Olive Branch CrossFit

I get this question a lot in the gym, “I am horrible at ring dips, what do I do?”  You can substitute “ring dips” for just about any other movement.  Maybe you are horrible at pull ups.  Maybe you are right on the verge of getting your first Muscle Up, but just cannot quite get your head through.  What about push ups?  Are you still doing push ups from your knees during the CrossFit WoD?  What about Pistols, Overhead Squats, and Box Jumps?  Any and all of these movements (among many others) can be a “goat” for you.  A goat, in the CrossFit world, is something that you suck at.  So, what do you do?  How do you get better at the movements that you are just not good at?  In the past, I have struggled with Muscle Ups, Pistols, and Overhead Squats.  One great way that I have learned to get much better at these movements that I am not so great at is to set aside some time every day that I am in the gym to work on those movements.  During our “Strength/Skill” portion of the daily workouts we often have a number of sets of 30 seconds of work and 30 seconds of rest to work on one movement.  We also frequently have EMOM (Every Minute on the Minute) work on skills as well.  If we are working on Double Unders one day, and you feel like you are already pretty good at Double Unders you should substitute something that you are not really good at and work on that.  Just tell your coach, “Hey, I really suck at pull ups and I’d like to practice those instead of Double Unders today.  Is that ok?”  If you are training here at Olive Branch CrossFit then I’m relatively sure your coach is not going to have a problem with that. If you are not training at Olive Branch CrossFit and your coach wants you to stick to the schedule then ask if you can come in a little early to work on a skill that you are not good at.  See if you can come in about 15-20 minutes early and do a little session of 8 to 12 minutes of EMOM work on a skill that you want to be better at.  I am pretty sure your coach will be more than happy to allow you to do that.  Here are a couple of examples of short workouts that I like to use to get better at certain movements.

EMOM 8 Minutes (Every minute on the Minute for 8 Minutes)

• 1 Muscle Up (Or Muscle Up Attempt)

Or You could also do something like:

6 Sets: 30 Seconds of Work followed by 30 Seconds of Rest:

• As many strict Pull Ups as possible

You can substitute whatever movement you like in the examples I have given here.  So there you go.  A simple solution to getting better at things that you just are not good at during your CrossFit Workouts.  If you still just can’t get the hang of whatever movement you are trying to master, you can always schedule an hour of time with one of the coaches here at Olive Branch CrossFit.  Whether you are a member or not, we would love to help you get better at something that you are not good at.  If you need to schedule some time, just go here:  https://obcrossfit.sites.zenplanner.com/scheduler.cfm