One of the things I love about CrossFit is that even though I’m far from the fittest person in my gym, I can still try a challenge proposed by a former Fittest Man On Earth title holder.
This 20-minute CrossFit workout comes from the mind of 2015 Games champion Ben Smith, and it’s so simple you can do it almost anywhere. The workout was posted to CrossFit.com as part of Smith’s two-week stint as a guest programmer.
To do the workout, set a timer for 20 minutes. Run as hard as you can during the odd-numbered minutes (to avoid doubt, start at minute one), then during the even-numbered minutes do 15 weightless squats and rest for the remainder of the minute. Your score is the total distance accumulated during the 10 minutes of running.
“The goal is to equalize your distance every minute,” Smith writes in his Instagram post. “You can schedule a 1-minute run from your home and do 5 round trips trying to improve your pace as your workout increases!”
I didn’t listen to this advice and opted for a one-kilometer hilly loop through the park, which turned out to be a mistake.
My score
It’s common after completing a CrossFit.com workout to head to the comments below and share your score. Strava recorded my score as 2.6 km, or just over 1.6 miles.
I was able to follow Smith’s recommendation to “aim for at least 30 seconds of rest after each set of squats,” although I wasn’t able to match or surpass the distance I ran in each round.
It all started well. I reached 270m in the race, went through the squats and still had 30 seconds to catch my breath. The second, third, and even fourth rounds didn’t seem too bad either. Then things started to get worse.
My quads started to tire from squats, and the next segment of my park circuit included a relentless incline. The minute of running that followed fell well short of the 250m average I had set and the burning in my lungs made me question why I hadn’t chosen darts or snooker as my sport of choice.
So, my top tip: do this workout somewhere flat.
Although I managed to keep my rest times to at least 30 seconds, that breath felt shorter and shorter with each round. In the last minute of the race, I was running what felt like a max-effort run. After the last set of 15 squats, I fell with my arms open on the grass, gasping for air and attracting funny looks from passersby. As the CrossFit crowd would say: “I had fun.”
Smith’s stint as a guest programmer on CrossFit.com came after guest appearances from CrossFit Games competition director Adrian Bozman and general manager of sports Dave Castro, and it’s been my favorite.
I discovered the sport after watching the 2015 Fittest on Earth documentary on Netflix, in which Smith stars. Trying a CrossFit cardio workout from an athlete I’ve admired for a while added extra incentive to push myself, and this challenge expertly balanced accessibility with a lung-shredding challenge. Smith wrote in his post that training is about “doing the ordinary exceptionally well.”
I could be accused of adapting my CrossFit training to focus on impressive gymnastics skills like weight training and handstand walking, but simplicity must always have a place if you want to develop the strength, skill, and fitness needed for CrossFit. There is nothing simpler than running and squatting!
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Image Source : www.coachweb.com