Barbell Shrugged - How to Beat Tia Claire Toomey and Building Power Abs with Kari Pearce, Anders Varner, Doug Larson, and Kenny Santucci - Barbell Shrugged #396

Episode Date: May 22, 2019

With a competitive gymnastics background, Kari Pearce began training at New York Health and Racquet club where she met a powerlifting coach and did her first competition. While she was preparing for my competition, the owner of CrossFit SPOT contacted her about coaching CrossFit because he knew of her gymnastics and training background. Kari knew this would be the perfect opportunity for her to start.   After winning the powerlifting competition, Pearce decided it was time to change direction. The other sports were great but she loved that there are so many different movements and always something to work on with CrossFit. Once Pearce started, she realized her background was perfect and she began to excel quickly.   Six months after beginning CrossFit training, Pearce found herself competing at the EastRegional. In her first year she was able to qualify for the CrossFit Games and finish 21st placein the world. After this, Pearce knew she had found her sport and loves everyday of it!   In this episode of Barbell Shrugged, Anders Varner, Doug Larson, and Kenny Santucci discuss what it takes to win the CrossFit Games, how Kari Pearce used her gymnastics background to excel at CrossFit and what CrossFit athletes are missing when it comes to core training. Kari Pearce is coming off winning 3 CrossFit Open workouts and is on her way to the CrossFit Games for the fourth time. The guys discuss her training, preparation, and the lifestyle of a CrossFit Games athlete.   Minute Breakdown: 0-10 - Winning CrossFit Open Workouts 11-20 - Governing Body For CrossFit Sanctionals 21-30 - Starting CrossFit in New York City 31-40 - CrossFit athletes being great at gymnastics 41-50 - Athlete and Coach Relationship for Games Athletes 51-60 - Eliminating the demands of life for focus 61 -70 - Open Ocean Swimming 71 -80 - How Do You Beat Tia Claire Toomey 81 -90 - Gymnastics for Average CrossFitters 91-100 - Power Ab Training 101 - 110 - Taking 5th at The CrossFit Games with. Partially Torn Achilles ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Show notes at: http://www.shruggedcollective.com/bbs-pearce ----------------------------------------------------------------------- @whoop - whoop.com  “shrugged” for 20% off @organifi - www.organifi.com/shrugged to save 20% @vuori - www.vuoriclothing.com “SHRUGGED25” to save 25% storewide @halo - gethalosport.com/shrugged “barbell” for $100 off   ► Subscribe to Barbell Shrugged's Channel Here ► Subscribe to Shrugged Collective's Channel Here http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedSubscribe 📲 🎧 Listen to the audio version on the Apple Podcast App or Stitcher for Android Here- http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedApple http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedStitcher Shrugged Collective is a network of fitness, health and performance shows that help people achieve their physical and mental health goals.  Usually in the gym, but outside as well. In 2012 they posted their first Barbell Shrugged podcast and have been putting out weekly free videos and podcasts ever since. Along the way we've created successful online coaching programs including The Shrugged Strength Challenge, The Muscle Gain Challenge, FLIGHT, Barbell Shredded, and Barbell Bikini. We're also dedicated to helping affiliate gym owners grow their businesses and better serve their members by providing owners tools and resources like the Barbell Business Podcast. Find Shrugged Collective and their flagship show Barbell Shrugged here: SUBSCRIBE ON ITUNES ► http://bit.ly/ShruggedCollectiveiTunes WEBSITE ► https://www.ShruggedCollective.com INSTAGRAM ► https://instagram.com/shruggedcollective FACEBOOK ► https://facebook.com/barbellshruggedpodcast TWITTER ► http://twitter.com/barbellshrugged

Monday, May 27th. That's next Monday. The One Ton Training Plan launches. Our boy, Coach Travis Mast, the best weightlifting coach in the country, just went into nationals for USA Weightlifting and won Best Male and Female Lifter in the country. That's the level that this program is operating at right now. I am so stoked to see you get strong, get into the one-ton club, PR your snatch, clean jerk, squat, deadlift, and bench. Program drops Monday.

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And also want to thank our friends over at Whoop. I have been traveling all week. I'm in Jamaica right now. My Whoop has been on. I'm'm tracking recovery i'm sleeping in weird places i'm up at four every day we're hitting the track early so it's really cool to be able to track where my recovery is at what my hrv resting heart rate all that stuff looks like so get over to whoop.com use coupon code shrugged save 15 whoop.com forward slash shrugged save 15 with the coupon code SHRUG to save 15%. Whoop.com forward slash SHRUG to save 15% with the coupon code SHRUG. Also, Carrie Pierce is on the show today.

She is so freaking fit, and this is so much fun to talk to badass athletes that have really cool stories. And enjoy the show. Oh, dope. Welcome to Barbell Shrug. I'm Anders Varner. Doug Larson. Mr. Beautiful. Kenny Santucci in the house. We're dope. Welcome to Barbell Strug. I'm Anders Varner. Doug Larson. Mr. Beautiful. Kenny Santucci in the house. We're at our East Coast home.

I need to come up with a nice name for our cozy little corner over here at Solace, New York. This is a big skew. I was hoping we'd get like a nice banner here. I know. We've got to talk to somebody. We're going to have this stuff. Lorelei and I, we're making things happen because we've got to get the fit aid. We've got to get everything locked in.

It's got to look nice. in. It's got to look nice. Yeah. It's got to flow. We were rushing too many things this week getting this set up. We'll make it pretty next time. When we officially make this our office, we've got some nice – a couch maybe. Well, I wanted to do that, but I need a place to keep these fucking boxes. Yeah, I know.

But if we had some, like, a nice leather couch here and stuff. Maybe we'll just put some new upholstery over the boxes, call it a couch. Or we could do it right in the window. Not much of a difference. Maybe we extend the window a little bit more. I like that. Make some seating in it. I like that.

Carrie's starting to feel left out over here. Carrie Pierce. Look at her. Carrie Pierce. What about me? What's going on? There you go. You won 19.3.

I did win 19.3. What is it like when someone puts a workout out and, like, I don't know, a couple hundred thousand people decide to do it, and you beat them all? I get stoked if I just beat my friends. There you go. Much less the people in my town, much less the city, much less the globe. Yeah, and it's the first open workout I ever won. I got second in an open workout last year by one second.

It was a bunch of burpees and dumbbell squats. And me and my coach thought I had that one because we saw a lot of the big names come up. And then this girl from Australia that I, like, had never heard of before, one second. He's like, you really couldn't move one second faster? I was like, what do you want from me? That's the hard part about the open. There's always somebody that's good at something. Remember when they did seven minutes of burpees and the guy that won was a professional aerobicizer or something?

Who knew? Right? Who knew that that existed in Russia? Exactly. Wait, so for you, I mean, a lot of people always say, and I get it so much here because I did decent, decent in 19-1, and everybody's like, well, that's because you're tall. But I was like, well, Carrie Pierce won, and she's not that tall.

So, I mean, for all those people out there who are like well i can't i can't be good at rowing because i'm short well this was a different way you won 19-1 also no i didn't win 19 i was like 19 really 19-3 was handstand push-ups yeah yeah okay i wish i won if i was strong like her those shoulders make a difference yeah you got a little bit of a problem though you want to tell the story of your your 19-3 experience yeah so as you said when the workout came out I was so excited especially when they're like oh there's a switch on it it's going to be strict handstand push-ups I'm like this is great because we've always had handstand push-ups in the past and my kipping are pretty good but my strict are definitely a lot better just because my shoulder strength so we went to do the workout Friday morning. Right after I finished, Coach and I were both really excited.

I finished in 7.17, and my judge came over. She goes, thank you. I thought it was fast, too. I don't think I could do just the handstand push-ups in 7.17. I don't have strict handstand push-ups at all. See, I got these short arms, too. She judged you right there. Did you see that?

I did. I didn't mean to, but the look shows it all. But the rowing and wall balls, you probably dominated me. So the speed across it. It's only because you're tall. Okay. And so, yeah, right after I finished the workout, my judge came over and she's like, did you alternate feet every step for the box step ups? I looked at her and go, nope. My coach is is like let's watch the video i'm like i can assure you 100 i did not alternate my feet he's like well looks like we're gonna do it again tomorrow i'm like tomorrow like shouldn't we wait till monday let's just get it over with well that is that does get into the being tall

thing though because you would think that the box step ups would make a massive difference because you're doing like a full squat with one leg each time. Kenny's got just a little baby step. Right. Those long legs. Well, yeah, that was easier. But when I got to handstand, again, my Achilles heel. What was the winning, the worldwide winning time?

6.46. Oh, so you smashed it the next day, too. Yeah. 30 seconds is huge. Yeah. That's a big difference. Especially in a seven-minute workout. Yeah.

And with a three-minute break in the middle. No, no, no, that was last week. Yeah. Yeah. We're going to all mess up. There's too many workouts. There is too many workouts with different elements and stuff. So would you have been close if you didn't have to redo it?

Was that a blessing in disguise? Yes, it was. Well, and like, yeah, right after it, my coach was like, well, it just means that, you know, something better is going to come. I was like, yeah, my arms are going to be tired the next day. My legs are going to be tired. What good could come from this? Why didn't you just wait until Monday? He just wanted, like, I mean, we kind of both were just like, it's for me, like I said,

I love handstand pushups, handstand walking. So I wasn't super fatigued afterward. And we're like, okay, well, worst case, we do it Saturday and we don't get a score we want. If I was a lot slower, then we still have time to redo it on Monday. So I guess just have a little extra wiggle room in case I forgot to alternate my legs on step-ups or did something else. Do you end up doing all of them twice anyways? I did the first one twice, unfortunately, to get like five more reps. But in that workout, everything was so close that every rep counted.

And the second one my coach 16-2 which was the repeat my coach actually programmed that two weeks before so I kind of knew what it was going to feel like just because that was then one of my worst open workouts ever. Gets heavy. Yeah it does especially in 2016 it was my one rep max so I got three reps at the final weight in like I was like four and a half minutes And then this time I was able to finish Both times I did two weeks before we had it programmed. I got 18 27. That's savage. Thank you And then in the open I got 16 34. I was like, sorry. I was slacking in training

So when you saw 19 3 were you like, oh I got this in the bag I mean, is it one of those times where you're like I have a really good shot at winning this yeah it it i definitely knew i had a really good shot at winning it and everyone reached out and like oh this is your workout this is your workout i'm like no pressure guys no pressure i just wanted those like i knew well i knew i would be in top three but there's so many fit girls and strong girls like you never know nowadays like like jamie green kristen holte we're both like me and my coach were like oh you never know and then sarah came up with a phenomenal score too why are the girls so much cooler in crossfit than the guys it's the only sport i say this all the time it's the only sport where like i'd rather watch the girls than the guys yeah you know everybody's so much cooler yeah it's so much

better they're actually really a lot better i mean pound for pound the girls are better than the guys thank you hands down yeah and when the documentaries come out i'm way more inclined to a lot better. I mean, pound for pound, the girls are better than the guys. Thank you. Hands down. Yeah. And when the documentaries come out, I'm way more inclined to watch the girl ones than the guy ones. I just find the guys

so boring. I feel like the girls, yeah, just have like more energy and I feel like they just enjoy it more overall. Yeah. You can see in their face

when they talk, like they're genuinely excited but the guys just, they're so meaty. Yeah. They don't talk as well. They're not. I feel like most of the guys who are really good at CrossFit just don't have a personality.

I feel like a lot of the girls lend their personality. When we talked to Frazier, he was on, but the majority of them were, they're just, you know. The girls are way more exciting. Well, thank you. I appreciate it. I was surprised at how cool Matt was. Yeah, Matt was really awesome. What's your training looking like these days?

We're in open, but this is like the weirdest CrossFit season ever, right? Where are you at in the world right now? I'm in eighth right now in the world. Savage. Thank you. It was that first workout. You got one more, and then you qualify for the games. That's it.

That's year five in the games, right? Yeah, it will be fifth in a row. how do you feel about all the changes this year i mean i'm like this year is just such a shock um like i was gonna do dubai and then wadapalooza and we're like okay no dubai let's just focus on wadapalooza try and win it i got second to tia i mean if you're gonna get second to someone she's the person to get second to and yeah just being like side by side with her and then like kristen holte and sarah in some of the events were just a lot of fun. Plus, I could kind of see where I was at training-wise. Yeah.

A few things we need to focus on, just kind of, like, some leg strength, some endurance stuff. So, Guadalupalooza was a really good tester. And then a few, like, a month and a half later, I guess, here's the Open. And then I'm going to do Rogue in May. I think that should be a lot of fun. That's going to be fun. Yeah. That looks awesome.

Wait, one more time. What's the scoop with the Open? Who goes from the Open with the new changes? Yeah, so this year, top 20 in the world go regardless, and then if there's a national champion or two or three, then the top 20 gets extended. So say there's five national champions in the top 20, then overall the top 25 from the open will go to the games. Got it.

So you say top 20, you'll have your ticket. Yes. Correct. Are there going to be – I mean, I don't get what the point of the second open is because I know that used to be the team series. It's like September. Well, the second open is for 2020. Yeah.

It's for next year. For next year. But are they going to have another open again in – No. Okay. The open in February no longer exists. Okay. So they're just changing the season. Yeah, so the Open kicks off the season,

and then the Granite Games finish the season, or the last event before the games. So you've got the Open for the top 20 and all the national champions, and then there's like 15 events that you can go to after that. Did I get that right? I think there's 15 events like including dubai and waterpalooza have you been to waterpalooza before yeah i this is my third year competing there yeah this is my thing i think it's a little weird that crossfit's like out of nowhere they had no affiliation with any of these events everywhere yeah they're not like they don't they're not sending somebody out to be like,

all right, what do you guys program? What do you do? They're just trusting on the idea that you guys, oh, you guys are doing a workout? All right, cool. Well, that'll count for ours. We're going to use your event to judge everything we're doing. It's kind of weird in a way.

And the coaches are programming workouts. That's a fun one. Yeah, but like randomly. I think like Misfits did one of the workouts. Henshaw had a couple. Henshaw had a, and are they talking at all? Are they like, hey, we're going to do this. Don't do this.

Yeah. Don't prepare your athletes for everything you know is coming. Yeah. That was, and that was one thing like at Wadapalooza, like you see all these different coaches, you know, they throw in different kinds of programming. Like, but if one group is programming a workout, I'm programming another one. Kenny's programming another one.

You have to tell me what movements you're doing. And if I have athletes competing, then, I mean, I might not know the exact workout. But if you say, well, hang cleans are going to be the throat climbs with heavy sandbag carries. Then I'm like, well, shoot, I'm going to have my athletes doing that triplet. Yeah, what's the chatter in the, I guess it's not really a a locker room but like the warm-up area amongst the competitors is everybody kind of like dude what the fuck like why are they doing this yeah i mean we haven't actually talked like the athletes we didn't talk a whole lot about like the programming and stuff that goes into water blues i have like out i guess outside of the competition just with like people i train with and

um athletes in other situations and yeah everyone's kind of like they need to find like a common ground for people doing the programming like you can't have coaches they're gonna call it a sanctioned event they should have a sanctioning body yeah that's what i exactly yeah i stole that from kenny at waterpalooza oh there you go perfect at least you give him credit it's a little, like, if you're programming hand cleans, and I'm programming, and he's put – now the whole workout, the whole event is hand cleans and rope climbs. It's like, can we think of something else? Because what tools do they tell them to have?

Like, hey, sky's the limit. So I write this program, and I'm like, it's all dumbbells, and nobody shows up with dumbbells. How often do you prefer to compete? You did a lot of blues, and now you're doing the Open, so you're going to do the Rogue thing. You have games coming up. That's already four times a year.

Is that perfect for you, or is that too much, too little? What do you prefer? Yeah, I like that. I had a good off-season this year after the games. I didn't really do any competitions. I did a small team one, which was just for a lot of fun. So that was a nice, solid off- was just for a lot of fun. Um, so that was a nice solid off season to have just to, like I said, really work on my strength. Um, just getting

my legs stronger. Cause that's the biggest weakness right now. And, but I do enjoy competing every couple of months as well, just to kind of like reevaluate. I really enjoy being on the competition floor. I have been competing since the age of five. So I'm used to competing and I just really enjoy being out on the floor and you push yourself. You can see things that are working in training, things that you still need to work more on or what you think is strong and you end up realizing it's weak. And like at Wadapalooza, my coach is like, well, the best workout you had was the snatches and burpees. So I think we're ready for the open. So we didn't train specific. We have we never really trained specifically for the open.

But he's like, OK, we don't have to throw in a lot of open specific workouts because you're already prepared for it. Do you feel like the open needs to change because it was always so inclusive, but now that you have these like sanctional events going on where they just, it's like heavy, it's like games programming versus all inclusive open programming.

Does the open need to change to kind of equal itself out to what these like sectional regional events are now sanctional events yeah i mean i guess i guess like open since it is everyone in the world then i guess they do have to have it a little more grounded like you can't be doing super heavy stuff and there's a lot of like i mean maybe they'll include rope climbs and higher skilled stuff but i think you have to have something that's what we need like a whole bunch of regular people doing rope climbs as hard as they can in the gym just at the top like how do i get down what do i do now i got it i made it should i take my hands off just jump just jump i've got you kenny will catch you so i think yeah i mean i think just like open you know there's

only like so many different elements that you can do because it is limited to a box and like not running and things like that but i mean you know you if you are going rx you have to earn that rx similar to like the handstand push-ups just that threw a lot of people off this year yeah there are ways that they do it that are always pretty clever but nothing really resembles that like one weekend long event like those those events um they always have like really complicated elements that you just can't do in the open when you've got 45 year old people trying to do the open and be the weekend warrior like it just doesn't work um how has your training changed though with the the new structure and just laying like a weird plan out for a year that nobody really

knows the answer to yeah so like this year was just like thrown off a little bit and at least this year is similar to like what has been in the past because i mean i did wadapalooza and then the open obviously is the normal time of the open. And then we have rogue, which is the same week of region or similar to regionals. So I think that like this year is pretty similar to years past. And my coach and I have like talked a little bit about maybe doing some more traveling next year. Um, whether it's like to Ireland or London or just going over to Europe a little

bit, he said no to China. They invited me. I'm like, he's like too much, too much travel. I'm like maybe next year, the year after.

Um, but I think so it will be nice like, he's like too much, too much travel. I'm like, maybe next year, the year after. But I think so. It will be nice like getting to travel a little bit more for some competitions. And so, yeah, we've basically just looked to August and then we're like, okay, after that,

I guess we're just going to take a little bit time off and then focus on the open, which is going to be right around the corner after the game's finished. Totally. And then kind of hopefully, I mean, we'll see if they keep the top 20 for the open or if it's just. Totally. And then kind of hopefully, I mean,

we'll see if they keep the top 20 for the Open or if it's just national champion. And, yeah, I'm probably going to do a few qualifiers for events that are throughout the year, maybe two to three months apart. And then hopefully I only have to do like one or two. And then maybe if I want to do a couple extra for fun, then I will, but I'll probably line up like four competitions. One thing that's nice about it is there's like a legitimate way for athletes to make will but i'll probably line up like one thing that's nice about

is there's like a legitimate way for athletes to make a living doing this yeah not have to rely on sponsorships alone like that's a real piece of the puzzle that was missing for a very long time is can you you have to spend eight hours a day in the gym and all your meals and all the things that go into being a professional athlete yet there's actually no way to go make enough money to do it. Yeah. Well, I just feel bad for some of the people who aren't winning. The people who are just like right there, those like four or five people who are always almost right there, like the sixth, seventh, eighth place.

They're just chucking them like a plane ticket for showing up. Like, I mean, are they getting anything? I mean, I know for games they give them a little bit, but, I mean, it's nothing. You spent the last year of your life training. If I get $25,000 for the year, I'd be like, oh, got to re-figure this whole game. What's your best finish?

At the games? Yeah. Fifth. Thank you. So good. Thank you. In 2016. Nice.

Yeah. And then this last year I was sixth. That counts. Yeah. That's close enough to fifth. Right. That's close enough. Just one other person ahead of you.

But, you know, it's fine. When you walk into training and you're setting up your year, is there a real belief that you can go out and win it? Yeah. Oh. Definitely. I mean. You're always in the mix.

Thank you. You're always right there. Yeah. And it's just, like like i said bringing up a few of those weaknesses because it's like i do really well in a lot of the higher gymnastic stuff with burpees and snatches and things like that it's just like the clean workouts and the long running workouts that are like the two main things that i need to bring up because they're always like so far behind especially like at wadapalooza tia finished i think second behind

kristin holte in the running event and i was like ninth and so it's hard to come back from that yeah i'm not your coach but if you want to get your running better you got to get out of the city you can't walk anywhere without almost getting hit by a car that's how it makes it better you run fast stop and start every block you're on the west side though i am on the west side so i run by the water yeah oh they have beautiful over there. No traffic over there? No, I mean, it's just like a straight shot the whole time. But yes, there's probably a thousand people on it on a Saturday or Sunday. How is training in the city, though?

We talked about it a little bit, and we were talking how, like, Rich has this amazing spot where he's just in the woods all the time, and then when he wants to go for a swim, he has this, like, beautiful natural pond to go swimming in, and somehow he recruited a whole bunch of people to move to cookville to hang out with them like being in the city is its own battle yeah it's the total opposite there's people everywhere buildings everywhere you go for a run outside the air you're breathing isn't really that clean no it's actually and right after i moved to new york i realized that when i went because

i'm from michigan i went back to Michigan, especially northern Michigan. One of my friends was getting married. I'm like, oh, this air is so amazing. Is anybody else breathing better? It's just me? Yeah, definitely. And then you really enjoy the fresh air. Yeah.

But yeah, it is definitely different. Space is limited. I mean, the gym that I'm at right now is 3,500 square feet divided between two floors. I was in Mexico City this summer, and they're like, sorry about our small gym. I'm like, this is bigger than the gym that I'm at right now is 3,500 square feet divided between two floors. I was in Mexico City this summer. And they're like, sorry about our small gym. I'm like, this is bigger than the gym I train at. But it's like you cap it at 12 people. You get used to being close to people.

You're doing snatches right next to someone. You can't be like, well, you're in my bubble. I need more space. So, I mean, it's good for when I compete at Wadaplusa or the games and you have your little lane. So you get used to being being in that like kind of confined area but yeah when i started training it was in a small studio apartment two floor maybe 700 square feet divide between the two floors if you're over six feet tall couldn't lift a barbell with bumper plates over your head i couldn't do muscle-ups traveled every weekend to go to a gym to do rope climbs and ring muscle-ups especially because we were trying to get ready for the open

and we knew they were going to most likely being ring muscle-ups so especially because we were trying to get ready for the open, and we knew they were most likely going to be ring muscle-ups. So I had to go practice. And even just doing things like walking lunges and stuff and any sort of running. We had Central Park close, and there was a bar there. So I would go and do muscle-ups and running. That was always like the couplet or carry my 35-pound kettlebell to the park to add a little something to it. You sound pretty content with just kind of making it happen and just figuring it out but have you

considered just moving somewhere that's more convenient to like make this um you know running and having high ceilings for rope climbs whatever it is like a daily thing where you don't have to seek it out all the time yeah it definitely has crossed my mind i actually moved out to new jersey for a little over a year just to kind of live a slower life and just really focus on training. And as weird as it is, like part of me missed living in the city and all the craziness and everything. Plus, I mean, I have a weightlifting coach in the city and then my CrossFit coach is out in Queens now. So it just, it works well that I have both of them. So right now I'm like, no, I definitely wouldn't. But I, to be completely fair with myself, I think I'm like no I definitely wouldn't but to be completely fair with myself I think I have like another year or two in the city and then I'll move out to get some

fresh air and maybe better training space where would you go if you could go somewhere I've actually been thinking about that don't say Cokeville don't do it no I right don't do it why not he must be a real estate agent or something kickbacks everyone going

yeah I've thought about it and actually, I think I would go either West Coast. I love Colorado or Oregon area. I was going to say, everybody like Colorado, I heard, is a training center. If I could do it, I would just move in with Hunter McIntyre, go run with him in the hills of Malibu all day long.

Then my running game. Yeah, he's got a running coach out there. Running game's good. Waxman's right down the street. You got it. There you go. Weightlifting. He said he's in Colorado sometimes too, right? Yeah, he's living in Colorado now.

Oh, there you go. Maybe that's it. He's got the life, I know. He's like Kato Kaelin, but fit. Earlier you were saying that leg strength was your big thing right now. Yeah. What's the word with that? I'm not exactly sure.

So I did power lifting and right before crossfit and i had a 315 back squat and then i started crossfit and i got a lot fitter but my leg strength just went down the tube it my back squat went down to 265 which i mean for you know normal people they're like oh that's really good but i'm like compared to crossfit athletes it's it's not like i'm trying to be the best in the world exactly like and like minute like right now it's at 290. So we're just, yeah, just trying to bring it up. And like I said, I think it's just from doing powerlifting,

I got really strong. Like my deadlift stayed the same. Bench press stayed the same. Everything stayed the same. It's just my squat, for whatever reason, just went down. It's one of those things like I keep working on it. I work on it. I'll squat three days a week, heavy weights, whatever.

We mix it all up. Nothing happens. I don't bench press for a a month and it goes down like maybe two pounds it's just it's crazy like all the squat and same with deadlifts like we don't deadlift heavy a lot and i just pr not we added a few more deadlifts but i just pr not too long ago like i don't know what it is with my quads they just they're just so resistant i was gonna say it's not like it's your like genetic potential because you clearly squatted heavier before. Yeah. So I don't know if it's – they're like, no, I'm going to run or I'm going to squat. It's one of the two.

What was your background before you found CrossFit? So starting at age of three, I did gymnastics for 18 years. I competed a long, long time. Yeah, so I started competing at age of five, which was great. I started with my sister, did it through college. I competed for University of Michigan. And right after I finished college, I was like, I love gymnastics, but I mean, you're pretty much done at the age of 21 because your body's peaked.

I peaked at 16 and then kind of cruised through college. And I wanted to keep working out, but I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to do. So I talked to our strength and conditioning coach. He's like, why don't you try weightlifting? Like you have short levers, you'd be perfect for it. So I interned with University of Michigan, just working with a bunch of different sports. And I started doing some weightlifting. So I learned about it. I got to coach it. It was a lot of fun. But then I ended up getting a bulge that's my back, which they said was probably from gymnastics and then end up just showing up a little bit later along with some

carpal tunnel my wrist. So I did one weightlifting meet and I was like okay that was fun now I gotta rest and try and do something else so I was also personal training at a gym and there was a figure competitor she goes Carrie you'd be great at physique like why don't you give it a try I'm like I don't know if I really want to like go on stage like how I look whatever she's like just give it a try like you'd be perfect so I was like well I can't do weightlifting I can't really do a lot of whole other training because a bull's just in your back you're really limited so I could still do leg extensions like curls for my legs and a lot of upper body stuff so I ended up doing a physique show and I learned about a lot about nutrition and just training you know to build muscle but I was like this isn't for me I

don't want someone to tell me how to look and And yeah, I was like, I want to compete like because I'm faster, I'm stronger or whatever. Better than someone, not someone thinks someone else looks better. Their suits fancier than mine, which was one thing that they said. They're like, your suit wasn't fancy enough. You need a little more gems on it. And I was like, wait, wait, rhinestones matter. I know. I had this fun, like bright green suit.

It was popping. I was real tan. It stood out. They're like, no, sorry. Exactly. It was like a little thing. And I was like, bright green suit. It was popping. I was real tan. It stood out. They're like, no, sorry. Exactly. It was like a little thing. And I was like, okay, yeah. Like a little goldfish in there.

Right. That's what I'm going to do. Right. That's what I'm going to do. Goldfish in the heel. That's a great idea. You spent the last six months training, and then somebody's worried about what you're wearing. Right.

I was like, I mean, I learned a lot about it. Respect people. You're so lean already, but you go on one of those diets it's like and like the water and stuff but this the spray the tan spray it dries your skin out so it makes you look even more jacked i was like that was kind of cool like and more vascular and stuff yeah i didn't know it dried you out as well could you imagine castro being like uh listen tia you did a great job unfortunately unfortunately. That's how Froning won. He was perfectly shaved all the time.

There you go. That was Froning's secret. Little tricks, right? Yeah. Now we know. It was the headband. Yeah. Headband.

He has to shave that chest every morning. No way. You guys never had a hair there ever. It's on point. Oh, sorry. And after I finished the physique show, then I ended up moving to New York City and was just kind of like personal training. Didn't really know what I was going to do, like competing wise or anything.

I didn't really have any plans. And one of the coaches at our gym was a powerlifting coach. And he's like, hey, you're pretty strong. Why don't you do a powerlifting meet? I'm like, what what exactly goes into that? And when he's like bench squat, I'm like, I don't know what my maxes are. He's like, well, there's only one way to find find out so he kind of coached me for like two months and then I did a show or a powerlifting meet and during that time I heard I I had been hearing about CrossFit from when I have friends in college but I was like no I'm I'm not into the gymnastics thing I'm over it been there done that she's like it's handstands and pull-ups I'm like I can't no that's it no more and she was this little birdie in my ear kept saying it and then one day I was at the gym and saw it on ESPN. And I remember

watching me like, oh, I could, I think I could do some of that. I was like, it looks kind of fun. So I talked to Billy, the owner of Spot, who had reached out to me and he told me a little bit about CrossFit and that he would want me to coach the gymnastics because he found out about my background and I was training. And I'm like, okay okay after i do this powerlifting meet then i'll be all in for crossfit which was november 2014 it's impressive you went to the games two years later i went to the game six months later wait 14 i went in 15 16 okay cool yeah wow that's a good start it was a good start you're great at weightlifting powerlifting yeah yeah did you Did you know gymnastics? Why don't you just do crossfit? Yeah, right?

Everything except the running, you know? Yeah. Mr. Beautiful, I appreciate you for. Thank you guys for having me. Kenny's got to go coach fast. Not to derail the conversation, but Mr. Santucci over here, there was like 10 people in each class, and then Kenny coached the 6 p.m. after the interview last night,

and there was like 30. I was like, damn, Kenny, get them jumping in here bringing the energy right did you know that power lifting plus olympic lifting plus back like gymnastics background was going to result in top tens at this brand new sport called crossfit i did not and it's even like going into my first open i was like oh this will be fun because i was training with like some other people that have been doing CrossFit for a couple years and they're like yeah you're gonna be pretty good like you might make regionals this year we'll see yeah and yeah I mean it was kind of like when the open started the first open that I did and the first workout was not so good it was like deadlift snatches toes the bar clean and jerk and then like a few weeks in,

there was a clean handstand push-up workout, 15-4. That was pretty much the one where like, okay, if I can hold on this last week, which ended up being rowing and thrusters. Oh, brutal one. It was brutal. 21-15 or 21-18. Yeah, 21-18, 15-12.

100 of E, that's painful. It was very painful. Like the metallic blood in your throat feeling yeah it was brutal and i was going with a guy and he's an animal on the rower and i'm like man i'm so slow right now what is going on yeah yeah and he like dies on the floor and i still have like a couple rounds left i'm like what come on like don't die in front i mean i'm not really thinking i should have been thinking more of him like he just pushed really hard great job but i'm like why you got to be done so fast?

Do you find that being a smaller athlete? I mean, I don't want to put you in a box by any means, but you're smaller than many of the girls. Um, do you find that to be advantageous or would you prefer to be much stronger? Is it just kind of one of those things of like, this is what I've got. Let's go. Yeah. And I think that's the beauty of CrossFit is, like, things like handstand push-ups, pull-ups, thrusters, like, are better if I'm smaller. But running in rope climbs and wall balls are things that are better for taller athletes.

So I think it just is a luck of the draw depending on the workout. By and large, on average, being shorter, I think, generally is better. Yeah. I mean, yeah, and I think especially a lot of the CrossFit stuff, it's any sort of, like, barbell cycling or gymnastics. So, I mean, I'm fine with my height. At least I'm not the shortest. I remember when Spieler continued to get asked that question, which is why I didn't want to say I'm putting you in a box.

But at some point he was just like, no, it's just a workout. It doesn't favor anybody. We just have to go do it. Do you have a lot of that like mental game that goes on? Because you're sitting there and then the workout comes up and it's like, oh, well, this girl's got that and this girl's got this and I don't have that. Do you battle those things in the middle of competition or during the open when you have so much time to think about it? Yeah. I mean, I think just the first workout this year is like the only time that I've ever really thought because I'm like rowing and wall balls really like especially because I mean, and I saw a lot of like shorter athletes struggle with it just because for crossfit especially the open like it's not a high skilled workout it's rowing and wall balls like if it had like some pull-ups or handstand

push-ups something that involved a little more skill or like some weight lifting i think it would have been a bigger separator but you had a lot of athletes that weren't near the top of the mix and you're like who's that who's that who's that and then you have a lot of the phenomenal girls too that are like at the top of the leader. And you're like, who's that? Who's that? Who's that? And then you have a lot of the phenomenal girls, too, that are, like, at the top of the leaderboard. You're like, how am I supposed to catch those athletes now that I'm, like, I don't know. It came in 82nd, which I was so happy with, especially for a workout like that.

But I'm like, how am I supposed to catch those better athletes? They're already, like, 60 points ahead of me. You know how you do it? Two weeks later, win the workout. There you go. That's it. Mic drop. Yeah.

Are you amazed at the level of gymnastics that goes on in CrossFit? Just like the average. Well, I shouldn't say the average. The CrossFit Games athletes are really good at gymnastics. They are really good at gymnastics. And I think it's just because there's more and more skills that keep getting into workouts, whether it was like the games or now different sanctionals instead of regionals um so everyone's been forced to learn

i think everyone who's at the top of their game is like oh i did that workout and i was really bad at strict ring muscle ups now i'm just gonna nail those ring muscle ups so the next time they come up then i'm gonna do well and i think everyone knows that they need to work on the gymnastic stuff because that's what can keep evolving. Whereas weightlifting, you can keep getting stronger, but there's not going to be any new skills. Whereas now we've had ring handstand push-ups, and who knows, they might throw in other movements, freestanding handstand push-ups at some point.

I feel like the skills for gymnastics are just endless. Yeah. I feel like there was a really large amount of time where people thought the strongest person was going to, like everybody was just so focused on strength. And then they kind of started adding a lot of these like strip gymnastics movements into it and changed the game. So now I think it really favors the most athletic person. Do you do a lot of training that is just kind of like pure agility drills, kind of like more just like athletic focus versus like this is just strict gymnastics and I have to be focused on like skin the cats and then like whatever those things are.

But when I think about like athletic specific training, it's almost like track and field type things, like just getting out, running, skipping, a lot of agility stuff. Are you doing things like that? Yeah, I definitely any sort of running session I have. We always do like skipping and high knees and all that kind of stuff. And I work with a running coach and I haven't worked with him like since the open started. But I he had me just do like things like shot put in discus, just like kind of throw in different things. Yeah. And and long jump.

So we're just working. Because track and field athletes are so athletic. I'm like, if I can work on some of those, it's just going to help with my weightlifting. Like the explosiveness and stuff of it. Plus it's fun. You just get out of the gym and you get to go into a different environment. Whether it's the indoor track or outside. So just things like that I think will help everything in CrossFit. Yeah, there was a time where it was almost like you did too much CrossFit

and it just stopped getting better. And everybody just kind of had to go and find, like, how do you just accumulate really good movement, really good reps in order to build capacity because just doing the muscle-up stopped making you better at just the muscle-up. Yeah, totally. Where are a lot of the weaknesses and holes in your game right now that you're working on?

Mainly these baby legs, these quads. They're not baby legs. Thank you. They just don't want to get stronger. They'll get bigger. They just don't want to get stronger for whatever reason. And running, I think it's just because of my background in gymnastics, the longest thing you do is a minute and 20 seconds, your floor routine.

And so we never did longer than like 10 minutes on a bike. How long until we see flips at the games? Hopefully this year. I mean, I remember like five years ago they programmed that stuff on the main site and everybody thought it was coming. Yeah. And then there was a bunch of people in the gym doing flips. And they had Froning and Dan Bailey doing flips out in Montana.

And it was like, oh, my God, here we go. They're going to have to snatch, like one RMm snatch then go do as many backflips as possible in five minutes it never happened i want it that would be so fun or like burpee backflips something or like backflips across the field i have a burpee backflip fail video on youtube you should check it out oh i will terrifying yeah landed right on the back of my head almost killed myself i'll bet yeah but you just felt confident and you're like, I got this. No, you want to know what happened? I'll tell the story.

We, I did my very first, we were on the gymnastics floor, so I didn't die, which was nice. It wasn't like in the middle of the road, but I did my very first backflip ever. So when I opened my gym, it was like, we were so poor and like, we didn't have, there was nothing like nice going on in there. We got an old mattress and that was like we were so poor, and, like, we didn't have – there was nothing, like, nice going on in there. We got an old mattress, and that was, like, our gymnastics pad. And I was, like, practicing backflips. And I had a gymnastics coach that, like, she was like, I guess we can use that.

So then I – we went to a gymnastics – There's a lot more space, like, yokes and stuff. We had a little break there, but we're going to finish my beautiful story of almost killing myself. So we went to the gymnastics studio, and I did my very first unassisted no-spot backflip, right? And then right after that, I was, like, so stoked on the world that I thought that I could just do backflips whenever. And then someone came over and was like, let's shoot a video where we do burpee backflips. And I was like, well, I definitely want to do that.

Not thinking like one, you've only done one backflip. And then you're going to do the burpee. So your line of sight is like so far off. Like as soon as your head goes down and then you're up. So it was literally like the suitcase where you jump, but your legs and your upper body just aren't connected at all. And then like instead of like jumping with my legs i just like threw my chest up and it was like oh this is bad next thing you know i was like on the back of my head legs hit behind me and then i just like crawled out of the

picture luckily that's it's the video is not very uh well seo'd for youtube so only like 12 000 people have watched it. But, man, I thought for sure. You probably scared them to death. They never went to a backflip. I thought for sure I was going on Tosh.0 to, like, go web redemption on almost killing myself. Yeah, I'll bet. That sounds really painful, but you were okay.

I'm walking. I'm fine. My soul was hurt. Did you have any epic fails like that in gymnastics back in the day, like falling off parallel bars or uneven bars or whatever it was? All the time, yeah. And that's one of the first things you learn in gymnastics is how to fall because they know you're going to fall so much,

especially on bars when you're learning different release moves and you're holding on to the bar, you're swinging around really fast, and then you have to let go of the bar and then catch it. I mean, when you're learning a skill, you fall 9 out of out of ten times well then by the time you end up catching it you're so happy because you're done with falling but usually you have foam pits and you have soft landings you have mats and stuff and at competitions you have someone who slides a mat in and out i mean most of times you fall flat but every once in a while you'll get a bad fall and actually one time i was doing a vault like way over rotate and kind of like land on my head.

So I tore some ligaments in my neck and my back. And yeah, but for the most part, you learn how to fall and you get used to it and then you get right back up. How often the competition, like you, you catch the bar, like you,

you do release move, you catch the bar and like in your head, you're like, Holy shit, I fucking got it. Oh my God. But like, nobody can tell.

You just, you just play it cool. Like I was, I was totally going to do that no matter what. Definitely. Cause I would always get so like bars was one was one of my most nerve-wracking events. And especially that one release where, like, you lose sight of the bar because you have to, like, come up, and then you sit up over to grab it.

And you can kind of see it in your sight, but every once in a while you, like, grab it, and then you just – your hands slip out of it. So once you grab it, and then you can start getting into the next movement, you're like, oh, thank God. But then it's like, oh, well, now you better not mess up because the hardest part is over, but don't make any stupid mistakes. So good luck. Well, gymnastics is kind of the only, well, I shouldn't say the only piece, but it's one of the biggest pieces that I feel like they can still scale up and need to scale up because when there's a barbell in your hand,

like there's really only a couple things you can do. You can move faster. You can add more weight. In gymnastics, there's endless things that we can do, it's on the rings on the floor whatever totally implement you bring into it there's like the bar there's there's a lot of ways to go and scale that do you feel like that is really where this sports headed yeah i think so and like i said i think like they keep slowly adding things in it's funny like as were saying that, it made me think of the games. And when we had Chaos, I was probably the only person that thought of this,

but there was that little mat that we had to do pistols on. I'm like, yes, we get freestanding handstand pushups. And then I was like, oh, it's pistols. Okay, fine. But, yeah, I mean, I definitely think so, especially, like, they've been programming a lot more just, like, freestanding handstand holds on the CrossFit main site. Freestanding handstand holds um on the crossfit main site freestanding handstand

push-ups we did that in oc throwdown in like 2000 2012 and it was heinous how we're gonna kill people yeah nobody was like okay we're a little too far ahead right now the sport has not gotten to this point yeah you're like let's bring it back down to the forehead yeah like that's their kickstand that they're just smashing into the ground so they can balance. Well, yeah. And, like, the standard was, like, you had to walk the whole way and then do the handstand. But, like, the handstand started it. So they would basically, like, just kick up into the handstand and walk.

But nobody was, like, linking them together like we were really hoping would happen. If you could add in one or two new gymnastics elements, what would they be? For me, I think, I mean, if we could do freestanding handstand pushups. And then I also think either backward roll of support on the rings or, like, forward roll to support on the rings I think would be really cool. And I think it would be fun for, like, the crowd and everything to watch at the games. Yeah, that stuff should be in there. Glassman used to take – there used to be videos of Glassman, like,

teaching that stuff to people. But I wonder if it's just not fan-friendly enough to kind of put that in. You have to judge, too, maybe. Actually, not really. Just get to the top. Yeah. Turn them out. And press out.

Yeah. For either one. It's just like you have to forward and stay on the rings. You can't come down to a full extension and then pop up at the top. When you are training, how much of your input and like what is that relationship with you and your coaches? Because how many coaches do you have now? You've got weightlifting, track, I assume like a CrossFit specific person. Do you have a gymnastics person?

No. Okay. That's my CrossFit person. He does all my gymnastics stuff. What is that relationship and how does an actual program get written for someone like you that's literally at the top of the sport? Yeah, so I do have all of those. And then I have, so my running coach takes the workouts that my endurance coach writes too. So I basically have kind of four coaches.

But the CrossFit coach oversees everything. So each week the weightlifting coach will send my program to the CrossFit coach. My endurance coach will send the program to my CrossFit coach. And he develops everything outside of that from there. So usually weightlifting is Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and then I'll have about six sessions of monostructural work, whether it's assault bike, skier, running, swimming, concept two bike. Hopefully now that it's getting nicer outside, I'll have some outdoor bike rides too. So he takes all of that and makes it into – I basically have two sessions each day. Well, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. Thursday is usually double active recovery.

I usually swim in a row. Fridays and Saturday are another two-session days. Sunday is completely off. So, yeah, my CrossFit coach takes everything, kind of puts it all into a program and focuses on what he thinks I need to work on recently. It's been, like I said, a lot of leg strength, a lot of barbell stuff, but also in that it's like you're great at handstand push-ups. We need to keep that.

You need to be able to win all those handstand push-ups, handstand walking events, or if it's paired with something else, then be, you know, like right in the top. But you need to be the best at those and at bar muscle-ups. We do a lot of that kind of work, and we've been working a lot of my kipping ring muscle-ups. Great at strict, but still the whole hip thing. Being a gymnast, I mean, female gymnast, you don't really use the rings a lot.

So it's a little bit different. And so, yeah, we've really been focusing on that. Because I got seventh place at the Games on the ring muscle-up workout. My coach was like, no, we need to do better than that. Like, you should be in the top three on an event like that. So, yeah, my CrossFit coach takes everything and then kind of compiles it into five days of training, like I said, with the one active recovery day.

Do your coaches ever butt heads on, like, my stuff's more important, we need to do more of this or more of that and less of this other thing? Do they get along all the time, or is it competitive, so to speak? Yeah, I mean, for the most part, they get along, though. My CrossFit coach is like, you need to start squatting more. more like my weightlifting coach was adding in a lot of the squats and the weightlifting stuff and he's like you're still not squat we need to squat more and we need to squat heavier and i didn't have a whole lot of like deadlifts in my weightlifting program kind of like strength weightlifting program so he's like okay every saturday is going to be deadlifts

because weightlifters don't do deadlifts, but CrossFitters do. And, like, we need to get that as strong as possible, especially because that is one area that I, like, I just PR'd at 400 pounds right before the new year. So he's like, that is a strong area. We just need to make sure that it stays that way. So, for the most part, they agree. But, like I said, the whole squat thing, my CrossFit coach is like, okay, we need to take out some of the other, like,

if there's some technique stuff, he's like, we just need to get your legs stronger. Like the technique overall is good and it's not like your clean is not going to get any better unless your legs get stronger. So did your Olympic lifts go down when your squat went down? You snatch a clean jerk totals? I hadn't done, so I did weightlifting like right after college, but then I hadn't really done much weightlifting after that. So I didn't really have very good technique for my snatch or clean. So they just kind of like stayed the same. Gotcha.

Yeah, because they weren't anywhere close to my squat because my technique wasn't very good. Yeah. Have you noticed the strength endurance stuff, like squat cleans for 21 reps? Does that go down a lot? Your times and workouts like that? If you're, when your squat numbers are down. Definitely.

Yeah, definitely. But I mean, we've been doing a lot more just in like, cause I feel like it's easier to increase your muscular endurance faster than like your prior strength. Yeah. And so recently like my muscular endurance for like 19 to like the squat clean a

lot of squat cleans and stuff has gotten so much better even though my absolute strength hasn't gone up a ton yeah is it tough for you to take days off like you said every sunday it's off no matter what is that is that rough on you or like fuck i should be training right now like you're still motivated or you're just like thank god it's sunday and i'm just gonna chill yeah it depends on the day like some sundays i'm like i actually feel pretty good like i want to go do something i'm like okay just go out for a walk stop thinking about the gym like and so i'll just going to chill. Yeah. It depends on the day. Like some Sundays I'm like, I actually feel pretty good. Like I want to go do something. I'm like, okay, just go out for a walk. Stop thinking about the gym. Like, and so I'll just go to Riverside park. Cause it's right along the water or I'll go to central park and walk around. Um, and then other days I'm like, man, my coach kicked my butt the other days. Like I need this rest day. Cause during the open,

I think he's taken it a little bit easier on me on Saturdays. But especially before the Open, every Sunday I was like, I need this rest day. Because for a part of a point in my training, I was training seven days a week, and it would be two active recovery days. And I'm like, okay, this is good. But I think mentally more than physically, I just need that Sunday where it's like you're not doing anything athletic,

like I do some mobility and stuff but i don't like go into the gym and do any sort of rowing or any active recovery to get me if i want to do anything then it's just outside to get away from it all and then monday i come in i'm like okay i'm ready to go yeah well this really is like a 24 hour a day sport like how many different things are you doing for recovery uh so i i mean every night i get right around nine hours of sleep which is beautiful i know so many people are like how do you do that and i'm like well i go to bed around 10 that part in the city is mind-boggling to me last night we were going to bed there was like eight dump trucks that came by with something like the trash was

getting taken out it's like what is going on out there? Yeah. Can it be quiet? Right? Everyone, shh. I'm trying to go to bed. I'm an athlete. Right?

Listen. I need my sleep. Stop. Yeah. Yeah. They don't listen. They don't listen. But I think you just get used to all the noise.

And then, like, now I go home and I'm like, it's too quiet. Yeah. But I have a fan and stuff. So, I don't know. I get used to that and yeah my dad was here like a couple months ago and he's like i can't sleep every like sirens and things good like you said dump trucks and whatever i'm like i just i just get used to it you don't even hear it anymore are you super structured about optimizing the things

outside of the workouts like are all your meals prepared ahead of time like all your macros are dialed in like you sleep like at the exact same time every single day get your nine hours you like you're sleeping from you know 9 p.m to 6 a.m every single day and like you're super super super consistent or are you kind of all over the map about some things yeah no i'm very on it when it comes to food um i have kettlebell kitchen i have food a meal prep service and i follow rp strength so they make it easy and i've been with them for like almost three years and so i'm like it's basically like clockwork for me. I eat basically the same things every day, nearly the same times. I mean, it differs a little bit depending on like my training.

Sometimes like the sessions will last longer or shorter. But for the most part, I always have to have food ready after I'm done working out. So I'm like, I'm always, I need to eat right then. I walk 15 minutes to go home and some days I'm like, I can't even make it home. I'm too hungry. I need to eat now. But yeah, I always have like my food and everything ready days I'm like, I can't even make it home. I'm too hungry. I need to eat now. But yeah, I always have like my food and everything ready.

Cause I'm like, I don't want to be angry. And it's just part of me that I know that works and I recover well and everything. And, um, what was the other part that you asked? Sleep.

Oh, and sleep. Yes. For the most part, I always go to bed like right around 10 o'clock. I mean, it might give or take like half an hour and yeah, I usually get up right around seven, every morning, seven to seven thirty every morning just to make sure i get up

and then i'll eat before i get my monostructural work done in the morning because then it's like i said it's very similar monostructural work done and then i eat rest a little bit and then i'll get my crop like weight lifting crossfit kind of session in the afternoon and then i eat again like right after that's done is it a is it a struggle for you to get enough food? Like are you having to like force feed yourself to get enough calories to be recovered each day? Sometimes. Yes.

But I have like, I think I've been following like the same basic, basic template, like for the past three years. And at first it was such a, I was like, how can I eat this much food with like all the activity? Cause when I first started CrossFit, I was doing like two hours a day. I wasn't doing anything like super crazy. And then slowly increased to three hours and then it becomes four. And, you know, you're just burning.

And especially when I swim and run, those are the two like most demanding things that just my body eats up calories because it's working so hard, I think, because I'm so bad at them. But I eventually like got used to what I eat. And like I said, it's so programmed that my body gets hungry and it craves the certain foods at certain times. And I've just kind of gotten into a groove of it. It's so nice when you have pre-made meals and you don't have to. The cooking part is the really hard part when you're eating that much. Yeah. How do you just go back and now you have an extra hour of prepping food all the time?

And then cleaning and having to go to the grocery. Yeah, I know. You save so much time and energy. And then you travel, too. You have to have that stuff. How long have you been working with Kettleball Kitchen? Three and a half years. They're your sponsors.

You can talk about them. Yeah, they're one of my sponsors. I've been with them three and a half years. Actually, when we opened CrossFit Spot in New York City, they came to like the RAND opening because we carry, we carry their meals there. And they're like, hey, you want to try some of our food? I'm like, well, I've heard from a few other people because I knew a few people at Brick and they're like, oh, we love their food. It's really good. And I was like, oh, sure. I'll try it. So I got a few meals and I'm like, okay, how do I, how do I get more of these? Or how do I, and they're like, oh, we can sponsor you. We can give you some food. I was

like, that's amazing. And now I like thinking, I'm like, how did I live more of these or how do I and they're like oh we can sponsor you we can give you some food I was like that's amazing and now I like think I'm like how did I live without them now just because you get so used to it and now they're like nationwide delivery so when I went to I was like okay ordered everything that I needed to the hotel and it just makes it so easy because there's one less thing I have to worry about and yeah I feel, that's like a massive part. How do you, how do you decide what things are actually worth your time and energy? Cause cooking clearly isn't, if you can find somebody like totally getting rid of all of those extra demands in life, is that a struggle for you? Sometimes. And like you said, like finding little things that just save you a minute here, a minute there is great. And like, luckily for me, I walk to the gym every

day. It's like 15 minutes. So I don't really have like too much of a commute which is good because i know a lot of people spend a lot of time like driving and traffic and everything so it's just like something that's like consistent and it's like 15 minutes here and there yeah and yeah and the food thing is like huge and just having like snacks and stuff too that it's always on hand what about like the personal life things like lots of friends in your life or you have a pretty tight crew? Yeah, I have a very

small group of friends and quite a few of them are still from college. Just people that I've like kept in close contact with and then I've gotten some close friends in CrossFit

that are in the city. But I mean, I don't like go to movies a lot. Like I think I went to the movie for the first time with a friend

last weekend probably in the last like six months. Friends are tough. like go to movies a lot. Like I think I went to the movie for the first time with a friend last weekend, probably in the last like six months. Yeah. They take a lot of your time. They do. And you don't realize it until like you start working out something and you're like, okay, well let's go to like the sauna together or let's go to like priority. Like let's do something that's like fits in like your fitness lifestyle.

So I think that's the good part of like having, they don't get it. Yeah. They're, they're good friends, but they don't get it. Yeah. Totally. Realize that you want to just hang out in the your fitness lifestyle. So I think that's the good part of like having, they don't get it. Yeah. They're, they're good friends, but they don't get it. Yeah, totally realize that you want to just hang out in the gym. Yeah. No,

no. And I'm going, well, I'm going to a bachelorette party next week. Oh no. What are you going to do? Good thing the open will be over. That's it.

Party time. Where are you going? Where's the bachelor, bachelor party? Uh, Washington DC. Ooh, yeah.

That'd be fun. And so it's like my friend, like for the bachelor, she actually does CrossFit and she's doing the open. and she, she was a gymnast. She weighs like 100 pounds soaking wet. But she got 31 strict handstand pushups in the handstand pushup workout. So, yeah.

Well, after this event, after five weeks are over, she's done. You got to keep going. I know. It's a big difference. She's going to be ready to party. She is. Yeah. I'm glad your season's five weeks long.

Mine's 12 months. Yeah. We're surprising her. So she doesn't even know. But none of my other friends are into CrossFit. And so I was like, yeah, let's go work out. Becky will want to work out. It'll be a good refuel week for you.

Yeah, totally. So I'm really excited. Yeah, we're going to do like some brunch cruise things. We'll make sure this doesn't air before then. Okay. Can you imagine? I know. You ruined it all.

I know. That would be terrible. How much? I'll be like like don't listen to barbell shrug right don't do it until yeah how much uh communication do you have between yourself and like the other top female competitors i'll talk to them like here and there a little bit like through instagram um especially like sarah i'll reach out every once in a while and jamie green here and there um but mainly it's just competitions that I see them at,

and we just kind of, like, hang out. And I remember, like, last year getting ready for Dubai, like Sam Briggs was like, let's go train together with Jamie. And it was going to be Sarah and Cara down in Abu Dhabi. So just, like, little bits that you might see them, like, a little bit before a competition or hang out a little after. Or just, like, the athlete get-togethers. Like Alexis Johnson I talk to here and there, too. out a little after or just like the athlete gets together get togethers like alexis johnson i talked

to here and there too but not a ton like of other games yeah who are you training with here i just train with myself how do you not does it drive you crazy not knowing kind of like where your i mean the open's nice when you want to work out you're clearly on the right path but is there a mental game sometimes where you're not next to sarah When you win a workout, you're clearly on the right path. But is there a mental game sometimes where you're not next to Sarah, so you finish a workout and you're like, wow, that was really hard. Well, was it really hard? Or, like, did I really push? Is that really what the best time should be?

Is that where, like, how do you, I feel like I would want to be around other top ten girls as much as possible. Yeah, I think there's definitely, like, for me, there's, like, a time and place to do it. I think i think like sometimes i get so caught up in what other people are doing when i'm working out with them especially like on the competition floor and i'm like okay i'm gonna go unbroken in this set of muscle-ups and then someone else breaks i'm like oh should i break them or should i not so sometimes i like just training by myself because then i know that i'm like doing what i can do and not worrying about anybody else but then there also also is that element like, should I have broken that up without I've been smarter?

OK, could I push myself a little harder on the assault bike to make it hurt a little bit better? And I'll be a little bit fitter because of it. My coach does work with like Con Porter and like a few other athletes. And so sometimes I'll be like, OK, well, he got this time or he did this and he broke it up this way and whatever. And we kind of evaluate it to me, but he mainly works with guys. So it kind of is helpful, but sometimes it's like, like what,

what would Sarah do? What would catch and do? What would Tia do? Kind of thing. Like in the back of your mind, you're like, I don't know, but I do sometimes in training,

like picture them being next to me and being like a little bit ahead. And I'm like, come on, you got to push, you got to push to catch Sarah. So I don't know. I like to push myself, but I don't know. Yeah. If it's as much as it would be if Sarah was next to me or T or someone. Yeah. We actually just got done interviewing

the people over at Whoop. How do you use that band in your training? I mean, like I've had it for a year and a half and I had a friend that like reached out and was like, Oh, have you heard about this thing? I was like, it looks kind of cool. It looks like it could be helpful. Yeah. And the main thing that it's like really helped me with is my sleep. When I first started wearing it, I would be in bed for my typical nine hours. And I would get like six and a half hours of sleep. I'm like, how is that possible?

I was like, there's no way. This thing is totally wrong. And it was like day after day. And I'm like, there. And like my recovery was usually like in the yellow. And like, well, I'm not going to let it affect my my training like i have certain things like my coach has me do and so it's like whether i'm in the yellow or the green i have to do them regardless but i started like putting my phone away a little bit sooner and just doing little things to get ready for bed and like now i'll be in bed nine hours and i'll sleep eight and a half or eight

hours and 40 minutes and so it's really helped me improve my sleep, which obviously helps you improve your recovery. So then you're just going to do better and better in the gym. What's your resting heart rate when you wake up? Right now it's at 39. Goal! She beat me. She got us. Oh, there we go.

Yes, I win. I'm fitter. You are fitter. I was 40. I was 40 this morning. He was 40 this morning. He got me. I was 40. When he asked me, he's like, you ever been to 30s? I was like, nope, 4-ter. I was 40 this morning. He was 40 this morning. Got me. I was 40.

When he asked me, he's like, you ever been in the 30s? I was like, nope, 4-0. Never been in the 30s. Are you even alive? Your heart's not even beating. Every other second. What's your HRV? Yeah.

I don't know. I'm not sure. I think it's around 140. God, you're in shape. Got it. I got it on that one. I was 144. Oh, man.

Let me check my digits. You're a games athlete. I totally am. You are a games shape. Got it. I got it on that one. I was 144. Oh, man. Let me check my digits. You're a games athlete. I totally am. You are a games athlete. For sure. He's ready. Is the sleep one really the only big marker that they have on the app that you pay attention to? I mean, I pay attention to my recovery and everything.

And when I'm in the high 90s, I give myself a little pat on the back. So I'm like, oh, he did great. Great job. Yeah. And I like looking at the strain, too, especially, like, on, like, days that, like, I'm like, wow, my coach really kicked. Like, the highest I've gotten is a 20.6. Oh. Yeah. They told us basically if you're above, like, 16, you've just gone too far.

Yeah. So 20, like, 21, because we're usually, well, I'm usually're usually in like 12 to 14. He was like, that's actually really high. That's a big day. And I was like, man, if you're doing double days and training like you are, he was like, 21 is not something you really want to be trying to get to. That was probably like the marathon row day at the games. I took the whoop off dirt like earlier in the day

because I'm like, I don't want to worry about it. I was like, it would be really cool to see how many calories the marathon row burn. I think it was around like 2,000 just for those three. I was like, respect. Yeah. Because I was like, I need to wear it. I just want to see for if nothing else, you know. Are there any specific workouts like that that kind of, like, really stand out?

Clearly the marathon row just because it's, like, so just absurd. Yeah. And it's, like, one of those things you're like, I never, ever thought I would do a marathon row. But when he announced it, Dave was so excited, too. He was the only one excited, though. Yeah. But that and then another event is, like, the trail run that we had to do when we went to Aromas. That trail run was a gnarly one.

People sliding down the hills and stuff. What's going through your head when they put you on a plane? And then you guys got stuck. Yeah, in the airport. And everyone's like sleeping on the floor and like days back. And he's like, oh, sorry, guys. And, yeah, we had to do the swim the next morning. We were at the airport, I don't know, until we probably got home at 1 a.m. or so.

And then we had to be up at six or so to go do the swim after you had just done a bunch of workouts yeah and you're just but at least the swim was the only event that day so you're like okay i finally i can like go home and rest and i'm not a good swimmer anyway so i'm like swimming half asleep so uh do you ever try to game the events like you're just like i know i'm not gonna do very well at this like if i just like don't go 100 i can save some energy for other workouts or is it just like you just always just go as hard as you can every time no matter what and that's just the way it is i always just go as hard as i can and that's the way it is i don't really try and get i mean sometimes like well

maybe it would be smart if i like gain certain things but i don't know i think it's just like the competitor in me that i'm like okay i'm gonna game it and then once you get to the competition floor it's like no i'm gonna i'm gonna go to game it. And then once you get to the competition floor, it's like, no, I'm going to, I'm going to go, I'm going to go ham. Where are you doing all the swimming stuff? There's a pool that's actually like a couple blocks from my apartment. I guess I was thinking more like the open water, big swims. That's scary stuff.

Yeah. I mean, you're right about being in New York and that's, it's a little hard to get to, but luckily my rowing coach, my endurance coach, he started off as my rowing coach. he's out on Long Island and his girlfriend's pretty fit so I'll go out there but I mean usually it's once every other week to go in the open water though I really like the lakes in Wisconsin or yeah in Wisconsin a lot better than the ocean in California yeah there's way less large fish yeah and there's And there's not as many waves, and it just feels a lot more like a pool. Like when we were in Guadalupalooza in Miami, the water was not too crazy,

and I'm like, okay, this reminds me of the pool. I think if Castro really wanted to play some good head games, he would have a projector screen with just the size of what an actual whale looks like. Or like, do you know what a hammerhead shark looks like? In real life, could you imagine? This thing, you're a CrossFit, you're super fit, and this thing is now looking at you, and its eyes are on the side of this hammer

that nature decided you're going to use this to kill other giants in the ocean. Right? And we're going to swim 2k tomorrow guys good luck yeah good luck hope you have fun welcome to the crossfit games but i mean he didn't say those exact things but i think it was my second year at the games he said something very similar like yes we know there have been shark sightings and you know we've seen them but one thing i've been in the water a lot and one thing i've realized is you know if they want you they're just gonna get you you just have to accept it it's fine i'm just like

did he just say that yeah yep just let the sharks eat you it's fine no big deal what are you gonna do fight it in its own backyard no way with all those teeth no you walked into its home yeah sometimes the landlord shows up sometimes so wait what is the word with Castro these days? I have no idea what his involvement is right now. I don't know anything. Come on. No. I wish. No, no one knows.

The only thing that I've seen is. He's got a private Instagram account all of a sudden. No one knows. Probably. You follow him already. I don't. Yeah. I don't want to let him know that I'm following him now.

Now that he has to accept it. Ah, keep it quiet. What about medical stuff do you you look at blood work you get your microbiome tested like genetic testing um intolerances allergies like all that all these little details that kind of more nutrition related do you use any of that stuff to optimize your training i actually haven't um i saw that like some people were doing like i saw i think like sarah or someone got like allergy tested i'm like that would actually be a really good idea and i think it would be really

cool just to like see how it could affect you especially because i eat certain things and so if there was something that my body wasn't like really accustomed to or that i shouldn't be eating then i probably would like expect if they said i couldn't eat oatmeal i think i would freak out i don't know if I'd be allergic. Right. I'm out. I can't do that. No, I can't perform because I love oatmeal too much.

I have standards. You cross them. The line is here. Yeah, no. And so, I mean, I get, like, regular blood work done and stuff. But, no, I've never, like, actually, like, ventured into that. But I think it could be something cool and definitely something that is going to be becoming more and more popular just because everyone's so fit and near the top of their head. When you're ready, Dr. Gabrielle Lyons, she's ready for you.

We just left this morning. Oh, yeah. You got your blood work done. She called us elite, but not in the fitness realm. Oh, okay. Just good people. There you go. Perfect.

It's going to be elite in different categories. She looked at the blood and was like, you know, you should just stay on the microphone. Leave the fitness thing alone for a little while. Right. This guy doesn't have much. I'll just throw him a bone. Really got a smile out of you. One of the when when you were talking about when you guys got trapped in the airport coming back from the ranch.

Do you do what is or do you have a coach? Is there a big discussion in your training about kind of like the mental side of staying in the game throughout an entire what is like a week-long competition now or five weeks in the open um do you have any stuff specific to hey you're gonna go to the ranch and then you're gonna get stuck in an airport on accident for many hours right yeah i mean well it's during and during that we didn't have our coaches or anything it It was like you were paired with a man. I was with Sam Dancer and you had a judge that you were assigned to. So it was like this group of three that you basically like had to stick with the whole time. Everyone's falling asleep in the airport and everything.

So the only way I could really like talk to my coach was over text. So you're like kind of like texting and you're like, well, OK, we're stuck. And he's like, just try and relax, try and take a nap, sleep, like recover if you can. You're like, I can't like sleep on the floor. We don't know when the flight, because they're like 30 minutes. Okay, 30 more minutes. Okay, 30. And it wasn't like, okay, three hours.

Okay, now I'm going to take a nap and then I'm going to be able to get up. Yeah. But it's like, everyone's just there like laying on the floor and trying to relax. And I mean, like being an athlete, like my whole life, I think like my mental game is pretty strong. Just like, I know how to kind of, like, forget things in the past and then move on to the next. And one example of that, I remember Chris Henshaw.

I know you guys did an interview with him a little while ago. She listened. I did. That was one of my favorites. Barbell strike. Yeah. You make me happy. Love it.

Look at that. Yeah, and he came up to me at the games after. So I was in the middle of the handstand walk event at the games with the parallettes. And I was, like, winning. I was, like, oh, handstand walk event at the games with the parallettes. And I was, like, winning. I was, like, oh, this is my jam. I get to the parallettes and I fell. And then I came back and ended up, like, finishing in the next try. After I walked off the competition floor, he came over.

Like, I've talked to him a few times here and there. Like, hi. I worked with him once up in Boston. But he, like, came over. He's, like, Carrie, I want to tell you something. I'm very impressed with the way that you handled yourself out there. i just kind of like looked i was like that's it like he i mean he probably forgot it and whatever but like that meant the world to me i was like i'm honored that he like came over and said something like it is like you know the gymnast in me like you

you have to stay focused like you're out there you can't get all flustered but like when he came up to me afterward i was like ah that's so cool people are watching yeah right super cool you've only worked with him one time yeah and like yeah and then listening to him i'm like man i need to reach out to him just like talk because uh yeah he like blew my probably so many other people too he like blew my mind talking to you guys about like this swimming and everything i was like this is in it you know like being a crossfitter and my kick game like now whenever my coach writes kicking and I'm like, okay, you better do that kicking. Maybe you should even add a little bit more because it's so important.

I don't like to use my legs during my kick either. Not that your network isn't the coolest of all time, but PJ Nessler as well, the guy over at XPT, they do really cool swim workouts. There's like a lot of stuff that they're experimenting with. Oh, that's cool. At ICBT that you should definitely check out. Yeah, that's cool because anything swimming,

my brother and sister did swimming growing up, and I was like, no, I'm going to do diving. So I did diving for a little while. It's obviously totally different. You swim, like, the five feet to get to the side of the pool, but I never did swimming. Did it take you a while to learn the swimming thing? It's kind of its own beast.

Nobody's really – I mean, Henshaw even admitted it. He was like, that's the thing that's so far behind because you just can't be in the pool that much. Because you have so many other things. Yeah. And, like, yeah, you need your shoulders for your snatches and your muscle-ups and everything. You can't keep using them for swimming.

But, yeah, so actually the first games i was training for it and my coach was like oh we should go to open water i've been doing a little bit of pool work the day that we decided to go to the beach though it was out in jersey on the ocean there was like nine foot waves and he's like oh maybe this isn't the best but the ocean's no joke right no joke yeah and i'm a little baby wave all of a sudden knocks you over you don't know how strong it is right and i'm like footers hold you down. Yeah. I'm like a little afraid of the water anyways.

But I'm like, I know I'm going to have to face it when I go to the games. There's no choice. So he's like, well, this girl was a lifeguard and she'll be fine. She'll go out. Then you'll meet her and then you guys can swim together. Just make sure nothing happens. Well, she goes out and then I start to go out. But then I get hit by one wave and then another. And like, it was one of the scariest things in my life.

I thought I was going to drown, and then I eventually, like, come out. I'm, like, ankle deep, and I just, like, stare at my coach, and I was like. Never again. No, and he's like, yeah, we're going to stay away from the open water until you go to the games. And I was like, but then I got to go at the games, so how is that going to work? Yeah, when you get pushed down, and all of a sudden the water temperature changes like 10 degrees on you, you're like, ooh, it's cold down here. It's really dark.

What kind of monsters are down here? Terrifying. And those sharks that Dave's been talking about, you never know. They're down there. That's where they're at. When we were talking to Chris, he gave us some cool behind-the-scenes stuff about him training with Rich and Frazier and whoever else. He almost broke Rich's neck, and he almost drowned Matt Frazier once or twice.

Do you have any fun behind-the-scenes stuff from the games that you haven't stated publicly or our audience might not know about? Not that I can think of right now. Like I said, the main thing was almost drowning in the water that one time just because I was like, I am scared to death now to go in water ever again we're not going to do it until you go to the game so hopefully you end up swimming and then it ended up being a 500 meter swim and then the mile paddleboard and then a 500 meters and I thought I was going to drown on the second swim like as I'm on the paddleboard I'm like there's no way I

can swim that 500 meters again after my shoulders are already fried I was scared to death I finished I think I finished out of like 40 girls I I think I finished in like 38th place. And I was like, yes, that was great. I didn't drown. I finished the workout on top of the world, even with my 38th place. When you're training by yourself, I can only imagine there's the mental games that go on when you're just by yourself in the gym day in and day out. Have you ever just thought about getting training partners

that really want to be in the grind with you? Yeah, I guess the hardest thing is finding training partners that want to do the workouts with you. I'll get people here and there to jump in the workout, but sometimes they're like, I don't feel like hurting that bad, so I'm going to do it at my pace. You can do it at your pace. Then that's a distraction. I was going to say, to be completely honest, yes, I don't feel like hurting that bad, so I'm going to do it at my pace. You can do it at your pace. Then that's a distraction.

I was going to say, to be completely honest, yes, it's more of a distraction. And I'm just like, are you even working out? I'm dying here, and you're barely even breathing and sweating. So I'd rather just do this by myself. But usually, at least when I do my workouts, there's other people in the gym. I'm not by myself a lot. There's someone in there, and you're like,'re like okay they're watching i need to push myself and i don't know secretly i'm like okay how hard like can you make it hurt it's kind of like yeah in the back of my mind where does that

sickness come from with you where did you train by yourself as a gymnast no no i was always with other people as you're never by yeah i was never by myself as a gymnast always with coaches i'm just i guess i'm just really a competitive person, like, deep down. Yeah. Yeah. In MMA, it's really common. Like, if you have a five-round, five-minute fight, you might do five rounds in training with five different people.

So you have five minutes for the first person, and then now you're tired. That guy's gone. New guy, fresh guy comes in for round two, and then you're getting more tired. That guy's done. Now a new person comes in for round three. That's really common to do those types of sets. Like, does anyone anyone across that do that where it's like a five round workout and it's like you go against one person they're going as fast as they can they're sprinting so to speak yeah and then they get to take a break and the new person comes in now you're you're chasing a fresh person the whole time i don't happen no i don't do that but that's a great

a great way to go about training just because you do like get a fresh person that you're like, okay, now I'm tired and let's see if I can be as fit as this person that's fresh. I've done like solo workouts against like partners, which is kind of a similar thing, but not a completely fresh person. And that's always fun just because it is kind of challenging though. Sometimes I'm like, oh, you guys have two people. Why am I by myself? And I'm like, my grip is dying. And I see you just get off the bar and then you can switch. But I think that would be kind of cool. I think, was it Dan Bailey that did, like, the workouts against, like, five?

There was, like, five girl workouts. And he did one back-to-back against, like, different people. I remember something like that. Yeah. I remember that. What is Dan Bailey doing? Is he still injured? I'm not sure, to be honest with you.

Yeah, I don't know either. Yeah, I don't know.. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I have no clue. We're going to take a quick break. Somehow we blew through an hour already. There we go. We've got like 45 minutes left. Perfect.

Cool. We'll be back in a minute. Monday, March 27th. That is when the one-ton train plan goes on sale. We're going to make you so strong. PR-ing your snatch, clean jerk clean jerk squat that bench getting you into the one ton club 2 000 pounds for men's take your one ton total 2 000 pounds 1200 for you ladies i can't wait to work with you man travis mash really outdid himself on this this year-long program

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Carrie Pierce is in the house in Solace, New York. I'm literally staring out the window onto, is this 5th right here or 32nd? No, it's 32nd. 32nd. When you're in New York, when you live here, do you feel like you're in a movie still? No, I don't. Are you kidding me? We can't go anywhere.

I just look up and I'm like, oh, my God. They're like buildings but giant. They're like normal-looking buildings but 500 times the size of the buildings that I normally look at. See, and now I was like, I'm never going to be, like, a spoiled New Yorker. But now when I go outside of New York and I'm like, oh, that city's small. Like, I went to Chicago and I'm like, this city's so small. I never thought I would say that. Is this a city or is it a town?

Right, exactly. It's so small. I'm like, where's all the buildings? Yeah. There's a few, but. Yeah. How do people even work here? There's not even enough office space.

Do you ever think about how the food gets here to feed all these people all the time? Right? No, I just think about how are there so many people in my way all the time? Get out of my way. I need to go somewhere. I have places to be.

Right? I have a big question for you. Coming up, we're not going to say that you've already qualified for the games because we got one more week left in the open but um i think one of the big questions how do you beat tia you just have to be fit at everything yeah she's great at every i'm like because i was talking to my coach the other day and he's like i i hate to admit it but tia's definitely fitter than you. You know, we need to work on some more things.

Because, I mean, we were at Wadapalooza, and she's great at running. She's great at swimming. She's great at the gymnastic stuff. She's super strong. Super strong, yeah. Yeah, with her weightlifting, her deadlifts, her everything. She's an Olympian. Yeah, she is.

It's crazy. Though, like, sometimes people get us mixed up somehow. I don't know. A lot of people do, though. And I had this one guy come up to me, and he was like, Tia, congratulations on the Olympics. I was like, I'm not Tia. I'm Carrie. And he's like, oh, well, congratulations on the Olympics.

And I was like, I didn't go to the Olympics. And he's like, yes, you did. I was like, should I say just thank you? Like, yeah, it was great. Would you like an autograph? Do you need to sign as Tia or Carrie? I don't get it it that's just as good as going if people think you did right fake it till you make it is that um when you think about this process of becoming a champion at the crossfit games are you thinking like just in your brain is this like a 2019 goal, 2020? Where are your coaches at in this development of how you get to top of the podium?

Yeah, I think just getting to the top of the podium. I mean, obviously working your weaknesses, but definitely keeping those strengths. Everyone's always like weakness, weakness. And yes, I am definitely working my weaknesses. But when, like I said before, anything that gymnastics is like, I need to feel super confident in any of those workouts just the way that the point system works is you need to be you need to win and be in the top three of multiple events just because it will like help with a few of the weaknesses but

the point spread the points are very very heavy at the top and then kind of like wean down a little bit as you go down so the better you can get some of those finishes, the better you're going to end up placing overall. And as you said, Tia, she's the perfect example because she doesn't have a lot of weaknesses. So you've got to try and bring up those as much as possible and just not get anything that's hopefully outside of like top 15, top plenty because she's not going to. Yeah, it's kind of like one event when you're fighting for that few points at the top. Yeah, it's crazy. And that's when people are like, oh, do you think you can win?

I'm like, everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has a bad day. Like, you make a couple mistakes in the games, that's a couple seconds. It can be places and places. So you never know. And I think all those girls that are, like, at the top, you have to be on your A game for the entire week. Like, you have a bad workout it could lead to two or three depending on where everyone's at mentally um but yeah you have to be on the top

of your game the whole time yeah do you pay much attention to the guy side of the things not really no i don't you and me both you and me both as we said the girls are better yeah they're way cooler yeah um are you coaching coaching many people at your gym? So I only coach one CrossFit class a week just to kind of keep coaching. And then I have four private clients that I train. Just I enjoy working out other people. And sometimes, like, it feels like you're on the journey with them. I just have the four select clients because I'm like,

I would rather have a few that are, like, fully committed than having a bunch that are, like, kind of all over the map. So I meet with each of them two to three times a week, and all of them except one are into CrossFit, and the one that isn't, she just wants to learn. Similarly, she wants to learn a backflip, and she wants to learn how to walk on her hands. So she's getting there.

We're slowly making progress. But I enjoy coaching other people as well as doing the doing the sport myself do you i mean who are the clients are they athletes are they competitors are they gen pop just they're just gen pop they just yeah and they just they kind of either found me like reached out through the gym or one guy i've actually been training for like four and a half years and i started training him before i started crossfit and so it's kind of cool like him the other day he's like yeah you're a lot happier now than you were back when i met you i was like what are you i'm happier now as crossfitter than i guess um powerlifters aren't

happy you're right heavy metal anger i like that we both went heavy metal first oh yeah smelling salt you don't want that no one wants a dingy, gross, dark gym Yeah It just made me laugh though That's the only way you can be a power lifter There's no stigma on it Louie did that to people You have to be upset all the time

You have to be angry In this dark gym, in the dungeon Black hoodie over the head all the time there you go sleeping it training it sweating it don't wash it that's it 800 pound deadlift got it sold sign me up you mentioned you have one client that's super interested to get a backflip tell me about the coaching so if you're working with kind of like the the average person that walks into a crossfit gym we got to get them all gymnasty yeah where do you start this process with them i mean i start by looking at their core strength

and then kind of like their upper body pushing and pulling strength gymnastics is a lot of core and so many people are like i have a strong core but they don't know how to activate it and you're like ask them to do a basic hollow body and they can't and so it's bringing it back down to basics when i was five years old in gymnastics you learn your hollow body your arch can't. And so it's bringing it back down to basics. When I was five years old in gymnastics, you learn your hollow body, your arch, you learn how to hang from the bar, you're learning push-ups, you're learning pull-ups, you're learning all the basic strict stuff. There's a potential that everything you just said went right over a lot of people's heads. So if you were to break down the hollow body and then we'll go into the arch,

what are you thinking about when you're coaching just a standard hollow body position? Yeah. So first I'll lay someone on their back on the ground and then I'll bring them. So their arms are straight above their chest and then their knees are bent at a 90 degree angle, their feet off the floor. From there, have them slowly reach their arms over their head, slowly extend their legs and bring them down, making sure their back stays on the ground the whole time and their abs are engaged. The minute that their lower back starts to come off the ground is the minute that they've lost their ab engagement. So I stop them there, pull them back a little bit, make sure that they can keep their back on the ground and just have them hold that and just really learn how it feels to have your core activated and squeezing your abs

similar to what you will eventually be using in different movements but you have to make sure that you can activate your core properly just so it does get stronger which will relate to gymnastic stuff but also a lot of different weight lifting stuff yeah because of hollow rocks i think that the average crossfitter has a decent understanding of that position whether they can get there or not. But when you start to get into the arch, that one gets weird. Especially when you see a kipping pull-up from somebody that doesn't really know what that position looks like or feels like. How do you teach that one?

And their legs are swinging all around. I saw one earlier today. I didn't want to say anything. I saw one. Do I cross that line or not? I don't know. Nails on chalkboard. Nails on chalkboard.

And you want to say something, but you don't want to offend them. You're like, hey, I'm not looking out for you. Just your labrum. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. This coaching cue is to keep you out of the hospital. Yeah. You're welcome.

Yeah. Thank you. I don't care if you hate me. Your labrum loves me. Exactly. And you will love me in a few months from now. It's fine yeah so for the arch similar thing i just have them lay on the stomach lay on their stomach on the ground and

then just lifting their arms and legs up and a lot of people like to spread their arms wide make sure they keep them nice and close to your ears because if you go on the bar you're not going to be gripping super super wide might be a little bit wider than shoulder width apart but just making sure that they know how to properly lift their arms up and just kind of you can evaluate their shoulder mobility from just doing a simple arch on the ground and just seeing if they know how to like activate their glutes, their lower back, and you'll get a little bit of hamstring work as well. When you were just even towards the end of your gymnastics career, how much time did you guys spend on these like core components of just body awareness hollow body arch these these are you

still practicing it 15 years later in your gymnastics career totally it always comes back down to the basics everybody thinks that you can get away from it no no every day yeah it's wrong you yeah you can't you can never be too good at the basics yeah and yeah every day would be like 10 to 15 minute core circuit and now i like look at those i'm like i don't know how i did how i did some of those core circuits that you watch the kids doing gymnastics no joke the v-ups right in the hollow body then the holds then they do the flutter kicks yeah that's gnarly look so easy effortless yeah i'm like you only weigh like 80 pounds right now.

Yeah. Don't you dare make that look so easy. My leg weighs as much as you do. Come on. What do you squat, little kid? You a punk? That's it. The better question.

They make it look so easy. Yeah. Because you do, like I said, every day is like 10 to 15, just of that. And that's not even including the conditioning, the hanging leg raises. We call them toes to bar that you have when you're on bars and the other like that not the toes to bar that people are thinking i feel like on that no like everyone talks about strict pull-ups and strict muscle ups and whatever else but like strict toes to bar those are a thing but i don't feel like they're

enough of a thing i don't feel like enough people do strict toes to bar i agree because everyone just like learns how to kip it right away and they're like okay that's fine i got it especially the top half of the movement like i saw on your instagram the other day you were doing the like the flutter kicks and then you were doing the just the top half you know from an l set to the bar to an l set to the bar like that top half of the movement i feel like a lot of crossfitters are very weak at yeah i agree games athletes but just as a whole yeah definitely and that's yeah something that i see a lot in boxing people like start to learn the kipping and they just i feel like people just become so reliant on like the kipping knee raises and stuff and they're like i'm fine just doing this the rest of my life

instead of like trying to learn how to number one do strict toes bar let alone like the kipping toes bar and yeah that's some of the hardest stuff is because it's so controlled and it takes so much like ab and hip flexor strength that people are like, ah, it's okay. And like else people hate L sets, but they're so good for you. So people kind of like, just like shy away from it. And they're like, okay, I'm fine doing this other version of it. What kind of other things like that do you do that probably isn't so common amongst other athletes?

Like the, the, the top half toes to bar drill that I just mentioned. Yeah, we do like that. And then a lot of kind of like windshield wiper stuff just to really work like your obliques and your abs hanging from the bar. So that's like a strict toes to bar, but you're doing like a big around the world circle. Yeah. Just straight up and straight down. All the way around the world. And then we even go from like horizontal from side to side, kind of like you're like a windshield wiper on a car.

You know, it starts straight to the side and then you go up and but we go all the way around three o'clock back to 12 o'clock nine o'clock exactly so you don't even go all the way around but we also do all the way around and then we do a lot of like med ball toes to bar too just to add a strict toes to bar to add a little bit of weight to it just you know why not mix it up and then you can even do like the hanging l sit with a med ball just to add a little bit of weight because i mean 15 seconds there it'll feel like an eternity and yeah i do l sits multiple times a week just a lot of things that people don't and it's a short amount of time um that just really helps get your hip flexor stronger for a lot of toes to bar and stuff when some you win 19-3 and you're doing handstand push-ups,

and I imagine a lot of that, like people don't think of handstand push-ups and core engagement and things like that. Just they don't, nobody would think that your skill set in core development, but that stuff plays a massive role when it comes to full body athleticism and doing movements like that. That carryover when you're working with people, is that, you know, your ab program? Is that really like the base of how you get people stronger to move into other movements? Definitely.

I mean, everything that we do stems from your core, whether it's, you know, strict pull-ups or the kipping pull-ups or muscle, strict or kipping muscle-ups, any stricter kipping, handstand push-ups, handstand walk. The minute you lose your core in handstand walks, you're falling over. Why are CrossFitters so bad at walking on their hands? It's so, their feet are all over the place. When you see a real gymnast do it, it's so pretty. I know.

It looks like they're on their feet. It does. You have feet on your hands. You're a real gymnast. You're a CrossFitter. Everything's swaying around. Yeah. And I must say I'm kind of guilty for that too because that's like in gymnastics, yeah,

it's all about you got to be pretty, your legs together, straight legs, pointed toes. Yeah. You're judged on how you look and how you perform. CrossFit doesn't have style points, so people don't really pick up on what looks nice and elegant. There might not be style points, but efficiency of movement is a massive thing. Totally. And I think CrossFit is just like, okay, I'm going to kick up and then just try and move my hands Looks nice and elegant. There might not be style points, but efficiency of movement is a massive thing. And I think CrossFit is just like, okay, I'm going to kick up and then just try and move my hands. And they don't pay attention to what their feet are doing because they're so just worried about what their hands are doing and moving.

Well, how many people, when they actually introduced, I remember the first year that they had handstand walks at regionals, I couldn't stand on my hands yet. I just tried to walk. Yeah. There's a bad problem there. Yeah, right? There's like a basic progression. You think you want to just learn how to be on your hands. I was trying to walk down the floor.

Yeah. No, it doesn't work well. Like a kid, we're just going to learn how to walk before you can stand. Hey, do me a favor, little one. Just start sprinting. Yeah. No big deal. Exactly.

The progressions, they're not there for most people they just want to go right to the real thing yeah kipping toes to bar exactly and i think that's i mean it could be part of like the coaching and then part of like the athletes because it's easy for a coach to be like yeah you can't do a strict so let's try kipping it let's go and same with like handstand push-ups and stuff like i know i should be teaching a strict but let's try kip it why not maybe you can get your handstand push-up that way because's going to be a little bit easier and like i have people working handstand holds and they're like but i want to learn how to handstand walk i'm like if you can do this though then you're going to be able to walk like if you learn that body awareness yeah you're going to be

able to walk on your hands for it you're going to be better than that guy that's walking on his hands a few steps if you learn how to hold and you just learn where your body is in space yeah do you have or see a lot in your clients and just in general like you guys stretch a lot in gymnastics too do you do a lot of that stuff too now not nearly as much as i used to and i think it's because no one's babysitting me to do it it's like yeah you would do like 15 20 minutes we need to find you a stretching coach now i know right you pretty much have the requisite mobility for everything you need to do in CrossFit at this point. For the most part, though, I've never, like, so, like, putting my arms right next to my ears over my head, I've never been able to.

Like, if my arms are right. You're 18 years of gymnastics since you were three years old. You don't have full shoulder flexion? No. Holy shit. And I never, and I don't know if it's, like, the way my joint is in my shoulder. Well, you're probably way more jacked now. Yeah, that doesn't help.

Yeah, it doesn't help at all. Your lats are like three times the size now. Right? They just like pop out and get in the way. Unlike my college coach. I'm too jacked. I have that problem too. Way too jacked.

I can tell. Those shoulders are popping out of the shirt, you know. It happens to the best of us. Making fun of me, everyone. Yeah. But like splits and stuff, yeah, it's always been there there and like i can just like hit it for a quick second i'm like okay good lower body whatever hamstrings hip flexors fine but yeah it's just that shoulder and it plays into my front rack which is something we've like been working on just trying to get better especially on

my left arm so everything else is there it's just like that little bit that like i said it's never been there and i don't know what i'm just gonna blame it on my parents i. So everything else is there. It's just like that little bit that, like I said, it's never been there. And I don't know. I'm just going to blame it on my parents, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. Why not? Do you have any shoulder problems related to that? If you don't have full flexion, it's such an overhead dominant sport,

you'd think you would have some aches and pains just as a result of not having full mobility. Yeah, you definitely would think. So the beauty of gymnastics is, especially when you get to a high high enough level like when you're in like through high school and college you can select what movements you do and so you can kind of work around that weakness so I always like flipped and like never really put my hands down anywhere especially on balance beam because I couldn't keep my arms close to like have my hands go on the ground when my body over my head to like be able to do something properly so I could kind of like work around it i didn't really have to i didn't have to work through it with crossfit yeah there's like you have to be able to squat clean and you have to be able to

snatch and stuff so you can't really work around it so you have to really work through it so yeah you have a sweet mailing list that you're sending out to teach people all the gymnastics can you tell us about that yeah so i have a newsletter it's called you're sending out to teach people all the gymnastics. Can you tell us about that? Yeah. So I have a newsletter. It's called Pierce Pointers. And it teaches people basic things for gymnastics. It will go over all the CrossFit movements.

And then I also, like, break them down into different drills that you can do if you're looking to work on, like, your pull-ups, your muscle-ups, handstand walks. And, yeah, it's been going on since October and I've had a bunch, like I said, whether it is like strict pull ups, butterfly, and then it breaks it down. And then also through, um, like the open, I had special pointers each week. So if there's any sort of like events or things coming up, then I'll have sort of like special newsletters for different things. So it teaches CrossFitters movements that maybe your coaches don't have time to do. Or if you're like, okay, I've been working on pull-ups, but I can't seem to get it. It just throws a different twist or might throw in some different drills that you've

never seen or never done before. Or it just breaks it down. If you have simple questions on how do I do a correct strict pull-up, where to place my hands, where to place my head, how do I properly activate my lats? Just a lot of little things like breakdown that there's not always time to do in class or that maybe you have a problem that the majority of people don't have problems with one thing learning from people like you that is so cool is those tiny little things that make a massive difference like when you see somebody pop up on the wall for the very first time to do a handstand push-up and you see their elbows flare out to the side you're like hold on we don't even understand the basic shoulder position now your neck's gonna break

let's not do that like let's talk about how we actually get down to the floor to do this totally don't think they don't have that knowledge and honestly like a lot of the coaches don't either they just yeah say let's do the kipping one so you can do it yeah definitely i think that's something like i said sometimes like i get that like class okay you have an hour and you have these people and like you just took them through like if they did their foundations class for crossfit and then no matter how long they've been crossfitting there's like little things that like even for me like when i'm coaching i feel rushed i'm like there's a hundred things that i could talk about for this handstand push-up right now but I have to condense it because we have to get through it and we have to get through the workout and then we have something else to do

and so like just like being able to throw different things out there so that people can kind of like take their own time be like oh this is how my hand should be and this is the way my elbow should be and this is how I activate my lats or my shoulders or whatever it is, just kind of like really breaking it down. And they can kind of like take it themselves and go to like their open gym or when they're doing it in class and maybe the instructor didn't have time to go over. They're like, okay, I read about this. Let's try this and adjust it. And I've had a lot of positive feedback from people just like talking about different

gymnastics skills that have either improved or that they've gone for the first time. So that's a really cool thing that i got from doing the newsletter most of the time the coaches aren't able to get into those level of details just because they've got 20 people in class and they can't go and walk through every single person it's like okay handstand push-ups everybody good good if you can't scale here's or if you can't do them here's two or three things you can do and now you got people walking around in a box but no one's ever teaching body mechanics and how the shoulder actually works and having a resource like that is just super awesome because people don't know those things yeah and they want to be good at them they want to be really good that's so what's so

cool about crossfit yeah people want to be great for like definitely and that's like one thing is like oh i always like bringing this up i'm like when i see like people and they scale things like the same way in workouts all the time like the box is great for handstand push-ups but you're never gonna get your handstand push-up unless you're actually in a handstand like yeah you can reduce the range of motion or you can do negatives like there's different things you can do but you can't just scale it the same way all the time and so that's why i've like thrown out a few different things um just get because people get so comfortable with one thing it's like no that's not eventually work you can do that sometimes but to do pull-ups you got to actually be on the pull-up

bar not just doing ring rows all the time too oh great yeah it doesn't it's a totally different plane people yeah um sorry i've coached crossFit for a long time. I did that. I wasn't perfect. Don't hate me. Right. No, it is. But, you know, there's some things that are better to do than others. Right.

Where do you make up all the ab things that we see on Instagram all the time? Some of them are from gymnastics and some of them are like my creativity. Yeah. Or like sometimes I'll be on the parallettes like doing my L set and I'm like, what could I do? And I'm like, think of like the straddle one or think of like bringing my feet up or like the i'll be on the parallettes like doing my l set and i'm like what could i do and i like think of like the straddle one and or think of like bringing my feet up or like the flutter kicks and so sometimes you know else it's the 30 seconds i'm like uh what am i and i just think of like different things i could do what's the longest l set you've ever held do you know i don't roughly roughly about a minute oh my god that's a long time i know but 60 whole seconds yeah because one minute

sounds easy 60 seconds that's a long time that is a really long time especially when you're just like one 15 two yeah i've been my knees a little that used to be a standard at our gym and i remember trying to hit a minute multiple times and it's just like your feet are falling and you're shaking you're just like ah 45 seconds yeah that's brutal yeah but when you're when i was a gymnast my legs weighed a lot less too so makes it a little bit easier when you're a gymnast but now it's impossible well not impossible but it's really 45 seconds at least my coach like we do them a lot like my coaches started making me do them more because he's like they're just gonna be great i'm like yeah and i like's like, they're just going to be great. I'm like, yeah.

And I tell people they're so good for you. And they are so good for you. Yeah. But it's just doing them is brutal. When you structure or when your program is laid out for you, how much accessory work are you adding in? So you've got like the big lifts clearly, the Olympic lifts and the power lifts. But how much accessory work is going in for shoulders, core, like single leg, everything?

Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, so my five days a week that I'm doing training, I do accessory each of those days. And usually it's like four to six movements. And it is single leg, single arm, a lot of like rows, core, all that stuff. And it's usually three or four rounds of anywhere from like eight to twelve reps of each you do any single joint stuff bicep trice calf raises hamstring curls stuff like that on top of it not a whole lot uh my coach knows i love bicep curls and tricep pushdowns though little big head life you know so he'll throw those in for me usually once a week but the

majority and we do like banded hamstring curls um but the majority of it is a lot of like rows and dumbbell bench and reverse hypers banded hip thrusts weighted hip thrusts kind of things like that yeah have you noticed the hip thrust making you really strong yes i think so i think i know breck and treris you want to talk to him wait what breck and treris he's the guy that invented it. There we go. Yeah. They're taking over the world. I think it's helped with some booty gains, and then I think it also helped me PR my deadlift.

That's what I told someone I relate to PRing my deadlift. It's like a combination of those and reverse height bears because we did a four-week deadlift program, and I PR'd by 20 pounds. I have friends that train with him in San Diego and one girl specifically is like 39 years old and she didn't go to the games she went on Invictus' team like the last three years and she's

PR'ing all of her lifts. She's been working with them like eight months. That's incredible. The CrossFit people don't do like isolation stuff like that. Yeah. And she's just crushing it these days like she says she feels better than ever that's great I don't know how she's still getting strong at 39 right what are you doing something yeah we need to look take less I'm like aren't you done she's like no

way next year I'm the young person again right I'm training for that next master's group you know that's incredible though yeah I think that it's really interesting. I know Lauren Fisher's been over and training with him. Rasmus has been over. So he's, like, slowly infiltrating the CrossFit world, which is really interesting. Yeah. And I think a lot of, like, the accessory stuff just keeps me healthy. I feel better doing it.

Like, I do a lot of squats and stuff, but I really like, like, the single leg Bulgarian split squatsian split squats the step ups and stuff i think they just help with strength and they help make my knees and stuff feel better you got to accumulate just reps if you're just dead lifting and it beats you down all the time you still have to be able to lift weights and just have that load like the volume and if you're doing that just in squats and deadlifts it's just it's way too much yeah way too much of a beat down on your body and i've experienced it with like the knees and stuff so but overall stay stay healthy but yeah every once in a while have you had any injuries whatsoever uh little things nicks and dings but yeah little things here and there the main one that i've experienced i was actually a lot more beat up with gymnastics than crossfit and i think i'm just like smarter with my recovery and everything in CrossFit but I did hurt my right Achilles at the games in 2016 on the box jump over workout why do they

still do that I know but they why I know how many do we have to explode yeah luckily it wasn't a full tear it was just a partial tear but it I know it was it was keep going yeah of course yeah and but my freak my brother was what he's, how come you started jumping off of like one foot? It was just partial. It wasn't fully. And then we had a sprint workout the next day. And so my coach kind of just like fully taped up my ankle. And he was like, well, I guess we'll see what happens.

2016. That was the year you got fifth? Mm-hmm. You took fifth place with a half-parsely-torn Achilles? Yeah. I love how you just think that's okay. Like, oh, yeah, it's fine. I mean, we taped it together.

It was fine. Next year, yeah. Tape it up. No big deal. Couldn't feel anything. Put a little Band-Aid on. You're good. You get the adrenaline going.

It's fine. Will you tell me about this super cool ab program that you have? Yeah. So I have this super cool ab program that you have? Yeah. So I have this super cool ab program. It's a 30-day program. And a lot of the core work stems from a lot of things I did for gymnastics. And I think just so many people overall, whether you're in CrossFit or like general fitness, you just need more core strength.

It's going to help with your squats. I mean, I was listening to something earlier saying like 80% of people have back pain at some point in their life. Stronger core, you're going to have less back pain. And it's kind of cool, just different things too, because it's from gymnastics. And I mean, you were talking about earlier, the little girls doing all the gymnastics, ab work. It's crazy just how much you do and just how strong your core gets from doing all that stuff. And people have had phenomenal, like I've heard so many really cool stories especially uh like i said

back pain is the number one thing and then number two is like if you're doing crossfit just the more efficient gymnastic movements especially toes to bars like what everyone said has like gone through the roof and they're like it's a lot of fun a lot of people like have gotten their friends to do it i even had a few boxes that were like we had like members like sit down and put it on our big screen and do it all together and so it's just been really cool like throwing like sit down and put it on our big screen and do it all together. And so it's just been really cool, like throwing like an ad program out there, just going, coming from my knowledge in gymnastics and being in health and fitness ever since I graduated and then now being in CrossFit. So it's cool. It's a 30-day program.

That's something you don't have to change any of your other workouts. You just tack it on to the end of your workouts. Yeah, it's less than 10, every workout, it's less than 10 minutes a day so it's just something easy like even one of the ladies at our gym said that she actually does every night before she goes to bed she has two four-year-olds twins and they all get red like dressed to do the workout together do the workout and then go to bed and they're like they her kids are correcting her mom you need to show your legs on your hip or like you need to jump higher on that like smash by your four-year-old exactly she's like i can't keep up with you guys need to be easy on mom like i'm at my level you guys do you it's fine you know why people need

this program because everyone in crossfit's looking for like the cash out yeah they always want to do the abs and you know what they do it has to drive you crazy they go and do ghd setups yep and they do them less than perfect yep far and they're like now my back hurts and then they end up hurting themselves and then they hear people like rich froning are doing 300 a day and you're like stop yeah stop with the gHD machine. Do this. You have a 30-day program that they can just at least learn how their abs work and core stability before you start flinging yourself around on GHD over there. Yeah. And it's level one and level two.

So if you're more beginner or a little more advanced, then you can find something that works. Do the L-sit more than the GHD? Yeah. And the hollow holds. I'm assuming you have, like, video demonstrations and everything. So if they're not familiar with it, they have an easy guide to how to do it correctly.

Yeah. So it's actually, like, each workout has a video. And I have two demo people, one doing level one, one doing level two. And I'm coaching them through. I'll jump in here and there. So you can actually, like, see it. And you can, like, be working out with people. And, I mean, there's, like, MRAPs, you can kind of like challenge

yourself to the guy or the girl in the video and kind of see where you compare. So it's kind of fun for people because I bet they've reached out and been like, man, that guy's really fast, or I finally beat him by one rep or whatever it is. So yeah, they can see it. And I explain everything like we go over demos of each of the movements, what to look for, what not to look for, what you should be feeling. So it kind of goes into everything. And, yeah, it's visual and then it's written out. So whichever kind of learner you are, there's something for you. And then is there any way for them to interact with you during the program?

Is there like a Facebook group or anything like that? We thought about making a Facebook group, but we actually haven't made it live. Um, but most people just email me, Carrie at peerspointers.com if they have any questions or anything, um, during the program, which people definitely have, like it, I had a shoulder injury. I can't do A and B. What do I do to replace it? Um, or like I'm in the middle of the program and this is going well, however, this isn't working or whatever it is. So they kind of like go back and forth if they have any questions or some things like people are like, Oh, i was able to hold my hollow body for 10 more seconds um this week than before whatever so people just get excited about their progress and then throw

it back me i've done more toes of our unbroken than ever before so people kind of like throwing little things at me like just to update me on their program yeah yeah i imagine people finish the 30 days and they want to keep going do they Do they start the program over and just do it again? Yeah, that's what people have done right now. I mean, eventually we'll have another program, a little more advanced one. But, yeah, so it's – I mean, everyone's like, oh, so do I get – do I have to pay like every month? I'm like, no, it's a one-time fee.

It's 30 days. You can do it as many times as you want. You can do it the rest of your life. Five times. Seven times. Pay me every month if you want. Just for you. Rebuy it on the same email address. And every month if you want. Just for you. Rebuy it on the same email address.

And, yeah, it never expires or anything, so they can use it. Unless, yeah, unless you want to buy a new program, then why not? Totally. That's it. How much is it? $39.99. Oh, yes. No-brainer.

No-brainer. And 30 days, six-pack, I'm in. That's it. Can we put together a ab challenge for our people? Yeah. That goes along with this show. We can do it on that bar over there, this beautiful solace. There we go.

It looks so pretty on Instagram. It is so pretty. I hope you're warmed up. This is on the spot ab challenge. Okay. Oh, gosh. Get over to the Instagram team, Carrie Pierce, Ab Challenge. Where can people find this program and find you?

So they can find me on Instagram, Carrie Pierce CrossFit, and the app program is piercepointers.com slash powerabs. Piercepointers. Powerabs. Yeah. Right? Thank you. You know what I don't have?

Powerabs. There you go. Well, piercepointers.com is a power ab. That's very forceful. Oh, yeah. Doug Larson. Yep. You can find me on Instagram at Douglas E. Larson.

I'm Anders Varner. You can find me at Anders Varner. Shrug Collective. At Shrug Collective. Get into iTunes, YouTube, like, subscribe. Leave a nice comment. We will see you on Wednesday. That is a killer show. Carrie Pierce crushed it. Thank a nice comment. We will see you on Wednesday. That is a killer show.

Cary Pierce crushed it. Thanking our sponsors. Get halosport.com forward slash shrugged. You're getting the prelaunch price at $279 over at that website. Love them. Organifi. Organifi.com forward slash shrugged. Saving 20%. Whoop.com.

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