This text goes through five things that I’ve found to be the most challenging parts of programming (and training) in competitive CrossFit.

1. Random for random's sake is not efficient or progressive.

Even though CrossFit is described as constantly varying functional movements, progressions are needed. By doing random workouts day after day will get you fit, but in the long run, you need progressions in every area of training. Weekly routines of strength workouts, gymnastic skills, and aerobic work with purpose will keep you on track of your progress and it will also give your body time to adapt to the ongoing “routine”. If you just throw random stuff here and there every day/week you have a bigger chance to get injured, overtrained or even worse, undertrained (nightmare).

2. One of the reasons people started CrossFit is because “it’s not boring! It’s fun and it has variation”.

At least I did. Many people start CrossFit because “it’s not the boring daily routine. Every day is a little different and every week brings new exciting challenges”.

Programming for regular gym class is different than competitive programming, and training for health and fitness is different than training to excel on competition floor. But, I believe there is still one big thing in common what comes to competitive athletes and regular gym goers: Both want it to be fun and exciting, and they want to have variation and “unexpected stuff”.

In my opinion this is the most challenging thing to program for athletes with competitive goals. How to program “interesting and varying” stuff every week if you need to do eight week progressions on gymnastics, weightlifting and aerobic capacity?

I’m not the most experienced coach or programmer but what I’ve found out to be pretty effective is programming ‘energy systems’ training and not so much just movements, sets and reps.

I know it’s not THE MOST efficient way to weekly change the movements and layout, but this keeps it interesting and I’ve seen really good results with my athletes while they are having fun at the same time.

Just an idea how it might look like:
If you are working on muscle endurance, you can program 3x20-25 handstand push ups on week one, three rounds of 20-25 reps of push press inside a metcon on week two, and maybe some supersets of handstand walk + 15-20 rep sets of strict dumbbell presses on week three. I know, it’s not THE MOST efficient, but it retains the fun and variation and you get still pretty close to the intent of training “block” or season. Keep in mind that CrossFit athletes are not trying to specialize on anything, though you have to build a solid foundation on every area to be ready to compete.

3. Training hard and staying healthy

I’ve been injured or overtrained too many times because of my lack of understanding. Too many times I’ve separated training for health and training for competing. What I’ve learned that it’s not efficient to do all the slow tempo training and basic conditioning when you are 8 weeks away from CrossFit competition (or any other competition that requires also speed and strength), but that has to be in your programming in some point of your 12 month long training year. I try to build as solid foundation as I can during the first 3-4 months of training after the competition season is over. Healing pains and aches, building joint health, fixing imbalances, and working on the aerobic foundation.

4. Programming for CrossFit.

How do you program for a sport that requires every energy system? You need speed, strength, power, aerobic capacity etc. I try to narrow it down to the most often used energy system and the most strained muscle groups. I did some calculating on the past four years of Open workouts and there are a few things that I noticed:

• The average workout time is around 12 minutes (if you think a good-average result in all workouts).
• The repetitions were somewhere around 250-300 reps per workout. Most stressed muscle groups were grip and pulling movements (weightlifting, rowing and gymnastics).
• Average barbell weight was around 50kg for men and 35kg for women.
• If you put these together you get the average of 20-25 reps per minute at 50/35kg. Obviously all the movements are not done with 50kg barbell but you get the idea.

NOTE: this is what I calculated and there are probably more than one different outcomes depending how you look at the previous workouts and do you count in everything like double unders or meters rowed etc.

This means the most used energy systems are lactic capacity and aerobic power. If you take the best results it means we are looking at 27-35 reps per minute. Every minute. For 12 minutes. Ouch.

You need to have the whole package. Weightlifting, gymnastic skills and strong aerobic foundation but remember that 130kg snatch and amazing set of skills are not alone going to make you the fittest CrossFit athlete. You need to hurt and feel like crap to get there. That is why I think programming needs to be interesting, varying and fun. Because feeling like a wet cloth every day won't keep you motivated for long.

5. CrossFit is a new sport and nobody perfectly knows what they are doing.

Weightlifting has been here for ages. So has 100m sprint. Both are well known sports and it’s pretty clear what is needed in these sports. Maximum strength and power. Of course you need general athleticism, but there is no actual need for a weightlifter to run 5-10k every week for endurance, or 100m sprinter to do “Murph” (lot a freakin’ reps and running) during his/hers competition season. Be sport specific but also athletic and versatile. And remember to have fun!

Let's stay humble and open minded while coaching, programming or training. Learn new stuff every day and try your best with the tools you are given. Even if you know a lot about something, you only know little about everything.