Crossfit Games Open 2014

The Crossfit Open is just around the corner and I for one, can’t wait. Even though I’m far from a competitive Crossfitter, I love the Open competition. I enjoy the competition it breeds within a gym and I relish the idea that somewhere Rich Froning, Jason Khalipa and Talanya Fortunado are all doing the exact same WOD. As the excitement builds each week I spend hours each day thinking, strategizing and projecting what I think the WOD for that week will be (spoiler alert: we’re never right because Dave Castro is an evil genius) and regardless of what it announced, the excitement instantly turns into frantic preparation. How quickly should I start on the 7 min of burpees? Should I try to go unbroken on the 75lb snatches? The bottom line, for 90% of us Crossfitters out there, the Open is our big stage. While my main goal of doing CF every day is to just be a fitter human being, I really enjoy the feeling of being a competitive athlete for these five weeks. With all that said, I decided to do some predictions on the Open, interview style (because we all talk to ourselves right??):

Will we see any new movements this year in the Open?

Interesting question and I thank you for asking. There are three years of history to consider here when looking at movements from previous Open competitions, but I’m going to narrow our sample size even farther. I think the first year, HQ wasn’t entirely sure what they wanted to the Open to accomplish. Sure they wanted to find the fittest and I think they accomplished that goal but I think when you look at the three Opens in total, 2011 stands out as the least “inclusive” and it’s by a considerable margin. Start with the 11.1 and it opens with 30 double unders. That knocks out a sizeable number of CFers instantly. Double unders are a fairly high skilled movement and any time to you introduce a highly skilled movement first in a WOD, you are going to lose a large number of your population. In the two years since then, both 12.1 and 13.1 started with burpees, a movement every single CF can perform at their own speed. 2011 also included a WOD that was made up entirely of heavy squat cleans and a third WOD that included heavy overhead squats. Both of these WODs don’t fall under the “inclusive” portion of the Open. With three WODs out of five (well techinically six because of HQ error), the 2011 Open wasn’t very ‘inclusive’ at all. Since then the weights have been light and the higher skilled movements have been buried with WODs so that everyone can at least post a score.

So you didn’t really answer my question, will there be any NEW movements in 2014?

Oh forgive me, I started talking and totally forget where I was originally headed. I think HQ is comfortable with what they’ve presented in the past two years and I don’t see them changing up the formula too much this year. I think we’ll see at least “repeat” WOD, but if there is a new movement, I think it’ll be introduced to clear up some of the controversy last year. Box jumps are a difficult thing to judge, especially on a video submission, but you they need to keep some form of jumping or explosive movement as a component of the Open. My solution to that problem: Burpee box jumps. I think we see them this year and that’s the new movement. There I answered your question.

So that’s it, burpee box jumps? What about bar muscle ups or handstand pushups, running or rowing?

I don’t think bar muscle ups would be used simply because I’m not sure how many garage gym-ers have the equipment to do that movement. Handstand push ups are a possibility, but they’ll be buried deep within a WOD, much like double unders and muscle ups have been the last two years. As for running, rowing or Aerodyne work, that’s too difficult to judge in a video submission. There’s no chance of those showing up.

Check back later today or tomorrow and we’ll hit up predictions for 14.1, including what the WOD will be and who will win the live announcement battle between Marcus Hendren and Garret Fisher.