Barbell Shrugged - Aerobic Training for CrossFit: How to Improve Pacing, Breathing & Recovery - 204

Episode Date: March 16, 2016

Everyone focuses on strength.  But have you ever spent time actually developing your aerobic capacity?  Doing so will help you in all areas of your training not just your conditioning.  Tune into find out how you can start improving your aerobic engine. Want our help increasing your Aerobic capacity? Our new "Aerobic Monster" program is specifically designed to help you improve your aerobic engine so you can pace, breath, and recover better. Check out all the details at http://overtime.barbellshrugged.com

This week on Barbell Shrug, we're talking about energy systems, specifically how to train the aerobic system for CrossFit. Hey, this is Rich Froning. You're listening to Barbell Shrugged. For the video version, go to barbellshrugged.com. Hey, I see you sitting there, lonely by your keyboard. If you want to, just whip your fingers out, put them on your keys, type in http://www.barbellshrugged.com. While you're there, swing on over, sign up for the newsletter. We'll send you some cool free stuff. And make sure to check out Overtime. It's a sweet place with a bunch of sweet stuff. And last but not least, I know you're trying to find a bitchin' t-shirt to get your mom for her birthday. Head on over to merch.barbellshrug.com.

One, go! Welcome back to the Barbell Shrug Podcast. I'm your hoax. I'm a hoax. You're a total hoax. I'm a hoax. I'm your host, Mike McGoldrick, with coach Alex Macklin. What's up? Coach Kurt Mulliken and coach Mike McElroy. What's happening? Welcome, guys. What's happening? What are we talking about today? Today we're talking about Alex's favorite topic. It's the complete opposite of weightlifting. We're going to talk about actually two things.

We're going to talk about aerobic training for the sport of CrossFit, what those things actually mean, what aerobic means, why do you need to be better at it, how it can actually help you in the sport. So if you're a CrossFitter and you're someone who wants to be better at long Metcons, this is the perfect episode for you. Can we talk about how to make it not suck? Ooh, yeah. I'll talk to you a little bit about that.

What to do to get better at it. It doesn't have to be long, grueling, boring sessions by yourself. On a treadmill. Several ways you can do it. So I can't wait to dig into this one. I'm going to pick your brain on all the details. I'm glad you guys are excited. Whatever. You got some things you can do it so i can't wait to dig into this one i'm gonna pick your brain on all the details i'm glad you guys are excited um whatever you got some things you can add to it i know i never ran cross country you've got way more endurance experience than i do well yeah i guess so and you know about mitochondria i do know about mitochondria so with that said you know i said that

crossfit's an aerobic sport so what does that mean exactly like should we give a definition on what aerobic means or how CrossFit itself is you know maybe we should talk about that first yeah so in in my definition of what aerobic means aerobic capacity or being able to be aerobic means and and kind of layman's terms is the ability to sustain a certain effort for an extended period of time with minimal rest so that may be the ability to sustain a certain effort for an extended period of time with minimal rest. So that may be the ability to repeat reps. That may be the ability to continuously go on a treadmill or running or a rower. It may be the ability to continue to do one rep, rest 10 seconds, one rep, rest 10 seconds, one rep, rest 10 seconds for 30 minutes.

But the ability to sustain effort for an extended period of time is aerobic capacity. Gotcha. But that's more like the training kind of definition, right? Yeah, that's kind of how I translate it to clients when I'm talking to them. Right, right. But there's energy systems involved here, right? I mean, there's – because you have the three energy systems, the phosphogenic –

Phosphocreatine. Yeah, phosphocreatine, and then you have the glycolytic, and then you have the oxidative. The oxidative is what we're talking about right now, right? The ability to use oxygen to produce energy to sustain that effort. Right. So predominantly using oxygen as the fuel. Yeah.

So in really specific terms, I guess, maybe not specific is the right way, but what we're doing right now is aerobic. Yeah, just standing around. Just standing around. Do you have to be stepping up and down on a box with hand weights for it to be aerobic? Yes. Okay.

So that's the only way to train. Is that super aerobics? Yes. All right. So aerobic training is pretty much, or aerobic is anything sustained for a long effort, the sustained effort for a long time and utilizing oxygen. Yeah.

Utilizing oxygen to sustain the energy that you're putting forward. So it may not be necessarily a long time and utilizing oxygen yeah utilizing oxygen to to sustain the energy that you're putting forward so it may not be necessarily a long time um it may be that you're doing maybe 20 seconds to work with five seconds rest 20 seconds work five seconds rest over and over again which eventually would be a long time but 30 seconds of work 30 seconds of rest you know so it doesn't have to be 45 minutes steady state it can be just minimal rest so you have to be able to recover during that minimal rest to go back into the next effort and keep that sustained effort all right well how does this make crossfit an aerobic sport then because nothing in crossfit feels very sustainable especially the workouts when you're doing them

right and you're never standing around in it so what do we mean when we say it's an aerobic sport yeah and most crossfit workouts aren't longer than 20 minutes or so until you get out to maybe regionals or maybe the games but most most workouts aren't what we would you know kind of classically define as aerobic but the ability to they're not purely aerobic yeah they're not purely aerobic and when especially when you look at them i guess nothing's purely aerobic. And what you say, yeah, and what you say as far as why would we, how does this help with that because nothing feels sustained in CrossFit. Well, now we're getting into the difference between testing and training. So when we're talking about testing, it may not be fully aerobic.

Just like an 800-meter guy, maybe you're running, his 800-meter may not be when he, at that pace he's running at for his time trial is not a sustainable effort. Hell no, because I used to run 800. I know that shit ain't sustainable. But when you're training for it and when you're trying to get better at it, you do want to be running at a longer, slower, sustained effort so that that higher effort can eventually slowly and slowly get higher and higher

and it's still submamaximal yeah so when you say training versus testing like give me an example like what makes something no longer aerobic so we'll use a 5k for example at what point is it no longer like predominantly aerobic yeah i mean as far as like what it feels like and when i'm again when i'm just talking to clients about it if you get off the rower and you're completely laid out and can't move for the next 10 minutes then that wasn't aerobic if you get off the rower and you can walk over and get some water and have a conversation that's what we're talking about is aerobic and that's what we want during training because if we're always hitting that maximal effort which is tapping into that anaerobic system the glycolytic system we're talking about if you're always tapping into that

then you're going to be overdoing it and your your body is going to not respond as well, and you're not going to be able to recover as well. Right, so that was my next question is why is that bad then? So if I want to be better at rowing a 5K, for example, why can't I just hit it hard all the time and just keep getting better at it? Why doesn't that work? Yeah, so some of that is developing, again, the ability. Doing aerobic training is developing the ability to flush out lactate better, so you're recovering better. Again, the ability, doing aerobic training is developing the ability to flush out lactate better,

so you're recovering better. The ability to use oxygen better, so your muscles are recovering better. And that can be during the actual event. You're not taxing the system as much. And so if we go longer and longer, you're going to be able to, you're going to be able to, that effort, just like we see, I mean, we see marathoners, you know, elite marathoners, running like a five-minute mile for 26 miles. And for us, looking at that, we're like five minutes. How is that possible? That's insane.

Yeah, we're like a five-minute mile. That's above maximal effort. That's booking it. That is booking it. But for them, it's aerobic because they're sustaining it for three hours. They can sustain it, right. Which is insane. Yeah. I don't even know how you get to that level i mean what you're saying it makes

makes 100 sense because uh like you know when i did used to run i ran in high school or in track i ran the four and eight the four and 800 meter and our track coach he would always have even the four and eight guys we'd we'd go on like four mile runs you know a couple times a week like three times a week yeah um and it was to be, you know, sustained effort. It's not supposed to be like where we're like dying at the end of it. It's supposed to be where we're supposed to be able to just coast at a pace. And there's a pace. And what that was trying to do and what that does is that it helps build that

tank, you know, like to where, okay, yes, now it's time to run the race. You got to go all out. However, your ability to recover within within that race you can stretch you can push it longer because you have that built-in tank of aerobic endurance you know yeah well think of it in simplifying terms of if you want to get better at weightlifting right you don't max out every single day right now you might have some benefit to that as a beginner or not i won't say Olympic weightlifting we'll say like weightlifting in general so like in the beginning you could probably hit that to that as a beginner or not. I won't say Olympic weightlifting. We'll say like weightlifting in general.

So like in the beginning, you could probably hit that, that high percentage a lot more often and you'll just continue to see gains. But at some point that progress curve is going to start to, to, to level out and then what you have to start training it more. Right. So the same thing with CrossFit, we see people coming to CrossFit and for generally six to 18 months or so,

we see people make really good progress with just hitting the Metcons every day. And then once you get past that, you kind of lose those newbie benefits and the results and things like that. Yeah, the gains. So we have to start getting more specific with it, and you have to go to the longer stuff to work in. And like you said with your cross-country or your 400 and 800 training, you don't do it every day. Right. That's not what we're saying, but it's got to work in. And like you said, with your cross country or your four and 800 training, you don't do it every day.

Right. That's not what we're saying, but it's gotta be in there. It's gotta be a big piece of the puzzle, especially the higher level you get in CrossFit. Yeah. Especially when you're getting to the regionals and the games levels. There's a big mental aspect.

I have to be. Yeah. So, so what you're saying though, I'm sorry, go ahead. Well, I was just saying anything then could be aerobic.

It could be done on just a rower. We keep using that example because it's very simple, and it's just like you sit down and you do it. But how can CrossFit workouts be aerobic? Can you have mixed movements in it? Again, it all comes down to, what, the effort that's put out? Is it based on your heart rate? Like how do you know what to measure?

So I think before we get to that, maybe we should address does cyclical work, so rower, running know jump rope things like that does that completely 100 translate into crossfit workouts right um and so if with that question being translated into helping cross helping you so with that question being asked can you get better at crossfit by just doing your strength and conditioning or your strength training and then uh five to seven minute amrap or whatever and then some cyclical work and the answer is not cyclical work again cyclical is just like just rower just running monostructural is how crossfit yeah claims it but rower runner running you know just swimming or swimming okay not a barbell or not a calisthenic

or not anything like that low intensity for low intensity. Yeah, low intensity. Sustainable. Sustainable. Sustainable intensity. I like the direction that you're headed here because I think when a lot of people start learning about energy systems, they hear, you know, first off that, you know, anaerobic benefits aerobic. Aerobic doesn't benefit anaerobic. So they're like, why don't I just stick to completely anaerobic all the time?

Yeah, which the anaerobic would be a whole other topic, but the fact is the aerobic does help with the anaerobic and even the CP system. What's the CP system? Creatine phosphate. Okay. So when we're talking about... What's an example of that? String training.

Right, so any time you pick something heavier. So less than five seconds. Standing up. Yeah. Could be that simple. Yeah, it could be. And just to clarify too, so we have these three energy systems we brought up, The time you pick something heavier. Less than five seconds. Standing up. Right. Yeah. Could be that simple. Yeah. Could be. And just to clarify, too, so we have these three energy systems we brought up.

It's not like one is only working and the other two shut off. Yeah. They're just all working in different ratios from one another at all times, right? Yeah. So standing here right now, predominantly aerobic, right? Yeah. And that's the thing. The aerobic one is involved with all of them, at least to an extent,

whereas the CP is definitely not. If you're going to the extreme, if you're doing an hour-long row, there's not a whole lot of CP in the system involved with that. But with the aerobic, it's kind of involved with everything because it goes back to the repeatability. So it may not be the sustained effort. There's the ability to rest a little bit, and then repeat it again. So back to your question, i think you were asking um you know how does this look in a crossfit form so

uh some of that depends on the time of year but you can do aerobic style training low intensity style training with you can do it inside of a gym without a rower so it again the focus in kind of layman's terms and the way i like to think about it is it should feel like you're doing uh something you're comfortable with whether it be rowing or running or swimming that effort when you're doing sustained efforts in those pieces that's what it should feel like as far as breathing should be controlled and then as far as the movements go it should be relatively easy for you to continuously move through that so if i'm doing something aerobic and let's say i want to be doing something that's 20 minutes of work,

10 minutes of rest, 20 minutes of work. Well, if my back squat is 400 pounds, I wouldn't do something with 315-pound back squats in it. But I could do wall balls in it. I could do 10 wall balls, bear crawl 100 feet, 10 sit-ups, five toes to bar, something like that where it's sustainable through that and just continuously moving and breathing through that i'm not trying to do an amrap i'm just breathing i'll do the movement breathe move to the next thing breathe walking lunges you know

i guess the main thing is just making sure it's sustainable sustainable is the main so some people a good example might be uh i'll say i'll give a client 20 minutes your choice get out and do something active and they're like i went for a 20 minute minutes, your choice, get out and do something active. And they're like, I went for a 20-minute run. And some people can go out for a 20-minute run all day long and feel great, and their heart rate stays low, and it's very sustainable. But my point is, is someone else might not be sustainable while they run. They may not be able to run five minutes. I ask, definitely.

Yeah, can you go out at any speed, can you go out and run for 20 minutes straight? Hell no. Right, so just because you might have heard. I'm a fat weightlifter, though, so I don't. So, you know, hey, that's me. But something we possibly could give you, and we don't want to get into the weightlifting topic, but possibly something we could give you is maybe 10 minutes.

It doesn't have to be super long. 10 minutes of Turkish get-ups, side planks, and heavy farmer's carries. And that could be something that could benefit your weightlifting. You're getting some shoulder stability. That's true. You're getting some grip strength in. You're breathing a little bit, but you're not going to be, like, sucking wind. I guess, too, people always think, too, and I like that you brought that up

because when I always think of, like, aerobic work, I'm thinking, like, boring ass, like, on the treadmill, cardio, on the road for, like, row for, like, 30 minutes. Activity. Activity. This is where CrossFit has done wonders for us because they've brought into light, hey, we can do aerobic stuff. See, I'll do that aerobic shit.

I'll do some heavy farmer's carriers for like, you know, just at a conversational phase, you know. Hey, I'll do that. I'll do that, yeah. So we talked about it, and then I don't think we finished the point, but we'd asked can this kind of training make you better at those CrossFit workouts without actually doing the CrossFit workouts? So if I want to get better at, like, a long Metcon, right?

So if I want to get better at doing a 20-minute AMRAP with box jumps, toes-to-bars, and wall balls, and let's say that box jumps, toes-to-bars, and wall balls I'm pretty good at. It's my problem with that workout, with being good at it, is my breathing. So my inability to, like, just basically have a bigger tank can i just go do intervals on a rower and be better at that yeah so one thing that to note in there that you said is you you are good at wall balls toes to bar and whatever the other movement was you said box jump um box jump so if you are good at those and efficient at those, then yes, just training the energy system itself on a row or something like that will translate pretty well.

Now, if you have a tendency to kind of blow up, maybe it's chest to bar or something in there, and you have a tendency to blow up or your quads tend to blow up on wall balls, then muscle endurance plays a factor too. So you can't just train the energy system itself, which is developing that ability to breathe and increase oxygen throughout your body and increase blood flow throughout your body. But you also have to develop local muscle endurance by doing local muscle endurance things. And that's where- And what does that mean?

The ability to go longer without lactate buildup and that- For like the lactate threshold. That big pump that you get that we've talked about in previous episodes uh we're trying to avoid that when it comes to crossfit because when you get to the end of that you're not trying to blow it up yeah you you can't keep going you're not trying to go to failure you're not trying to look good but you can't keep going so how we would do that again is that mixed modal aerobic work where we're putting some things in and maybe it looks like so let's say grip tends to blow up for somebody, and pull-ups or toes-to-bar, their grip tends to blow up. Well, maybe now we do five toes-to-bar and then farmer's carry

and then some other stuff like walking lunges, row a little bit, toes-to-bar, farmer's carry. So they're not just doing the toes-to-bar, but they're still getting the grip work in with the farmer's carry that's following that. So they're not going to blow up, but they are training that endurance in that aerobic position, in that energy system. Now, how does the aerobic system actually help that?

So most people would think, well, my grip blows up on toes-to-bar, so I just need to do way more toe-to-bar. Yeah. So the other thing with the aerobic system is it's, and if you're measuring heart rate, this kind of brings in heart rate a little bit. Depending on what movement you're doing, your heart rate is going to be different. So if I'm measuring my heart rate, and let's say heart rate a little bit um depending on what movement you're doing your heart rate is going to be different so if i'm measuring my heart rate and let's say i'm going at a perceived effort on a scale of one to ten at a perceived effort of seven um and on

the rower and on burpees my heart is going to be different for the two of those even though i'm at the same same perceived effort so if i'm training the energy system we've got to do it with movements that we're going to be using in our testing workouts that CrossFit gives us. So if we know our heart rate gets higher in a certain movement, we've got to learn to breathe, which is what we're doing with the aerobics system is learning to breathe, learning to use oxygen better. We've got to learn to do that while we're doing toes-to-bar, while we're doing wall balls, while we're doing deadlifts and things like that. For instance, I tend to breathe better on squatting movements than bending movements.

So wall balls, front squats, thrusters, I tend to do okay on, but throwing, kettlebell swings, things like that, I don't tend to breathe on. So I breathe better on specific movements. Yeah, they're the complete opposite. Yeah. That's crazy. The breathing is probably, I'd say,

because I've done some Metcons and stuff before. I did a Metcon once. I did a Metcon once. I did a Metcon once, but it was funny. I think somebody was yelling at me like, breathe, breathe, because I was just doing like thrusters and I wasn't breathing at all. And, I mean, yeah, you could do that, but you're not going to do it for long. Yeah.

So breathing – You mentioned it earlier, getting comfortable with that. Or I can't remember exactly how you said it. But getting comfortable with that and just learning it mentally is what you said. Just learning it mentally, being able to do that. And sometimes it takes bringing awareness to that. Like, hey, you're not breathing when you're doing wall balls. Right.

And they're like, oh, I'm not? So aerobic training for CrossFit will not only, you know, what I'm hearing is too is that it will help you train your how to breathe. Yeah. Yeah. 100%. Breathe while doing movements because most people don't have a problem rowing for 30 minutes because it's very simple to breathe.

You might be closed a little bit sitting in that position. But when you have to think about transitioning from holding the wall ball to going to the total bar, you forget to breathe. That's crazy. Deep breaths, right? Yeah. I mean, if you have to think about it, ball to going to the total bar, you forget to breathe. That's crazy. Deep breaths, right? Yeah, I mean, if you have to think about it, you're going to slow down. I'm feeling this hurry. You're in this panic state. Yeah. It's a hard day. Oh, yeah, and then you get panicked, and then that's how you just

freak out. I've seen it happen, like, with people at competitions, man. They're just like, and they're just like, they look like they're dying, and it's just no fun. Right, right. Just look at, like, you have experience, obviously, eventually making it to the game. So in a year-long program, when you're far away from competition

versus when you're peaking for regionals, what are the kind of differences that you went through looking at that? Yeah, it's drastically different. So way far away from actual the time that I was competing, it was more basic, like, energy system training. Like, on the time that I was competing. It was it was more basic like energy system training work Like like on the rower long intervals it kind of boring stuff. Honestly, I mean I like that third energy system Yeah, I mean I liked it, but it's just very like the classic boring very monostructural, right? So mainly because for it's I mean for several things like for one we need to talk more about this too, is it helps me recover more between

sessions. The ability to recover from one session to another is kind of an aerobic quality. That's huge when it comes to CrossFit competition. If you're someone who's pretty powerful and has a really bad aerobic system, you go do Fran for the first event and you blow it up. You kill it.

You get first place. You can't recover enough. You can't event and you blow it up. You kill it. You get first place. But you can't recover enough. You can't buffer and you can't recover to go do anything really. But the dude next to you is a few seconds slower because he's not as powerful as you, but he's got a much better aerobic system. He's 100% alright for the next

one. You've got to consider that for days that have, for competitions that have multiple events in a day. And even training just to go along with that part of it in training especially for crossfit you've got to be able to handle a high volume of very taxing movements and when you're far away from competition like we're talking about uh that's when you're kind of preparing for that so you're doing your strength work with relatively high volume and you're doing aerobic work so you're not killing your joints and everything,

but you're developing the ability to recover for later on in the season. Now, we talk – and I have a question about that is that – is that more work capacity? Like is – or is there a difference between what you're talking about and then building work capacity? That part of it that we're talking about is the aerobic system, just the energy system development. So the ability to breathe, the ability to produce oxygen and use oxygen can create bigger lung volume. That part of it in the far off season is developing the energy system in order to set us up for developing higher work capacity later on. Yeah. Now, what's exactly work capacity yeah so my definition

of work capacity is getting a little bit into that muscle endurance type deal where you have the ability to do a lot of work uh movements specific crossfit specific movements you have ability to do a bunch of those movements without burning out and the ability to sustain those efforts i mean isn't it specific on what you're doing on how you're testing it so i mean your work capacity on the row is going to be different than your work capacity in 20 minute metcon yeah or i'm just or like a 10 minute workout right so i mean it really depends on what it is you're doing um the aerobic system can help those right is what we're getting at so what i'm hearing is like the aerobic aerobic work is like your base right yeah that's your foundation, right?

So just like for strength, you need a good foundation of muscle, right? Yep, absolute strength. To build strength, to build absolute strength. You need a good foundation of aerobic endurance and capacity to build work capacity later on. Yeah, what's the – Mind blown, man. What's the measurement of the tallest pyramid?

I feel like the philosophy. Was it Lewis Simmons said? Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, your pyramid's only as tall as all these inside. So your base is the aerobic, right? So with that said, I want to talk about some of the problems that might come up when you're trying to figure out

if you're getting better, if your aerobic system is actually getting better. let's say that we want to think you're not puking and why i want i'm gonna all right i want to know if my if i'm getting better at long workouts so my aerobic system is getting bigger so i'm going to use that 20 minute amrap that we talked about it has box jumps wall balls and toes to bar tell me why that might be bad to to to see if it's an indication if my aerobic system is better? I think if you're testing the aerobic, I think both need to be taken into consideration. So let's just say we do a 5K row also,

which is going to be around a 20-minute test, and we have the 20-minute AMRAP. I think it's important to look at both of them because if we look at just the AMRAP, then we may not be getting more skilled or we may lose skill possibly in the toes-to-bar and wall-to-walls and box jumps, and that skill development may not be getting more skilled or we may lose skill possibly in the toes to bar and wall balls and box jumps and that skill development may not progress as well as the breathing or some other factor may cause us to decrease on those maybe grip endurance went down for some

reason and if we test the 5k row and that's improved then we may need to look at this athlete and say hey this athlete needs to do more muscle endurance-based stuff to help with that aerobic system in developing the 20-minute NAMRAP, which is going to be specific to CrossFit. Whereas some people, they move well, their mechanics are well. Like I said earlier, producing just the system will help with that. And I tend to be kind of on that end of the things. I'm a shorter athlete, so movements tend to not be as hard for me. So muscle endurance usually isn't the limiting factor,

whereas you may be on the other end because of being taller and movements do get a little bit harder, where actual chest-to-bar do get a little bit harder. Maybe muscle endurance in those things may be a bigger factor. Right, so he's saying, you guys get that, so basically if we use that test and i'm trying to see if that's making me better my aerobic work with my aerobic system is better but what if i got worse at toes to bar does that mean my my aerobic system is worse because i didn't get as many uh a better score

in that amrap that makes sense yeah right so it's it's too many factors right so simplify the testing even further so use the road for example the-minute row is a very popular one. And I'm about to talk about as well how just using the 30-minute row without any heart rate metrics is also not a good idea. So let's say you do a 30-minute row for the first time. It's a great test to see just how much work can you put out in 30 minutes on the rower. A good aerobic test. What kind of level of intensity are you supposed to do?

Get as many meters as you can in 30 minutes. This is a max effort test. Oh, so you're trying to go hard. Yeah. Well, I mean. For 30 minutes. That's the thing. So obviously you're not going to sprint out the gate, right?

Okay, okay, okay. But here's the thing. So like when you're used to RAM 5K. Right, okay, I got you. What can you sustain for 30 minutes? Now, let's say the first time you do it, you get 8,000 meters. That's a really good score. Good job.

First time you do it, you get 8,000 meters. Next time you come back and you get 8,000 meters. That's a really good score. Good job. First time you do, you get 8,000 meters. Next time you come back and you get 8,500 meters. Now, looking at that, you're like, well, I'm in better shape. But are you? Did you just get better at taking the test, right? Did you maybe learn more the second time you did it? Maybe you just learned how to pace better. Maybe you kicked it in harder at the very end.

So it could be both, right? You could have developed. You also could have just gotten better at taking the test. So what is one way we can make sure that we're really checking out that it's internal development yeah i think i think keeping it to cyclical tests is one way because it's less likely to be another a different factor other than you actually improving the aerobic system um but yeah checking your heart rate and that's the way that gets a little bit more into training but having a heart rate monitor and that's the way that gets a little bit more into training, but having a heart rate monitor while you're training is very important, too,

to make sure you're staying in that effort because it's very important to stay in that submaximal effort so that we're not getting outside of that. What would that zone be? Yeah, so depending, I mean, you can do different intervals for different levels of the aerobic system, but generally speaking, it's below 170-ish. And now that's going to be a high-effort aerobic system, but generally speaking is below 170-ish. And now that's going to be a high-effort aerobic training session. So, again, the farther outside of the season you are, it's going to be lower and lower effort. So, I mean, off-season training I would do up to 90-minute pieces

where I was supposed to be staying under 140 or so beats per minute, which is a pretty low effort when you think about it. You're running, you know, I would do stuff like running and Turkish get-ups and side planks and things like that. If you think about it, when you're doing side planks in a workout, obviously your heart rate is going to come down a little bit. But we want that when it's a 90-minute piece. And then the more intense we get into the season, the higher it's going to get.

But still, if you never repeat that, like the other day when I was running, I was doing 30 seconds on, 30 seconds off off and my heart rate stayed around 160 or so so it wasn't like i was sprinting all out for 30 seconds but i was staying submaximal that i could sustain it and these are alternatives too so like it's it's not like the only way to do long aerobic work is to just sit on a rower for 90 minutes like he's talking about doing like a variety of movements because it does a couple of things one it's it's variety right it keeps you sane and then two it teaches you to be better about transitioning and to different movements right exactly which is crossfit right like it's it's the ability to to adapt to moving to different movements and staying aerobic as possible so you can get more work so we touched

on do more work touched on a little bit but maybe getting more specific with how to design a workout that we know is aerobic with using mixed modal stuff and how often should you do it like i mean how how how frequently i think it depends on when that end point is that you're trying to develop to as well as what you're trying to reduce in terms of the other issues other things that it might kind of not ruin like some strength possibly but just depending on how much time you have in the off season time do you have yeah how much time do you have so or how much time you have in a day too yeah so what are some examples yeah i mean if if i have somebody that has this training twice a day

which is going to be obviously a higher level athlete then usually especially starting out in the off season their am pieces are mostly aerobic. It's debatable whether or not AM or PM is better, and we don't need to get into that. But usually I just like to set it up where the AM piece is aerobic, where they're getting usually close to six hours or so of aerobic work, five or six hours a week of aerobic work, because every AM piece is aerobic. And then as the season gets closer, we start getting into more anaerobic stuff and blending those two systems together.

Did I kind of answer that a little bit? Yeah, that's pretty good. With an individual, sorry, with somebody who only has one session a day, then it gets a lot different. Right. And, again, this gets into not having the preconceived idea that it has to be really long for it to be aerobic work. It just has to be sustainable.

So, like, I have a regionals-level athlete that can only train once a day. So, basically, she does some strength work and then does aerobic work. But the aerobic work usually doesn't last more than about 30 minutes because that's all she has. Right. She's only got time for that. But we make sure the effort's in the right sustained energy system. But she would do it every day. Yeah, she would do it every day. Yeah, she would do it every day.

Until what, close to peaking season where? She's pretty much doing it every day. Every day, okay. I think it's necessary to keep in there at least three or four days a week all the way through. Now, if they only have one training session a day, then it makes it a little bit harder. But I don't think with CrossFit being the main goal, that there's ever a time where you need to completely take it out even for a day. Let's talk about, so you have this plan,

you're doing this stuff in the off season. You're not really sure it's working. Like, A, how can you know? How can you test and retest to make sure you're doing the right thing? And then B, how do you actually keep yourself sane and stick to that process? Because likely if you're doing a lot of this stuff, it's a weakness. You're doing it because you want to be better at something you're not so great at. So how do you actually trust that and stick to it? Yeah. I think a couple things.

One, if you're a high-level competitive athlete, like you alluded to earlier. Shut your mouth and do the work. Yes. That's it. That's exactly it. If your goal truly is regionals, you're going to do boring stuff. You're going to work yes that's it that's exactly it if you're if your goal truly is regionals you're going to do boring stuff you're going to do stuff that's not fun you're going to do supplementary stuff even that's not aerobic you're going to do boring stuff to rehab

your muscles and things like that that's boring so if you're a high level athlete you just you just got to do it yeah um if you're not a high level athlete it's either up to you or your coach or whoever's doing your program to make it creative and to make it fun, like we were talking about earlier with you. I wouldn't give you a 10-minute run. This dude is going to be cussing the whole time. Oh, dude. I would fire this guy.

I'd be like, screw this. What if the mental aspect of it is what he needs? Toughen my ass up? I'm about to talk about that. I'm really interested. Go ahead. Yeah, so the psychological of that, like I'm a naturally, like, very high-strung, explosive person.

I'm very powerful, always have been. You just like pain, dude. You love pain. Well, here's how I look at things, and it's almost my mindset is that I like to be able to see the end point, and I want to get there as fast as I can. Aerobic and endurance sports aren't like that for the most part. They're not like that. You can't always see the finish line and you've got to be comfortable just going out and working.

And I'm not comfortable with that. So on the psychological side of it, if you're someone who is about to start, you know, your rowing intervals and you're like, oh God, I suck at this stuff. I hate this. I know I suck at it. So it's just going to suck. You're never going to be good at it. You have to change your mindset in that. You have to think like someone who is good at it. It's going to take a while. It's a lot of practice. You have to tell yourself, though, that I'm going to be good at this at some point. I think I can.

I think I can. I mean, it sounds silly, but it's the truth. And not only that, but for me, like I said, my limiter is always lungs because of how short I am. Movement is usually not the limiter so what i think is like if i can get down to even 80 of what mcgoldrick can row then i can probably hang with him on most classic crossfit workouts right which is usually the case with like there's a guy in town who's six two or three and if i can get anywhere even remotely close to him on a road test

usually i can hang with him on a classic CrossFit workout. So just put it all in perspective with what your goal is. Like if you're training to get to regionals or to do really well at regionals, but you're maybe not necessarily – or even if you're worried about the games, usually they're not going to be a 60-minute row test. So take it all in consideration and say, if I can get my 60-minute row or 30-minute row or 5K row even remotely close to these guys, I'll probably be in pretty good shape when it comes to the actual CrossFit workout with them.

Another measurement to maybe look at that we haven't talked about as far as recovery and stuff is looking at your resting heart rate first thing in the morning when you wake up. This doesn't really have anything specifically to do, I mean, yeah, it does, with training. But if your resting heart rate is getting lower because of your aerobic training then that's a sign that it's working why is that better because if we're always in that sympathetic sympathetic yeah it's a sympathetic response yeah if we're always fight or flight if we're always in that fight or flight which means the heart rate's usually a little bit higher we're never going to be able to down regulate a little bit in our home and recover and recover and it's not going to be there so so in other words you could say the aerobic system

would help you get to that point faster after workouts right right so a good example was a few years ago i was training and i did a ton of aerobic work and i retested my fran and i did way better on my fran well let's say i did a few seconds better which just could have been because i got better at that but my ability when i was done after that Fran, once I finished it, I was like, I hit, I dropped the ground, I hit the ground after the last pull up and was like, you know, and I was like, whoa, like, that's crazy. And I didn't do any training for Fran whatsoever. Point being is that the aerobic system, the aerobic training helped me get better at recovering after those workouts which is going

to help me for my next event right so i was i was back to homeostasis or i was you know back at that recovery that healing level much faster which is going to allow you to i mean basically do better and yeah so that brings up a good point with high level athletes and we see like everybody compares to rich froning and how much work he does in a day and the volume that he does and the intensity that he does. Because they see his workouts or pieces of his workouts and they see his times and they think that's incredibly fast. But all of what he's doing is aerobic,

and it's just he's so developed in that system that all that stuff is submaximal. So same thing with you. I've had the same experience. Everybody talks about Fran. Basically, we're just saying he's a superhuman he's a superhuman are you comparing me to rich frowning no uh so like you said with fran i've had the same experience everybody talks about how how fran lays you out and last time i did it i literally did it as fast as i could um and i when

i got done i dropped off the last pull-up bar and I was fine. I walked over and got some water. It wasn't hard. And you see people win 800-meter or 400-meter races and take a lap. They're just chilling out. They talk to the person. Most crossfitters go do a 400, and they're like, ah! Yeah, and it's because their aerobic system is so developed. And a good example I saw, too, was at the Open last year, 15.5, when Sam Briggs did that rowing and thruster workout.

When she got done, she was like, just looking around at people. And I was like, oh, wow, yeah, that shows the difference there. And the other athletes were laid out. Smoked. Died. They may not have fallen on the ground, but they were trying not to. I cocked that. Yeah.

Oh, my God. She was totally fine. so just another sign there. Yeah, and bringing it in, we didn't touch on really, but talking about how developing the aerobic system, especially for the sport of CrossFit, helps with the heavy stuff. I was going to touch on that. Like, what about the strength stuff? So a specific example, a very specific example,

would be 15.1A and 15.1B. You have to be able to recover in less than six minutes to hit a one rep max cleaning jerk so you just do a nine minute m rap or you just sandbag the shit out of it then they'll call you out yeah that's true in trouble yeah there's people that did that but so you got to do a nine minute m rap and it's you've got to go hard that's a scored event you got to go as fast as you can but you've got to be able to recover in a short enough time uh to do a at least a decent cleaning jerk after that and okay let's take it out of the open um so it's not that uh when you were at the games they had a cleaning jerk ladder it was on the third day i think um i don't know it was like it was like it was like a

week it was like a week long 13 it was on saturday it was on saturday yeah so It was like a week long. 13. It was on Saturday. You don't remember your CrossFit games? It was on Saturday. Yeah. So it was like four days in. Yeah. And I don't remember if it was their first event that day or not. That doesn't really matter.

No, the first event was Naughty Nancy where we did 100 rep squats and ran around the stadium four times. Four times? Six times. Four rounds. Yeah. So they had to do that, and you have to have the ability to recover and still hit close to your one rep max.

Right. Now, you may not hit your one rep max after that, but some people did, and some people came close to that. And that's the aerobic system giving you the ability to recover, your muscles the ability to recover, so you can produce a high output. Now, are they hitting truly their one rep max? Now we're getting into how much they're digging into their cns like true right one rep right based off yeah uh even when they're fresh

in training um because like frowning you know we've are different people i'll speak to somebody that i have actually personally worked with but i've had a guy work with hit a one rep max clean and then we do a a test, a CP battery test. So creatine phosphate battery test. Basically, the ability to repeat creatine phosphate work. So like I said, that heavy one rep, one clean is a creatine phosphate energy system. The ability to recharge that battery and do that lift again, over and over again, how fast you can do that. So for example, the open workout where they had snatches at 135 165 yeah that gets into that that would get into that so the test that i use

or that we use some with that is do a clean one rep max and then rest a couple minutes and then do eight minutes max reps at 90 um jesus christ your first thought is maybe like a couple yeah like eight minutes three two so i've worked with somebody who, Drew Shamblin, he did, I can't remember his exact number, but it was like 37 or something reps. Are you serious? Holy shit. And I've heard that Fronting's is like 40-something. But the point is not that they're weak at the lift,

because like Fronting's hit 370 or something on his clean. Drew's not extremely strong but his clean at the time was like 315 and 325 so not terrible um and then he repeated that for 37 times and that's why he's been top 50 in the world in the open several times when he only snatches 225 and cleans 315 yeah that's how he has that ability to recharge faster between that that sub max effort so that's crazy yeah so it's just a different again it's the ability to recover even between heavy lifts or recover after several workouts and then go hit a max lift got it okay so we talked about uh i want to get a little more details on how to train it right so somebody's listening to this and they want to know like all

right like where do i start like do i do intervals that are you know like one minute on one minute off do i do like long sessions like you said with a few minute rest like where would someone start and how do they know how to progress that towards you know an end point yeah when i'm when i'm working with an athlete i usually um and if you're just doing this for yourself you know ask yourself what's your background what's your history like you said you're a doing this for yourself, ask yourself what's your background, what's your history. Like you said, you're a very explosive person, a very explosive athlete, so that takes into consideration not only what times I'm going to give you. I'm a power fitter. You're a power fitter.

Yeah, you're a power fitter. Not only what times I'm going to give you, but how I'm going to describe the workout to you. So I usually like to start on two ends of the spectrum, so give like a 30 seconds on 30 seconds off um for 20 to 30 minutes um so one to one work ratio one to one work to rest ratio and then on another day i may give a long easy effort so it's maybe starting with 40 minutes of just sustained effort but how i'm going to explain it to him let's say you let's say you come from a triathlon background

you've done 10 years of long slow easy stuff yeah you know me um if you're if you're coming from a triathlon background you've done 10 years of long slow easy stuff yeah you know me if you're if you're coming from a long uh triathlon background and you're coming from a weightlifting background power fit i may say uh 45 minutes at uh 60 to you or easy sustained effort to you right whereas to you i may say 45 minutes at 90% effort. Because your 90% effort, because you're so ingrained in that long, slow, is still sustainable. Right. If I tell him 90%, he's going to hit a wall in five minutes. It's going to be pretty close to max.

Yeah, he'll be dead. He'll be dead. So the biggest thing I usually talk with clients talking about this is making sure it's easy enough. Most people go too hard when we're talking about this work. Make sure it's light enough. Most people go too hard when we're talking about this work. Make sure it's light enough. You could hold a conversation. I've done workouts with, and mind you, at this time,

I was a borderline regionals athlete, and I've done long workouts with a 35-pound kettlebell swing. Now, that's not heavy, and most people, when you give that to them and they're starting with you as a coach or something, they're like, am I only supposed to do 35 pounds? Like, I usually do 70-pound kettlebell swings. And it's like, no, you're supposed to be able to do that. That's the point.

Does it have to hurt to work, basically? And with aerobic work, no. Yeah, absolutely not. Even though I know, like, Metcons are supposed to hurt, right? Yeah. Like, that's the other thing, too. We'll have a whole other – we'll do a Nuggets of Pearls on that. Like, what does Metcon mean?

Like, that's such a broad term to everyone people think it's if it's weightlifting or metcon the metcon could be so much so there's no such thing as an aerobic pump like where it's got to hurt it's got to it's got to burn to grow right there's no such thing no i think the equivalent would be an aerobic sweat okay yeah get your sweat on get your sweat on so so we covered how aerobic training is going to help you, you know, compete better in the sport of CrossFit. It's going to make you recover better between efforts. It's going to help you recover faster after those efforts.

It's going to increase your work capacity. It's going to help your muscle endurance in some ways, your CP battery. He talked about that a little bit. So your ability to hit a heavy weight and immediately be able to come back and hit it again um which is crossfit which is i mean all those things are i mean it's really a number of things we don't really know what crossfit is right right but i mean that's what people are so far is what we've seen that where it can help you you know um we gave you some ideas on how to train it right and how to test it too so you can know if you're actually making improvement because that's important you want to know if you're doing all

that work you got to know is this even working and we gave you some ideas on how to test it correctly right so so that way you know that it's not something else that's thrown off the skew you know skewing the data so using the heart rate monitor to to to measure simplifying the test heart rate monitor making sure there aren't things in it that can change that might be out of your control like like limiters, different bar. So what to take from here and how to apply in your everyday training, because we didn't get necessarily into specifics as far as how to lay out the periodization of it on a weekly template or anything like that, and we're not going to be able to get into that.

But looking at things, looking at energy system work, you're not going to find any energy system books or energy system work on crossfit specifically but just take what's out there on specific energy system work for a track athlete for a triathlon athlete um there's a website called slow twitch which is like the opposite of what you would think you would want to do that just sounds terrible yeah i know that's what i thought when i first saw it. Slow twitch. The Lore of Running is a huge book that has stuff in it. But any energy system type website or book, and just take the principles of it and then apply it to CrossFit, making sure the movements designed are easy enough to do it in a sustained effort.

So the same time frames, all that stuff. Keep it simple. Do exactly what it says in the book and put mixed modal stuff in it, and that's going to be your base for learning how to do this i got i got a question for you do you think you'll build a program that we could put in overtime something specific that sounds like we should put that shit in overtime something you could add to a training program you're already doing yeah yeah we'll build a template or exact system or just a template that you can fill in the points of where to put that into your system so maybe you have six training sessions.

We'll give you kind of three sessions or something to go along with that. And maybe also teach people how to build this for themselves too. Right. Teach people how to implement this. So given a template that shows maybe the time frames and intervals, but they can put it in the work. Because I know I'd be fucking lost. They can put it in the work for you.

I'd be lost as shit. Very cool. I think the biggest thing I like what you said, that takeaway for me, is that it doesn't have to be like that just on the roar boring shit. Like you can lift weights and make it aerobic. I think that that's – that'd be something a weightlifter, I'd be down to do. And as a crossfitter, it doesn't have to hurt. It doesn't have to kill you to benefit you.

That's huge. You're killing multiple birds with one stone. Yeah, you can make it part of your process. You're improving your movement quality. You're doing all these things that could help your weightlifting. Yeah, for sure. I mean, shit, now I want to do some aerobic stuff. I can't believe you just said that.

It's on camera now. It's true. People are probably going to be like, what the fuck? All right, guys. Thanks for listening. Thanks. on camera now so it's true people probably gonna be like what the fuck all right guys thanks