Sevan Matossian (00:00):
Max does say on top of the fact, bam, we’re live on top of the fact that Max says that, uh, he does say he balances out one of the most insane things I’ve ever heard about CrossFit, uh, by saying that this was the best open ever. I don’t know if he’s on drugs or what, but, uh, he does say at, at nine 20 in that video that, uh, CrossFits in a crisis of culture or culture crisis, that they have a crisis of culture, meaning that,
Brian Friend (00:26):
Oh, and that’s, that’s more or less what Andrew’s been saying too.
Sevan Matossian (00:29):
Yeah. Hi, Claire. Claire?
Brian Friend (00:33):
Mm. No, sorry.
Sevan Matossian (00:37):
Oh, but we heard something. We heard like a, Hey guys, she came on. Oh, uh, she came on early to test her shit out, just so you know. So don’t think that like Claire just shows up late and her shit doesn’t work. Uh, Mr. Halpin. Hi. Oh, that’s nice.
Brian Friend (00:56):
Can’t hear him either.
Sevan Matossian (00:58):
Oh, I can’t. Halpin Halpin. Did you talk? Oh, no, can’t hear him either. Guys, go to your, uh, go to your settings and then go to audio and just make sure the right mic and the right speaker is chosen. Oh, do you know how happy Claire is right now? That helping shit in the bed too? She’s so stoked. She’s
Brian Friend (01:18):
Like, yeah, who invited me is mine work. Oh, there you go. I think Claire’s is the one that’s buzzing. Hey
Sevan Matossian (01:25):
Dude, there’s some sounds coming from Claire that makes me sound like she could get electrocuted. Like she’s sitting in a bathtub and she has her, like her blow dryer plugged in next to her.
Brian Friend (01:33):
She’s probably in her ice. She’s probably in her ice barrel.
Sevan Matossian (01:35):
Yeah. Are you in an ice barrel? Claire? Can you hear us? Claire
Brian Friend (01:39):
<laugh>?
Sevan Matossian (01:39):
No.
Brian Friend (01:40):
Didn’t make any chips on <laugh>.
Sevan Matossian (01:42):
My favorite kind of co-host one that doesn’t talk. Uh,
Brian Friend (01:46):
Is that why you keep Caleb a on?
Sevan Matossian (01:48):
Yes. <laugh>. Um, I, I I I will say this though. Uh, Brandon May, maybe just Max was trying to sound crazy because Brandon really shined in that show. Is that the guy’s name? The Brandon the blonde? Brandon? What’s the, Brandon?
Brian Friend (02:00):
Brandon. Brandon.
Sevan Matossian (02:01):
Brandon Brandon.
Brian Friend (02:02):
Yeah.
Sevan Matossian (02:03):
Yeah. He really shined. Um, okay. Uh, uh, what’s interesting too is Max gave this year’s open an eight out of 10, which is like a c plus or a B minus, but then he also called it the best open ever. I, I just, I don’t, I, I don’t understand. And then I also listened to, um, the, the podcast of very Not fucked up or whatever that, that podcast that Pat Sherwood and Adrian Bosman do on beyond the
Brian Friend (02:29):
Whiteboard. Very not random.
Sevan Matossian (02:31):
Very not random. Yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I have to tell you guys, first of all, before I start about my biases, I cannot stand beyond the whiteboard. And, and, uh, I am, uh, pat Sherwood on my list of favorite people is, um, uh, is, he’s not on that list. He’s on my fist list of least favorite people. So if you hear any biased in my voice or in my analysis today, you should know that I do have that, uh, that biased and for, for the obvious reasons that you guys all know
Brian Friend (02:59):
Already. I will say this, during, uh, 2000,
Sevan Matossian (03:02):
I do like Max El Hodge, though I do like Max El Hajj, but he is gonna have to take an ass pounding tonight. Go ahead, <laugh>.
Brian Friend (03:08):
Well, everyone has their night. Yeah. Uh, from like 2015 through 2018, I did learn a lot about the CrossFit methodology from Pat Sherwood.
Sevan Matossian (03:19):
Cool. I I listened to that podcast today. Very not random. And it sounded like it was just a mashup of all, of all the lines I’ve ever heard Pat Sherwood say, like, his shtick is completely the same, and I got nothing from it. Although he was on there with Adrian and I enjoyed listening to Adrian speak. And I’ll tell you another bias I have. I love Adrian to death. Joe, Joe. So someone goes, Hey, you’re not a journalist the way you’re biased towards Adrian. Uh, you’re a hundred percent right. I am not a journal journalist. Not even in the slightest, not even a tiny bit.
Brian Friend (03:49):
And I would say that to some extent the way that you feel about Pat, which is what I, well, what I’m hearing you say is that
Sevan Matossian (03:56):
I don’t respect him at all. Zero <laugh>.
Brian Friend (03:59):
Okay. Well, we all hear that. Okay. And what I’m also hearing is that he’s not, you know, he, like his, um, his, the process of thinking about the sport is not evolving as, as the community and the, and time evolves and the sport evolves. And I think that there’s an element of that that is showing in the way that all of the higher, higher ups in CrossFit games team right now are running things, is that there’s a little bit of a disconnect between what they think it should be because they’ve been around for so long and what it’s become and that what it’s becau and, and while they, I think they’re struggling to find the harmony there.
Sevan Matossian (04:40):
Okay. Okay. Um, uh, Don b Barry, uh, Mike Coer, uh, donation for Caleb to stay a dollar 99. Uh, it’s a nice sentiment, but, um, we’re gonna need a few zeros added on there, but thank you. I I don’t mean to kick a gift horse in the mouth or whatever the fuck that, that thing is. Gimme
Brian Friend (04:58):
A cheeseburger,
Sevan Matossian (04:59):
McDonald’s. Yeah, there you go. Look at, Hey Claire. We can see Claire still in the back. And sh I just saw her petting her mic like that. Like that’s, I like that. She was like, Hey, hey. Come on baby. Work for me. Claire, do you want us to bring you on? Try you one more time. Hi. Hey Claire. What do you think, Claire? Oh, does she know she’s on? No. Hi.
Brian Friend (05:22):
I don’t think she can hear us, so,
Sevan Matossian (05:23):
Uh, Caleb, can you private chatter and tell her like she could come on. We’ll work on it. Okay, cool. Alright. You’re good dude. Okay, Barry. Uh, but before we just tear into this thing, um, can, can we look at the leaderboard and just do some friendly, um, like, like love on the people who are Yeah. Just to love on some of the people. Uh, I just wanted, can we just pull up the games website? I just love on some of these people before we just fucking lose our shit. I, I mean, I, I really, you know what’s crazy is I thought the show was gonna start an hour ago cuz I had the time wrong. Go figure. And then, so that’s never happened before. And so, you know what I did since I was an hour early, I literally sat with my back against a wall and, and just breathed for like 30 minutes. I just stayed and I was just like, oh, se let it go man
Brian Friend (06:08):
In a wall. Sit.
Sevan Matossian (06:09):
Yeah. Just per, yeah. Just like a, you know, in the lotus position, but kind of lazy with my back against wall sun, you know, sun on my back. It was a set setting sun and I’m like, just chill man. Peace and love to Sherwood and to be on. Can
Brian Friend (06:21):
You reenact that? Hire a photographer to take a picture of it and make it a thumbnail for one of your life shows.
Sevan Matossian (06:26):
I was just like this, you know, just, and then fucking soon as I came out of that I was like, Nope. Then I’m still there. I feel
Brian Friend (06:32):
Like I need to go get my stuff on Podcast shirt and bring it on. Cuz isn’t that how you’re sitting for that?
Sevan Matossian (06:36):
Yeah. That’s a, but just, but there’s grenades just dropping all around me. Uh, wad Zombie starting only fans, Caleb, that one guy sells his underwear for big bucks. 4 99 Wad Zombie. Hey, wad Zombie. I, I saw I got an email that you mailed me some new cards. I am pumped. Okay. Uh, mal Mall O’Brien. Uh, good honor, man. Right? What a page,
Brian Friend (06:59):
One of the cards that you probably got mailed is on this list right here.
Sevan Matossian (07:03):
Oh,
Brian Friend (07:05):
It’s not Mallow
Sevan Matossian (07:06):
O’Brien though. Please tell me it’s a Page Powers or Emma Lawson card. Ariel Lowen. Oh, I’ll take it. I’ll take it.
Brian Friend (07:13):
<laugh>.
Sevan Matossian (07:15):
Hope there’s a photo over her on the back there. Uh, on the back pregnant. I have a thing for pregnant women. <laugh>. I’m really, I’m really into Tia now that she’s pregnant.
Brian Friend (07:23):
That’s how you spent your last hour just watching Tia’s 23.3
Sevan Matossian (07:26):
On repeat <laugh>. I I’m so fascinated by pregnant women, like working out. It is,
Brian Friend (07:32):
I thought I sat in the lowest Lotus position while the sun was sitting and watched Tia pregnant, working out for an hour.
Sevan Matossian (07:38):
<laugh> it, it, it’s like, it has that, that uh, Logan Aldridge effect, you know what I mean? Like, like the one arm guy working out and the pregnant women, they kind of fall in that same like category of like, are you kidding me? This is incredible. Ah,
Brian Friend (07:48):
Wow. A pregnant picture on the back though.
Sevan Matossian (07:50):
That is beautiful.
Brian Friend (07:55):
Thanks. It’s, uh, Tyler Watkins has a lot. It’s a zoo with that. Um, whoa.
Sevan Matossian (08:01):
How’s that spinning thing happening? Can we, I want one of my shirts that’s for sale to spin like that. How come my shit doesn’t spin like that?
Brian Friend (08:09):
Only the best.
Sevan Matossian (08:10):
Wow. All right. Uh, okay. Uh, mall O’Brien, we’re happy with this, right? I mean this is like a no-brainer. This is, this is, this is the fu The future is here.
Brian Friend (08:22):
Well click on, click on her profile mm-hmm. <affirmative> and take a look at how she’s done in the open historically. I mean, we’ve mentioned it. She’s only had three opens in the two opens in the, uh, elite division and she’s pretty good. The, the 20 21 1 actually counts because it’s the same, uh, workouts that they did. So there’s no surprise that Mel O’Brien is winning the open. I would say more surprising is how close Paige Powers was to her
Sevan Matossian (08:48):
Is, um Okay. And, and, and I’m excited to talk about that. It, uh, historically Fraser great in the open, right?
Brian Friend (08:57):
Pretty good. Yeah.
Sevan Matossian (08:58):
And Rich did great in the open, right?
Brian Friend (09:00):
Yeah. I mean all of his finishes combined through 12 opens are summatively lower than his finish this year.
Sevan Matossian (09:07):
Uh Oh wow. Okay. And we’ll talk about that too. And, uh, and, and Tia has done great in the open, right?
Brian Friend (09:13):
Yes. After her first couple years. Yeah. But she had an interesting, uh, like she was consistently getting better up until the point that she won. I mean, Mel has basically just inserted herself into, uh, top two position from the onset.
Sevan Matossian (09:26):
And, and and what about, uh, Justin Maderas? Uh, how’s he do?
Brian Friend (09:31):
I wrote an, actually wrote an article for Morning Chaka last year or the year before that. It talked about games champions and the relative open finishes. He had a one of the worst open finishes prior to his first games win. Awesome. After his second, after that win the next year, he had a really good open finish and then he went on to win the games again. And now he’s regressed back to what would be one of the lowest games finishes for a games champion if he goes on to win this year rope. Other guys that are rope
Sevan Matossian (09:56):
The dope.
Brian Friend (09:57):
Yeah. So, so he is, uh, but I think that Justin Maderas, as long as we’re talking about him, is very, very aware of how good Roman and Ricky already are and how good they’ll become August. And that he, I I would, I would venture to say that he believes he needs to be better this year if he’s gonna three PE than he was either the last two years.
JR Howell (10:16):
Yeah. Maybe that means that the peak is slower and longer throughout the season.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>,
Sevan Matossian (10:24):
You know what I’m gonna do? That’s, uh, that’s 10 20, uh, uh, JR Hall, is that a record? Is that a record? I dunno if it’s a record, but Jer Hall spoken. Uh, 10 20 has Hal how, and have you, have you said a word yet? Yeah, he’s
Speaker 4 (10:35):
Probably, probably just testing my mic.
Brian Friend (10:37):
<laugh>? No, no. He was craving McDonald’s cheeseburgers.
Speaker 4 (10:40):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>,
Sevan Matossian (10:40):
Um, uh, Paige Powers. I saw Mike see in here. I think he even donated money to it. Uh, I think Paige Powers is the next champion. God, that would be, that’d be crazy if the next champion came outta the Mayhem Empire.
Brian Friend (10:53):
Well take a look at her performances here. Cause obviously 137 points pretty low and, um, okay. I’ll look at them myself.
Sevan Matossian (11:02):
Yeah, please. <laugh>, I think Caleb’s fiddling with Claire. Uh, Caleb are you gonna, Caleb, you have to bring Claire in. Okay. Because I’m, I’m, I’m, stop looking at her. Okay. Or, or she can ping one of us to bring her in if she needs to be brought in.
Brian Friend (11:17):
What you’ll see with Paige, with, with, with Paige’s scores there, she was 18th on the first workout, 90th on the first part of the second workout, 25th on the lift and fourth on the final workout. And I would say if you’re trying to be competitive at the games, this is a very good indicator because even though that, uh, running, that running and burpee test is low compared to the other ones, what she’s demonstrating here is ring muscles are not an issue for her. Strict handstand pushups are not an issue for barbell cycling at moderate to heavy loads is not an issue for her and she’s strong enough. And all of those things will add up to success at the games over time.
Sevan Matossian (11:52):
Uh, how old Brian?
Brian Friend (11:54):
Uh, 20, maybe 20 now.
Sevan Matossian (11:56):
Okay. So Young
Brian Friend (11:59):
20th says here under
Sevan Matossian (12:00):
Portfolio a seedling. Crazy.
JR Howell (12:02):
Yeah. You know, into Brian’s point, like especially with the thruster, the fact that she didn’t mail it in on the first one and maybe not had a huge score comparatively worldwide, there were lots of people who chose one or the other part of that workout to excel at. So a lot of the people that knew they weren’t gonna be able to lift a lot just went as hard as they possibly could and buried themselves on the thruster, I’m, I’m sorry, on the burpee shuttle run and then juxtaposed to people who were just like, Hey, I’m, I know I can hit a big lift. And she still finished what, 13th on the lift, which is crazy.
Sevan Matossian (12:36):
And, and, and second overall.
Brian Friend (12:39):
Yeah. And if you’re just looking at a, a head-to-head against Mel O’Brien, she beat her on two of the four workouts.
Sevan Matossian (12:45):
Wow.
Brian Friend (12:46):
Wow. She beat her by one second on the last workout she lost by 20 reps on the first workout. So it’s not like, uh, one to one-to-one comparison. She lost by 25 reps on the second workout and uh, lifted her by 11 pounds. So, you know, but it is still, you know, it’s one of those things like when we were, you know, when we were rent, Tia was winning for all these years in a row, it was really hard to find anyone or Matt that was beating them on multiple events, period.
Sevan Matossian (13:11):
And, uh, and Halman, wouldn’t you agree that, uh, the, the wins over Mal will be more significant in a games field, in a games type scoring than out here in the open with only 20 gals or 30 or 40 gals involved?
Speaker 4 (13:27):
Yeah, cuz if you look at like Mel’s lift, she’s a hundred and seventh and Paige’s 25th or, or something like that. So like, she would excel way further in a games type lift than, than, well, I mean it depends on the lift maybe, but yeah, she would, she would jump way ahead in that case.
Sevan Matossian (13:46):
How, how is, uh, how is Mouse health? Does anyone, does it, does anyone have a pulse on her? Does any information leak out of there at the H W P O? Like, I mean, like finally I heard, uh, I heard Fraser’s injured. I dunno if anyone cares, but I heard his knees all fucked up. But, uh, how’s Mal, do we know anything about her other than what’s,
Brian Friend (14:02):
I mean, I spent a little bit of time with her in Omaha and, and spent a lot of time with Jake Marconi and Matt O’Keefe and uh, she feels great. I mean, everything’s on track
Sevan Matossian (14:12):
And, and, uh, and she’s getting better. It’s like obvious where she’s getting better. Um, do you think she embarrassed Danielle, Brandon? Do you think it’s embarrassing what happened to Danielle Brandon out there?
Brian Friend (14:23):
No, and I had said immediately after that I thought Danielle had 60 to 90 seconds that she could make up. She actually ended up making up nearly two minutes on her performance there. And that’s not uncommon. I mean, we, we see a lot of times that the top level athletes that’ll go and do those open performances and one of two things happen, either they do at Vener enrollment did, and they said, ah, whatever. I know it’s not my best. I know there’s people that will beat it and they’ll learn from my mistakes, but I’m just gonna let it ride cuz it’s not a big deal. Or they go back and they usually obliterate their score or their time. And that’s what, um, Danielle did. I haven’t seen her whole video, but I was able to, she sh posted like the last six snatches and it looks like more like what you would expect. Um, you know, when you’re, when you’re going head to head in front of hundreds of thousands of people, uh, against, you know, someone who’s the best in the world at the open, it’s really easy to fall into the trap of racing or early. And if you do that in the first two rounds there, you can pay for it on the back end.
Speaker 4 (15:17):
Yeah. That’s a big part of like that sixth. I mean, she had that workout for what, 20 minutes before she hit sixth in the world and then she didn’t repeat it. So,
Sevan Matossian (15:27):
Uh, explain that to me. Sorry, that’s over my head. Say that one more time. Explain that. What, what are you saying?
Speaker 4 (15:31):
She only had the work she did the workout live, right, right. So she got six without a repeat like all these other ah, ah, all these other athletes, including Danielle, they had 24, 48, 72 hours to figure out a game plan and
JR Howell (15:45):
Then Yeah, yeah, yeah. And all their coaches are using them to write down pay strategies to know like checkpoints of what time they need to be picking up the third bar, what time they need to be snatching the first rep on the last bar, all that kind of stuff based on their performance.
Brian Friend (15:59):
And there’s like, there’s no doubt about it. If you sort by the, the finish, the two of the women that beat her, beat her by one second and another one beat her by 11 seconds. We know she had multiple no reps there on the, on the live open performance in addition to not having any time to prepare and, and study someone else’s work. So I think, you know, I don’t know if she beat Danny Spiegel in Brooke Wells time, but no doubt in my mind, she could easily have the third best time on this workout with very, very little, uh, effort relative to what she did the first time.
Sevan Matossian (16:29):
And in all fairness, we don’t know if she actually redid it or not. Maybe she did redo it and didn’t get a better time and, and, but, uh, and I’d ask JR this, um, Brian is saying that, hey, there’s a lot of pressure to do it in front of a hundred thousand live, uh, viewers, but hey, isn’t that what’s gonna happen at the games? Isn’t that what’s gonna happen? Like I think now showing that she can perform seeing a workout for the first time under pressure and Danielle May be saying, Hey, I can’t
Brian Friend (16:56):
No, no. What I was saying is that the pressure for Danielle is not necessarily that there’s a hundred thousand people. It’s said there’s a hundred thousand people watching you go head to head against the best in the world at these style of workouts. Okay? And so it’s easy to fall into the trap of like, well, I don’t want to get so embarrassed and fall behind the pace immediately. And it’s like, even da uh, Danielle said, she’s like on the first set of Wall Walks, even like I was already feeling the pace from her.
Sevan Matossian (17:20):
I don’t want anyone to think that under any circumstance that Claire’s, uh, issues are on accident. We always sa sabotage the minorities in the marginalized on this show always. We do not set them up for success and we have people that handle that so we can get the credit for inviting her on, but don’t actually have to have her Hello? Hi Hiner. Wow. And bam, just like that. There you are. Hey, you sound good. Nope, you’re gone. Damn. That was an awesome, she’s not, she’s not.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
I just heard her
Sevan Matossian (17:52):
Again. Claire say something. Oh, I see what she’s trying to do. She’s doing the video and, but she’s on the call, but Oh wow. What is she doing?
Speaker 4 (18:03):
I can hear her. Mike
Sevan Matossian (18:05):
Claire, can you hear us? No, she can’t hear us. Okay, fine. Okay. Oh no. Up there she goes again. Bye. Uh, Danny Spiegel absolutely murdered it, huh? Yeah. Any surprise there? Anne Brook? Wells crazy. I
Brian Friend (18:17):
Would say yes and no for surprise on Danny Spiegel. I mean, I, I, uh, we’ve talked about before that there was a handstand walking over obstacle course in snatch workout at Waap Pluto in 2019 that she just obliterated. Honestly, it’s one of the most impressive live performances I’ve seen from any athlete anywhere. So the fact that she would be good at these two things is not necessarily surprising. However, as soon as the workout came out, I just took a, a shot in the dark and said, I thought Toora Keno and Mall O’Brien might win this workout worldwide. And I got hundreds of people responding to me telling me I was wrong. I can’t remember, and maybe I’m forgetting, but I can’t remember anyone saying Danny Spiegel’s name. So the fact that she won the workout in hindsight doesn’t seem that surprising. But I don’t know if anyone was thinking about her as worldwide winner on this before it happened,
Sevan Matossian (19:01):
And not by a little bit either.
Speaker 4 (19:04):
No,
Brian Friend (19:05):
Right. I mean, there’s a massive drop off after her and Brook to the other, other women, especially given the time domain.
Sevan Matossian (19:10):
Who’s this girl down? Uh, like in ninth, Lexi Neely. Who’s that?
Brian Friend (19:15):
Um, I don’t know too much about Lexi, but I, if I, I think that she’s on the smaller side and stronger side
Sevan Matossian (19:24):
5 2, 1 40,
Brian Friend (19:26):
Not so great on the thruster is what I would’ve expected. But, um, you know, the, the barbell cycling and the strict hand Sam pushed us probably in her wheelhouse. She’s young. She’s young.
Sevan Matossian (19:37):
Alright. Uh, can we go back to the, um, list? Oh wow. This is an interesting name. Extra sloppy, some of my hard, hardly earned money for Caleb’s transcendence to better things. I think he meant transition. I think he meant transit. Caleb, this guy wants you to transi that you can buy a wig <laugh>, you can afford a cheap wig and begin your transition. Caleb. Thank you. That’s awesome.
Brian Friend (20:04):
Little Billy Madison reference,
Sevan Matossian (20:07):
Like, oh, is that what that is?
Brian Friend (20:10):
Yeah. Sloppy Joe’s.
Sevan Matossian (20:11):
Oh. Um, okay, let’s go, let’s go back to the list, uh, uh, the, the open. Um, uh, how Halpin, you said something interesting, uh, you were comparing Emma Carey and Malo Bryan regarding the workouts. Would you like to share that here? I thought that was great.
Speaker 4 (20:29):
Uh, yeah, there’s been a, well, I’m sure JR can speak on it too, but there’s been a lot of talk about that second workout and how much like Hiller even talked about it with the walking and then a lot of people that were either sending the A or sending the B. So, um, it came up, I think Peter’s podcast was talking about it as well today is, well, what if you just took the first workout and the last workout since those are more CrossFit type workouts, if you just take those two, I haven’t looked at all of it, but Emma Carey would win the open just based on 23.1 and 23.3.
Sevan Matossian (21:05):
Um, someone was, uh, sharing with me the word commensurate, commensurate. And they were saying that that workout, the movements were not commensurate. And I’ll give you an example. If you have someone run five miles with five pull-ups and it’s four rounds, those two movements aren’t commensurate. Right? It’s like, what’s the point of the, the five, uh, pull-ups commensurate, cor corresponding in size or degree in proportion? I’d also like to say that it, it reminds me of Rogue when they had those sandbags in the middle of the workout and that wasn’t commensurate. That was bizarre. And when we asked people why it was there, they were like, uh, the, that was there just to knock off their pacing. I call bullshit on that. I think it’s just a, just a fuck up. But, um, something was wrong with this workout. This, this, this, uh, 23.2. I don’t understand how people are, are arguing that, um, Brian does, does what Halpin says about Emek. If you take those that workout out and em Carey, uh, wins the open d d does that mean anything? I mean, it only takes us down to two workouts.
Brian Friend (22:05):
Well, uh, yeah, but even if you put in the, the first part of the second, it just took the lift out. I think they’d both be on non points with the way it’s currently written. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> or scored. But I, but Emma Carey, just like Mel O’Brien immediately enters into this division and has opened success two years ago. Last year she was unable to do it cuz of her back. So, you know, the fact that she won the workout, the first workout of the open this year, wasn’t that surprising. The fact that she has three top 10 finishes on the metcons is not that surprising. It’s, it’s all it’s really telling us is that she’s healthy again. And when she’s healthy, she’s also one of the elite open competitors. However, and it makes sense given the fact that she was coming back from a back injury for the last 18 months. Basically she finishes nearly 600th on the one ru max thruster. For me as an analyst projecting what’s possible for her, uh, throughout the rest of the season, that’s irrelevant. I’m not worried about that. I’m assuming that as long as she stays southeast, she’ll continue to get a little bit stronger. And even if she’s not strong enough or as strong as the other women, there’s no other format where you’ll be punished more than in the open for something like that.
Sevan Matossian (23:12):
Uh, Halpin, uh, I wonder what you’re gonna think about this. Um, at 34 50 in the, in the, in the, I wanna call it the woke woke cast, very not random, uh, 34 50, uh, I don’t recommend anyone listen to that podcast. Let JR Jr will listen to that and report back to all of us every week on what’s on there. Great. No one needs, that’s
Speaker 4 (23:37):
How I
Sevan Matossian (23:37):
Got it. Yeah. No one needs to go to be on the whiteboard and listen to anything. A 34 50. Pat said Week two is his favorite workout and we will see it again. He thinks we’re gonna see that workout again. And, uh, he said that he thinks that that workout’s a great way, uh, that to pick people, if you wanna live through the zombie apocalypse, look how people did on that workout. And I mean, he really likes it. He’s saying we’re gonna see it again, like as an open workout or as a linchpin workout. Yeah,
JR Howell (24:00):
He’s saying yeah, he’s saying he’s gonna program it for his affiliate.
Sevan Matossian (24:05):
Uh, I would not live through the zombie apocalypse though. That’s for sure. I mean, there’s, there’s two things going on here and I think Adrian tries to explain it in the beginning. Um, do, do you want to take a shot at JR Do you know what I’m, the two things I’m talking about? The, the competition versus, uh, working out for fitness?
JR Howell (24:23):
Yo, I think you have to back up to 23.1 to kind of get a, a picture of where he was thinking for this workout specifically. He said, leading into this open, there were three things that he wanted to do. He wanted to do a repeat because there wasn’t a repeat last year. He wanted to do something new and he wanted to do something heavy. Those were like his three super broad general, um, goals for this open. He explained that on the first week the workout was made you do everything in chunks. So it really didn’t allow you to really push the gas pedal no matter who you were. Even the elites of the elites probably had some sort of strategy as far as how they were gonna break things up or how they were gonna attack it piece by piece. So there were roadblocks as the workout went on based on your fitness level.
(25:12):
And then when he went to the second workout, he wanted it to be the opposite. He wanted to be very accessible. He wanted it to be something that wouldn’t slow you down based on the movements chosen. You can always run, maybe you just run slower and slower. You can always get down and do one burpee and jump up and probably get your chin over the bar one time. And then into the workout. He acknowledges that for some people, maybe that burpee pull up is gonna deteriorate. But for the most part, he played with several versions. He said he played with a shorter version and he played with a version that didn’t act as a ladder. So just set reps. And the way he described it as in testing, he didn’t think the elite people would be able to separate enough with one of those other two options that it needed. There needed to be one of the movements that increased in reps so that as the pace or as the engine started to show itself for some athletes, they ended up getting weeded out and getting left behind.
Sevan Matossian (26:11):
God, I find that, I find that, uh, hard to believe that he, that he was concerned about, uh, separating the groups because in other workouts that that didn’t seem to matter at all. Having 5,000 people tie for a certain place, helping has some graphs that we can <laugh> represent that.
JR Howell (26:27):
Well, you know, I asked Mike, you know, I said, you know, although it is a, it is definitely an upper level score that for a lot of people you use that 1 55 number as some sort of barometer. And you said, Hey, if I can get through the round of 30 burpees, that’s a 1 55 score. And I said, okay, well there’s gonna be a lot of really good athletes that get somewhere between 1 56 and 1 65, which is somewhere in the shuttles after the round of 30. And at that point in the workout, those 10 reps are gonna take most people a minute, whatever, a minute to a minute, 20 or a minute 30. So I asked Mike, how many people, how many males fell into that tie break And there were about five 4,500 mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Now had we had a tie break
Sevan Matossian (27:15):
That wow, that’s cool.
JR Howell (27:17):
The lift had a tie break, which was the Metcon and the Metcon had a tiebreak, which was the lift. I think that would’ve taken care of itself, but we didn’t really have that. So we actually did have a ton of tie breaks.
Sevan Matossian (27:27):
What about number four? Uh, I think you missed that. Uh, what, what were the first three? It was, uh, uh, something new. What were, what were the three? Uh,
JR Howell (27:35):
Re repeat, new and heavy.
Sevan Matossian (27:37):
Heavy. Okay. And, and then number four, add this to your list. Do you have a pencil with you? Uh, Jer could you write this down? I wanted to make affiliates miserable. Add that to, um, <laugh> number four. Okay, let’s, let’s go. Let, I have,
Brian Friend (27:50):
Go ahead. I have to know from talking to Adrian that he does not want that. However,
Sevan Matossian (27:53):
Yes. Fair <laugh>. Yes. Go on. Fair.
Brian Friend (27:56):
He may have created some problems for, for some affiliates, unintentional,
Sevan Matossian (28:00):
Of course he doesn’t. That’s that’s called humor. But, um, yes, uh, uh, we do have confirmation from Brian Friend who got to speak with Adrian. How much time did you get with Adrian? 30 minutes. An hour?
Brian Friend (28:11):
Yeah, something like that. Okay. I would, uh, I, the other one thing that I haven’t, don’t think I’ve mentioned or have heard anyone talk about is that the, is the similarity here also between, um, shuttle to overhead A and B at the games this past year. And we, and that, you know, Adrian was, let me tell you, <laugh>, he told us, I mean, he was ecstatic about that workout. He thought that that workout very similarly to how Pat was talking about this workout. If you looked at the people who did well on both shuttled over at A and B, that those would ultimately be the fittest come the end of the, of the total test at the CrossFit games. Um, it’s very similarly to this workout. I think there are some things that were overlooked, which is the fact that you could, you could, because of the scoring system in the, at the games, you could choose to really, really push it on the run and mail in the lift. Well, the super next, we’ve talked about this example before and outperform someone who was average at both. And in this, in this open workout, because there was no gated barrier, you had kind of both options available to you or you could, you didn’t have to pursue an, the best average finish on the two. You could choose to have a great score and an average score or below average score on the other one. Either one.
Sevan Matossian (29:26):
What workout was that again? Say that again? The one you’re referring to The, uh, o opus den
Brian Friend (29:31):
X shuttle to overhead A and B at the games.
Sevan Matossian (29:34):
Oh, okay. Right. Okay.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
In that, in that case though, they were doing ’em at the same time versus, which is what Brian sang versus in case you had 15 minutes of one and then five minutes of the other. Okay.
JR Howell (29:46):
Yeah. Yeah. And I think maybe like another way of describing it is not that it was intentional in Adrian’s part at all, but it’s like people are watching the game saying, how can you value this shuttle so much equally to the lift.
The above transcript is generated using AI technology and therefore may contain errors.
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