Programming Theory

When looking at each day's programming, it can be easy for coaches and clients to become overwhelmed with the amount of different layers and prescriptions that we use to create the best experience for everyone.

I personally like the term 'layer' because it reminds me of how famous television painter Bob Ross used to paint.  He'd start with an outline here, a smudge there.  Then some trees, a lake, then all-of-a-sudden BOOM.  An amazing painting.

https://youtu.be/hRa5VhrbSLY

These layers may…

In this video I discuss the importance of "Alive" programming (programming that is constantly being updated according to the days of the week, time of the year, holidays, etc.). I also talk about and show how the programming is build using layers from most important down to least important.

Direct link video on YouTube.

If your programming isn't "Alive", it isn't as good as it could be and you are probably doing your clients and your coaches a disservice!

For those of you who aren't already …

Got this article from my buddy Eric LeClair at Team CrossFit Academy Good Stuff!

Opex Fitness: When does fitness make sense for health or for competition

I was just talking to a client of mine who buys our gym programming (which is decidedly HEALTH based vs competition), they used to do another great program that was more focused on competition and considered one of the best.

His members HATED it. It was monotonous. Everything had to be scaled (can a cake that has every ingredient changed …

https://youtu.be/w_bne4O9CpY

In this series, I look at CrossFit WODs from the past that I created at analyze what I would do better now.  Today's workout has squat jumps  and dumbbell hang power cleans (no name since it pre-dated the naming of every workout).

And if you want more videos like this one, as well as other special content and programming for your box, head over to our store and grab one of our programming packages by clicking here!

Thrive on.

-jj

One of the tools I developed over the last few thousand workouts was this spreadsheet.  It is a basic list of every movement (or category of elements) that we do in our gym programming.  I set it up so that I keep records of how many times per month we do each movement.  I also added the feature that it turns darker and darker red, the longer the movement goes unused.

This ensures that we hit all of the movements in the right ratios, and no movement gets left behind!

You'll notice at the end o…