Crossfit Open 2014: Predicting 14.4

With three weeks down in the 2014 Crossfit Open and the live announcement for 14.4 less than 24
hours away, I'm quickly running out of chances to get even close on one of these predictions. As the weeks go by though the list of exercises that Crossfit HQ has to choose from is dwindling so I'm liking my chances this week. First let's recap some of our basic assumptions:

Crossfit Open 14.3: Back to Basics

Dave Castro dropped the announcement of 14.3 on us tonight and for the first time in the 2014 Crossfit Open, you won't read any complaints from this lowly blogger. This is an inclusive, yet increasingly challenging WOD, and it'll challenge the beginner, intermediate and advanced athlete. This is, at least in my opinion, exactly what the Open should be about. These type of WODs are why the Open has grown from 26,000 people to over 200,000 people in just four years.

Crossfit Open 2014: Predicting 14.3

Tonight Dave Castro will grab the microphone and shock us all with a WOD we never saw coming, but just for grins, we’re back this week trying to predict what Castro will pull out of his hat. I was incredibly wrong again last week (and next week I’ll write this same sentence again), although I was right that burpees wouldn’t be involved. I’ll wear that as a badge of honor for sure and I’m definitely going to continue with my theory based on mainsite programming. With that assumption and many more, here’s what I’m assuming going into 14.3:

• We won’t see double unders, snatches, overhead squats or chest to bar pull-ups. That’s a given, we’re done with those movements for the remainder of the 2014 Open. That’s leaves us with these movements as available options thrusters, clean and jerks, burpees, toes-to-bar, box jumps, muscle-ups, wall balls, deadlifts and push-ups.
• The mainsite workouts of the past couple days have included push-ups a couple days ago and heavy push presses yesterday. So I’m assuming we won’t see push-ups or anything heavy overhead in 14.3. The overheads might be a stretch but I've got to rule out some options one way or another.
• I also thought that they might stay away from anything like toes to bar or muscle-ups because so many people tore up their hands on 14.2, but after looking back at previous years, I’m not so sure. In both 2011 and 2012, they had back to back WODs with toes to bar and then chest to bar pull-ups. Granted the order would be switched this year but at best this is probably a flaky assumption (still going with it though).

If these three assumptions can be trusted (which of course they can't), that leaves us with burpees, box jumps, muscle-ups, wall balls, deadlifts and cleans. I also think we'll see a longer WOD this week and I still think we see some form of triplet. I thought the same thing last week, but previous Opens have each included multiple triplets, so they've got to surface at some point. So with all that being said, here's this week's prediction:

17 minute AMRAP
Two rounds of DT at 115/75
20 Bar facing burpees
Two rounds of DT at 135/95
20 Bar facing burpees
Two rounds of DT at 155/115
20 Bar facing burpees
Two rounds of DT at 175/135
20 Bar facing burpees
Two rounds of DT at 195/155
20 Bar facing burpees
AMRAP rounds of DT at 215/175
A round of DT is 12 deadlifts, 9 hang cleans and 6 push presses

Now you may be wondering why several elements of that WOD conflict with my assumptions above (namely the overhead portion and the triplet), but it's a guess and I figured since I'm throwing darts blindfolded it might as well be a WOD that I'd like. I actually did a WOD similar to this the other day and it was a real beat down. This would also be a creative way of adding a strength portion while still being very inclusive. I assume almost every athlete could make it to at least the hang clean portion of the second set of DT. They could go one step further as well and allow full cleans instead of just hang cleans. Anyone else want to take a shot at guessing?