15 mile bike today and yesterday 

Catching up today. Completed 250103 then ran a 5k

Champions Club Scaling Notes

RANT
What's up family! Especially Mel, Jim, Mike, Coastie, Lincoln, Jonathan, Steven... definitely miss checking in with you guys on here. I was going back in the archives to check on Dr. Seyfried's cancer stuff and refresh on the anatomy and physiology lessons. And as luck would have it, both of those originated on this very night six years ago... which was also the same night Coach Glassman gave me the green light to do the scaling notes. Nothing like some nostalgia to get the urge to do another write-up on here.

Since the spring we've been following year-to-date workouts from 2004's archives (well, technically now they're 2005's workouts), which marks the first time in my CrossFit lifespan of 19+ years that I've been off the main site's WOD for this long (I did take a brief detour into CF Football when it came out, then humbly came back  with my head down and tail between my fatigued legs, spitefully admitting plenty of effective workouts last more than 8 minutes). The amount of understanding I've gained through this process - especially with themes like context and foundations - makes me want to continue down the old workouts archive, at least for the time being. With your guys' permission, though, instead of staying in my lane with regards to the boring-ass scaling variations of workouts, I'd like to take this Rest Day to share three unrelated things that have happened within the last few months, that I will make every attempt to wrangle into a single, united, useful theme:

One of our moms qualified for the Boston Marathon without really training for it
One of our moms who has MS took her first two crawl "steps"
Michigan beat Ohio State 13-10 in front of 10,000 alumni and 74,000 truck drivers at the Shoe

What do those three things have in common? They all were accomplished by a relentless focus on the basics while ignoring tons of distractions; Mrs. Hill ignored the various online running groups with infinite opinions and simply didn't take a cheat meal from July through October, Mrs. Leze ignored all of her other limitations and instead repped out L-sit after L-sit after L-sit, and Michigan ignored the fancy new invention of the forward pass en route to the biggest upset in the rivalry's history and a post-game brawl. 

In most cases it seems anything that doesn't involve getting better at the basics could qualify as a distraction. Actually, here's an example: a few months ago, at the ripe age of 34, I shit my pants while running. Literally shit my effing pants. Right on Stephenson Hwy. With all the shame of a 3rd grader who was denied a hall pass by his tyrant nun of a teacher. This happened because I ignored the basics of running (whatever you do, don't shit your pants) and instead got distracted by any- and everything that could have helped me save my favorite pair of shorts. Dr. Romanov never covered this in any of the Pose clinics I've been to. Okay... less graphic examples? How many rounds of Cindy gives you the pass to try Cindy XXX 2k25.01? How heavy does your deadlift have to be before you can get creative and use bands and chains? How good do you have to be at blocking and tackling to be able to skip that at practices? I'm not sure there are any solid answers to any of those questions, but they are questions that go through my head all the time, especially at basketball practices that involve stupid things like cones and heavy balls when, even at the elite level, lay-ups are missed all the time and errant passes are thrown without going against defense.

With regards to the article, what are some distractions for grip training? Well... chalk, wrist straps, a hook grip, a desire to take weight lifted and reps completed out of the context of what they're there to develop in the first place. Take care of those first and then see if you need to get cute with the supplemental stuff. Get your pull-ups to 30 (or 2, depending on ability) and see what that does for your grip strength.

...........

I've felt a little conflicted about my time spent typing words into a computer - both for these notes and on my own affiliate's site. It's cliche to mention how much influence the online world has on our own world, but if I'm going to participate in it then I really can't talk to my people about it with any kind of credibility. I usually keep my laptop at the gym to avoid the temptation of the opinions that seem sooooo important in the moment. I really wanted to post on here after the CF Games death, asking everyone to take a breath, let God do His job, and remember that every athlete, volunteer, and spectator was doing their very best. I also wanted to post about the MetFix stuff, and how I feel drawn to that more than I do with the current state of CrossFit - something I have been critical of on these notes. And, I mean, did you hear Eminem's verse on Road Rage? Plenty of content to fill the RANT sections.

But then I remembered the basics, which for me is in-person coaching and interactions. Almost anything else is a distraction for me. If I was really that dope of a coach and if my ideas and opinions were really that important, there would probably be an in-person demand for them, and it would be way more difficult to make time to blog and comment than it is. In the six years since I started doing these notes, my desire went from 1) fill a void, to 2) impress Coach, to 3) keep up my end so I can get an advanced look at the workouts, to 4) keep my word, to 4) keep the OGs on track. And the more I thought to keep the OGs on track, the more I realized how easy it was for me to get off track. So not sure how much I can give to the veterans of the Main Site here, I just wanted to come on again and share how much I have learned by being able to spot distractions for what they are and rededicate the effort on the basics. Also, to say what's up again!

Love you guys!