There is 1 thing about music that really bothers me: Good or great songs being too short. That one that you just love and can jam out on repeat in your car all day but every time it leaves you just short of breathless. I can list 5 songs that I consider “good” and not “great” simply because they are too short. I still wish I knew Hendrix when he wrote “Little Wing” and could be like “bro you just need to ride that solo out like 2 more minutes man, at least give us four and a half solid minutes!”.
I doubt many people talk about Hendrix and then immediately about Avicii, but I am fascinated with Avicii. The little pip-squeak is like 24 years old and already has something like 5 top songs in his career and is worth $50 million and counting. Argue what you want about EDM music and it’s worthiness in being categorized as “music”, but Avicii has quickly taken over as one of the Dudes of the scene. His songs are just so damn catchy, I bet he has a wicked hard time finding female friends.
He is also a too short offender to the max! I’m talking like makes me want to wring his puny little Swedish neck and scream “JUST PLAY THE LOOP FOR 30 MORE SECONDS FOR GOD SAKES WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU!!??”. In which he would reply “Håll käften Lando är jag allt du önskar att du var at 24 år och jag sätt snyggare”. Which would anger me and I would then say “that’s not nice Mr. Avicii, at least I can back squat 400#.”. In which he would then reply “Bro ni ens lyfta?”. That one would just confuse me because it would be redundant. I would win the argument, however, when I play all of his hits together and they don’t even come to 15:00. He would certainly cry really hard in his new $15 million Hollywood Hills mansion, for at least a minute. Stupid brat.
The feeling I get when I hear Avicii’s song “The Night” is the same as when you don’t get the most out of your workout because of not scaling properly. Let’s get real here. None of us do this (CrossFit) as a living. None of us do this to a point where it matters more than just fitness and personal growth. So let’s be honest and scale ourselves appropriately starting in 2015. Yes, I just gave you a New Year’s Resolution that has to do with scaling CrossFit workouts.
What am I talking about? Choosing a weight or scale of a movement that you can operate for the full time of the workout. If you look at your times and you are constantly at the bottom of the pile in terms of the top times, or lowest round scores, and I mean if this happens nearly every time you come to the gym, then you aren’t getting the most out of your fitness. At the end of the day we have a good sample size of scores that gives us a good median score. Since 99.9% of us here are doing this for the fitness of it, no matter what the scale someone used is that median score is a good indicator of where we “should” be at. If you are always wayyyyyy off this median score then you are short changing yourself with your fitness the same way Avicii short changes me with my enjoyment of his music.
Scaling is a skill in and of itself. Using too heavy of a weight or trying too hard of a movement will cut your intensity down so much that you get nothing out of the workout. If a 12 minute amrap yields most people in a 5-6 round range, and you end up with 3, something went wrong there. Obviously I am negating effort in this assessment, but I implore you all to kick off the new year with a distinct focus on proper scaling. Nobody needs to be a hero, seriously, we just need to be fit. I recently read that the key to fitness is consistency and intensity. I would argue that they can even be factored as one in the same, as maintaining consistency with your intensity in a workout is the key, and doing this on a consistent basis is even more key.
As always your coaches are here to help. If you have a question about what weight you should do or how to scale a movement please ask. We are all here to guide you not just in coaching the movements but in how to perform at the best of your ability.
SATURDAY
Early Crew: Meet at 8:30
Strength: EMOM 20m
1 Deadlift, 1 Squat Clean, 1 Power Clean, 1 Jerk
WOD: TBD
10am/1pm
Strength: Press
5-5-5-5-5
WOD: Partner WOD
200 Air Squats
200 Double Unders
100 Knees to Elbows
100 Burpees
50 Hang Clean 115/80
50 STOH
