gun club, right?

• 56:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:35Chris Williamson?

  We know which is, which, which is like a. Sort of hypertrophy based eight to twelve, fourteen rep kind of, but still using the methodology, right?

• 56:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:43Chris Williamson?

  And still kind of like compoundy, functionally, stuff like that. It's definitely less functional. Yeah.

• 56:51Chris Williamson?

  You know what I mean, like.

• 56:51Speaker 02

  I think he picks up off, up off the ground, that's about the only functional thing.

• 56:54Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. Then you curl it whilst looking at your body.

• 56:58Speaker 02

  Only good curls for an hour, that's it, just curls.

• 57:00Chris Williamson?

  I mean, that's. With an arm wraps at CrossFit.

• 57:05Chris Williamson?

  Arm wrap.

• 57:06Speaker 02

  Terrible.

• 57:07Speaker 01

  It's a massive community, there's gonna be people in it that you don't like, or people whose opinions people don't agree with.

• 57:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  And, and whether you jump on board, I mean, I can imagine PT, some PTs, I mean, not so much now, you know. We went and did a weekend course, that's always a big deal on everyone, as if, as if the personal trainer course is that fucking difficult either, do you know what I mean, like. People just pick up on these things, oh, well, they've opened up a gym, and yeah, we're like, yeah, we opened up a gym, or Jordan opened up a gym. And then we spent the next seven or eight years going on every course, I mean, every single coach, like travelling, like working with people, working with people at a high level to get where we are. Do you know what I mean, and, and you know, and you did a level whatever PT a couple of years ago.

• 57:44Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 57:44Speaker 01

  And you're still jerking yourself off over it, like, sit back in your box, mate.

• 57:48Chris Williamson?

  He's, he's, we warmed him up now.

• 57:54Chris Williamson?

  Just to lit the fuse.

• 57:55Speaker 02

  I think that's a, that's a good point as well that Paul's brought up there, which I was gonna, I was actually gonna mention earlier, which he's reminded us of, is. Like, with CrossFit now, there's so many different certifications that you can do, certification for everything. Doesn't that mean physiological certification, there's the weightlifting certification, there's, you know, kettlebells, nutrition, there's all this stuff. That a load of CrossFit coaches are going and doing, like, I'm not saying that there isn't, but there's not many PTs who work in the commercial sector. Who are going away on weekends and doing extra courses.

• 58:25Chris Williamson?

  Like once they get their level three.

• 58:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, they just stick there. Actually spending money on learning and getting better.

• 58:30Chris Williamson?

  I think the fa, I think the fact of the matter is that most of the, um, most of the guys that are doing the PT stuff have got one thing on their minds. And that is, I need to maximize the money that I can make.

• 58:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, it's money.

• 58:41Chris Williamson?

  How can I, how can I get as much as possible for as little as possible?

• 58:44Speaker 01

  Well, I think that's gonna be anyone in any job, there's gonna be those people, cause that's. It's like saying that PTs are bad because like there's some incredible, we're lucky enough to work with people who aren't CrossFit coaches who bloody good at being incredible PTs.

• 58:54Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 58:55Speaker 01

  But, you know, we're lucky as well that they're around us, so they're more open minded about what we do.

• 58:59Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 58:59Speaker 01

  They know that we've got our jam and they know that they've got their jam.

• 59:02Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 59:02Speaker 01

  And if I wanted to go do a physique type thing or a bodybuilding thing, then, you know, those are the guys.

• 59:06Speaker 02

  I'm sure I saw a video of you doing curls.

• 59:08Speaker 01

  Oh, there was a guy.

• 59:09Speaker 02

  Flies.

• 59:10Speaker 01

  They were fly.

• 59:10Speaker 02

  Flies. Getting coached through flies, you know, some boy.

• 59:16Speaker 01

  Um, but, um, you know, that's people who are going to be good at it, uh, whatever they do.

• 59:19Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 59:20Speaker 01

  And I just think, you know, you can't, every, Goss CrossFit's got a brand, it's easy to just tie everyone underneath that.

• 59:26Chris Williamson?

  Exactly, man.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  And that's, that's the good and the bad.

• 59:28Chris Williamson?

  There's not a push pull leg.

• 59:29Speaker 01

  You're right.

• 59:29Chris Williamson?

  That someone can tag it on.

• 59:31Tim Briggs?

  Shall we just put it down there? Shall we make one?

• 59:33Chris Williamson?

  Of push pull legs.

• 59:34Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, it's just a more around the table.

• 59:36Speaker 02

  Balance domain now.

• 59:37Tim Briggs?

  Let's get it.

• 59:38Speaker 01

  PPL.

• 59:39Chris Williamson?

  PPL dot com. I'm going to guess that a typical CrossFit membership is probably somewhere between fifty and seventy pounds a month.

• 59:46Speaker 01

  Uh, well, I mean, it depends where you are.

• 59:48Chris Williamson?

  Oh, yeah, so, so.

• 59:49Speaker 02

  That's a, that's a good thing to say. So like we, when we first opened our membership, it was forty quid. Now it's eighty quid.

• 59:55Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 59:55Speaker 02

  Because times have changed, we're offering more services, there's more competitors where, you know, we're still, we're still reasonably priced with it, within.

• 1:00:02Tim Briggs?

  There's investment in the gym as well.

• 1:00:04Speaker 02

  You know.

• 1:00:04Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, all you get with a payback with stuff like that.

• 1:00:06Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:00:06Chris Williamson?

  My point is that for, for that, even at the absolute top end, like even if it was a hundred pounds, that's three hours of PT.

• 1:00:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:12Tim Briggs?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:13Chris Williamson?

  And when you think of the service that you can get in comparison to someone. Yeah, exactly.

• 1:00:17Speaker 02

  Every day.

• 1:00:18Chris Williamson?

  And I think, you know, this is, uh, this shouldn't sing like a sort of CrossFit is the end, the, the, the only solution to the problem of trying to get yourself fitted. But I do think that there's a number of elements in there, external accountability, a level of intensity that you do not get when you sit in the gym. And the, the, the, the main thing for me, or one of the main things for me is that when you see a global gym now, having been in a CrossFit side for so long, you realise that someone's stepped into a gym, but their headphones in on their own. Even if they've got a training partner, their headphones are in while they're doing a set. They're sat looking in the mirror at themselves.

• 1:00:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:55Chris Williamson?

  Lifting weights, seeping in their own neuroses. Like, just wallowing in it. And you just think. Bro, like it doesn't have to be this way, like it genuinely does not have to be this way. Not only can you achieve more in less time.

• 1:01:09Speaker 02

  That's exactly what I was gonna say, it's the time, in and out within an hour. Joe Public is in and out within an hour, even like competitive athletes that we have at the gym, they're not in there for longer than like two hours, two and a half hours, maybe he's had a push.

• 1:01:22Tim Briggs?

  And there's a bit of showing there.

• 1:01:25Speaker 02

  You know, like I've watched people in our gym who come in and train on like the global side, they've been there for three hours, I'm like, what are you doing? Three hours?

• 1:01:34Tim Briggs?

  A long time.

• 1:01:37Chris Williamson?

  It just say, I don't know, like it seems like there there must be a paradigm shift coming soon, as far as I'm concerned. And I think one of the things is that you had the Z era that, I don't even know, Paul, were you ever?

• 1:01:48Speaker 02

  What's Z era?

• 1:01:49Tim Briggs?

  Oh mate, I kinda know what this is.

• 1:01:50Chris Williamson?

  Right, okay, so there was a guy, there was a guy called Aziz Shavirishan, um, who was an Aussie fitness model.

• 1:02:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:01Chris Williamson?

  Um, dude, he was really charismatic, had a big YouTube channel, and was like, fucking cool guy.

• 1:02:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Chris Williamson?

  Shredded a bit, but was the the ultimate bro, like the tiny shorts, the stringer vest.

• 1:02:13Tim Briggs?

  Was he, was he nothing?

• 1:02:14Chris Williamson?

  But this is this whole sort of, like, not your bodybuilding.com forums, like he made his name on bodybuilding.com like forums and there's memes and all the rest of the stuff and bits and pieces. Sadly, he died actually like five years ago. Um, and, but that was the beginning of like the aesthetics bro era, like the.

• 1:02:32Tim Briggs?

  Kind of coming back around as well.

• 1:02:34Speaker 02

  Also as well, it's it is trendy to be in good shape now, like things like, like you can hammer Jordy Shaw as much as you want. Things like Jordy Shaw, all the lads on there, good with Nick, now everybody wants to be in good shape, it's trendy to be in good shape.

• 1:02:46Tim Briggs?

  But when you look at clothes, you get muscle fit clothes.

• 1:02:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:49Tim Briggs?

  Or everywhere.

• 1:02:49Speaker 02

  The whole, I think the paradi-, I think you're right, I think the paradigm is shifting, but not just in like fitness, in like culturally as well, like it's now frowned upon to be out of shape.

• 1:02:59Chris Williamson?

  Absolutely, absolutely is. So I think one of the things to bring that back around again is that those guys that were watching Z and were like part of this whole like tiny shorts, stringer vest, bum bag, like muzzing, dancing on the beach.

• 1:03:12Tim Briggs?

  Nothing wrong with that.

• 1:03:13Chris Williamson?

  Gabberdy and B stuff.

• 1:03:14Tim Briggs?

  Nothing wrong with that.

• 1:03:15Chris Williamson?

  I literally don't understand a single word you said.

• 1:03:17Speaker 02

  That's Tim 2009.

• 1:03:19Chris Williamson?

  I mean, Tim 2009.

• 1:03:20Tim Briggs?

  Calvass 11.

• 1:03:21Chris Williamson?

  Calvass 11.

• 1:03:25Speaker 02

  You know it.

• 1:03:26Speaker 01

  That's what's a legend.

• 1:03:28Speaker 02

  I need to become yours.

• 1:03:29Speaker 01

  Twitter handle Instagram profile.

• 1:03:31Speaker 02

  Twitter handle Cabot11.

• 1:03:33Chris Williamson?

  If you flick down, fire it up, you'll see. Go to media history, man. We'll find someone, put it on the video. And so you had this, you had this kind of era of guys, that was me, right? So that was me, twenty two, twenty three years old. That was me, that was, those are the guys I was looking up to. That was the training methodology. I was reading stuff like T Nation, Bodybuilding.com and all the different bits and pieces like that. And then those guys now, as far as I'm concerned, you get to your late twenties and you hit a fitness menopause. And I've been saying this for as long as I can remember now, you start to realise that being lean at all costs is not the only goal in fitness.

• 1:04:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:13Chris Williamson?

  And you start to think, fucking chronically aware of my own mortality as I reach thirty year. Like, I need to be able to bend down and touch my toes.

• 1:04:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:23Chris Williamson?

  I need to be able to get up set of stairs without being out of breath. And it wasn't so long ago that I was reading stuff from guys that are doing comp prep and stuff like that. Almost take pride in their lack of fitness.

• 1:04:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:35Chris Williamson?

  And they're like, oh, it's so funny. Like, I couldn't put my socks on this morning after arms yesterday. And you're like, dude, like, that is, that is, that's not something to be proud of. I'm aware that you, you're, you're wearing that like a badge of honour.

• 1:04:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:49Chris Williamson?

  But is your body telling you that you fucked it?

• 1:04:52Speaker 01

  I don't know. I, I like, I did it. I enjoyed trying to get fit. But when I was in Globe or Gym, I didn't know anything about fitness. I didn't really have the guts to go speak to a member of staff. They were too busy speaking to the girls or the juiced up guys. The juiced up guys were just doing their own thing. I was scared to walk near the weight area. Like, it was, it was terrifying and I was in on my own. The only thing that I had was a copy of like, reading the, waiting for the next issues of Men Fitness or Men's Health to come up to read and like, try and figure out what I'm meant to be doing. Do you know what I mean? It was like, that wasn't social at all. That was pretty lonely.

• 1:05:22Speaker 02

  And that's one thing why I think like CrossFit does so well is because like, you're coming in and you get told what to do. You're not having to go in and think, oh, what am I gonna do today? Am I gonna do back and arms? Or am I gonna do?

• 1:05:32Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:33Speaker 02

  Shoulders and legs or whatever. It's like you come in, you get brought in, you get warmed up. So you're getting a specific warm up for the class that you're gonna do. You then get told what you're gonna do, shoulder movements. You get ran through the class. Everyone gets a high five and they're out the door, like all in an hour.

• 1:05:47Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:47Speaker 02

  So you're getting, you're getting that mega high level of service and you're not having to think about it.

• 1:05:53Chris Williamson?

  I think that's a big, that's definitely a big deal for me that you can talk yourself out of going to the gym an awful lot.

• 1:05:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05:59Chris Williamson?

  Like, you know, talk about with, what do we, January seventh today, like a lot of people will be in the midst.

• 1:06:05Speaker 02

  They've already dropped it.

• 1:06:05Chris Williamson?

  Already broken the New Year's resolution. They'll be in the midst of like first week down.

• 1:06:10Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:06:10Chris Williamson?

  Shit. Like this isn't as easy as I thought it was gonna be. Probably, the problem is, this isn't as fun as I thought it was gonna be.

• 1:06:17Speaker 02

  People probably trained on Monday, they're still sore now.

• 1:06:19Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 1:06:21Speaker 02

  I did some stupid workout that Tim gave me to do on Wednesday. Legs are still sore. So I had like an otho for Christmas.

• 1:06:27Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:27Speaker 02

  So imagine like having.

• 1:06:29Tim Briggs?

  What else was that to do with it?

• 1:06:30Speaker 02

  A lot of bad food. And I went on detox.

• 1:06:35Speaker 02

  Detox has ruined my life.

• 1:06:36Chris Williamson?

  Keto for Christmas?

• 1:06:36Speaker 02

  I went keto after Christmas. It's killed, it's killed us.

• 1:06:38Chris Williamson?

  You went keto?

• 1:06:39Speaker 02

  I didn't go keto. So I didn't go like keto. I basically just ate nuggets. I didn't eat no calories.

• 1:06:48Speaker 02

  But I wasn't eating the stupid high amounts of fat. So I was basically just eating protein.

• 1:06:52Chris Williamson?

  Why?

• 1:06:53Speaker 02

  Uh, and fat.

• 1:06:54Chris Williamson?

  You got fat?

• 1:06:55Speaker 02

  Got fat.

• 1:06:56Chris Williamson?

  Hmm. Jordan Wall has got fat.

• 1:06:57Speaker 02

  Mega fat.

• 1:06:58Chris Williamson?

  Fucking hell.

• 1:06:59Speaker 02

  I mean, I always rock a bit of a dad bod, but I was rocking like super dad bod. So I was like, right, I'm gonna sort it out January first. I'm getting done. So I came in, saw Tim. Tim does all my nutrition. Tim and Paul do all my training. And then I was like, right, Tim, I'm uh, I'm on detox, getting sorted. So that was Tuesday. By Friday, I was like, Tim, I'm off the detox.

• 1:07:20Speaker 02

  I trained on Wednesday and Thursday and I, I, and Friday, couldn't walk.

• 1:07:24Chris Williamson?

  Gassed.

• 1:07:25Speaker 02

  Like broken, like totally broken, just by not eating enough food. So, um, yeah, I'm off the detox. Detox is a bad man. They are.

• 1:07:33Chris Williamson?

  They are bad.

• 1:07:33Speaker 02

  They're not good.

• 1:07:34Chris Williamson?

  But that's, see, again with that, like. I want to do another, another podcast that we focus solely on this, but we can touch on it now. About using performance as, CrossFit being able to use performance as a metric for everything else that you're doing in your life. Because your performance is mitigated by all of the other influences that you have. It's mitigated by your sleep and your diet and your mood and your rest and your mobility and your, everything is tested by it.

• 1:08:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:05Chris Williamson?

  Whereas if you're feeling under the weather, like I, I had that stomach bug at the start of the week and I went in.

• 1:08:13Speaker 01

  Aids.

• 1:08:13Chris Williamson?

  I had full blown.

• 1:08:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:15Chris Williamson?

  Aids.

• 1:08:16Speaker 01

  Let me get one so I see what I'm like.

• 1:08:17Chris Williamson?

  That's true.

• 1:08:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:18Chris Williamson?

  Fuck.

• 1:08:18Speaker 01

  It's in now.

• 1:08:20Chris Williamson?

  Spread it. Spread it. Be a rabbit.

• 1:08:26Chris Williamson?

  When it.

• 1:08:27Speaker 01

  I don't know what's going on. And I'm meant to be the, the loose one.

• 1:08:30Chris Williamson?

  Um, and you go in and you're like, this is really quite a lot harder. Gravity feels like so much harder than it usually, but if you're hanging out your arse or you're hungover or whatever. Let's say you're hungover is a really good example. If you, if you're hungover and you go in and you have to do a class, you're going to know that you're hungover. If you're hungover and you have to go in and do buys, buys, tries and apps on like bodybuilding.

• 1:08:50Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 1:08:50Chris Williamson?

  You can just dial back the level of output sufficiently down wherever you need. And I think what's, what's interesting is that if you were to,

• 1:09:00Chris Williamson?

  if you used CrossFit as you were growing up to just judge how you're getting on with the rest of your life. Am I sleeping alright?

• 1:09:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:06Chris Williamson?

  Is my relationship with my bird okay? Like, because my state of mental health, when I get into a workout, I have these, like a lot of negative self-talk that comes through. Is that maybe because I'm got a little bit, I'm a little bit negative at home at the moment? Or I'm stressed at work because work's going too bad or whatever it is. Like you use the performance as a, a barometer for how everything else is going. Which is really, really useful as opposed to going in and going like.

• 1:09:32Chris Williamson?

  I look two percent leaner today. I don't look two percent leaner today.

• 1:09:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:36Chris Williamson?

  And I think one of the, one of the key takeaways for me from CrossFit has been externalizing your progress or, um, yeah, externalizing your progress. So usually what would happen, like you could be doing a cut through, a physique competition and wake up one day ten percent, that is you right now.

• 1:09:53Speaker 02

  That's me right.

• 1:09:54Chris Williamson?

  Wake up one day ten percent body fat and be in a bad mood and think that you look really, really shit. Put two, two percent body fat on and be in a better mood three weeks later and think that you look good.

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  I think what you're saying, I love CrossFit, which is, is cool, but all those things are like subjective. Completely subjective. Whereas CrossFit totally, it's objective. Like it is, it's co- completely, um, you know, you can, you can actually look at the numbers. There's numbers there that show you that.

• 1:10:21Chris Williamson?

  And that's where the ultimate comes in.

• 1:10:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. So like.

• 1:10:24Chris Williamson?

  The test of fitness.

• 1:10:25Speaker 02

  Exactly. Like you can do the open in two thousand and fifteen and come, you know, whatever, like say top ten percent. And do it two years later. If you come in top eight percent, guess what? You've got better. Like it's why we do, um, it's why we do these benchmark workouts in the classes, like Helen and Fran and all these things. Cause you can see that you're getting better and it's, you know, nobody can lie about it. If you've got three minutes of, say you've got five minutes month one, you do it again month 12 and you get three minutes. You've got two minutes better. Doesn't matter whether you've had a bad day, if you've had an argument with your missus, you've had a Burger King, whatever. You've got better. Like, and you can't tell me that you haven't because the proof's in the pudding. It's there. Five minutes, three minutes. There you go.

• 1:11:06Chris Williamson?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:11:06Speaker 02

  You know what I mean? Whereas all the stuff that you've mentioned, like about, do you look any leaner? You know, have you got any bigger? It, it is really very subjective.

• 1:11:15Chris Williamson?

  Well, that's why I think it's, that's why I think it's so unhealthy and it, it leads to people having, um, jaded ideas about what they should and shouldn't be doing with regards to their training.

• 1:11:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:28Chris Williamson?

  That, that it is so subjective. And then let's take it to the nth degree. Say you're going to do a competition, you're then externalizing that subjectivity.

• 1:11:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:36Chris Williamson?

  Because it's still not someone is objectively bigger, objectively leaner, because it's aesthetics, which is by its very nature, subjective.

• 1:11:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:44Chris Williamson?

  And you think, well, that to me just leads to like, I'm not surprised there's so much fucking anxiety.

• 1:11:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:49Chris Williamson?

  Like it's, that is the. Cookie cutter for how to create anxiety in someone. I don't know if I look good enough, but I hope that I do.

• 1:11:57Speaker 02

  Yeah. You can't stay on edge, aren't you? You don't know what you, what, what you should do.

• 1:12:01Chris Williamson?

  If you, if you know, if you know that you can deadlift, Sam Danson knows he can deadlift 600 pounds. A deadlift ladder comes up and the top weight is 600 pounds. He knows that he can pick it up.

• 1:12:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:12:10Chris Williamson?

  Okay, there's mitigating factors. Did he sleep? Did he?

• 1:12:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he knows he's got it.

• 1:12:15Chris Williamson?

  And the seven mile run beforehand, or seven K trail run beforehand.

• 1:12:18Speaker 02

  Last on the run, first on the deadlift.

• 1:12:20Chris Williamson?

  What a nice line, man.

• 1:12:22Speaker 02

  I'd have been the other way around. First on the run, last on the deadlift.

• 1:12:26Chris Williamson?

  So, would you rather be sticky or itchy?

• 1:12:31Speaker 02

  Sticky.

• 1:12:32Chris Williamson?

  Sticky. Sticky? Yeah, mate. Sticky?

• 1:12:35Speaker 02

  At least for sticky, you've got, you know what I mean? Itchy, it could just get worse.

• 1:12:39Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, itchy.

• 1:12:40Speaker 02

  Sticky, you're only gonna, you're gonna set stickiness.

• 1:12:42Chris Williamson?

  We're CrossFitters, if we start hand wrap scratching, we're going in. We're going deep.

• 1:12:47Chris Williamson?

  We just scratch until it's gone away.

• 1:12:48Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 1:12:49Chris Williamson?

  Right, okay. Would you rather fight 20 duck sized horses or one horse sized duck? One horse sized duck.

• 1:12:56Speaker 02

  Damn right. 20 duck sized horses?

• 1:12:58Chris Williamson?

  No, I want, I want the big, I want the big duck. Yeah, big duck.

• 1:13:02Speaker 02

  That's it, easy.

• 1:13:02Chris Williamson?

  I want a big duck. One big duck, mate, can you imagine the level of aggression? Ducks are really aggressive and they're small. I'd just go for his legs.

• 1:13:09Speaker 02

  What a fucking way to go.

• 1:13:10Chris Williamson?

  Go for his little legs. Straight in there.

• 1:13:12Speaker 02

  Nah, I could, I could kick 20 horse sized ducks all over the shop.

• 1:13:18Chris Williamson?

  Ducks sized horses. As long as you stayed below your anaerobic threshold, you'd be able to. You've got to pace it, mate. You'd be able to spread them out into a smaller manageable pack. Funnel them, like in 300, funnel them into.

• 1:13:30Speaker 02

  Emon three. Emon three.

• 1:13:32Chris Williamson?

  What?

• 1:13:32Speaker 02

  Three on the minute, every minute until it's done.

• 1:13:34Chris Williamson?

  Yeah. So it's a six minute workout, that, isn't it? Power endurance.

• 1:13:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, there you go. Easy.

• 1:13:38Chris Williamson?

  Well, Emon, what are you, what are you, what are you doing with the duck?

• 1:13:41Speaker 02

  I want the big duck.

• 1:13:42Chris Williamson?

  How are you gonna attack it?

• 1:13:43Speaker 01

  I don't care, I'm willing to go down.

• 1:13:44Chris Williamson?

  How are you gonna?

• 1:13:45Speaker 01

  That's the way to go.

• 1:13:46Chris Williamson?

  Right, how are you gonna attack it though? What's your, what's your strategy with this horse-sized duck?

• 1:13:50Speaker 02

  You know what a duck would do? Pull your face straight off.

• 1:13:53Speaker 01

  I don't care.

• 1:13:55Speaker 02

  Your face would be gone.

• 1:13:56Speaker 01

  I just wanna see the big duck.

• 1:13:57Speaker 02

  Your face would be gone.

• 1:13:57Chris Williamson?

  Big duck's the ultimate.

• 1:13:58Speaker 01

  I just wanna see the big duck.

• 1:14:00Chris Williamson?

  They take over.

• 1:14:00Speaker 01

  Straight off as well, that would pull them hundred and whatever pounds.

• 1:14:03Chris Williamson?

  Why is he fighting me anyway? Why, why do we have to fight this duck? What circumstance comes up?

• 1:14:08Speaker 01

  To be fair, I would probably run away at thirty second intervals with a one and a half minute rest to tire it out.

• 1:14:12Chris Williamson?

  A bit fart. Do some fart like me. Do some fart like Lampoast, stop. Lampoast.

• 1:14:18Speaker 01

  Tire it out, it would get, it's massive, it's so much muscle it's gonna get.

• 1:14:22Speaker 02

  I mean, a duck's muscular.

• 1:14:24Speaker 01

  Can you imagine how?

• 1:14:25Speaker 02

  I'm gonna guess the problem.

• 1:14:26Speaker 01

  Ducks are pretty muscular.

• 1:14:27Chris Williamson?

  Mate, when you cook one.

• 1:14:29Speaker 02

  They're all tasty though.

• 1:14:30Speaker 01

  There's a lot of meat in them. That duck's going lactic.

• 1:14:32Speaker 02

  To be fair, imagine how much money you'd get for a horse-sized duck.

• 1:14:35Speaker 01

  That's so much. Imagine how big your raps would have to be, the duck raps.

• 1:14:41Chris Williamson?

  Them little pancakes, you're gonna need loads.

• 1:14:43Speaker 02

  Mate, you need a whole cucumber in each wrap, mate. You need a whole cucumber, just like, just like a tortilla wrap.

• 1:14:49Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:49Speaker 02

  Cucumber, duck, either side, the whole thing.

• 1:14:53Chris Williamson?

  But I mean, you could, Tesco was doing those horse burgers, weren't they? So.

• 1:14:57Speaker 01

  That's true, yeah.

• 1:14:57Chris Williamson?

  Miniature, like.

• 1:14:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:00Chris Williamson?

  Money to be made there anyway. There is. Would you rather be able to attract any lady you want by wearing a special magic fedora? And saying the words, my lady? Or be able to run at five times your current speed, but you have to put your arms behind yourself?

• 1:15:20Speaker 01

  Like a penguin?

• 1:15:21Chris Williamson?

  And make, and make aeroplane noises?

• 1:15:22Speaker 02

  I'd do the aeroplane noises all the time.

• 1:15:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, aeroplane noises first, sure.

• 1:15:25Chris Williamson?

  You think?

• 1:15:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:26Speaker 02

  Five times?

• 1:15:27Chris Williamson?

  Five times, but you're gonna have to go.

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:15:29Speaker 02

  That's fine, mate, you're welcome, mate.

• 1:15:30Chris Williamson?

  You have to make that.

• 1:15:31Speaker 02

  I'd go, yeah, do the whole thing.

• 1:15:32Speaker 01

  It's out.

• 1:15:33Speaker 02

  Five times?

• 1:15:34Speaker 01

  What's the phrase? Sandwich you're willing to squeeze the lemon on, what is it?

• 1:15:37Speaker 02

  Is the juice worth the squeeze, bro?

• 1:15:40Speaker 01

  Aeroplane noises is worth top acceleration.

• 1:15:43Chris Williamson?

  It is, I mean, that's gonna be, you're gonna be quick.

• 1:15:45Speaker 01

  Can you imagine beating everyone in the gym every time on every warm-up and everywhere?

• 1:15:48Chris Williamson?

  But it looks like you're taking the piss as well, like.

• 1:15:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're not even bothered.

• 1:15:52Chris Williamson?

  And Matt, can you imagine, right, if that actually happened and then there was a whole school of coaching that came out of it, where other people were trying to replicate it?

• 1:16:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:16:01Chris Williamson?

  They're like, pose running all over again. Do you think that, it definitely seems, looking from the outside in, that specialists don't do tremendously well?

• 1:16:08Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:16:08Speaker 01

  Because they'll get caught out.

• 1:16:10Speaker 02

  They get caught out with one thing, I mean, look at like Matt Fraser, for example, like his first, um, like, two or three years of CrossFit, he won a lot of competitions, but he also didn't do very well in a lot of competitions, because if things played with his strengths, he could dominate, but then if things didn't, he was crippled, but then you saw what he's done, is he's taken that and he's basically worked at those, those elements in the singularity to make them a lot better, so he spent a lot of time on a bike, a lot of time on a rower, a lot of time, da da da da da, to get better at the sport. Transferred over into CrossFit.

• 1:16:41Chris Williamson?

  I suppose the fact, when you're talking about programming, is that there's already a, a model in place for how to become a good rower. For how to become good within each of the four, um, uh, areas of fitness, I suppose, or categories within which the workouts go into, there's how you get good at deadlifting, how you get good at all of the different bits and pieces, so really, the programmer doesn't, that, that's not anything special in terms of specialists, that's just knowledge, deployment, like, read it, read it and re-verbalise it.

• 1:17:12Speaker 02

  Putting it together, yeah, that's the thing.

• 1:17:14Speaker 01

  It's like, okay, so you've got that then, it's like, okay, so you've got, like, taking a typical, like a standard person, we've got periodised year, so it's like, where are we going to focus on those single aspects and how are we going to progress through the year focusing? So for us, we start the year with like hypertrophy and movement mechanics, because we believe in quality of movement.

• 1:17:31Chris Williamson?

  So talking just after the open year?

• 1:17:32Speaker 01

  After the open, quality of movement, joint prep, because we're going to load you up in the next cycle and we need you to get strong, you know, quite far away from the competition, which we know is like a, a aerobic power kind of best thing, it's like, then we're going to load you up, so that's where we're going to hit you, but also, we know that we need to continuously work in that aerobic base in it, so it's getting all these parts of when they're suited together and then putting it there, and then you've got the athlete who comes to use the individual, like, it's okay, well, where do they need to bias this, where do we need to bias this cycle, okay, this guy needs a lot more strength work, so actually, this is going to be a, a stronger feature throughout it, and where something goes in, something needs to come out. So you just need to balance the programs based on where that goes in direction for that that client and that athlete. Or people or as a population, if it's like a general block or something like that, or the gym.

• 1:18:17Speaker 01

  So you need to just look at all those facets and say, actually, this is fine. So now we're approaching the open. Couple of those blocks are taken up with sport now.

• 1:18:25Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:25Speaker 01

  Because we're like, we've got three or four sport blocks, but we've still got one block, which is like aerobic power, which is single modality. Because we still want to be developing that that, but we need to try and fit all that in with everything else at the same time.

• 1:18:38Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:39Speaker 01

  And putting and pairing and pairing movements that are appropriate. So like cleans and cleans are there with like, in a lot of CrossFit workouts, we're there with like a ring dip or a toaster bar or now bar muscle.

• 1:18:52Chris Williamson?

  Push pull mate, push pull.

• 1:18:54Speaker 01

  Deadlift and handstand push ups, deadlift and handstand push ups.

• 1:18:58Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:58Speaker 01

  Like if you if they thought, I mean, they might they might change it, but you thought if they were going to put handstand push ups in, it would be with a deadlift.

• 1:19:03Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:03Speaker 01

  Or a clean. Diane and all these other movements, all always always like paired up with them.

• 1:19:08Chris Williamson?

  So I was gonna say, that was that was something we haven't touched on. What what are the particular pairings of movements that tend to go together?

• 1:19:15Speaker 02

  Thrusters, pull ups, thrusters, burpees, deadlifts, hands down, because they're brutal. It's a it's they're in the same plane. So like a thruster and a pull up, they're in the same plane.

• 1:19:22Chris Williamson?

  So thruster, thruster, talking front rack, front squat into an overhead press.

• 1:19:27Speaker 02

  Press and then a pull up is obviously a pull up. So they're in the same plane, but they're working in different directions. So you're basically getting smashed from both ends. That's the that's what's happening. Do you know what I mean? That that is what it is.

• 1:19:38Chris Williamson?

  Full on eithel down.

• 1:19:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, brutal. It's brutal.

• 1:19:41Speaker 01

  Squat snatches and or snatches and muscle ups.

• 1:19:43Speaker 02

  Deadlifts and handstand push ups.

• 1:19:44Speaker 01

  High skill, high skill.

• 1:19:46Chris Williamson?

  Because you're pulling in that direction and you're pulling in that direction.

• 1:19:49Speaker 02

  Mister Joshua, deadlift to extension into flexion, either way around.

• 1:19:54Chris Williamson?

  But that's as obvious of a version.

• 1:19:56Speaker 02

  Whichever way the movements are are are going to.

• 1:19:58Chris Williamson?

  Snatches and burpees, snatches and chest to bar.

• 1:20:01Speaker 02

  All those different combinations, it's like, it's the way that the body's moving. Obviously, anything with a burpee and you're moving your body through the largest range of motion possible.

• 1:20:09Tim Briggs?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:20:09Speaker 02

  You're literally going all the way down to the ground and you're getting all the way up and leaving the ground. So anything with that is gonna be horrendous.

• 1:20:15Tim Briggs?

  And if it's a thruster going as low as you can to as high as you can.

• 1:20:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:20:19Tim Briggs?

  It's gonna be just be kind.

• 1:20:21Speaker 02

  Those combinations are just brutal. They're just brutal.

• 1:20:25Chris Williamson?

  So when we're talking, to bring it back to one of the points that I brought up at the start about why is CrossFit so hard? Like, why does it suck so much? Like, the feeling you're going through during a workout, let's say that you're doing something like Fran, which is twenty one fifty nine of thrusters and pull-ups. Um, that, I think, the best times on the planet are between two and three minutes of that, right?

• 1:20:45Speaker 02

  No, it's like sub two now.

• 1:20:46Chris Williamson?

  You can get below that.

• 1:20:47Speaker 02

  People go sub two, yeah, like.

• 1:20:48Chris Williamson?

  But I mean, for ti- typically, typically in a box, you'd probably put, what, like a ten minute time cap on it or an eight minute time cap on it?

• 1:20:53Tim Briggs?

  Oh, I'd drop it down more.

• 1:20:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, more like six minutes.

• 1:20:56Chris Williamson?

  Six, seven minutes. So everyone, everyone can kind of get it done in that super, super short space of time.

• 1:21:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, providing the skill properly.

• 1:21:02Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, is it, like, because your lungs are hurting an awful lot. So your heart rate's high, so that's one of the things that will contribute to the pain, I guess.

• 1:21:09Speaker 02

  But like Fran, for like me, for example now, Fran doesn't really hurt that bad.

• 1:21:14Tim Briggs?

  No.

• 1:21:14Speaker 02

  Because I'm efficient with both a thruster and a pull-up. So like, when I first did Fran, I couldn't do twenty one thrusters and broken.

• 1:21:21Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:22Speaker 02

  So twenty one thrusters and broken brutalizes. Now I can maybe do forty or fifty reps and broken without putting the bar down. Don't, don't call me on that, but, you know, like, so it's not that bad. Twenty one pull-ups might be my max set of pull-ups. Now, now it's not. So it's like, I could do Fran and let's say like two thirty comfortably.

• 1:21:40Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:41Speaker 02

  But it's that little extra at the end to get it down to like two ten or whatever.

• 1:21:45Tim Briggs?

  The same, what we're saying about the rower, it's really gone.

• 1:21:47Speaker 02

  Which is what brutalizes it. And it's, it's that, it's again, it's like just the efficiency of the, of the movement. So how well versed you are on CrossFit.

• 1:21:55Chris Williamson?

  So if you were to put a, a flag in the ground that which has been the workout you've felt the worst in, in your entire CrossFit career, can you, does one come to mind or do a couple come to mind?

• 1:22:06Speaker 02

  Okay, so the worst ones.

• 1:22:07Chris Williamson?

  Do some highlights.

• 1:22:08Speaker 02

  The worst ones by far are, have basically been the final workouts of the open. So twenty fifteen, I was like, I knew I wasn't gonna qualify, but I was, I was just outside of qualification for regionals as an individual. And the last workout came out and it was twenty seven, twenty one, fifteen, nine, thruster, uh, calories on the rower and thrusters. So, did it on the Friday night and um it was hard, but it it brutalised us, but it wasn't that bad. Did it again on the Monday, got like ten seconds faster, but it killed us. Like I was literally spewing all over the shop. Year after, same thing, thrusters and burpees, spewed all over. This year, thrusters and double unders, spewed all over. It's just that last workout is just so bad and I think it's like

• 1:22:54Speaker 02

  the culmination of the whole five weeks coming to an end, all the pressure and stress and all that stuff. It just kills me, like absolutely kills me.

• 1:23:02Chris Williamson?

  Well, we saw, I I was watching you do seventeen five this year, which was nine thrusters.

• 1:23:08Speaker 02

  I think it was, was it seven thrusters?

• 1:23:10Chris Williamson?

  Thirty five and nine.

• 1:23:11Speaker 02

  Thirty five and nine, I don't even know.

• 1:23:13Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, uh ten ra- ten rounds of nine thrusters, thirty five double unders, thrusters at forty two. And I'm right in saying that you beat the two Icelandic girls, like the two quickest women on.

• 1:23:26Speaker 02

  I think I came like second in Europe on that one, I think I second or third.

• 1:23:29Chris Williamson?

  Second quickest in Europe at that particular workout. Like watching that to me was just like, I don't know, it was like there was another gear that I didn't think that people were able to get to to reach with regards to that.

• 1:23:41Speaker 02

  It's just one of those things where that's just a good workout for me.

• 1:23:44Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:44Speaker 02

  You know, like, put me doing hundred and forty kilo squat cleans in it, that that ain't happening, you know what I mean? But then you can watch someone like, um, you know, like Ben Duncan, who we've got in the gym. Strong boy, can pick one forty up like that, no problem. It's just, it's things that people are good at. I'm lucky that the open tends to be ninety percent of the time, things that I am good at.

• 1:24:02Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 1:24:02Speaker 02

  That's it. It's all it is. It could be anything.

• 1:24:04Chris Williamson?

  And then as you start to move towards regionals, the weights get a little bit heavier.

• 1:24:07Speaker 02

  A lot more complex, the skills get harder, the movements get harder, the weights get heavier and it's a lot, it's a lot harder, you know, it is. And it's not as great for someone like me, but then it's better for other people.

• 1:24:17Chris Williamson?

  Mm hmm. So that must be difficult, there must be some athletes then floating around who would be great or would be good regionals and games athletes. Just can't get there. That just can't break through the open because they. Yeah, there are quite a few.

• 1:24:29Speaker 02

  But it's the same as any sport, you've got people who play Sunday League, who are great, who probably could play in the Premiership, but they just can't perform.

• 1:24:35Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:35Speaker 02

  You know what I mean? It's.

• 1:24:36Chris Williamson?

  Or they can't stop the game.

• 1:24:37Speaker 01

  The season, the season starts with the open. Like, do you know what I mean? Like, if you can't get through the open.

• 1:24:43Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:43Speaker 01

  Doesn't matter what else you could have, because you're pretty, there's clearly a domain and more that in a bunch of movements. Nobody's sitting there going, oh, but I'm the strong guy. Yeah, you're the slow guy.

• 1:24:52Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:53Speaker 01

  You're the fucking slow guy, get get faster, get more efficient and moving. You know, the things John's talking about are fundamental movements. A thruster is a squat and a press. Like fundamental movements, like you need to be able to move quickly through them. So if you look at the season as in, I need to get this to get to that. The season isn't that, the season is the open into regionals, into the games. Some athletes know they're gonna get there because they've already got like all the stuff in the bag.

• 1:25:15Tim Briggs?

  Yeah, they just periodised.

• 1:25:16Speaker 01

  Further people are like, there's no point talking about what you would have done if you got past stage one.

• 1:25:20Tim Briggs?

  Should have, would have, could have, isn't it?

• 1:25:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:22Tim Briggs?

  So many people post, oh, it came 12th, the regionals.

• 1:25:25Speaker 02

  But also what people don't take into account.

• 1:25:27Tim Briggs?

  No.

• 1:25:27Speaker 02

  You weren't there. Well, also.

• 1:25:28Tim Briggs?

  You weren't there, you came 100 and.

• 1:25:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, it came through and they only got on regionals, bro. But then what people don't take into account is, um, like the fact that at regionals, it is entirely different to doing it in the gym.

• 1:25:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:39Speaker 02

  Like, you know, you get, you're warming, you're warming up, you've got Migo Saylor next to you. Like, do you realise how intimidating that is to have like someone who was the fittest man in the world at one point warming up on the road next to you? There's that that you've got to contend with. And then you've got the fact that you've got to go in and sit and sit down for 15 minutes before you go on the floor. So it's like stuff like that that people don't realise that you have to do. You have to be there at a certain time.

• 1:26:01Speaker 01

  Train well, be happy mentality. You can't do them on, you can't do them on Instagram like.

• 1:26:05Speaker 02

  Just gonna go to the toilet and get a coffee and have another knock or whatever. It's like, no, no, you will be there at this time. You will perform at this time. Like. You know, Dave Castro.

• 1:26:14Tim Briggs?

  Bring it on Instagram.

• 1:26:16Speaker 02

  Dave Castro waiting for anybody. You know what I'm saying? You, you're going on at that time. That's it. So it's like all of those things. It's, it's the classic thing.

• 1:26:24Speaker 01

  And Instagram is full of people.

• 1:26:26Speaker 02

  Training, compete.

• 1:26:26Speaker 01

  Instagram's full of people that will like do a regionals wod out of context. Do one regionals wod and say, I would have come this, but no, you wouldn't have done. Cause you have no idea what the people who were there are going through and how hard that, and how hard that and harsh that environment is in such a quality way. I mean, it's like fricking amazing to get there and to go through it all, but. You know, it's, the context is completely fucking different.

• 1:26:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's totally different.

• 1:26:45Speaker 01

  You're in Madrid, you're flown or whatever, or in Copenhagen, you're flown whatever there. You're in a pressure cooker of an environment.

• 1:26:52Speaker 02

  Eating some veggie treats though.

• 1:26:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. And everybody is like all out, giving everything.

• 1:26:58Chris Williamson?

  It must be a very intimidating atmosphere to be in. And I think what's.

• 1:27:00Speaker 01

  Maybe it is an atmosphere, but I think it's just very different to, you know, people saying, oh, if I get there, I'll smash it. You've got to get there first and then you can go and see if you can smash it.

• 1:27:11Chris Williamson?

  I agree. I think what's interesting is that there's the parallels that you can draw between powerlifting. Like if you've picked the weight up in powerlifting before, or in weightlifting or whatever it is, you know that you can pick it up again.

• 1:27:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:21Chris Williamson?

  I think what makes CrossFit such a good observer sport is that you can see the narrative of the suffering going on within the person during the event. Do you know what I mean?

• 1:27:33Speaker 01

  I definitely see some suffering.

• 1:27:34Chris Williamson?

  You've got such a short window. Someone's trying to deadlift 300 kilos at a local comp and they either get it or they don't and it's pretty much over.

• 1:27:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:44Chris Williamson?

  Like within a couple of seconds.

• 1:27:45Speaker 01

  You've got three attempts.

• 1:27:46Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:47Chris Williamson?

  And you're like, right, okay. But then you watch someone do CrossFit and the um, the spectrum from them failing or succeeding.

• 1:27:57Speaker 01

  So big.

• 1:27:58Chris Williamson?

  Is that it's so drawn out.

• 1:27:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:28:00Chris Williamson?

  And there's such a narrative that's attached.

• 1:28:01Speaker 01

  So many variables in there.

• 1:28:03Chris Williamson?

  And you get, and that's what makes it compelling watching, right?

• 1:28:05Speaker 01

  I think they've also done a very good job of like how they've changed the sport in a way. Cause like it used to just be, it was a bit of a shit show. Like everyone would just be doing stuff at the same time and you wouldn't know where anybody was and someone would finish. You'd be like, whoa, I finished.

• 1:28:18Chris Williamson?

  Did he win?

• 1:28:19Speaker 01

  Whereas now it's like, there's clear areas on the floor where people do things. So you can go, oh, well, he's 15 reps ahead.

• 1:28:24Chris Williamson?

  Because they rolled the ball.

• 1:28:25Speaker 01

  But also like they talk about, the commentators always talk about at the games. It's like, you've done front now. You know, when you watch someone do front at the games.

• 1:28:34Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:34Speaker 01

  You know what that feels like? You know what you felt like when you did that workout? Or you did those exercises and you can like completely relate to someone who, even if they're on a completely different level to you. Like, oh shit, I've done that workout. Just like that guy. Except he, how the fuck did he do it five minutes quicker than me?

• 1:28:49Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:49Speaker 01

  Do you know what I mean?

• 1:28:50Chris Williamson?

  And demur.

• 1:28:50Speaker 01

  And but you can relate to that because.

• 1:28:52Chris Williamson?

  See away from a shower.

• 1:28:53Speaker 01

  Cause even, even if nothing else, if you're a competitor, you're a competitor alongside that person, even if it's in a different part of the world and like a different league.

• 1:29:00Chris Williamson?

  I think that's one of the views of the open thing.

• 1:29:04Chris Williamson?

  A workout is issued and everyone from the person who just started two weeks ago to the best guys on the planet have to do it. And to me, always seems impressive that, I mean, how many people did the Open last year, like half a million?

• 1:29:16Speaker 02

  I think it was like four hundred thousand.

• 1:29:17Chris Williamson?

  Not four hundred, you know, four hundred thousand people did it worldwide. And the guys that came top in that were all renowned names.

• 1:29:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:26Chris Williamson?

  Do you know what I mean? Like Noah Olson is always going to be top five. Like, and you think out of all of the variables that are going on in life, and it is such a wide net of things that can go on and it can go wrong. And these guys are still so dominant with what they do, that you can give them this kind. And yeah, maybe it's well within their capacities or whatever, because it's a, it's an easy workout. Or maybe there's so much further ahead of everyone else.

• 1:29:50Speaker 01

  If they're meant to be at the Games, they will do great in the Open.

• 1:29:53Speaker 02

  The people that, the people that do well at the Games tend to do well in the Open and do well at Regionals, like, um. It, it's, it is what it is.

• 1:30:01Chris Williamson?

  It's rarely an All-Star round from the Open that smashes it to the Games, right?

• 1:30:05Speaker 02

  It finds the fittest people, it does, especially now that they've added in like a heavy element. So in the past it used to all be light. And it didn't find the fittest people, because like, for example, for me in 2015, a one rep max clean and jerk came up. And I came like fif- there was two parts of the workout. First workout, I think I came ninth. The second one, I came like four hundredth.

• 1:30:23Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:23Speaker 02

  I'm not fit. It's not easy. I'm just not fit enough. There you go. You know what I mean? That, there's no, it's black or white. I'm fit or I'm not, and I wasn't. So then I didn't go that year. But then 2016 came along and there was a heavier workout, but it was blended with other skills. So it was like heavier work, a heavier lift, but within a workout. So it was a blend of your ability to do toaster bar, double under, and then rep a heavy barbell.

• 1:30:47Chris Williamson?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:30:48Speaker 02

  And when that came out, I was able to, I still had a terrible finish. I came like a hundred and eightieth in Europe or whatever. But I was still eight, that was still high enough to allow me to then go to the next stage.

• 1:30:58Chris Williamson?

  Something that's slightly less, um, partitioned will weed out people, especially it's a little bit more effective as well.

• 1:31:05Speaker 02

  So the point I was trying to make there was. It it found the fittest people, you know, you can complain about and go, well, oh, it was a heavy workout, I'm not prepared for it. Well, no, if I was fitter, i.e. stronger, my fitness was more rounded, I would have been all right.

• 1:31:18Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:18Speaker 02

  So it identified a massive gaping hole in in in my fitness. Um, and people find that every year, you know, like the dumbbells totally trip people up this year. Like I said, you know, people spent all last year doing percentage lifts, percentage snatches, percentage cleans. Twenty kilo dumbbell messed them up. Two hundred and fifty reps of dumbbell snatch, broken. People were getting like twenty minutes on that first workout. People who had previously been to regionals, previously competed at a high level.

• 1:31:43Chris Williamson?

  Just got wrecked.

• 1:31:44Speaker 02

  Twenty minutes on the on the dumbbell snatch workout, like, what are you doing? That's a massive, that's a massive hole.

• 1:31:49Chris Williamson?

  And then get messages like, oh, I would have crushed it if it had a barbell in, I wish it was.

• 1:31:52Speaker 02

  That was the eight kilos, I would have killed that, yeah, but it wasn't.

• 1:31:55Chris Williamson?

  Hmm, like.

• 1:31:56Speaker 02

  Twenty two and a half, and it blew your back up.

• 1:31:58Chris Williamson?

  Boo, boo.

• 1:31:59Speaker 02

  You know what I mean? Get a grip.

• 1:32:00Chris Williamson?

  I think I think that what's what's really, really funny to see is that there's, there really is nowhere to hide, is there? Like with regards to, like, when people have underperformed, like, I guess, bad judging. Like, if you get absolutely nailed by a judge who doesn't understand the standards, but that doesn't seem to really happen all that much at regionals and at the games. But aside from that, like.

• 1:32:24Chris Williamson?

  Oh, we stepped inside.

• 1:32:25Speaker 02

  Ah, no, it goes both ways, though. I mean, you get let off for stuff as well.

• 1:32:28Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:28Speaker 02

  You get penalized for stuff.

• 1:32:29Chris Williamson?

  You win, you win and you lose. This is pistols, right?

• 1:32:31Speaker 02

  It is, yeah, exactly.

• 1:32:32Chris Williamson?

  Um.

• 1:32:34Speaker 02

  You know, crap, pistols in the left leg and the turn, you're going to crush over that.

• 1:32:39Chris Williamson?

  But, yeah, the, what you're saying is really, really right, that if someone fucks it, they fucked it. Like, the thing about the dumbbells, like, I'm right in saying there was no barbells, even in regionals either.

• 1:32:49Speaker 02

  Well, the only barbell workout in this year in the open was the deadlift.

• 1:32:54Chris Williamson?

  Thruster.

• 1:32:54Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. And then in regionals.

• 1:32:57Chris Williamson?

  There was the, there was a squat snatch as well.

• 1:32:58Speaker 02

  Squat snatch, yeah, correct.

• 1:33:00Chris Williamson?

  The last three, yeah.

• 1:33:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, in regionals, there was, uh, it was mo, it was all dumbbells.

• 1:33:04Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, that was it. The regionals had absolutely no barbell.

• 1:33:06Speaker 02

  A deep ball as well, so like they had to put the ball over the, over the back, uh, something.

• 1:33:10Chris Williamson?

  Then those heavy kettlebells.

• 1:33:11Speaker 02

  Heavy kettlebells, no barbells.

• 1:33:12Chris Williamson?

  Which is, which is fucking.

• 1:33:14Speaker 02

  And you saw someone like Alex Smith, who has struggled to go to games in in the past. When that stuff comes up that he's really good at, wins his region, beats his brother, Ben Smith, who's like the fittest man on the earth in twenty fifteen. Cause he's good at that stuff.

• 1:33:27Chris Williamson?

  Hmm.

• 1:33:28Speaker 02

  So it shows you that, like, even though you have to be good at everything, if you're good at specific things, you will excel in certain years. It's why someone like Frohn and Fraser were so impressive. Because they win year on year, doesn't matter about the programming.

• 1:33:40Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:40Speaker 02

  They win. Do you know what I mean?

• 1:33:42Chris Williamson?

  All we do as well.

• 1:33:43Speaker 02

  All we do is win no matter what.

• 1:33:46Chris Williamson?

  Guys, thank you very much. We're gonna do this again a number of times, but thank you very much for your time. We dominate nutrition, Reebok CrossFit Time Side, Bill up North, Warrior programming, all those bits will be in the description. And, uh, thank you again.