Why we do the things we do at ChalkBox: New Cycle Monday 20th!
OUR PROGRAMMING:
It is time for a note on our fitness programming. We are coming out of long cycle started all the way back summer 2016. We have noticed significant improvements in your fitness. We program the in cycles of 6 weeks. Our focus in the cycle starting Monday 20th will be the Olympic Lifts Clean & Jerks, Snatch and gymnastics movements like muscle ups and hand stand push ups. Yes we know it takes time to master all these movements and that's why we practise them. Also these movements are all functional and by working through these lifts and gymnastic we are working same time on your fitness :-).
As a reminder and for the newbies a brief overview below of "why we do the things we do at ChalkBox"
The Context
We updated our program in August and embarked on 25 weeks long cycle ending January 2017. The overriding theme of the cycle is building a stronger aerobic & strength base using the conclusions from the last Check In in April.
Looking back the majority of training days ( Monday - Friday) have been focused on developing strength (Monday & Wednesday) and your aerobic systems (Tuesday & Thursday) whilst Friday was Skill day. Weekends are reserved for truly community workouts and are really intended to workout together, suffer together and enjoy the community aspect. We hear that you enjoy the format of the Saturday mornings and we will not change it.
Broadening the Base
It is time now to add some different building blocks to your General Physical Preparedness.
WE ARE MAKING 2 CHANGES:
1) MIND OVER MATTER IS MOVING CENTRAL STAGE
Great athletes are often praised for their mental thoughnes. This is not something people are born with this is something you can develop. Mental Thoughness applies to all things in life and as well to fitness. A general description of mind over matter is: the use of will power to overcome physicial problems. Applying that to our workouts it can mean many things to different people from a member doing his or hers first pull up to setting a new PB in the Clean & Jerk.
We believe in working in the present moment is important but we believe in 1 step at the time setting mini goals and celebrate them when you complete them.
2) RX LEVEL WILL BE REMOVED AND ONLY BE GIVEN FOR CERTAIN WODS
We believe by removing RX for workouts it will free up the mind to really focus on consistent movement first followed by adding load when earned.
ChalkBox is a CrossFit gym located in Sevenoaks
Now we have shared with you the context we are introducing 3 different sessions namely:
- Movement & Skills Session (A)
- Fitness Session (B)
- Mental Thoughness Session (B) + (C)
What is a Movement & Skills Session?
What you can expect on a M&S day is practise. We believe life is continious practise so is CrossFit. No one is ever finished in mastering a movement e.g. squat or skill e.g. double under. There's some well known research saying it takes ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field.
Therefore on M&S day you will be practising the most common movements in CrossFit varying from squats, dead lifts, push ups to more complex Olympic Lifts and Gymnastics. As these are practise session there will be NO RX levels provided. Every member will be required to work at their own level. We believe taking the RX level away will free up the mind to get you more focused on moving well before you add weight.
What is a Fitness Session?
CrossFit defines fitness as increased work capacity across broad time and model domains. So you will be running, rowing, biking, jumping, lifting, carrying, pushing pulling and more across different time intervals in different formats.
Is that new? No it isn't. It is CrossFit and you have been all along! In these session we will continue to provide you with RX levels as we believe it is a way to measure your progress. Obviously all workouts are for all abilities and scalable.
What is a Mental Thoughnes Session?
This will be a day you will have to challenge yourself mentally, break down a wall and deal with fight or flight emotions! Sounds dramatic but you have been doing that on many occasion already. By designating certain days to these types of workouts we envisage that you will come in with a different mind set than per usual.
So what's different you might ask as for some the workouts are a challenge already? The devil sits in the detail. The WODs are designed to be low skill and low weight bearing. For example 100 burpees for time. Everyone should be able to do some form of burpee 😃 and everyone should be able to finish it.... at whatever time domain at your current fitness level. There's no limit here. Progress is measured very easily. Try to beat Coach Agnes. She completes 100 burpees under 5 minutes. Again there's no RX level here either.
Is this really new? No it isn't you have been doing this however what new is that we will label the sessions as such so you can prepare your mind. Remember we are now focused on Mind over Matter: the use of will power to overcome physical issues.
Will this get me fit?
Oh yes - the goal hasn't changed building a stronger aerobic & strength base is goal of the cycle. Every workout will be one that helps you to progress further on your fitness journey. By providing you with more context we envisage that you will be able to create better movement patterns and progress more quickly.