S02E35 DOES TRAINING AGE MATTER?

What is "Training Age?" How is that different from your chronological or biological age? How does knowing your "training age" help you perform better and become more fit? We take a deep dive into the concept of training age and how a high or low age can be an advantage or disadvantage for your fitness potential.

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S02E35 DOES TRAINING AGE MATTER

[00:00:00] David Syvertsen: All right. Welcome back to the HerdFit podcast. I'm coach David Syvertsen. I'm here with coach and Dr. Sam Rhee. A topic today is going to be something called training age. And this is something that we can go into a few different rabbit holes. We're going to try to avoid the rabbit holes. We're going to try to keep this a little more broad and the purpose of this.

When I sent this to Sam, we started talking about it a little bit. I want everyone to try to reflect on their own personal situation, and hopefully this can guide some thoughts slash maybe just a different way of thinking about your performance at the gym, whether you're really happy about it, whether you're really upset about it, whether you're indifferent about it, all those emotions, all those thought processes will come across when you're thinking about your training age.

I think a lot of us are. Focused on our current state. What we're good at right now? What we're bad at right now, what we can't do right now, what we feel like right now compared to, 10 years ago, it's all about like how I feel, how do I feel? And then I think there's some reasoning behind whether you feel good or bad that you might not realize.

It revolves around training age, training age to me is what your body has gone through prior to CrossFit before you started CrossFit. Some of us, some people have a very extensive athletic career. And when I say career, it could be college, it could be high school. It could be even pre high school things that you did with your body leading up to your current state.

And we have a lot of different ages at the gym. We have people that we have teenagers that come to the gym. We have 50, 60, we've had 70 year olds at the gym. And it's really hard. We talked about this individualized part of CrossFit. How individualized is it that we're all coming together and doing the same workout.

And no, we don't all respond to it the same. No, we don't all see the same gains. We don't all see the same losses. And a lot of that has to do with what your body has done over the course of. Sam has a little bit more refined definition from James. Tafaro what he got.

[00:02:01] Sam Rhee: Yeah. So I'll talk about what OPEX, founder, James Fitzgerald said, I also wanted to mention that there are a couple of different just general age definition.

Okay. One is chronologic age, right? So that's just how old you are, right? Based on your date

[00:02:15] David Syvertsen: of birth, right? I'm 25. Sam's 30. So thanks

[00:02:19] Sam Rhee: man. 30 mentally, maybe. And then the biologic age is your state physiologically. So for example, if you have two 13 year old athletes, one may have a different biologic age because he or she has progressed.

Farther in their adolescent development. So their biologic age might be different. And then also, depending on what you've gone through. So if you're a 35 year old, but you've had 15 medical problems in your life, or you might have the body biologically of a 65 year old, maybe if you were smoking a pack a day or whatever it is.

So as Dave said, training age is really the amount of time you've spent training for a particular sport or skill. And you could go down that rabbit hole of like how many different sports do you have a training, a strength training age of five years? Cause you've been doing strength training, but maybe not a whole lot.

Plyometric training what James Fitzgerald says is that, and this blew my mind when I read it. I'll tell you that. When I started looking at this stuff, it was very technical. He says training age is all of the contractions, a client has accumulated over time relative to their maximal physical potential.

So all of the contractions that you've had In relation to what your maximal physical potential is. I did not even understand what that meant when I first

[00:03:43] David Syvertsen: read that. That's the way they talk, they always talking about like contractions, right? When they talk about the how much volume is in a workout with ring muscle ups, they talk about the amount of contractions around your shoulder blade.

And we've talked about this before. In how hard cross it can be on the shoulder, because it just gets used in so many different directions, in so many different workouts. And some of it's overhead, some of it's pulling and. It's a contraction around your shoulder blade. And that's why they're so big on trying to strengthen the muscles around that shoulder blade to protect it.

So that's just the way they talk contractions, where we might just say reps, right? That's probably fancier way of saying. How many reps has your body done over the course of your CrossFit life? If you tried to think about as I was reflecting on this, I'm trying to think of a, how many workouts have I done?

Like how many training sessions? And I tried to figure out in my head how many, for whatever reason, I think I did wall walls that day. Like how many wall balls have I done in CrossFit? And then also tie that to the thruster because it's a very similar moon pattern. You're probably looking at. Maybe close to between 50,000 and a hundred thousand reps for most people that have done the cross it for 10 years.

And that's a lot,

[00:04:47] Sam Rhee: right? So when you're training for wall balls, how you do them would be different than someone who's only accumulated. To

[00:04:54] David Syvertsen: 200 rounds. Yeah. Yeah. If someone just started like a month ago. And, but that could be a good thing or bad thing. It could mean I'm really conditioned or it could mean that, my body is more beat up than that.

Person's done. This is like where this discussion is going to go there. We're going to talk about how training age helps CrossFitters, but also we're gonna talk about how training age can hurt across fitter. And before we get into, how long have you been doing cross it and why is it impacting what you're doing?

I think a lot of people should put thought into what they've done prior to CrossFit, whether it's a sport career or just your workout career, your workout regimen. All right. So let's talk about sports first. I always like to dive into what people have done athletically prior to starting CrossFit.

Not because I'm pro sports or anything. We have members in our gym that never played a sport in their life and they come in, they're crushing this stuff. I don't think it really matters that much, but I think some sports lead to me, understanding an athlete's issues and strengths within CrossFit.

So I've always, for example, I've always felt soccer was a really good background for CrossFitters. Their rubbish capacity is generally speaking a lot higher coming off. Like even if they haven't played soccer in a while, like they've been in a sport where there's a lot of running. Different gears to slow medium, fast, they're good at changing directions.

So Usually they have a little bit more agility and body awareness. And then the one thing I've also noticed with, especially with women with soccer more than men, is they really understand torque like the amount of power they can create from their hips and let it translate to the extremity. And the last thing I've seen with soccer players, they're just low or lower bodies are much more.

Then someone like a basketball player because of the running and the one foot planting and the amount of power produced from the hips.

[00:06:39] Sam Rhee: We often see athletes that come in who've had previous high school or youth sport experience. And so let me give you another couple examples.

If you have another athlete, for example, who said, you know what, and we see a lot of them used to play football in high school, maybe some in college. What are your thoughts in terms of what their training age is or what are you preconditioned to think about with

[00:07:01] David Syvertsen: that type of app with a football player?

A football player. So generally speaking, you can look at the actual football activity. And again, there's different positions, but it's very physical sport, right? It's, you've taken a lot of extra beatings to the joints usually, you see it all the time. If you watch football today, guys get their knees taken out the shoulders, get put into weird positions when they're making a tackle.

But one thing that helps a lot of them is they have a strength background. You're rarely going to meet a football player, especially the someone that played beyond high school. That was not part of a serious weight training program at. Like even Collarater he's not a huge guy, but he's pretty strong.

He's a lot stronger than most people, his size. And he was a wide receiver and Lafayette, but he said like their entire, for four straight years, it was deadlift back squat bench, press deadlift, back squat bench, rest that brute strength. A lot of kids that go to college, they're not doing. They might go to the gym and do some curls, but they're not doing like a regimented powerlifting program to enhance their strength.

He said his football

[00:07:58] Sam Rhee: program was a little different that the wide receivers were lifting with the O line and the D line guys,

[00:08:03] David Syvertsen: and even looking back on it, he probably would have, we should have him on at some point. There's probably some thoughts on man. I wish I, if we were a little more explosive with our training, maybe it would've helped us out.

But. Just the take away, like how good that program was or how bad that program was. He was lifting a lot of weights while he was in college, while most people that when they're in college, they're not doing that. And I think that really goes a long way towards what Kyle is able to do right now safely.

When you watch him move, he moves almost perfect. No matter what Lyft he's doing, but it's because you've had so many repetitions contractions, right prior to what he's doing here,

[00:08:41] Sam Rhee: what was your athletic background prior to CrossFit? What was your training

[00:08:44] David Syvertsen: age? So this is nothing. I played a lot of different sports and that's another thing that, Sam has two kids that play high school sports, and they're athletic.

They come here, they work out. But the fact that they're doing this I think is going to help them. So this is similar to me growing up. I was big baseball, football, basketball. I stopped basketball at some point to put more attention on baseball. I played a lot of different sports and that was what we did back then.

Now it's different with kids. It's like everyone thinks their kid is the next Mike trout. So they have to play baseball all year round or the next kid, the next Patrick, my homes. And they need to play football all year round. I think that the variants that I had in my movement, in my contractions going sideways, going forward, going backwards, throwing, kicking, squatting, hedging, all these different movement patterns, I think helped me and I, and I.

Played a lot. I was on a lot of different teams growing up, but I was predominantly baseball. And a lot of baseball players are one side of their body dominant whether the obvious is throwing, I was a pitcher and I pitched a lot. I probably pitched too much growing up. I was on three different teams, a pitch wall, and this was before we had like pitch limits and any limits and.

So I can even tell, like right now when I'm lifting, I still see that there is so much more power on the rights of my body, but it's not just my arm. It's my leg. We'll think about what a pitcher does. You re you kinda coil up on that one leg, you start squatting, you go into like that half squat, and then you explode off that one leg to create torque with your hips.

That's what's which leg is mine is. It's my left, which knee is bad on my body. It's my left. The muscles around my knee joint are so much stronger on my right side. The muscles around my shoulder are so much stronger on my right side, that kind of training age will impact who I am as an athlete.

What

[00:10:29] Sam Rhee: about athletes that maybe weren't playing in school or youth, but we have a lot of athletes they engage in common fitness activities before they get here, like spin or yoga or boot

[00:10:41] David Syvertsen: camp, or even bodybuilding James from to quote him he thinks that the optimal way to build a competitive CrossFit athlete is starting in their teens.

They do nothing. Long endurance and bodybuilding for, I don't want to quote him. I don't want him to call me one day. Yo, you misquoted me, but it was like a years. Like your entire teenage life is just bodybuilding in endurance. Really? No thrusters, no kipping, no muscle loves, just get strong.

So there's equal benefit to both. And we ha we've had both. We have guys here that basically just bro lifted from. , there are guys here predominantly guys that they did, what a traditional guy that does at the gym for a long time.

They go to New York sports club. They put headphones on, they do a set every two minutes. They look at themselves in the mirror, but they're building muscle. We joke all the time Delta and I there's a lot of value in standing at the gym and doing curls and tricep, extensions, and lat pull downs because it builds the muscles around your joint.

So there are athletes that do that kind of training age, I think helps people and their longevity within CrossFit, because they're so strong that it can translate into a lot of the movements that we do here. The other side of it is people that did a lot of bootcamp and spend, they might not be strong, but there are aerobic base comes in much better.

You need to know what you've done, what your training age consists of. Was it more bootcamp hit, spin running, I think that there's a lot of runners in our gym that respond to our aerobic work very well because they've been running for 20 years, Laura teary, Kathleen.

Yup. They come in with that background and they can handle you can even watch them work out that training age that they have. They are aerobic athletes. I tell teary this all the time. I don't think I ever see teary doubled over on the ground after a workout. Does that mean she's not trying hard?

Nope. It just means that her robotic system is so solid that it's going to impact who she is as an athlete here. Now, if she had never run before, but she was a big lift. She'd be a lot stronger right now. Should we do higher cleans, better pull ups, all that stuff, but I bet her aerobic system wouldn't be better, that background really impacts who Laura teary is as an athlete right now. And again, there's no right or wrong there. If I had to pick one, I would pick Laura teary side. I'd rather be aerobically driven than strength driven.

[00:12:53] Sam Rhee: I might've heard Glassman say this, that having a gymnastics base to your training.

Can be very important in terms of how well you can CrossFit. Yup. You look at a Patrick Vellner I would think of some of the best athletes that we have at the gym and they have. Gymnastics background. Yeah. Even

[00:13:13] David Syvertsen: if it was just a few years as a kid,

[00:13:14] Sam Rhee: just a few years, I think if you are a long-term gymnast, the problem is, and you can get into training age.

If you have a lot of experience as a gymnast, you have a lot of injuries just like in football. You get into progressively more and more dangerous moves as a gymnast. Yeah. And that gets you into a whole host of problems, but I feel like anyone who's had some of their training age comprise of gymnastics seem to have a better kinesthetic sense, a better body awareness sense.

I agree. And all the rig stuff They do things that I couldn't even imagine doing.

[00:13:46] David Syvertsen: Yeah, no, that's a good point. And I like Ash and I have talks every now and what do we want Brock to get involved with? And when he gets older, he's so young for all this stuff. But next year, yeah. I do want him to have a gymnastic, something, whether it's like a little kid class and he hates it, then we stop.

Or if he likes, wants again to the sport a little bit, because I think it's this. Like we've talked about this. When we talk about programming, like body awareness and B the ability to move your body is such a crucial part of CrossFit. And it can translate to lifting where I wouldn't say that about the other way around.

Even if you're a really good, only lifter or a power lifter that does not really carry over to bodyweight movement in my opinion. So I think that's a good way of putting it people with a big yoga background, this can go in two different directions. I've seen that for whatever reason, I've had a lot of people come to buy some over the years and they want to try it.

Some didn't stick it out with a pretty, I would say, accomplished or extensive yoga back. And obviously they come in with a lot of like mobility flexibility, but a negative on this is that they don't have stability, right? Like that, those three words like you want to have all three,

you want to be flexible, mobile and stable, flexibility, mobility, without stability, AKA like the ability to stop the joint from moving and lock it into place and be strong in that position is. Probably more dangerous than someone that's not mobile. I'm trying to think about we had we had a teenage girl.

I don't want to say her name back in the early days of bison and she was unbelievably flexible. Like just man, I wish I could squat like that, but. Kept getting hurt every time we went to overhead, she couldn't stop the joint from locking in. Now, the thing about someone like Aaron Aaron's got a terrible level of flexibility mobility, but he's pretty stable in his positions.

And he's knock on wood has been very safe. Coming up on nine years now, eight years. Sorry. And if you walked in off the street and the kind of looked at them and be like, all right, that guy can't do anything. She can bend herself in every direction. Like she could probably do more, but she was actually at risk more because she was almost too flexible.

So I think sometimes if you come in with a yoga background or a stretching background, you have to be extra cognizant of what levels of stability you have in your joint. Because that kind of training age of bending and twisting and turning your body in all different directions. If you're not able to fully control when you're doing a snatch, a muscle of a TOSA bar, even a burpee, you're actually putting yourself at more risk.

[00:16:09] Sam Rhee: Yes. I think you're right to a degree. I think one of the biggest issues CrossFitters have over time with training. They really do have

[00:16:17] David Syvertsen: to work on her mobility. Oh, for sure. Because saying don't work on it, right? Yeah.

[00:16:21] Sam Rhee: Because when you're overly stiff, that will cause you problems.

I think someone like Erin is safe because he knows his limitations. He's never going to try to squat beyond what he can squat. He's never going to try to put his body into positions that he can't hold and they may be very limited, but. W what his limitations are. Yep. If you are a CrossFitter and you are trying to get to a certain level of achievement, you're going to need mobility.

And if you don't have it, and you're forcing your body into ways that it's not really used to going. Yep. You're going to, you're going to have

[00:16:57] David Syvertsen: issues. You'll have an injury. Yeah. So it's a little bit of a balance I would say. Yep. Yep. I mean, a lot of this talk right now, as we're going. All right.

We don't want it. We don't want to make a strong statement of don't do yoga before CrossFit or don't play soccer before CrossFit. It's just try to find this medium line. You, if you do have a certain background, right? Yeah. Let's go back to the sports. A lot of women that have a soccer background, generally speaking, are very well-developed below the ways, but they lack a lot of upper body strength.

There is a huge divide between what they can do with their legs, so they can squat all day, jump all day, jump rope all day, but put them upside down and said, do shark tanks and pushups done throughout, and it's. There's a positive to being developed below the waist. I, if I would rather be developed down there more than above the waist, just because of the movements that we do here, but try to have that awareness of what your background is and what you might need work on.

If your background is in this sport or this training regimen, for all you boot campers that came in here and want, more high intensity work and more long workouts, I think you need to go on the other side of it and look at it as I need to improve my power production, my strength, because now you can really be like a fully fit person.

So what about the ones who have I have

[00:18:05] Sam Rhee: no sport experience? Was there like me virginal? Like my body has probably never experienced any stress before

[00:18:12] David Syvertsen: I started. Yeah. So the next topic I was going to have , the difference between someone that has an extensive background, whether it's sports training.

Or someone that doesn't have any I have someone that just joined the gym, he's a morning guy, and that could relate this to Sam as well, because Sam was similar in zero fitness background whatsoever. He's 35. He just started two weeks ago and has literally never been to a gym before.

And I give him so much credit that he. I was talking about that with one of the coaches last week. I was like, really? And I was like, yeah, after I started talking about that is really cool. That's all right. If you ever listened to this, that's a shout out to you and he bought nanos he's all in now.

. He moves well for someone who's never met you. Well, He's got no restrictions. Yeah. Yeah. And he's actually, I think, yeah, some natural athlete and him that he doesn't even know about. But, I'll relate this to you and him in that. I actually think it was easier for you to progress.

In that you didn't have to deal with former injuries that you would have had if you played soccer and football for 15 years. Look about Mike McKinney, who does not have a lot of CrossFit experience. Awesome athlete can do crazy things with his body, but you know the years of football took a toll on his body.

I see this with some guys that played baseball that years of pitching took a toll on her body. You don't have to deal with that. So that doesn't mean you're in. All right, because if, maybe because someone that never played sports or never one that worked out, there's not a lot of body awareness, like there isn't coordination.

And sometimes I had coach we'll all forget that sometimes I'm like, all right, so let's just get under the barbell. And they're like, what are you talking about? Get onto the barbell. What does that even mean? Get there's not that sense of snap that quick Twitch fiber that's been trained over and over for years.

I want to talk about the difference between someone like that. You tell me Sam, you've coached, you've done CrossFit long time. You've been one of the more dedicated people to your health fitness in general, over the past eight years, you coming from a background without sports or even training really used to go for a run every now and then, right?

Yep. Okay. So real impressive. And but the tell me, what was your experience. And because you have a good, you have a good broad view of this.

[00:20:17] Sam Rhee: Yeah. I was on the other side of it. I had no real athletic experience and except for running a little bit. When I first came, I think the biggest challenge is.

Learning how to move right. Body awareness and coachability. So like you said, if you've been in any kind of athletic background you've gotten coached, you've had people look at, you, tell you what to do, correcting your movement. Yeah. That's a good point. I didn't think about that. And so when you think about what people's experiences are.

From a sports specific background. They're typically they're pretty coachable. Yeah. And I already been coached because they've been coached and they've they know how to incorporate feedback when you and Chris first looked at me and I was starting to learn how to do cleans you. Look, you looked at me like I was an alien.

I had no idea how to get through to me. Yeah. And. I think as a coach, you have to realize if someone doesn't have that kind of training experience, you have to find different ways of. Getting through to them very good point. And I think CrossFit is so good about finding, if you take the L one, if you take any advanced coaching class, okay, some people need this kind of cue.

Some people need a verbal cues. Some people need this type of and everyone's always trying to, and I know Liz is always trying to find that, that Example or queue that sort of triggers it for somebody. Yep. And I think when you don't have that experience it just takes longer. It takes such a

[00:21:51] David Syvertsen: long time.

So you think it's a longer ride for someone that doesn't have any sort of sport background or training background? Absolutely.

[00:21:57] Sam Rhee: And I had to watch a lot of videos. I had the video myself. I had to listen to my coaches constantly. Yeah. And I've gotten to a point where. A lot of the movements are more natural, but anytime I have to pick up a new skill, it's a challenge.

Okay. I

[00:22:11] David Syvertsen: don't like right now, like what's a skill that is, it's hard for you, right? Handstand walk. I

[00:22:15] Sam Rhee: was going to say. Yeah. Just that uncomfortable feeling about being upside down yep. Is such a foreign feeling. And I was just talking to Dave and I saw him last week in open gym and he was moving pretty goddamn well on them.

And I thought he was where I was in terms of struggling. And he S and he had a queue, which I have to try at this point. When he, when you do wall taps and you're tapping your shoulders, you're not necessarily making forward progress. He was wall tapping without the wall and that's how he started.

Interesting. Okay. And I said, wow, I never thought of it that way, because most people tell you to fall forward. And then catch up. And he's I don't like that feeling. Yeah. And I was like, yeah, I don't like that feeling either. So that's why I don't do it. Yeah. If you don't have that training background or your training age is zero, you have to get.

Keep finding cues that might help you keep

[00:23:12] David Syvertsen: your eyes open.

[00:23:12] Sam Rhee: Same thing with the bar muscle ups ring muscle ups. I kept having to try to find different cues. Yep. And I tried everything. I tried, Anything anyone ever told me I was trying to incorporate it and sometimes it stuck in. Sometimes it didn't eventually you'll get there.

It's like learning a different language. When you get, when you have never learned languages before, it there's more of a challenge to it. Yup. But I do believe in CrossFit and in life, you have to acquire new skills in some ways I do feel blessed that, I don't have a crappy back.

Like some people who've had athletic experiences or like John Hartman who had to go through surgery because, he has, if he's, have you ever seen his x-rays? I think

[00:23:52] David Syvertsen: he's shown Monday. Don't look at them the same way you do, but I know that they're not normal. I was

[00:23:56] Sam Rhee: like, whoa. And it was just from his football background and his training background.

I do have that advantage in that regard, but

[00:24:03] David Syvertsen: yeah. So it's it's again, this is like a catch 22, right? There's no like right or wrong, like your lack of training experience prior to CrossFit probably. Made things longer for you to obtain physically, but I think mentally you were a little bit more coachable even though maybe Chris and I didn't always have the best cues for you because we weren't dealing with someone like that before.

Or we were just two former meatheads, yo just pulled up, like it's but that's where a, that's why we have a style, like a very like high variety staff. I think that's always important for a lot of gyms, but it's almost but the advantage is you weren't. You don't have to stop training cleans because your old back injury from football is bothering you, but yes, mentally it might've been taken a little bit longer, but then also you are easier to coach you a little bit more humble.

We have a lot of people that have training backgrounds that are not humble when they come in. They try to sell themselves to me, it's I am in shape because I did this. I played this for my dude. I don't, yes, I care. But it's not really going to help hurt you right now. You remember that pro

[00:25:06] Sam Rhee: football, that NFL player who came in the one who would be barefoot working out?

Yes, I do. Yeah. That guy's training age in terms of his experience was tremendous, but what was it about him that made him such. I don't want to say bad athlete, but someone who just didn't take

[00:25:21] David Syvertsen: the CrossFit. Probably some that he thought he knew everything or that his body was just mangled.

Like he was missing cartilage in his ankle, I don't think he had any cartilage or something like that. And is also, I dunno, why does a guy like that? Not do well in this kind of space, right? It's I do think some of these guys that, especially a pro athlete that was being paid thousands of dollars to play games.

They think they know everything when they come in and the sometimes when people start cross it and they're like, oh, I used to do this. Or I come in and I do this. I've done cleans before I almost had I roll my eyes sometimes, I'd rather teach them our way, not my way, just Bisons wait and let life progress them slowly.

And I always say, when I do beginners now, like the ego is the worst thing that can happen to you here. If you come in and feel like you know, everything, or you can't handle the fact that there's nine women in class lifting more than you do, like chill, right? Like you have to take. The way, like a slow ride towards your eventual.

So do you think a

[00:26:15] Sam Rhee: high training age, in some regards can be a detriment for sure, mentally and physically, because coachability you, I said they might be more coachable, but in some ways they're, they might not be as coachable because

[00:26:28] David Syvertsen: of what they've gone through. I feel like they've know everything right.

Or they feel like, you're just across a code. Like I had a strength and conditioning coach at my school. And if you watch some of these college strength and conditioning programs, Lyft, they do everything wrong. It's more about. Here's a good one. Here's a good example. We don't talk about Hines.

All right. Hines is naturally, I think one of the most gifted athletes I've seen ever wall through bison, just like jumping, running, burst strength, and he's having a hard time comprehending range of motion with his squat. I talked to him the other day on texts about wall balls. And I was like, dude you're stronger than everyone here.

Pretty much. You're faster. Most explosive. I just don't think you had the body awareness right now. As far down, you need to go to new squat. And I sent him a video of his wall balls, and even he was like, oh my God, that is terrible. Like I did not know that. And he said, he goes, I come in, I come from that football background, like when we lifted, it was all about being explosive and being powerful.

And that makes sense. That's what you train for years. There was no. Get further down into your squat so that your judge doesn't know rep you in the CrossFit open. That's not a thought for them. It's be explosive move as much weight as you can. So if you can produce a lot of power by going halfway into your squat and coming up, good, go for it.

And I think that kind of background where Heinz is he's coachable though. He does want to hear feedback. In that regard, but the negative is that he's done it for so many that he's done a lot of contractions. With that half squat, that's where his body is producing a lot of power. And that's what his mindset is.

So I don't think Heinz has any sort of ego issue. I think that he's been physically programmed to move a certain way for a very long time. And that training age is going to help is going to make it tougher for him for awhile. And it's going to make him slow down. And concentrate on his range of motion.

And with guys like, he's my age, right? That's he's had a lot of success in sport, a lot of success in fitness, that it's hard to shut off that switch sometimes.

[00:28:27] Sam Rhee: How do you unlearn movement patterns like that? Or how do you coach someone

[00:28:30] David Syvertsen: to try to unlearn slow down, go lighter, just like you would start someone that like Ray, that just cross it and it's never worked out a day in the life.

That's where the similarities. Is our all right, no more 20 pound wall balls. You're gonna use a 10 until you do two workouts in a row where you never missed a squat depth. And I think he's actually, Heinz is getting a little better with some of the barbell stuff where he's going lighter so that he can feel what a jerk is.

Because he just got used to just push, pressing everything. So I think that's always the goal. Everyone, if you feel like you're moving patterns, aren't trained is slow down, go lighter technique first. If we were really drill sergeants here, we wouldn't let him use anything more than 55 pounds until he did that.

It wouldn't let them use a 20 pound wall ball. This is

[00:29:11] Sam Rhee: the OPEX fitness methodology. But. As a coach, I find it very difficult. It is to correct athletes and have them work on their form. One maybe because they're moving patterns have been ingrained to, like you said, they don't even realize exactly what it is they're doing.

And three, there's an ego issue where why do I need to change what it is?

[00:29:34] David Syvertsen: I'm doing. Yeah. And that's another reason, number 146. Why we do the cross it open? It's like that one time a year. We can tell you. Nope. Doesn't count. Nope. He's I've gone up. I've gone up to several people. I know rep someone today doing wall balls.

I said, no rep not even being funny, it just, it, the ball that hit the wall and how you respond to that will say a lot about you, but I'm not going to go up to you every single workout, every single rep and be like Nope. I'm not going to be that coach. I've made that decision a long time.

, I don't want to be that I'm not the constant, no rapper. I will come tell you a few times. And then sometimes you'll give me your score and I'll write scale and what it gets skilled. You didn't do the motion, right? You scale the movement pattern. And then that can create that conversation of, Hey, the real movement is this.

So that in the open, when the open comes up, you're going to have a judge. I've already had a few people ask me you. Who's going to judge that person because that. Does not do reps correctly. I'll take care of it. Don't worry.

[00:30:23] Sam Rhee: If you're training age on your fitness background from before you did CrossFit, How you learn CrossFit and how you develop and progress and CrossFit.

Yep. What's the opposite. So I do know a lot of people who go back to the sports that they are doing. Okay. They generally feel pretty positive about the benefits of CrossFit. Maybe you're a paddle or a tennis person, or you cycle, or you're a triathlon person, or you run weird.

Does that come

[00:30:50] David Syvertsen: into play? How much does a CrossFit training age impact your performance elsewhere? Yes. I mean, I think because CrossFit is so new to that person, right? Let's think about Sasha was soccer was talking about Reno as an Ironman. They had that training age in that sport or that activity prior to CrossFit because they came in and did new stuff to their body.

New the contractions to their body that have never been done before it improve their fitness, generally so much that every other fitness soccer, Ironman improved. I remember Reno telling me he's my biking got so much better after they cross it for a year because he just got stronger.

Obviously. I think that anyone that has a, some people use CrossFit as an accessory to their training for something. Whether it's a sport, whether it's an, a Spartan race, something like that. When you try out a new training program that has so much variety, the way to CrossFit does, it's going to make your physical capabilities everywhere else, more productive.

[00:31:52] Sam Rhee: I would agree with that. I think it's also sports specific. So for example, with Sasha, she happens to love CrossFit. Yeah. And she does. And she pops in and out of watch. She she mixes it in our off season. Nick is a basketball player and I not sure exactly how to integrate CrossFit exactly in basketball is tricky

[00:32:14] David Syvertsen: so if you were really trying to get Nick better at basketball, is doing CrossFit going to make it I do think he's still like that young stage. I do think it could help him, but he should probably stick to more. Strength and stability based workouts. He should come in and do cleans and back squats and shoulder press, because in basketball it is a more physical sport than people think that

[00:32:35] Sam Rhee: all adolescents should do that though.

Don't you feel like all kids should have some sort of strength based

[00:32:40] David Syvertsen: training? Yes, I do. At a certain point when that starts, that's pretty debatable right now. Like I always try to I don't like talking about other people's kids. What will Brock do? I'll probably start having him play with like weight training when he's like 12.

On a very light scale. I'll be there, I'll watch him like a Hawk. Just so that when he can actually start hitting that puberty stage and really starts , developing, he has at least the mental. Capacity and awareness of what a squat is, we're dealing with some teenagers right now that come to bison.

I've never done a thing in their life. And they're trying to do cleans that there's no body awareness. So from that regard, no, I don't think they should be doing it. And I've told their parents that and they need more like personal training types, nick I've, we worked with Nick. I've seen work.

Nick work out a few times. If he got stronger, I think he would make him a more stable basketball player. There's a lot of physical contact and basketball. And you see in basketball at the time, these guys can't handle contact, they get touched. They that's correct. And that's a big part of what he would need.

Does he need to come in on burpee kettlebell, swing, run day. And I do wads. Now that guy has a

[00:33:40] Sam Rhee: motor that could crush

[00:33:41] David Syvertsen: me any given day. I think when it's really good for a specific athlete, you need to really put thought into what do you need to make you better at your. Or your activity, whatever you're doing and then a bias your training towards those

[00:33:54] Sam Rhee: days, do you think CrossFit can help address deficiencies in your training age?

For example, I've seen Dave book when he first started, he had back issues. Yeah. And he's much stronger. His back has, I wouldn't say it has rehabbed him, but it feels like he has capability in terms of where he was from his previous training to where he is now. His. Leaps

[00:34:17] David Syvertsen: and bounds. I do.

And I'll tell you why, because I think he's doing things different. He's doing different things. Exercise wise than he did. Prior to CrossFit, and he's doing a lot of gymnastics training. Like it's funny, you look at a guy like Dave book, like that guy does gymnastics training. He's huge. He's a monster right now on gymnastics.

Muscle-ups toes, a bar. Pull-ups he way I don't even know. I would say 2 25, maybe two 30. And, he's doing five, six button bar, muscle ups in a row. If anyone wants to know what that feels like, if you're a 180 pounds, go put a 40 pound vest on and see how well you do with pull-ups and muscle-ups all that good stuff,

[00:34:51] Sam Rhee: he made the Carlo just blow me away every time they

[00:34:53] David Syvertsen: announced their impressive. And even Squire a Squire's up there and wait to, it's a lot, there's a lot of ways that you're moving and they move it very well. And I think when you do gymnastics training and D and they, those guys do things correctly, movement-wise, your midline gets a lot of strength.

A lot of gymnastics training is midline based where you're like, true, like your core, and the stronger, your core is the less pressure you'll back will take on. I think that's a big part of why date. Has a safer, stronger back because he's never done gymnastics training prior to CrossFit his training age with lifting, he probably kick the crap out of guys in college.

I would not want to get hit by him. And I know for a fact that car. The crap out of guys as a football player, I was one of them. You know, like the, those guys though, because they're, and Brian's had back issues too he's gotta be a little careful with something, but I think because of CrossFit and the way that you're moving your body weight and all those things that we're doing, it's rehab their backs to a certain.

If you

[00:35:51] Sam Rhee: wanted to summarize in terms of how people should approach training, age, how they should think about it, how coaches should approach it, what would be your takeaway messages for it?

[00:35:59] David Syvertsen: I would say. Being realistic with your goals is the big takeaway I want from this. If you have a training age that has really you have a beat up mangled body,

from your training age, whether it's sports or just fitness in general, I think you need to temper your expectations for how much better, like how much better you're doing. At cross it. If you're someone that's just performance, what am I scores? One of my scores. If you've been doing cross it a long time, like you said, just recently your progress.

If there is some is very slow, it does not mean you're not working hard. It means that you're not a 21 year old and that you've been doing cross it a long time. You're not all the sudden I don't like hearing someone that's been with us for seven, eight years. That want another 30 pounds on their lift or they want to double their unbroken ring muscle ups.

I'm not going to say it's impossible. I'll never be the coach that says, Nope, you can't do it, but you need to be aware that the training age that you have, within cross it, but even before is going to either help or hurt that. Cause, and I think it's something you should put thought into, or we have a lot of people that have a hard time controlling. Comparisons themselves to others. How come she bounced back from a baby? And I didn't do you know what she did 10 years before cross it? Nope. That's a big one I hear is why does this woman respond better?

From having a baby than that one it's too extensive. And you're only looking at CrossFit was like, there are so much that we've all been on this planet for a really long time. And you could even get into what their nutrition was as a kid. Like all this I'm genetic. That I think that if you really look at a broader perspective of what training age is, what people have done before, that can really help answer a lot of questions.