The Open is closed.

Thank God. The Open is a great experience to participate in because you’re pushing yourself to do things you might not normally do with friends you might not normally workout with. We saw so many people do things they never have before and it was glorious to watch and cheer you all on.

All that said, it’s a nightmare to orchestrate a legitimately good class experience while facilitating Open-er’s competition scores. Along the way, it’s really difficult when people don’t listen to the workout explanation at the beginning or the logistics get cramped or there’s a question I don’t know the answer to. What THEN happens is I’m annoyed that I can’t do a good job for all of you and I end up snapping or being short or rude or unpleasant, so let me just say I apologize if any of you caught shrapnel from any of those stresses. That’s not ok and no circumstance would make it ok to be rude, so I’ll do my best to make sure I’m more kind and pleasant in stressful situations. All I hope is that you understand I’m trying to do the best I can FOR YOU and the feeling of not hitting that goal is hard and makes me snippy. It’s a weird catch 22 situation.

I want The Standard to be a haven from all negativity and you should be able to come in and have a great time even if I’m not. So. If I stepped on any toes or was offensive with my comments or sarcasm or jokes: I hope you’ll forgive me.

SUBMIT YOUR SCORE RIGHT NOW!

If you haven’t submitted your score, do it RIGHT NOW… The deadline is tomorrow night at 8pm EST!! If you don’t log it, you can’t have it count.

TRAINING

Assessments FOR This cycle are:

deadlift & running

E DISCIPLINE IS: POWERLIFTING

SYSTEM: VENTILATION

VIRTUOSITY: BODYWEIGHT

Our programming is designed to bring a broad and inclusive general physical preparedness to everyone participating consistently at The Standard. That means we have to work in cycles where we focus on certain implements (KB,DB,barbell,etc), energy systems (heavy breathing vs muscular burn), virtuosity (proficiency of a specific skill), and E discipline (neurological learning typically with weights). If we tried to do them all throughout the year, all the time, we would get less progress across the timeline, so we break it up so we can get a specific adaptation. Just in case you wanted some nerd stuff in your blogs. :)

IN-HOUSE UPDATES

IMPROVEMENT SERIES.

Part 1 - Category Level-Ups

This will be the first installment of a series I’m calling Improvement Series. These topics will address “How to get better, faster.,” on a variety of different topics. Today’s is geared around leveling up. If you look at your levels in Chalk It, the lowest level is the one we would say needs the most attention. This is typically a strength, cardiovascular, or neurological deficiency. If it’s strength, it’s either bodyweight or external loads (barbells/DBs/KBs), cardiovascular is being able to breathe through the task, and neurological is a skill-acquisition process; “how do I get my body to make this happen?”

No matter which of those three it is, number of exposures is the key to improvement. You have to do more of it more often. The Standard’s lowest level as a whole is “RINGS.” Rings are the perfect example here because strength isn’t the only variable, it’s also neurological. If we decide we want to improve our RINGS level, we have to find opportunities to practice. Here are some ways to do that intelligently.

If you’re at the entry levels of RINGS, then the stability hold is the main focus. This is pretty easy to address because it is rarely lack of strength, but rather lack of understanding the balance and body position, so I’d recommend you arrive 10 minutes early, go through crossover symmetry, then make two good attempts at ring stability hold with a short break between. IF you can’t yet hold at all, put one toe down to support you just enough that you can work for 15 seconds. REPEAT AT THE END OF CLASS. Two good attempts at whatever level you are capable of.
If you’re trying to get your first ring dip (or more of them), your limitation is strength. You should prioritize attending class on days that have upper body pushing oriented (pushups, push press, bench press) movements. You should look at the week’s worth of workouts in advance so you can plan your attendance around your own athletic development. Then the same thing as above. At the end of class, spend 5 to 10 minutes getting 2 or 3 really good practices . You can vary your effort based on where you are.
If you can do 1 dip and want more, then put one toe down and help yourself move through the range of motion for 5 reps. You have the strength to do 1, you don’t have the strength to endure the time under tension of multiple, so let’s increase that time and increase your dip #s. If you want to do a heavier weighted dip, you can tackle that with volume (max number of highly technical reps) or with progressive overload (weighted dips or even weighted negatives 😳).
Elephant in the room… if you want more dips, how much non-functional weight are you carrying? If you get rid of that AND put in the work to get stronger, your level will improve much much faster. It’s easier to weigh less than it is to gain the muscle required to push more.

This is how I would address any category. You need exposures which means you need discipline. It’s never a good time to do 3 minute bike sprints at the end of class, but if it helps your lactic tolerance level go up; maybe it’s worth it.

If you want specific direction on how to address your lower levels, speak with any of your coaches and we’ll hook you up or point you in the direction of who can.

NEXT WEEK: NUTRITION…

PODIUM REMINDER

I’ll be placing order #1 for items, so if you want something, let me know what and what amounts. If you want to check their products out, YOU CAN CLICK HERE Essentially everything is $45/per item.

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