I thought I would muse about what I expect this years Open workouts to look like, below is some information that may be of interest.
Inclusiveness…..
In order for Crossfit to continue its growth and grab a larger piece of mainstream fitness it must retain the inclusiveness it has worked so hard to attain. Crossfit needs the Open, there is no doubt. Aside from affiliate fees, this is the number 1 money generator it has. If you take the $20 entry fee and multiply it by the number of athletes who will register this year, you will see what I mean. Frankly, Crossfit can not risk making workouts difficult for the average person to attempt as this may result in an unwillingness to register in future events. Simple.
Now notice that I said “attempt.”
Expect the workouts to be internally scaled to ensure that the best athletes still rise to the top. Think of 13.2’s Snatch/Burpee ladder. Every single athlete is given a fair and reasonable task to attempt so that they receive a score. By increasing the weight, Crossfit will effectively challenge those higher end athletes while simultaneously giving the 2nd & 3rd tier athletes something to attempt but not necessarily complete. Same can be said for 13.3 which had us complete Wallballs, DU’s & Muscle-ups and allowed us to continue on to further rounds if possible.
So keep in mind that every WOD will have a component that allows every athlete an extremely high probability of posting a score.
Olympic Lifts
The Snatch & the Clean (& Jerk) will come up. These or variations of these have come up every single year and they will continue to. If you are not strong in these, start working on them now for 2015.
Guarantees of what will NOT come up
You will not see Rowing, Airdynes, Ski-Machines, Running, Swimming or Biking. Remember how we talked about inclusiveness? Think that if it can’t be bought for under $100 on Craig’slist and it can not be done plain view of a camera, it is not going to happen. Same goes for Handstand walks, you can stop practicing them for now.
I also firmly believe that we will not see any singlets. When I say singlets I more specifically mean what we saw in 12.1 where athletes were asked to perform 7 minutes of burpees. Will there be burpees? You bet your sweet sweet can that there will be. When a bodyweight singlet was used in 12.1 it kept some of those would be regional athletes out of the competition. Crossfit prides itself on testing all their domains of fitness and this particular WOD did not reach that goal. If you’re a 145# sixteen year old kid with good lungs, chances are you are beating a good chunk of athletes who just destroyed you on a snatch ladder. what about the best athlete always rises to the top? Well because Crossfit scores an athlete based on their standing in each individual event, if there is not some parameter to establish a base of elite scores relative to the overall athletic abilities of said athlete, it fails to truly test for fitness (Think 13.1).
What we WILL see
Snatch, Burpee, Thruster, Pull-Up, Jerk, Toes to Bar, Double Under, Box Jump, Muscle Ups and Wallballs have been apart of each Open the last 3 years so expect all or most of them to come up again.
Couplets and Triplets….which in my estimation will make up all 5 WODs. No singlets.
The movement from bodyweight to barbell work in a single WOD.
Thrusters and Pullups (or C2B) coupled together. Why? Take a look at the last 3 years (11.6, 12.5, 13.5).
A repeat of at least one workout from past Opens. Why? Because they worked once to determine the fittest alive, they will work again. Plus Crossfit can bank on the fact that you had all the required equipment last year, you’ll be able to easily use the same stuff again. Yay inclusiveness!
A WOD between 4-20min….simple as that. Sorry to not go in depth. That’s just the parameters they have used in the past. But you can expect that the prescribed time will increase with the amount of movements required to complete.
The option to “step down” off a boxjump. This is to mitigate injury because Crossfit does not need nor can take the bad press associated with an influx of blown achilles. If you are not a Regional level athlete where every single rep is ultra important, work on cycling your boxjumps and step downs. It may save you in the long run (especially if you are in or beyond your 30’s).
** I am fairly confident in everything I have said up to this point because it all encompasses what we have seen in the past. The Open is designed for everyone to compete in, HQ will leave the tricks and surprises to Regionals and the Games. Now here is my personal predication on what we will see…….
The Overhead Squat!
Used once in 2011, triplet with Burpees and MUs and it has yet to return. I really do think that it will make its triumphant return and I will go as far to say that I think it will be a Burpee/OHS much like the Burpee/Snatch Ladder. I think the weight will be almost identical to 13.1 but the athlete will be permitted to use any form of ground to overhead method.
Final Thoughts
I did not get in to the required weights for each workout because I do not expect them to change from past practices. I believe that Crossfit HQ wants & need as many people to sign up for the Open as possible, they need to see continued growth and to do that they have to maintain inclusiveness. Will weights go up during a WOD? Absolutely! I also think we may have to do more reps this year because there needs to be a way of creating a defined separation between the weekend warrior and the competitive athlete. They are improving every year, just like the weekend warrior and they will need to test themselves as well.
Thanks for reading, I look forward to your thoughts!
FitForFire 