Hey Old Cityzens!

First off, Happy Anniversary, Old City! To those Founding Fathers – thank you for sticking with us over the years. What a wild and crazy ride it has been. And to all the New Cityzens, we hope you stick with us for 4+ more years and help us create more memories.

So in last week’s TWA post, I gave a brief outline of the strength layout and how it shifts weekly, alternates Olympic movements each week, and includes a Girl WOD benchmark workout every 3-4 weeks. This week I wanted to talk about what goes into each workout, how do we come up with this shit.. right?!?!

So Old City’s motto is ‘Preparing you for LIFE’. We want your work in the gym to allow you to play with your kids without tiring out, carry groceries in one load up your 3 story walk-up, never struggle putting luggage in the overhead bin.. basically being prepared for anything life throws at you. This is ‘general physical preparedness’, or GPP. Our programming will get you generally fit to do anything. Back in 2002, Greg Glassman wrote the Theoretical Template for CrossFit’s Programming. This is the basic outline for our programming. All the workouts we do are comprised of 3 distinct modalities – metabolic conditioning, gymnastics, and weightlifting. Metabolic condition or metcon or ‘cardio’ is usually running, biking, rowing, or jumping rope. Gymnastics is bodyweight movements or calisthenics. And weightlifting is anything done with a weight – Olympic lifts, KB swings, dball holds, farmers carry, etc. We don’t program in any rest days, but work on a Monday through Saturday schedule allowing members to come the days that best work for them. Most of our workouts are couplets (WW, WG, MW, GG) and triplets (WWW, MWG, MGW, GGG). We vary weight, volume, sets, and reps. Some workouts will be task priority, where you need to complete a list of movements as fast as possible (Fran at 12-15-9, or Helen at 3 rounds for time). Other workouts will be time priority, where the time is set and you need to complete as many rounds/repetitions in that time (Cindy – 20 min AMRAP). We’ve set four different time domains – 6-10 min, 11-15 min, 16-20, 20+ min. Workouts where there is strength, the time domain is usually under 15 minutes, and we mix this up with both task and time priority workouts. Additionally, for the task priority workouts, we strive to have everyone finish within 2-3 minutes of each other so as to make sure they are all hitting the same metabolic pathway that is intended.

I hope this gives everyone a better idea of what goes on behind the curtains. We’ll probably delve into the metabolic pathways another time, but this should give you enough to think about for now.

So before your brain explodes, here’s a brief look at the workouts coming up this week..

Monday – Front squats and a long winded explanation from me in that day’s post about how to break down the workout.

Tuesday – Halloween!! Dress up!! The more awkward the better. We won’t be going outside, but we will be jumping rope.. among other things.

Wednesday – This rep scheme might be all to familiar, but it’s never going to be easy even with dumbbells and a couplet.

Thursday – If there are any two movements that will make me vomit, it would be burpees and rowing.

Friday – You like the bike, right? Good. We’re also throwing in a big of a challenging gymnastics movement. I hope you’re up for it and push yourself to make it as difficult as possible.

Saturday – Busting out another mainsite workout. You might think you’re having deja vu with this rep scheme.

Let’s have another great week!