To be clear we’re not talking about real, abusive situations. We’re talking more about the quiet, soul sucking, goal crushing kinds of people we all have in our life. We go on diets to cut out bad food and pick up good habits like exercising regularly, but how often do we cut out those that drain us of our focus and feelings…?
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
We have found “competition” can really help you to “level up”. Not the bad, win or die, type of competition, but the overall type that gives you a big goal to attain. Performing or working in public can make you focus in a way that can really help you grow.
Basics; there is no magic training plan or diet template you should follow. The same things that worked for you in your 20’s, 30’s, 40’s will still work, you just need to be a bit smarter in your approach and recovery.
In short, recovery with the same focus as your work. 🙂
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
What are some of the things that might be holding you back to being happy, healthy and successful. Let’s go through several of these things and ways you can approach adjusting things in your mind and life.
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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We all fail. A lot. The thing is, what do you do after you fail? Do you give up or do you keep at it until you finally get it. That’s WINNING my friends.
We either WIN or we Learn.
We reference this article on Wired: Today I Learned That Not Everyone Has An Internal Monologue And It Has Ruined My Day.
My day was completely ruined yesterday when I stumbled upon a fun fact that absolutely obliterated my mind. I saw this tweet yesterday that said that not everyone has an internal monologue in their head. All my life, I could hear my voice in my head and speak in full sentences as if I was talking out loud. I thought everyone experienced this, so I did not believe that it could be true at that time.
Do you have an inner Monologue or something else?
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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This recording is part of a larger project/series Coach Gene and Heather are working on for another audio podcast (the Warrior Mindset). They are going through each chapter of the book The Way of the Seal by Mark Divine, creator of SealFIT.
They both believe in SealFIT whole heartedly for training and teaching mental toughness. Having both trained with SealFIT methodology for 2-3 years it has been instrumental in helping to hone their focus and overall lifestyle centered around fitness and being healthy human beings…
The chapter’s focus is primarily on learning to get through tough things in life, whether it’s a difficult workout or life challenge; like running a business or getting an advanced degree, you can and will learn something from pushing yourself physically and mentally in the gym.
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Talking through the why behind a year of Hero WODS. Simply put we do these things because we are constantly looking for ways to change our set-point. If we can learn to deal with being uncomfortable and push through in the gym or wherever we’re doing the hard stuff, we can translate and succeed in everyday life outside the gym.
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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This week we interview Coach Heather. Long time O.G. of Workhorse she’s been with the outfit since the get-go.
Heather is co-owner, coach, bodybuilder fellow SealFitter, and now candidate for Congress. Get some Heather!
https://www.voteheatherbauer.com
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Why do your New Year’s Resolutions fail so often? We think it’s because there’s no intent behind the idea. Maybe you keep things to yourself. Maybe you haven’t built a plan around what you want to achieve. Maybe the goal is just to big…
We think you need to put some intent behind your actions. Build a reason behind it beyond the standard; “I need to get better”. Make it public, tell someone else, get an accountability partner, put some skin in the game and you’ll see yourself making progress and even reach your goal(s).
We talked in-depth about Coach Ib’s upcoming year of Hero WODs. How he’s using that to change his level and make himself better. I read this post as well:
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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What is humility? It starts with vulnerability, but let’s frame it in a better light. I think it’s better expressed as “honesty,” and “self- awareness.”
A good friend laid this out online fo rus recently:
Admit you are imperfect and fallible. Be honest, especially with yourself, about who you are, who you aren’t, and where you are at. Your puffed up chest generally looks like exactly that. Be teachable and willing to learn.
Everyone has to fake it to make it sometimes, and trying to be better than you are means believing that you can in fact be and do better.
“Trust yourself when others doubt you, but make allowance for their doubting too…”
In this podcast we take a deeper dive into being a healthy, humble human being… Join us!
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Some quick gym updates for you as we close out the year:
We have a new gym swag store: http://shopworkhorse.mdiapparel.com/
January Challenge; we will be entering all members into a January nutrition challenge. More details to come soon, but it’ll be painless and you’ll all love us for it! Get prepared 🙂
Coach Ib talked through some points of performance with Lynne (longtime member) about her journey through fitness so far at Workhorse. We think there are some really good nuggets here so pay attention.
You’re never going to get the kind of attention at a big box gym as you do here.
Thanks Lynne!
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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One thing we know as coaches is that those who open up and share their goals, concerns, fears, desires and needs become better, more complete healthy versions of themselves. There’s something uplifting and therapeutic about sharing with another person. In our case, coaches can really help be the X-factor in our lives as do battle with the world every day.
While are specialty is fitness and nutritional coaching at Workhorse we have also helped dozens of our members through tough times. Just by being there, with zero judgement to help give advice or to just be with you through the the thick and thin. Take advantage of what we have to give should you need it!
I am an avid CrossFitter, Weight Lifter and overall fitness lover, but I have never found anything quite like Martial Arts. Between Karate, that I currently hold a Shodan 1st Degree Blackbelt in, Muai Tai Boxing and Jiu-Jitsu training on the regular. There is nothing that has challenged me both mentally and physically, at the same time, than these practices have.
Martial Arts has a really great way of exposing your weaknesses and helping to expose the real you. Helping you find the path or your “why” more easily than other types of athletics mainly because of the mental or heartfelt journey you find yourself taking more so than just a physically based activity.
Mark Divine’s 5 Mountains is the antithesis of this concept.
I truly hope you find someplace to learn the way, wherever you are. If I can help in any way just message me anytime.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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We took a quick visit to CottonTown Crossfit, where we’ve done MURPH and a Grid6 competition this year. To talk with our friends owner Mark Sanger and Coach Michel Brazell. We wanted to share some insight into how they operate their gym and how their community works.
We have a lot of similarity with CottonTown and we hope you glean some useful info as to how we all work in the Coaching community.
CottonTown Event:
On September 30, 2015 Forest Acres Police Officer, Greg Alia, was killed in the line of duty while trying to apprehend a suspect.
Please join Cottontown CrossFit and Serve & Connect for a special WOD in honor of Officer Greg Alia.
Date: 12/14/19 – Gregory Alia Day
Time: 9:00am
Where: Cottontown CrossFit
$20 donation to support Serve & Connect – an organization created by Kassy Alia Ray in honor of Greg
Please arrive early/on time to sign waiver
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Coach Becky’s journey began as an original Workhorse member. Actually before that at Iron Tribe when Coach Ib was just starting out in South Carolina. So she’s what we call “OW”… 🙂
Always with a good spirit and a love for helping others Coach Becky has become a great addition to the team here at Workhorse in terms of Coaching staff.
Listen to her story as she goes into the detail of working through her back surgery to be better than before. Taking it slow and progressing one day at a time with a super consistent work ethic. Coach Becky is one to model your own fitness journey after for sure.
Monday is the start of Deadcember, so get signed up for that 10 or 15 day challenge. Also we’re going to be launching a nutrition challenge in January along with a new member drive/challenge.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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We have discussed Evan Owen in an earlier episode of the WHF Podcast, but wanted to get him for a short sit-down with us to go through some finer details of what it is that drives him to be in the gym every day.
Including quick trip to Bubba’s Biscuits, who by the way are our favorite cheat day cheats of all time here in Columbia… Hands down…
Evan has had huge success with rebuilding who he is physically. We suspect the mental aspect of what helps keep him pushing onward has always been there. Perhaps Workhorse has only helped expose a little more and quicker maybe otherwise he would have on his own.
We talk through friendly competitive comparisons and how to find ways to help you see where you can level up your growth. Evan is a very insightful and thoughtful person who has a good story to share with us all about his fitness journey thus far.
We are super proud of you Evan. Keep up the great work and ‘NEVER GIVE UP’ !
This is a jam session on this post by Ryan Michler where he goes through a few things that he’s suggesting that will help you have a fullfilling and meaningful day/life.
I too sent this post to a few friends and had similar results to Ryan… I was a little surprised that this seems overwhelming for most. I think it’s mostly because we don’t take the time to think about the way we live. By that I mean, we lack a ‘code’ for living. The Samurai had Bushido, we need a more modern form of Bushido – heck maybe it’s all we really need.
Let’s go through his list line by line and see what’s behind it.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Eric is a long time OG member, dating all the way back to the pre-workhorse days at Iron Tribe… dang…
He is active Military in the Air Force, recently back home in the USA after deployment and also legit weirdo and we love him.
Eric does some pretty amazing and insane races/runs like 100 milers and many other Ultras (anything longer than a Marathon). Along the way he’s learned a lot about Never Giving Up and seeing things through. We could all learn from Eric in this area of life. He is also eternally optimistic and it’s something we look up to in him.
Imposter syndrome can be defined as a collection of feelings of inadequacy that persist despite evident success. ‘Imposters‘ suffer from chronic self-doubt and a sense of intellectual fraudulence that override any feelings of success or external proof of their competence.
Let’s take a look at Imposter Syndrome and how Warrior’s overcome it. It all starts with taking a look back at your accomplishments and being grateful for the path you’ve traveled so far.
It’s hard for Imposter Syndrome to win when you take the focus off of yourself and put the focus on others and helping them to win.
Jake Thompson/Compete Every Day
People Pleasing
Fear of Missing Out “FOMO”
Write down your accomplishments
Positive Self-Talk
Go on a Comparison “Fast”
Social Media “Fast”
Reflect & Meditate
Principle 5: Forging Mental Toughness (page 97). Read that chapter to take a deep dive into how you can utilize controlling your attention and developing emotional resilience.
Quick Tip: Whenever you have specific negative feelings, force yourself to think or feel positive or healthy thoughts or vibes.
Look out for feelings of: Anger, Fear, Doubt, Jealousy, Confusion.
How to re-target these feelings with positive re-direction.
Never Give Up, you are always still in the fight to get better. You only need to improve 1% every day.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Listen or watch wherever you get your podcasts from: Youtube | Spotify | Apple | Google | Spreaker
We’ll be reaching out to each of you soon to setup a time to meet in person to review and/or set any goals you may have for 2020. We want you to get out in front of things and crush the new year!
Which brings up a great question; How do you set a goal and how do you succeed? It’s not easy but we go over some things you could do to help super-charge your goal getting.
Ib talks with Gene a bit about his Blackbelt and what was involved in achieving that goal. Now testing for 2nd degree in January how have things been going as he ramps up for this next challenge.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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Listen or watch wherever you get your podcasts from: Youtube | Spotify | Apple | Google | Spreaker
Hopefully you came out to the Squatoberfest-ivities and hung out with us. So many PR’s in October. Also, huge CONGRATS to everyone who hit their 15 or 20 day goals. You inspire us!
Get some beer, bring in a Growler or whatever and take some home with you while the keg is still tapped. It’s our gift to you!
TRIIB is coming out with a mobile app update soon, be on the lookout for it. It’s going to make things waaay easier. We’re also getting ‘Appointments’ which we’ll be utilizing right away so you’ll soon be able to just schedule any personal sessions on your own whenever you need to do it.
With the close of October/Squatober you’ll see some quite different workouts for this month. We’re going with NO-Score-November all month. We’re going to focus on conditioning, which like the beer at the party should pair quite well with all the strength gains we’re seeing from last month.
Also, we’re partnering with a new company to bring you some Workhorse Gear. So be on the look out for that soon as well.
That’s all for this installment of the Podcast update. 🙂
The startup scene likes to produce this type of quote when it wants to instill good leadership qualities. However I have found that this isn’t just about leadership of others, but just as important, if not more so, for personal growth and maturity.
Make sure you are surrounding yourself with the types of people who make you want to elevate your own personal growth just because you are around them. I’m not just talking about the people in your life that you go to for advice, those are necessary as well. But the types of people that you want to emulate in whatever area it is that you respect about them. This extends to your circle of friends as well. How many of us have a ‘friend’ that holds us back because of their own insecurity or jealously… it’s common so don’t feel bad for your success even if your ‘friend’ can’t get excited for you.
Think of these people as personal areas of life mentors. It doesn’t have to be official and you can do this from afar as well. The reality is modeling your behavior around people that are where you want to get to is paramount to you actually getting there.
I surround myself with those who inspire me and elevate me and that I want to be around. The more i’m around them, the more I want and the more I can give to the people who are around me.
Dennys Lozada
So how can you tell if a person is genuine in what you admire. Well, the reality is that most of us have our flaws. No one is perfect and you should never meet your heroes… But you can sure tell a few things about a person by how they react to things. Like your success or the success of others. A true friend or mentor will genuinely be excited for you when you win. But someone who is insecure or not really a ‘winner’ will ride on your accomplishments and never really add anything to your effort. In fact they will tear it down with snarky comments, jokes or maybe even disengaging from you while you are doing your thing.
The thing is, if you’re busy working on your goals or being a better version of yourself, you won’t have the time to spare to give in to negativity especially negativity directed towards others. These types of people are spending their energy on their own growth and learning as much as they can from their environment and those around them. Including you…
Heck if you’re one of these negative people you may find yourself being dropped from your own friend-circle. It’s like T-Pain says:
This is a real thing. There is even a subreddit dedicated to this subject, know as “AITA”.
Being an asshole aside, if you find that you have a ‘friend’ who is marginally supportive of you, or if this is you. Then you’ve got some work to do on yourself. Don’t despair, you’re not too far gone, I promise. You probably just need to start with some self-awareness.
A great place to start is to look at those you surround yourself with on a daily basis. If you find yourself is daily sit-down bitch sessions or aren’t talking about the good things happening in your lives then you may just be associating with someone who can’t help you get to that next level just by being around them. Find people who make you feel good and those that can help you begin to see things in a positive light, or simply those that will hold you accountable to your emotions and outlook. It can be uncomfortable at first, but if you are truly looking to walk the warrior’s path then you won’t mind getting a little better.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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A deep discussion on health and wellness with the Dr.
Dr. Tom Stetson graduated from one of the most well-respected health and wellness doctorate programs in the country, Palmer College of Chiropractic, with high honors. He also holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Pittsburgh, where he majored in Chemistry. He is the owner and found of Columbia Family Chiropractic that he and his wife started in 2010. Dr. Tom focuses on functional, natural medicine.
Dr. Stetson has invested over $300,000 on advanced training in spinal correction, toxicity, exercise and nutrition from some of the largest and most respected health clinics in the country. He spends countless hours training and traveling all over the world to get the most cutting edge information on health to bring to his patient base in Columbia, SC. Due to his training and expertise, he was chosen to be a member of the Wellness Advisory Council and has traveled the world working with athletes of all ages. He has worked with six World and USA Championship teams including USA Wrestling, Judo, Weightlifting and Martial Arts. As a team chiropractor he traveled to the 2012 Olympic Games held in London, England. In his early years he hosted the popular radio show, “Maximize Your Health” on WIS 1320AM in Columbia, SC.
Dr. Stetson is a sought after speaker in the community. He is regularly asked to speak at churches, corporations, community groups, and the military. His goal is to see the city of Columbia, SC become the healthiest city on the planet.
Find him on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/thomasstetson
Columbia Family Chiropractic: https://www.facebook.com/CFChiropractic/
I am co-owner of a gym; Workhorse Fitness, located in Columbia, SC. I had a great opportunity to attend the Self-Made Summit in Charlotte, NC this past weekend. One of my other businesses that I founded and have run for almost 10 years is an event production company. We created and produced a multitude of events, meetups, conferences and workshops; http://convergese.com/, http://frontenddesignconference.com/ & https://bdconf.com/ to name just a couple. Different industry than ‘gyms’ and ‘fitness’ but the event production aspect is related. 🙂
The Self-Made Summit was a very well run, very content intensive two days. I first thought that it was a little light on speakers but after the first day I realized that Stuart Brauer, the founder of the event was spot on and hit all the right notes for the subject matter. Now, we already work with Stuart via his WTF Gym Talk consulting services and have already gotten a ton of great insight and help from him in the micro-gym world of business. But this Summit was spot on and has us charged. There’s nothing quite like gathering like-minds together to share knowledge, frustrations, fears, wins/losses together in as honest a setting as it can get like this.
There are still plenty of things rolling around my skull right now. Here are some notes I took during the two days. This is not exhaustive nor is it meant to be. Consider this just shorthand highlights through the filer of my brain:
Brandon Cullen, co-founder of MADabolic, opened up the day/event with his backstory and overview of how they are currently working on their expansion into Franchising. A lot of his insight is into the business side of franchising and there is just a ton of intel there to comb through. That said the current status of where I am in almost all of my businesses, is not, relatable to franchising or opening up multiple locations. Regardless of how good that insight was I found myself really excited by the straight up trainer talk he was dishing out in the first half of his talk. His background as a pro-athlete and hearing that he has experience in training as a fighter and within the fighting world peeked my interest a great deal:
Some Takeaways:
Intensity in training is a goal.
Strength is relative.
“Gameday” is not how you should train every day. Training should prepare you for Gameday.
They program in Quarterly Cycles (actually all 12 months at once) then program the specific WODs weekly or bi-weekly.
John Briggs of Incite Tax wasn’t really a speaker per-se but had some pretty insightful thoughts he shared with us. He is also a very cool human. He’s coming out with a book soon too: https://profitfirstformicrogyms.com
Steve Pinkerton founder of Vitality Fitness spoke on evolving his CrossFit affiliate into a more all-encompassing ‘overall’ fitness centric foundation. EvoFIT he calls it and he runs every new member through it, then graduating those members up into more standard CrossFIT as desired/capable. The most notable thing that stuck with me was when he said not to just call it a ‘bootcamp’ and slap it onto whatever you have going on. To treat it with the same respect and approach as your main program and actually sink full effort into it and it will work.
We sat in on a great table discussion with Brandon as the last session of the day and were able to ask him and his team direct questions and get into some more detail with him.
Joe Tebaldi founder of Flexx was the last ‘speaker’ of the day. He really blew us away with his approach and tactical mindfulness for sales. He is probably the most quotable speaker of the entire event too.
Communication. Validation. Relevance.
This is the basic set of ideas he bounces all banding, messaging and sales off of. And boy is that relevant to where we are within our business’ process.
Quality depends on the customer’s frame of reference.
In this vein we need a 1 sentence, 3-4 sentence then a 5 minute sales pitch on our business. This is pretty common branding 101 stuff and i’ve been in and done it a thousand times when consulting with start-ups in the past, but the way Joe does within the Gym/Fitness space is mesmerizing.
People remember the emotion they had. Emotion matters, be positive! Don’t sell fear or fear of sickness. Sell the cool aspects of the community and how you will be validated by your peers for making the right choice with us.
Gym sales are based on 3 things: 1) Proximity to where they live or work 2) The person wants to look better 3) They will validate you on social and by looking at your website. Then “educating the consumer” is your job #1. If you are a CrossFit affiliate, then CrossFit does this for you with your $3k affiliate fee as part of their overall worldwide branding and marketing. But as a micro-gym owner, you don’t really get to leverage this…
These things aren’t like only for gyms, these are for just about any product or brick and mortar business that sells things, but i’d just never applied them in the ways he was discussing it to our gym members.
Mike Jones, founder of Alchemy 365, went through the beginning to current status on the evolution of his business. Starting out as a CrossFit affiliate owner, owning something like 5 affiliates then developing their own approach to fitness based a lot off of Core Power Yoga and Orange Theory’s model and approach. It is largely a mixture of no-barbell based functional fitness and yoga fusion.
By the way, he also invented the Torpedo, which is a pretty interesting Kettlebell + Dum Bell thingy. I’d like to get my hands on one soon…
Going from his roots to his corporate owned locations his story if fascinating and I couldn’t help but notice his humility as he was talking to us and it made me wonder if this guy practiced any type of martial arts and sure enough, yep, he’s a Jiu-Jitsu Blue Belt.
Takeaways from Mike:
C.A.R.E. Consistently Acquire and Retain Excellence will lead to Customer Acquisition, and Reduce Attrition…
Removal of Non-Core products and services. A-la Apple computer/Steve Jobs.
Net-Promoter Score – How likely are your customers to recommend you.
– How can we make things better?
They run a “Fresh Start” challenge:
4 Weeks, Weekly Check-ins, Diet Planning and Coaching- For New-Customers & current members
They run a Free-Week intro that they up-sell memberships into.
Stuart Brauer
Along with his WTF Gym Talk podcast and services he produced this event as well as owns and operates Urban Movement his micro-gym. He gave a really great run-through from start to finish of his rebranding of UM as well as the current situation of his branding by showing off the brand book he is about to roll out in his gym. Very thorough and thoughtful approach to how to share that intel with us.
Another great table discussion today with Joe Tebaldi where we went through a lot of what he spoke about the day before but more one-on-one. The way he sized up an attendees ‘1 sentence’ was amazing. The speed he showed with knowing his audience and business was awesome. Quite honestly Joe inspires me to get better at aspects of my other business roles in a huge way. Thank you sir.
Panel Discussion
We wrapped with a panel discussion with all the speakers they went through a TON of Q&A and covered some big ground, the coolest take away I had was when they went through their ethos statements:
Mike’s was:
Yes is the answer; what is the question?
Be F&%king awesome.
Be a Pro.
Pursue your legend.
Stu’s was:
Why not, not why. “Hold my beer”
Do what you say you’ll do, when you say you’ll do it.
Be endearing/enduring. Via Glassman. 🙂
Be Positive.
Sponsors/TRIIB
One of the coolest things was the access to the sponsors. This is apparent in a small, by small I mean less than 100 people. In the past my events have had up to 800 people – not small enough… I prefer the smaller more intimate events like this greatly to the larger more Expo like ones. I sincerely hope Stu keeps it small next year again… Because of this we were able to get lunch with TRIIB and have them go through several things with us in regards to our business and how we use the product that we were up until then largely not able to accomplish with phone confs and online help tickets. Bravo in a HUGE way to that and TRIIB’s willingness to do that. So cool.
The other sponsors were top-notch. You could tell Stu personally endorses them and it shows. They were all very solid humans behind the companies and were all people that we made the rounds and spoke with one on one. Something iv’e very rarely done at events.
In many ways, I want this type of event for every day business people. I know they are out there, but in order to do that you’d dilute the message. The fact that the attendees were all Gym/Affiliate owners looking at change in their business was inspiring and what puts us all on the same footing which allows us to be honest with each other and the speakers. It’s intimate and true. Something you can’t say for many conferences and/or workshops that sell you the same lines about what it will do for you. Probably because Stu walks the walk with this consulting and in his own micro-gym.
This was hands-down one of the most honest, rewarding and thoughtful conferences i’ve been to in a long time. I’m inspired, charged up and ready to take on my business now. Thank you! Truly.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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When we write ‘RX’ in a workout, it has a specific meaning. It means this is the ‘prescribed’ weight or rep-scheme or timing you should strive to be at. Sometimes you may not be able to do the workout with the prescribed weight, and that is very much okay! The overall idea is that this the intended weight, or rep-scheme, distance or timing you should be doing the workout at, so that you get the stimulus we want you to get from the workout.
Here’s an example: if the workout calls for you to do 10, 200 lb Deadlifts along with 10 Burpees as many times as you can within 10 minutes with an expected outcome on this would be 4 or 5 rounds. But you can only do a 200 lb Deadlift 2 or 3 times, so this means you only get 2 rounds out of the 10 minutes, then the workout is no longer delivering the intended stimulus. It has now changed into a max-out Deadlift strength workout for you. It would be far better for you to use 100 lbs in this workout if you are in this range for the lift. Then you’d get the right conditioning outcome that we want.
We go over a few reasons why you may not be losing weight. Going through the three main domains of; Diet, Workouts and Recovery. There are a few good rants in here too!
As you listen and have questions or comments, hit us up with a comment, post, text or in-person question. We’d love to get into anything you’re thinking about!
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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A seminar about how to live a healthier lifestyle because:
HEALTH IS WEALTH BE ABUNDANT IN HEALTH
Learn the ins and outs of healthy living from a number of accredited professionals in our community. Discover all of the options available to you as you walk the path to a healthier and happier lifestyle.
OCTOBER 26TH 9:00 AM – 3:30 PM COLUMBIA METROPOLITAN CONVENTION CENTER
Coach Ib and Heather are doing a session at 11:00 am
Get with a coach or front desk for your ticket!
We go over the importance of Mobility and why you need to maintain the bottom line on it. Some insights into how to approach it and why we do it.
Evan Owens has been with Workhorse Fitness for little over a year. He joined us at 285lbs and in his short time with us is down to 219lbs. When Evan joined, he could barely run a mile, he couldn’t do a pull-up, and he did push-ups on his knees – fast forward to now and he can easily run multiple miles, do multiple pull-ups unassisted, does toes push ups, and turned a 175lbs deadlift into 315lbs! He recently tested for his yellow belt by our very own coach Gene Crawford. These are just a few of his long list of accomplishments. Evan shared,
I started because I knew I could do better and I had my dad motivate me. Then I kept coming because of everyone’s support from the coaches to other members of the community when it came to creating healthy exercise and eating habits. It’s the people and the community around me that helps keep me coming back every day.
Evan Owens
We love Evan because he is the definition of “Never Give Up”. This man simply will never quit and will always win when you need him too.
If audio only is more your thing, here you go:
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In this episode we talk about what Squatober is and what it’s all about.
It is an official thing, created by Sorinex (USA company, HQ right here in good old Columbia, SC), who is where we get all our workout equipment from. While it is an official program that they get some ‘famous’ powerlifter/weight lifter types to write, we create our own, more suited to our personal more discerning WOD ways here at Workhorse.
Discussion is about how to stay disciplined and what happens when inspiration wears off. How are you going to keep after your goals when you don’t really want to get after it anymore.
We also go over some of the ‘challenges’ we put ourselves through.
This week was:
Challenge 1: 100x Back Squats @ 135#
Challenge 2: 1/2 mile of Lunges
Until next week, keep getting after it.
During the month of July and into August last year, the coaches at Workhorse Fitness took on the challenge of doing a month of Hero WODs. Hero WODs are notorious for being some of the longest, most difficult and most mentally grueling workouts in CrossFit.
Why do it? To test ourselves; physically, mentally, emotionally, intuitionally, spiritually to build our Kokoro (or warrior spirit.) We knew going in that it was going to be tough and that recovery and preparation between workouts would be key. We recorded the experience with short videos and put them all together here in this post so we could remember the journey and relive the experience a year later.
What we did was each coach picked a number of Hero WODs that were their favorite, for whatever various reasons, and then we wrote them all down on the white board. We then took them and planned out the sequence and the days that we would be attacking these workouts.
The first few workouts were quite tough. It was getting hot and settling into the work after 5-7 days proved to be something we all had to overcome. I think each of us, at least I know I was, were starting to realize the effort that we would have to put into this to see it through and finish.
We were all starting to learn more about what we were capable of this week.
Week 2 consisted of some even tougher workouts. Don’t get me wrong, week 1 was memorable, in that it was the first shot at digging into these things. Week 2 was just more terrible. The heavier weight in these workouts proved challenging and some of the WODs that looked like they would be completed in 45:00 to an hour wound up taking well over that.
The most memorable workout from week 2 and probably from the entire experience would be “CLOVER”. Which consists of a 10 mile run and 150 burpee pull-ups. This one took me well over 3 hours to finish and personally made me question my own sanity…
I can’t speak for everyone here, but I know that after week 2 I truly felt like I could do anything and that the rest of the workouts, while still intimidating, were going to get done no matter what.
I think we were all settling in pretty well by the third week. I know I was and was already starting to think about how much I would miss this training once it was done. The workouts were still very tough and challenging but I feel like we bonded together through all the suffering.
I think everyone would agree that the final week was the most technically challenging. Maybe it was the exhaustion of doing these things for 3 weeks prior or just the fact that we were close to the end of it and were feeling more relaxed mentally but we really hit our stride in the last week.
As much as I got out of this experience, I can’t really say that I would recommend it for anyone. You really need to make sure you’re prepared and know how to get yourself ready and recover as you go. We took precautions and planned the workouts out in terms of timing but we each still have some remnants of an issue or two of this month even today a year later. All in all, we did it, and I’m proud to have done this with my teammates.
Severin
For Time
50 Strict Pull-Ups
100 Hand-Release Push-Ups
5k Run
Wear a weight vest (20/14 lb)
Rahoi
AMRAP in 12 minutes
12 Box Jumps (24 in/20 in)
6 Thrusters (95 lbs/65 lb)
6 Bar-Facing Burpees
Danny
AMRAP in 20 minutes
30 Box Jumps (24/20 in)
20 Push Press (115/75 lb)
30 Pull-Ups
TK
AMRAP in 20 minutes
8 Strict Pull-Ups
8 Box Jumps (36/30 in)
12 Kettlebell Swings (2/1.5 pood)
Weston
5 Rounds For Time
1000 meter Row
200 meter Farmer Carry (45 lb dumbbells)
50 meter Waiter Walk, Right Arm (45 lb dumbbell)
50 meter Waiter Walk, Left Arm (45 lb dumbbell)
Marston
AMRAP in 20 minutes
1 Deadlift (405/285 lb)
10 Toes-to-Bar
15 Bar Facing Burpees
Tom
AMRAP in 25 minutes
7 Muscle-Ups
11 Thrusters (155/105 lb)
14 Toes-to-Bar
Bull
2 Rounds For Time
200 Double-Unders
50 Overhead Squats (135/95 lb)
50 Pull-Ups
1 mile Run
Griff
For Time
800 meter Run
400 meter Run (backwards)
800 meter Run
400 meter Run (backwards)
Clovis
For Time
10 mile Run
150 Burpee Pull-Ups
The Don
For Time
66 Deadlifts (110/75 lb)
66 Box Jump (24/20 in)
66 Kettlebell swings (1.5/1 pood)
66 Knees-to-Elbows
66 Sit-Ups
66 Pull-Ups
66 Thrusters (55/35 lb)
66 Wall Ball Shots (20/14 lb)
66 Burpees
66 Double-Unders
Johnson
AMRAP in 20 minutes
9 Deadlifts (245/165 lb)
8 Muscle-Ups
9 Squat Clean (155/105 lb)
Pheezy
3 Rounds For Time
5 Front Squats (165/105 lb)
18 Pull-Ups
5 Deadlifts (225/155 lb)
18 Toes-to-Bar
5 Push Jerks (165/105 lb)
18 Hand-Release Push-Ups
Randy
For Time
75 Power Snatches (75/55 lb)
Daniel
For Time
50 Pull-Ups
400 meter Run
21 Thrusters (95/65 lb)
800 meter Run
21 Thrusters (95/65 lb)
400 meter Run
50 Pull-Ups
Collin
6 Rounds For TIme
400 meter Sandbag Carry (50/40 lb)
12 Push Press (115/75 lbs)
12 Box Jumps (24/20 in)
12 Sumo Deadlift High-Pull (95/65 lbs)
Ricky
AMRAP in 20 minutes
10 Pull-Ups
5 Dumbbell Deadlifts (75/55 lb)
8 Push-Press (135/95 lb)
Coe
10 Rounds For Time
10 Thrusters (95/65 lb)
10 Ring Push-Ups
Rankel
AMRAP in 20 minutes
6 Deadlifts (225/155 lb)
7 Burpee Pull-Ups
10 Kettlebell Swings (2/1.5 pood)
200 meter Run
Nutts
For Time
10 Handstand Push-Ups
15 Deadlifts (250/175 lb)
25 Box Jumps (30/24 in)
50 Pull-Ups
100 Wall Ball Shots (20/14 lb)
200 Double-Unders
400 meter Run (with 45/35 lb plate)
