S01E28 - 2021 Legends Masters Championship WRAP UP PART 1

Our episode is with three-time CrossFit Age Group Online Qualifier (AGOQ) athlete, guest Kathleen Staunton @stautie3. Dave and Kathleen competed in the LEGENDS MASTERS CHAMPIONSHIP @_legendschampionship @thebobjennings @joe_linton84. We break down their experience at Legends and go through the challenging events programming. Go behind the scenes with the competitors' inside take on the biggest off-season Masters event of the year.

Congratulations to Dave for being the two time 35-39 year old Legends Masters Championship winner! @crafted.coaching @coachtorano

You can find more information at our website, HerdFitUSA.com, and make sure to like and subscribe wherever you watch or listen to our podcast.⁠

Thanks to Legends Masters Championship sponsors TRU GRIT @trugritfitness VUORI @vuoriclothing CBDMD @cbdmd.usa PROJECT ONYX @projectonyxdsm RX SMART GEAR @rxsmartgear TORQUE FITNESS @torquefitnessusa URLAND @urlndmats HYPERICE @hyperice ASCENDED STRENGTH @theascendedstrength. Please support those sponsors who support CrossFit Masters Athletes!

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@themasterschatter @seanwoodland53 @billgrundler @anniekimiko @crossfit @crossfitgames #crossfit #fitness #sports #exercise #health #movement #crossfitcoach #agoq #clean #fitness #2021legendschampionship #mastersassemble

TRANSCRIPT S01E28 - 2021 Legends Masters Championship WRAP UP PART 1

[00:00:00] Sam Rhee: Welcome to the HerdFit podcast with Kathleen Staunton and David Syvertsen coach and owner at CrossFit Bison. Our guest is Kathleen today. We just finished our last episode with you two as our preview for the Legends Championship. And today we're going to break it all down. And I know I'm really, really excited to hear how you guys did and what your experiences were.

And I know a lot of other people are too. So, the first thing I want to do is just give some of the background about the legends championship. If you didn't hear our first episode it's a masters championship for 35. Years old and older masters CrossFit athletes they're in their fifth year, it was started in 2017.

And you guys went out to San Diego, California for December 9th through 12th. Their Instagram handle is underscore legends championship. If you want to learn more about it. And it was a run by Bob Jennings, who's the owner and director of the legends championship along with Joel Linton of offshore with athletics.

And they had multiple sponsors, big sponsors, who I want to give a shout out to because they really support the masters and I want to support them for supporting the masters and that they included true grit. Who were the equipment sponsors of uh, who were the apparel Outfitters CBD MD, torque fitness, who supplied the torque tanks hyper ice, your land and RX smart gear.

There was also another Organization, project Onyx run by Elijah easy Muhammad. And their goal was to eliminate the barriers that that underrepresented and underserved people of color face. Providing affordable and accessible health and fitness services and mentorship.

So I would like to give a shout out to those sponsors and thank them for sponsoring this competition. And I just wanted to ask you guys what kind of credit do you want to give to Bob Jennings? And Joe Linton and the sponsors for the competition that you guys were in?

[00:01:48] Kathleen Staunton: Yeah. I mean, the, the sponsors were amazing.

The equipment was fabulous. The power was amazing. Bob and Joe did the most amazing job and made that whole competition run seamless and they're so they have this great presence about them that they just come, everyone. They were everywhere. If you needed them, they were there. They just have this overwhelming calming presence about them.

I thought anyway, but I thought they did a

[00:02:11] David Syvertsen: great job. Yeah. So for someone that's run a much smaller, much smaller competition at bison both with outside athletes and inside athletes, I have a lot of respect for all of the behind the scenes stuff that goes into running a competition like that.

And it's how I'm wired to notice things too. Like the second we walked there for the first day, just kind of checking. I'm constantly look, the first thing I was like, Kathleen, Lou, those rings right there, there are further than, the distance where that one's a little further than that one. Like I'm just programmed to think like that.

And so I know that there's a lot that we do know about that could go wrong. Did go wrong, needs to be fixed. Right. There's also a lot of things that we did not know about. I would say most things we don't know about that goes into running an event like that. Those two from minute one to the closing ceremonies were so calm, cool collected.

And there were issues. Some that we knew about some that we didn't know about. I think some of their support staff start to go down not feeling well or just overstress over tired. And those guys did so many different jobs. If there's one thing I hope they do next year for their sake is they have another, maybe two or three guys that just are kind of, lack of a better term, like little minions that run around and just do all the little odd jobs that come up because.

They were doing so many different things, including judging, certain events like being like a head judge and making sure its standards are being upheld. And I just hats off to them. Both these guys are pioneers for what CrossFit in general is doing for the masters in the sport.

[00:03:38] Sam Rhee: I would have to say I watching from a distance, it seemed like these guys have advanced the cause for masters in CrossFit, more than anyone else. And without them, there would be such a. Whole in terms of what the masters experiences competitively what was your overall gestalt or your experience just being there?

I know it, it was it looked first-class. They had bill Grundler, Annie Sakamoto, Sean Woodland announcing we were all watching all the live feeds, which were amazing. They were on talking elite fitness. So if you want to go to their YouTube channel and watch the. Experiences again they're all there.

As an athlete, you step in, you're doing what, what was your takeaway, your general takeaway from the.

[00:04:20] Kathleen Staunton: It was outstanding. It was the greatest experience that I've ever had. I mean, we got to do what we love and it was just such a great experience to be there with all of those athletes. And it's the most overwhelming when you cut it in a snuck in the first day to take a look at it.

And we got in trouble that we got in trouble. The Catholic school kids like leaving with between. But it's overwhelming to stand on that floor as it's there. We're about to say 3, 2, 1, go. Have your heart race like that under normal circumstances, it was great. But being there in that venue was, I think I almost passed out.

[00:04:53] David Syvertsen: Yeah. I mean, I was so impressed with how just systematic, everything was like, everything was on time for the most, like within five minutes, the entire weekend. Right. And that's a big deal when you are working out in the morning and the afternoon and it. You need to know what time to go back to room and shower.

He change go back, warm up. And if things are not on time, like you just don't know what to do. And they were just, they were almost to the minute they were on time, the entire weekend. And that's really hard to do. I want to say there was 400 athletes there. I think I have that right, correct me if I'm wrong.

And that's really tough to do. It's hard to keep things on time here with 20 athletes, so, they have two different floors going on at once. I think you guys on the live feed on the YouTube feed saw one floor, there was another floor with workouts going on all day and. I remember the day one, Bob came up to me and said, Hey, would you like to be, can you get interviewed by Sean Woodland?

I'm like, wait, what? Like the Joe Buck of CrossFit, that was like, when I was like, all right, this is pretty first-class that with the equipment, the way those floor was set up, how organized everything was. And for two athletes that have never been to the games, I think that's the closest we can get to in terms of field without actually being there.

[00:06:00] Sam Rhee: I know a lot of the athletes mentioned how crazy it was to have. Those three announcers discussing their performances, commentating, that's a special thrill for anybody, particularly you guys, which was really cool. What was that floor set up like that environment. So we saw, like you said, one side of it, we saw the rig we saw it was it was built out by true grit.

Yup. Yep. And what was that like?

[00:06:25] Kathleen Staunton: And it was first-class all the way. It was great. I mean, it was set up so well and they had you in your lanes and it was just exciting really.

[00:06:33] David Syvertsen: And cat, that was that pull up our Heights. We're all uniform. They're all the same men, women short. So that was something that they had multiple risers for women and some men and divisions that it was just too high for them to get to the rings to they, there was no adjusting anything.

Oh, we'll talk about the rings in the hallway, but yeah, I'm, that floor was really cool for what it looks so crisp. It really, it was like, I remember going out there and we got yelled at for being in there. It just looks so clean and so fresh. And they had the big CBM D logo right in the middle for the sponsorship.

And the other floor, which you guys did not see, it was so jam. This will come up later when we talked about that double dumbbell workout that I'm still having PTSD from, but it was small. It was tight. Like the lanes where I think we're only. Three feet. Yeah. Or for tight and, and logistics of that with the workouts, basically put on that floor for that reason, but it was, that was a much more, that was like a raw feel. It was just rubber lines on the ground and you go, there was no re there's, nothing fancy. There's no logo, there's no lane numbers. It was just a raw feel, which I kind of liked because that's at the end of the day.

That's what this still is, did you guys stay was

[00:07:43] Sam Rhee: a hotel. Right. Adjacent to the competition.

[00:07:46] David Syvertsen: Yes. Yeah. So we stay that, the hotel that mostly everyone stayed at was right there. So you can easily go back and forth. We did not, we stayed a mile away because we wanted to have a room that had a full kitchen.

So I did this last year in Arizona. And I was like, it was one of my best moves last year. So I was like, we gotta do this again. We found something out. It's ironic that there's multiple Marriott townhouse suites and the city of San Diego. And after we got our travel rental car, Kathleen has got the directions to the hotel on our phone.

I'm like, man, I didn't think this was this far. It said. Two blocks from the hotel and we get there, she checks in everything's great. I go up and give my name. She goes, we don't have a reservation with your name. And I was like yeah, you do. And before I even pulled out my reservation confirmation on my phone, she goes, did you book, the Liberty, something town center, whatever.

And I was like, yeah, she goes, that's the one near the airport. I'm like, oh, that's the right one. So there were no rooms left in captain. Syvertsen. So she's we're, we're booked. And I was like, okay, at that point. So, and this is on our time, 11:30 PM, their time, 8, 8 30. And so we just made the quick decision that she would stay there for that night.

I would drive to the hotel. That I booked and they had rooms available there. So same company, we did some finagling the next morning and she was able to come over the next day because they had plenty of rooms at the hotel. I booked so

[00:09:13] Kathleen Staunton: smarter, closer. We got to see some of the city though.

[00:09:19] Sam Rhee: I think that's interesting that you guys chose to stay away from the venue hotel.

It seems like such. Game or move to be a competitive athlete and be like, I'm not going to be, I, I'm in isolation, I'm going to be, focused on what I'm doing. I'm not going to hang out with anybody.

[00:09:34] David Syvertsen: oh yeah, it was. I mean, Catherine, I want your opinion before I give mine, what did you, the, the issue was we had, it was a little bit more like logistics works of going to, and from the venue, it was a 25 minute walk, which was a nice walk, or we had to kind of play around with the game, with the car.

Who's going to get the car 20 bucks to park every time. So what do you think at, I thought it

[00:09:54] Kathleen Staunton: was perfect for us knowing how we worked, because sometimes we needed to, you don't want to do some of those workouts and then just sit down in your room. So it was good to, one of us would walk back and just get some acid out of your legs.

Get a good walk, get your head where it needs to be, get some fresh air and just keep moving. So it was, it was, I liked it. I thought it was better for us. Yeah. And I think we were pretty seamless in terms of. The rolling and the timing and yeah.

[00:10:19] David Syvertsen: Yeah. I haven't, we liked walking, but the biggest thing for me is just the kitchen.

Like I wanted to go there and be able to cook rice, cook meat, like really do whatever I wanted food wise, where if you're in a room that doesn't have anything, just not even a microwave just has a mini fridge. I just feel like you're really limited. And to get away with that for four straight days,

[00:10:35] Sam Rhee: oh, I'd be Door Dashing Chipotle every day.

[00:10:38] David Syvertsen: The first stop we made when we got there, we went to grocery shopping and it was a, a full order food. And you just

[00:10:45] Kathleen Staunton: have to try and emulate whatever you do here. Right. Whatever you do on a regular basis. So that's what we wanted to try and do. Yeah.

[00:10:50] Sam Rhee: Wow. You guys were serious on that. So what was the swag like?

What was the check-in how they

[00:10:54] Kathleen Staunton: oh, it's so nice that, I mean, the quality that of the apparel is amazing. Bar none was great. It's really exciting.

[00:11:03] David Syvertsen: Yeah. I'm wearing one of the shirts right now. It's very comfortable. Yeah, when we went there, they have all these, these, the staff support staff lined up asking for a name, they give us a badge coach's badge kind of like the swag bag, right.

Where like all the clothes are in there and then they say, all right, we have a professional photographer. That's going to take pictures of you and they, they go over that, tell you to flex, cross your arms, smile, Bubba. We actually got a partner pictures, which was nice. But the funny thing, you're wearing your normal clothes.

I'm like, all right, go into the one of these little, like teepees over here to get change so that you get changed. I'm like, all right, fines. And it makes sense. There's probably 20 of them in the, this bar, this basement lobby. But they're literally the size of this tripod standing right in front of us.

Like I, I go in there and I turn around the thing starts to fall over. So you're trying to get changed and you're trying to hurry up. Cause there's people waiting for you. You come out, I'm sweating, going back to have a professional photographer, take my picture. Kathleen looks all pretty and done up.

Like I just got out of bed and I'm par for the course. Yeah. But the positive side is, this is when I think. You start realizing like, all right. Game times Carnivale. Yeah. Like we're under 24 hours away from this thing starting. We still don't know the workouts.

[00:12:12] Sam Rhee: Yeah. And I would say the nerves probably started to hit you by then.

The experience is a little bit different for each of you, because first of all, they came to you saying, oh, this is the defending championship champion. Give it Syvertsen you're there. First time legit games, athletes that are competing next to you side by side. So what was it once you started to get nervous?

What was that like?

[00:12:36] Kathleen Staunton: I, I don't know. I guess we started to get nervous maybe the night before.

[00:12:40] David Syvertsen: Yeah. The night before we said that we were glad we didn't come out the day before. I know a couple of my guys I'll come. My buddies that come competed, they went out the day before so they can get like a tour workout room. But I think the timing was perfect because the night before, that's when I started getting like that anxious, like, all right, we got to go again, like pent up.

We went and worked out in the lobby. They, before in the lobby, not sorry, the gym, the gym hotel. Sorry, we wouldn't, we just need to move our bodies and just distract our brains a little bit, because I think after we checked in that's when the wheels started spinning, because you saw everyone.

And you saw the warm up area. I visit. One of the biggest anxieties of the competition is what is the warm up area going to be like? And that's where the check-in was. How many days before did you guys arrive? Yeah, Tuesday night. Okay. Check-in was Wednesday, one was Thursday morning. Got it. Okay. So basically we're there for 36, not even 36 hours before we started.

[00:13:35] Sam Rhee: And you guys didn't reveal this to me on the previous episode, but you guys had some nagging issues. Going in you're so gamer, you guys didn't even tell me that you guys were fighting some stuff. So cat, you said you had something with your back and Dave got something with your calf. What was that all about? Were you worried about it?

[00:13:53] Kathleen Staunton: Oh, I was worried about it. Well, my back just, I just, I just had a spasm on one side of my back and it was like a Charlie horse in my back and it started really. I'm sure the flight didn't help. And then being nervous and not sleeping in your own bed. All of that comes into play with all of this.

And then just warming up on the rower right before our very first event, I was stunned to find that I was in a back spasm out of nowhere. And I just looked at Dave, like I might have an issue right now. So a lot of K tape and keep myself warm. Just head down and go.

[00:14:24] David Syvertsen: Yep. Yeah. I mean, I didn't go into the comp with any problems.

I had that forum issue that leading up to I didn't really get to train it normally for four weeks leading up to, but I had zero impact on it. But for whatever reason, like after the first event, which was just rowing my gas started just randomly bought me in a weird spot. And it was bothering me when I walked, but it didn't bother me when I would jump in place weird.

And and this is when. This kind of competition where even if you're confident or not, like you, you get nervous no matter what. And like in my head I'm like, this is your brain talking to you, there is not a physical issue you can warm up. Fine. I think there was just a lot of nerves throughout the weekend that if I've been through catfishes before, like when it goes, it goes and you're not gonna be able to squat.

And there were so many things that we didn't know about the competition, right? Like we didn't know events until 24 hours before. Right. So we had no idea if there was box shown, stumbling, there's way to double and there's all that stuff. So, it kind of worked itself out like this is where I kind of go numb.

Sometimes I've been through this so many times, like right before, 3, 2, 1 go I don't feel a thing other than just fatigue. Right. And heart rate so if something was bothering me, I really don't feel until after. So I wasn't overly concerned about it. And I made my, I always make my mind up before a competition that like, I will go until I physically cannot.

If something's bothering me, like I will not stop. If something hurts, I will not stop. If something's tweaked, I will like push it, push it, push it until it fails. And that's just, that's, I'm not telling others to do that, but that's just how

[00:15:52] Sam Rhee: I am. That's very Froning. Yes. Cause he said that when you're training.

You listened to your body right. In competition to tell everybody shut up. And that's,

[00:16:00] David Syvertsen: that's very true. I mean, I mean, why do you compete? Like that's something we should probably get into little and maybe another even podcast, because it's such a deep thought for me, but it's I don't go to compete only for an experience or I don't go to compete just for attention.

It's I just want to go and compete and win. That is why I compete. So that's when, if something like that comes up like a little soft tissue issue, soft tissue issue. You just get you, keep, you have to go through it. You have to. That's what I tell myself.

[00:16:26] Sam Rhee: That's such a weird mindset to be in. It's very rare that you put yourself in a competitive mindset where you're just about to start a workout only even in local coms.

It's almost an out of body experience for me.

[00:16:38] David Syvertsen: That's, what's making it. It's like an addiction. It's

[00:16:40] Sam Rhee: weird. And. I could see people loving it or hating it. Yeah. It's, it's something that if you've never had, you should really try just to see what it's like. And at that level it's gotta be even more mind blowing to be competing like that.

I can't imagine it, but so then what was it before you guys got out there? What what would you guys do in the world? What was the warmup area? What were you guys thinking about before you guys were we're going out into the competition?

[00:17:05] Kathleen Staunton: Well, the warm-up area was downstairs in the basement of the hotel.

And then you just had to do, you had to do you, it's not like you had everything you're back in call to warm up. So you have to figure out how to warm up certain muscles and body parts, the way you the best to your ability. And then they would just. Call your age group and they corral you in.

Yep. You're on your own warming up, but you were with your age

[00:17:30] Sam Rhee: group. I was going to say, do you sit there and you're high-fiving and hanging out and talking, or are you just zoned in, on your own thing? A little

[00:17:35] Kathleen Staunton: of both. Yeah. A little of both as the weekend, went on a little of both. Everyone was so supportive, especially my age group.

Amazing. Everyone's helping each other warm up and very kind and courteous. And allowing you to hear you use this, you try this, come and jump in here or use this barbell. Let's do this let's you know, and then you just corral and get your.

[00:17:54] David Syvertsen: Yeah, the the warm-up area, you have to know that going into a competition, whether it's like this or a local comp, like you, you're not going to have what you want or what you're used to, and you have to be okay with it.

And if you're not, don't don't sign up. And this is where I think when Bob talks about wanting to take this thing, like maybe at some point legends is the, the CrossFit masters games. Yeah. We should talk about that. And at some point, but he would need support from cross it for that. Right. And part of that is just warm up area logistics.

We had two rowers for everyone that was warming up in the one period. Oh my God, you don't go and be like, Bob, why don't we have more of that? Like they have other more important things to worry about. Right. But if you had a huge support staff from cross, it, you're just like, all right, guys contact C2 and get a 30 rowers down there.

Right. But you can't just do that. Right. There's other things they have to do, but there was a guy before that first event, all I wanted to do was get on that thing for a minute 30 seconds, do the intervals back and forth a guy right in front of me does a two K round two K just like calmly Raleigh.

And I'm sitting there. I'm like my heat's coming up. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me, dude. So, but. Like with the rent, there were no rings down there. The ceilings were too low for you to do muscle ups. The pull-up bars were like shaking. Every time you would go do a KIPP. So their workouts, like you really didn't do anything prior to you just had to do some like range of motion stuff with your body.

And, I'm big on warming up, but you don't need a specific template to warm up. If you have barbells and weights and dumbbells and boxes, you should be able to get through anything. And, but you also, one of the hard things you can't anticipate for is what she said, being corralled, you warm up and then there's probably about 25 minutes before you do anything.

[00:19:29] Sam Rhee: Oh yeah. It seemed like there's a lot of downtime in between heats. Like we're, at

[00:19:32] David Syvertsen: least we're just kind of, and you would, we would be waiting out outside while the previous heat was doing the thing. So all that time and it wasn't hot out there. Like a couple of guys were like standing in the sun because they're getting cold and stuff.

Again, like air squat stretch, do something right now,

[00:19:49] Sam Rhee: right? Yeah. Everyone's going through the same thing. So what are you going to do exactly? What, what were your Mo what was your mindset going in? What were your expectations, before every event, before all the events, what were you thinking about?

What you wanted to accomplish with it?

[00:20:03] David Syvertsen: Oh, making

[00:20:04] Kathleen Staunton: a cell sprout. Yeah, just doing the best we could with each one and enjoying each one. Again, making ourselves proud.

[00:20:10] David Syvertsen: Yeah.

I mean, before every event I would pray and then I'd think about Ash and Brock. And I even like, no, not just because these guys are listening to it, but I thought about bison a lot too, because I know they were like, there's some pride they take in that, that there's, that they say our name on a live feed, tremendous.

And it's, you are, we are doing this for ourselves. It's a very internal thing, but it does. It does add a little bit more fuel to the fire that, there are some other people that are benefit, not benefiting, but like just taking some. And being out there and you are us basically.

Exactly. And we are you and like that, I think that's one of the coolest things about this, and I would feel the same way if I was watching someone else do it. If someone else has those shoes next year, that's, I would know that they're going through and they're like, Hey, like we're with you.

And you're with me and we're doing this thing together.

[00:20:55] Sam Rhee: So let's go into the workouts. We had day one, there were three events. And the first one. And I, I wish I had the time to cut all of the anchorman clips in here. And it's funny because if you watched anchorman, it's so funny, and if you've never watched it, you're like, The hell are these workout names and they mean nothing.

Yeah. So if anything, hopefully more people will watch anchorman. Cause it's very funny if you like that kind of humor. The workout number one was I believe it's jogging or yogging, it might be a soft J and it was an AMRAP row, three minutes maximum. Two minutes, rest seven minutes, max meters, which is very strategic I would assume just looking at it. You had to go in with,

[00:21:41] David Syvertsen: oh, man. Right. So that was going to be the workout, but they changed it. So there's two parts of this that was supposed to be a run. Right. And we were like both excited because Kathleen and much more than me, but I, I can hang on a run. And when they change it to the rails, done, that's probably even better for me individually.

Yeah. But I think there was a supply chain issue out there. I think the actual air air runners or treadmills were actually on a ship in a port and they just couldn't cut them out. I see. So what happened was they set up the rower monitors to do three on two off seven on, so we came up, we talked about Hey one K pays two K pays, blah, blah, blah.

Right. The first heat, which was my age group, but the heat before me, there were several rower issues with the screens. And so these guys did their three minute row and then the two minute rest. And then when they started rolling, some of them weren't working, so they had to stop and then they did it again.

And I'm pretty sure they did it a third time. And on the third time this rowers were not, they said, all right, guys, workout's changing three minute row, four minute rests, three minute row. So the reason behind that, again, I'm just going to guess, right? That adds up that equals 10 minutes. And because of all these failed attempts at trying to get this thing going, they were 25 minutes behind, off the bat.

So instead of it being a 12 minute event, They made it a 10 minute event so that every heat that went, they picked up two minutes that they had lost. I see. So smart, not very smart. Again, this is what I'm talking about. They, they adjust on the fly. Now there were guys in my age group that said it changed their strategy a little bit.

Right. And they were feel like they felt that it was unfair. They said they would have paced their three-minute road. Different had they had known the second row would have also been three minutes. Probably not, I think it's just something, they were just probably a little angry about it that they, they did get screwed a little bit.

I am pretty certain that they got more than a four minute rest before their second row though. So I think it kind of balanced out so that that's kind of like, that was just a little backstory on that. And then they had issues with scoring Like they had my score wrong and a bunch of guys scored wrong for almost the entire night.

[00:23:48] Sam Rhee: I heard because there was a lane skipped and then the way they entered the scores, they didn't account for that.

[00:23:54] David Syvertsen: I'm glad I knew that the one of the guy, the guy that was missing from my heat, I know him. He's my coaches, athletes from long island and he broke his foot a couple of weeks prior to, and so he didn't show up.

So I knew, but he had a score. And I'm PR like I watched what, how the guys are doing the scores. They were literally just walking lane by lane writing numbers. And I'm pretty sure he just gave someone's score to that guy. And we were all off by one because I knew my meters, the guy to my left had them on his name and the guy to my right.

I had his scores on the leaderboard. So I'm like, all right, I'm pretty sure this is what happened. And they figured it out. They did some communication, it took 'em like, I remember they were up. I think one in the morning, the next day, trying to figure this out and if they fixed it, so

[00:24:39] Sam Rhee: we were confused back home.

Cause we were like, Dave is 20 something, but we thought he was kind of good at the row. And then it turned out you you placed third in that event. So what was the strategy going? Just max effort for three minutes before. Did you have a pace you were trying to hit? What was your pace that he tried to

[00:24:57] Kathleen Staunton: hit?

I mean, I just, I'm not growing isn't my strength, but I just went as hard as I could. And you knew you were getting arrested in a minute.

[00:25:04] Sam Rhee: So what was your pace time that you maintained or try to maintain the whole time for the first

[00:25:08] David Syvertsen: and the second?

[00:25:10] Kathleen Staunton: I don't even know. I really just went, just went. I just had to go because that's.

[00:25:15] David Syvertsen: Yeah. Were you able to sustain

[00:25:17] Sam Rhee: it or did you feel like you're dying at

[00:25:19] David Syvertsen: a certain

[00:25:19] Kathleen Staunton: point? I heard this on the second half for sure. But the first round I was like, I got that

[00:25:24] Sam Rhee: and you're able to finish three minutes strong or you're like, okay. Two minutes. On the

[00:25:29] Kathleen Staunton: third on the second, your second half, that last minute you were like, okay, come on.

Yeah, you're getting tired. Cause three minutes can be really long when you're sprinting, but then you just close your eyes and like every 15 seconds you're like, are you, I'm almost there. I'm almost there. Okay. Go, go empty.

[00:25:43] David Syvertsen: Empty. Yeah. I, I tried to hit, so I know what my one K row is. Is just under three minutes, like 2 58, 2 59.

So my coat and I kind of, my coach also helped me out with this. He goes, go at that pace plus a few seconds on the monitor. So I wrote like a one 30 to 1 32 for almost the entire thing. And I tried to pick it up a little bit at the end, we got that four minute rest and then I try to do that. Plus another three seconds.

Like I, so I tried to hit like a 1 35 or faster the second time. And then I think one of the heart like that, that three-minute window is very tough. It's too short for you to like really draw out a pace, but it's too fast for you to just go full sand right away. So I was trying, so I always try to break that into three parts Hey, in the minute I know I can hang on to this pace.

That middle minute is where it's going to separate a lot of us. And then the last minute is that everyone goes dark. You just get, you shut off your brain and just go. And even if you're starting to slow down, just try as hard as you can. So that

[00:26:41] Sam Rhee: second minute is

[00:26:42] David Syvertsen: really the deal breaker. I really do think that's where people separate and I knew I could do well in that event.

Like I always go into event because we've talked about this, I have such bad weaknesses that on the events I could do well, I have to do. And I knew there was only two guys there that can run. Better than maybe if they're both, like they were both 6, 4, 2 45, they're monsters, just huge guys.

And I was like, all right. If I can beat everybody else, I'll be in a good spot. When

[00:27:06] Sam Rhee: you get tired, do you increase your stroke rate or do you just. Pull harder per stroke and slow a little

[00:27:13] David Syvertsen: bit. I pull harder and kind of fall back more. Like I try to use my upper body mass to get more momentum on the chain and then pull it really hard into my stomach that slows your

[00:27:21] Sam Rhee: stroke

[00:27:22] David Syvertsen: rate down a little bit.

A little bit. Yeah. And then maybe the last 10 seconds, I try to shorten it up a little bit. If it's more breathing, I go longer. More power. If it's more like my arms are going numb, my legs are going numb. I'll try to shorten it up a little bit.

[00:27:35] Sam Rhee: You can't see what anyone else is doing next to you as you're doing this.

Right? I could, you

[00:27:39] David Syvertsen: could. I know there was one guy to my left. That was a very good rower. I could just tell by looking at people sometimes. Yeah. And I tried to stay ahead of them the whole time. Were you able to, yeah. Okay. Yeah.

[00:27:50] Sam Rhee: Yeah. All right. Wow. So, what time did this one go? The first one. It wasn't televised.

[00:27:56] David Syvertsen: We didn't watch it. So you were first thing in the morning. I was the second heat. You were

[00:28:02] Kathleen Staunton: 11, 10 or

[00:28:03] Sam Rhee: 1137. Okay. And then how much of a break before the second workout?

[00:28:09] Kathleen Staunton: Two hours for

[00:28:09] David Syvertsen: me, we didn't think we would go back to the hotel for them now. It was just a couple of hours. Yeah. Would you guys

[00:28:14] Sam Rhee: do just sit, eat, bring your, like your snacks that you ate?

Yeah.

[00:28:17] David Syvertsen: Yeah.

[00:28:17] Kathleen Staunton: Shaq's yep. By the time you left that floor and went back. Workout area, the warmup area rather, then they're going to have to cool down and then warm up again and they call you again.

[00:28:31] Sam Rhee: So the second workout was, well, guess what? Now this is happening and they were overhead squats, ten eight, four six two with ring muscle ups 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 for men, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 for women.

So it would be 10 overhead squats, two ring, muscle ups, eight overhead squat. Either four or three ring, muscle ups and then, and so on. So it was basically five rounds with decreasing overhead squats, increasing ring muscle ups. So I remember watching this one live and there are a couple of things that stood out for me watching you guys, but I wanted to see what you guys thought first.

[00:29:07] David Syvertsen: Oh, it

[00:29:08] Kathleen Staunton: was a good workout again, not my, for whatever reason. They're not my forte, but I was able to get through the first round, which is really what I was. So, what was

[00:29:16] Sam Rhee: the wait for you at the overhead squats? A

[00:29:18] David Syvertsen: 95, 95, 95. That's close to a one RM.

[00:29:21] Sam Rhee: Yeah. For you. I remember at the a H O Q before. Right. So, so how did you feel about those first 10 overhead squats

[00:29:28] Kathleen Staunton: there?

Oh, I felt great. I did. And I felt I can do this. I'm going to keep doing it. I'm just going to keep chipping away. If I have

[00:29:37] David Syvertsen: to,

[00:29:38] Sam Rhee: I think one of the things Bob Jennings talked about in one of the podcasts was what a challenge it is to program this because the top athletes are top, but there's also a significant percentage of athletes that are.

As elite and I was watching and Brett RC and I were commenting online. There was an athlete next to you and she couldn't get one ring muscle up. And we saw it. We watched for, several minutes that she was struggling, struggling, struggling, and we all empathize. We were there, it was just never broadcast live on YouTube for thousands of people to walk.

And so it's one of those things where. It's scary, but also great in some ways to see that, you can compete and you just try to do your best, regardless of whether you have it or you don't have. Right. And you look very positive during that whole situation.

[00:30:26] Kathleen Staunton: Oh, I was getting, I was getting them if it was the last thing I did and I did, and I, you just, that's part of the whole part of what I'm so proud about for myself, that the mental gymnastics that you have to go through for.

Workout, whether it's a strength for you or not. So I kept my head in the game and I liked it. I liked the workout a lot would be great if I could just bang them out. But

[00:30:50] David Syvertsen: I mean, we hear this all the time. I hear this as a coach all the time. No matter what result you get, you're always like, oh, I wish I could have gotten a little bit better.

Yes. And that's, and that's part of what makes us different than a lot of people out there, it's okay to think like that. And I think putting yourself in that position where you're uncomfortable and you're failing. It's sucks in the moment. If your mind is so obsessed with that current result, but you know, like you've been doing this long enough that it's going to lead to better things and you have to go through this bad stuff sometimes.

And it's really not that bad, like I also think. Getting those muscle-ups was a huge one and, close to one RM, overhead squat for her. It's huge. And you're still day one, still worried about the back, like she was picking her like raisins up off the ground, straight back, let alone at 95.

[00:31:35] Kathleen Staunton: It's like very gingerly.

[00:31:37] David Syvertsen: Yeah.

[00:31:38] Sam Rhee: So what did you think going into this workout? What

[00:31:39] David Syvertsen: was your mindset with this? Because I program a lot, like I knew it was gonna, it's a ring muscle up workout 100%, even more so than it looks like, pretend that. Ring muscle ups or your jam. That's still going to be a huge ring muscle.

Tests because 18 of the last 20 reps are ring muscles and you're tired going into them. What was the overhead? Squat weight? 1 55. Okay. So, and that, it's not a simple weight, but it wasn't anything you really had to think that much about like you'd almost get there and be like, all right, like this is a break from my ring muscle ups.

Get them done. And, I, this is where having a coach helped me out. There is my coach, Henry Toronto from crafted coaching. Now, he, he said he got to watch the heat before and he goes dude, Everybody was falling apart on the last of the muscle ups, even like some of the top guys in there.

Yeah. So he goes, so I went in and saying, all right, 2, 4, 6 on broken and then break them up at eight. My initial thought was try to do eight on broken, but there's no point, if you start doing some quick math and this takes some skill over the years, but if you start doing some math of how many reps per second, you need to get to have a competitive school.

You can look at workouts completely different and be like, I really couldn't do 4, 2, 2, it's not a big deal on the set of eight. So that was kinda my plan going in. What I did not anticipate was how much, how much of a hard time I was going to have getting on the rent. So I'll never have, I felt like less of an athlete jumping up and missing rings.

I think it happened three times. So our rings at bison. If your face, if you're under the rings, the rings are facing the outside where you can just go jump and grab them and like this, these for whatever reason we're facing forward. So you would look at them and have to grab them here.

They're also very long straps. So when you come down from them, they wave more and more. I'm not used to that. And it's funny, we just put up a new pair of rings in the gym that, we're, we're trying to get more pairs of rings in the gym and that's the way they're going to be set up. In addition, they were a little far, far a lot of us were saying that, but I just watched the rogue invitation on CBS yesterday.

That was the same distance. That's what competition standard is. And again, if you're not, I say this all the time, if you can't adjust to what the standard. Just get out. It's funny

[00:33:54] Sam Rhee: because I had at least three people at bison say, giving you advice saying, Hey, Dave, all you need to do is settled. And I'm like,

[00:34:01] David Syvertsen: dude, it's not that easy.

It wasn't, it wasn't. I mean, I think it, the third time it happened, it was definitely like a mental, I was just anticipating them moving. And I mean, it might've slowed me down by 20 seconds, but it wasn't a huge, I mean, I barely got my last muscle up. Oh really? It was so I, I was at muscle failure. So even if I had gotten the rings, I don't know if I would have been able to get up there.

They were tough. Like I'm usually comfortable with anywhere from eight to 12. Even if I'm tired, but I'm used to very short straps and they're a little different than the longer. So

[00:34:33] Sam Rhee: that those last two rounds were probably the most challenging.

[00:34:37] David Syvertsen: Yeah. And that that's when the, I think I came in fourth or fifth and fourth.

Okay. So the guys that beat me in that one, they that's where the separation was. I think they just did a better job on the eights and tens, the. So,

[00:34:50] Sam Rhee: and then how much of a break between that, and then the last event of the day

[00:34:53] David Syvertsen: long, that was like four hours, four,

[00:34:55] Sam Rhee: five hours. And you guys train this, you practice, like what would we do for four hours being in between events?

Yep. So you guys just did what you normally do,

[00:35:02] David Syvertsen: which is went back to the hotel. Yeah. Went back to the hotel and just said they all talk to you in a couple hours. It's funny. Like I was telling to her, we barely saw each other almost the entire weekend. It was just like, because we're so. Like in that, like when we are trying to stay in a zone and tried to S fully focused, we don't want to be around things and people and noise, like some people do.

Yeah. Yeah. It distracts them. Like I went back and watched hard knocks on my TV with my normal tech boots on, and just sat there and ate. Oh, you brought your normal techs out. Oh yeah.

[00:35:32] Sam Rhee: Oh, yeah. Nice. So the last week or the last workout of the day was workout. Number three, pants, party, three rounds of 15 handstand push-ups and a 25 foot tank row and a 25 foot tank push.

And let me speak a little bit about the torque tank. Cause I I'm not that familiar with the device. I've never used it, but basically it's 200 pounds. It's magnetically resistant. So you can set the resistance based on a dial. They've actually featured it in mid Atlantic, regional granite and west coast classic.

It was also in the 2021 games this year. And basically the resistance is proportional to the speed. So a traditional sled is easier as you gain momentum. Cause it has that speed that, you build up after you overcome the inertia, these actually get harder the faster you push it.

So it's actually more difficult than a traditional sled in that regard. And I looked up the settings. I was like, how hard is this? And there are basically three settings, right? There's neutral, which is 0 1, 2 and three. And to calculate the difficulty, what did you have the settings on? Whereas I was all the way up three and then.

I

[00:36:40] David Syvertsen: don't even think she was to basically to.

[00:36:42] Sam Rhee: Yeah. So if you calculate it by wattage set setting to a 675 Watts and setting three is 915 Watts. So 675 Watts would be a minute 20 pace on a rower, right? If you were pushing this at four miles an hour, right. 915 Watts would be a one 12 pace for 500 meters. If, if you were trying to maintain that push for four miles per hour on this, on the torque, something so cool.

Cause I just wanted to know how. That's really awful. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, obviously it's not as hard if you go slower, but if you go too slow, then you're not going to make any progress with it. Yes. So, you had no opportunity. Oh, you guys practiced it here.

[00:37:29] David Syvertsen: Something. Shout out to great white CrossFit for letting us drop in one afternoon, letting there they had a three-wheel torque one.

So I think it was lighter and a little different, but we did get the feel and that was important for us. We got to feel like, all right, what does it like on wheels? As opposed to a sled that's on rubber and the increasing

[00:37:45] Sam Rhee: resistance, the fast beautiful. How did this workout go for you? How did feel, what was it like?

[00:37:51] Kathleen Staunton: That was so much fun. Cat crush. That one was at night and the energy in the room was great and now handsome pushups are definitely my thing. So, and it was fun. I mean, it was good. I loved it.

[00:38:04] David Syvertsen: Broken on all the handstands, right? Yes. Three routes, 15. Nice. She crushed that event. And I remember that was one of the, I didn't get to watch all of her events, like we went on, we went in with the same page.

Over the weekend Hey, do you, you're here to compete. We don't have to beat each other to that or let's watch each other when we can. But mate, I don't want you to jeopardize your recovery between workouts. So there was a few, I just not get to watch. I'd watch on the feet, just like everyone else.

I

[00:38:26] Sam Rhee: want to shout out to Brit Matthews and David Lancelot without bison MVP. Oh my God. We would've missed out on so much. I wish I should've said this at the beginning of the podcast, but. Thank you so much for being there and, showing us so much of it. That was so

[00:38:39] David Syvertsen: helpful.

It's apologized to Dave too, because he, I think he said he lost about seven years off his life. He was so stressed out watching the event. It's stressful watching someone that you're invested in cheer for, because the margin for error out there is so small. Like you can get past that's one thing I want to talk about later.

Like you can get passed by 10 guys at the snap of fingers. That's crazy. If you drop something right. But back to that event, like I remember watching, I got to watch the, her do that. And she was so steady on the cap, on the handstand pushups. And that's where the separation was like rounds two and three, where you th the sled was basically moving the same speed for everyone.

There were a couple of guys in my division that were really like ripping through it, but for most people, it was a same CSO came down to how fast can you do 45 handstand pushup. And that's kind of, and that's why the workout was so short is that between two and three minutes of thank and and she was just like calm, smooth, steady, trusted the movement.

We weren't sure how it was going to feel on these little plexiglass things. But to me it felt normal. It felt normal. Yeah. And so.

[00:39:44] Sam Rhee: Placed 12th. And that's probably just because it was such a short workout. Your time was two 17. So probably five seconds makes a

[00:39:51] David Syvertsen: huge difference. I actually punched the the S the tank that didn't break.

It don't worry about, but I was mad after that event. I was the most angry. It was over the weekend because. I was, I was moving pretty fast. I CA I can only go so fast. I was unbroken, so I could only go so fast with my arms along. I'm not light. So I was with these guys, the top five in the, in the, in my lane.

But my last set, I thought I got to 15. So I came down and my judge was like, you got one more. And I was like, what? So I go out there and I do my last one. And I still to this day, Dave told me I'm, I'm pretty sure Dave told me that he's no, you did 14. And my coach's wife says, no, no, no, you did 15.

So I still don't know if I had to do an extra rep. But that right there was about six, seven seconds. Probably the process of coming down, listening to the judge, having a little wait, what? Okay, go back up. And that's probably seven spots. And that's, what's so stressful about these comps there's so it's not you go to a local cop there's three or four really.

Athletes and the margin isn't that bad if you screw up. But if you screw up, you get passed by so many guys. So I remember hitting the sled like that, like a stupid polo kneel and the dugout from the Yankees and my hand was hurting then.

[00:41:02] Sam Rhee: Right. Because the number one guy hit 1 59. So literally 18 seconds that do you have who that is?

[00:41:09] David Syvertsen: Oh, yeah, he's a guy from Ireland. I mean, there's some guys they're like, this is where anatomy and sorry. Anatomy is part across it. Like the guys that do that are very short and have short arms, like you watch some of these guys do handstand pushups. I'm like, it looks like they're not even bending their elbows on the way down.

It literally looks like they're just doing this. Like, how do you compete with that? But this was a very pull heavy comp. So, like I've coached for so long. That I can tell what events are my opportunity to beat certain body types. As funny as that sounds and what events, I just have to

[00:41:38] Sam Rhee: keep it together.

How has the judging overall for this competition? I thought they were

[00:41:43] Kathleen Staunton: amazing. They worked so hard and they were, they were great cheerleaders too. They were really, they wanted you to do well. They were right there with you. And they worked, they were tired of. They really had to work a lot. I thought the judging was

[00:41:55] David Syvertsen: outstanding.

Yeah. Very thankless job. But I, the the guy that was in charge of corralling us, especially the last day, he was like, make sure go, thank your judge. That's I do that at every local calm before or after, or both. I say, thank you for being here. We can't do this without you guys. I mean, think about it.

Like all these like egotistical competitors that go there. Like you guys have no shot at competing ever. If you don't have people doing judging for you volunteering their time, like they might get a shirt and a meal, But, that's something that we should always be cognizant of that there is no such thing as a competition without volunteer judges.

And I think for the most part, they did a good job in a sport. That's very hard to be a good judge. It's really hard when guys are moving really fast. Like I had a couple people like, oh, that guy wasn't sitting up on his dead list. I'm like, like it's hard to do that. It really is. It's hard to.

They move so fast. Some of these guys that you just can't, as long as you're, sometimes I got a warning a couple of times on, on a couple of workouts Hey, do this to make sure, Hey, you're getting close, you're getting close. They, they they're, they're not there to no rep you they're just there to uphold the standards to the best of their ability.