Two Oars

Brad B nails a 225# thruster on his birthday. Happy Birthday Brad.

2 time Olympian Kevin McMahon was in town and stopped by CF West and watched a class. Come by anytime Kevin, but next time bring some workout clothes.

Have you ever tried to row a boat?  It is not as easy as you might think.  If you don’t move both oars together it is very easy to kind of wobble from left to right even if you don’t go in a circle.  Both oars need to be going at the same speed to go forward.

CrossFit is a little like that too.  One oar is intensity and the other is form. When one first starts CrossFit, learning the movements is of foremost importance.  We call this mechanical competency.  Once a movement is learned, the goal is to be able to perform the movement over and over again. We call this consistency. Once consistency has been established, then intensity becomes the order of the day.  

So, mechanical competency, consistency, and then intensity.

However, once intensity has been reached, mechanical competency is not abandoned.  Both form and intensity need to be equally stressed.  They are the two oars that must be evenly rowed in order to progress.  One of the prime directives of CrossFit, as well as part of its uniqueness, is to not sacrifice one for the other.  If only form is stressed, then the athletes will become stagnant, but if only intensity is stressed, then the athlete will become sloppy and ultimately forward momentum will grind to a halt. Both should be stressed equally in order to progress.  

Were it not for CrossFit’s practice of stressing each oar equally, Crossfit could be a highly unsafe activity.  One of the criticism leveled at CrossFit is that fast repetitious lifting is not safe.  True, only if form is allowed to deteriorate.  By always pushing for equality in both form and intensity, CrossFit safeguards against this criticism becoming true.

Please post thoughts to Comments.

Workout:

Find your 1RM in the thruster.

Then:

40, 30, 20, 10

Deadlift 155/100#

10, 7, 5, 3

Handstand Pushup

5, 4, 3, 2

Box Jump 40/35″

Post WOD complete and score to Comments.