S02E58 REVIEW OF THE CROSSFIT LEVEL 2 TRAINING COURSE

Is a Level 2 certified coach better than a Level 1 certified coach? If you own a CrossFit gym or or a CrossFit coach, you already have an Level 1 certification. Why would you need or want a Level 2 certification?

Dave and Sam, both of whom took the L2 training course (Dave a couple of years ago, Sam a couple of weeks ago), break down their experiences with the CrossFit Level 2 Certificate course, and why athletes and coaches alike should care about the philosophy and methodology with which CrossFit trains their coaches.

Shout out to Sam's L2 Seminar staff @dennismarshall, @yescoachjenn and @larry_j_thomas at @crossfitgardencity!

@crossfittraining @crossfit @crossfitgames #crossfit #sports #exercise #health #movement #crossfitcoach #agoq #clean #fitness #ItAllStartsHere #CrossFitOpen #CrossFit #CrossFitCommunity @CrossFitAffiliates #supportyourlocalbox #crossfitaffiliate #personalizedfitness

S05E58 REVIEW OF THE CROSSFIT L2 TRAINING COURSE

[00:35:54] David Syvertsen: All right. Welcome back to the Herd Fit podcast. I'm coach David Syvertsen. I'm here with Dr. and coach Sam Rhee. We are actually here with is it official yet? Did you pass your test? I did pass it. Okay, so we am here with level two coach. Dr. Sam Marie. You can't fail that test. Oh, really? Okay. No. Oh really?

Is that true? Okay,

[00:36:10] Sam Rhee: sweet. You just keep it's like the judges' course. You just keep taking

[00:36:13] David Syvertsen: it over and over again. Got it. Got it. Sweet. All right. Don't tell anybody that all right. So Sam just took his level two. He took it upon himself to sign up for register for the level two certification in CrossFit there's level one, level two level three, level four.

And I would say I don't have the number. My random guess is about 25. To 27% are level two. And I think there's only one to 2% of coaches that are level three, level four. And the level two, basically level one certification is you have to have it to a open up a gym and also B to start car start.

Coaching CrossFit. And it's basically what it's CrossFit. That's what level one is you go over every single movement. You go over methodology, you go over a little bit of nutrition, level two is much more intense. And it's really about how do you coach. You could make the argument that to coach CrossFit, you should get a level two.

I don't think that, but you could make that argument and that is where you start. You get really critiqued on how well you coach, how well you run a class. You talk about programming there. Sam. Quick feedback or overview, and then we'll dive in a little bit more specifically. How was the L two?

[00:37:22] Sam Rhee: In a word? It was excellent. Okay. Yeah. Where was it? It was in Minola New York. What at CrossFit garden city one or two days? It was two days. It's a Saturday and Sunday,

[00:37:31] David Syvertsen: nine to five. And so it's a nine to five. So you are looking at 16 hours over the course of two days. Did you come home in between?

I drove home.

[00:37:38] Sam Rhee: It's like an hour and 15

[00:37:39] David Syvertsen: minutes. Okay. So you didn't like to stay in a hotel or anything? No. So that is you, the, these the way these things run, how many people did you have that were there? 17. 17 people, how many instructors three. So they, they will tell you they will pick how many instructors are there that work for CrossFit.

This is the CrossFit seminar staff. They're the superstar coaches of the CrossFit world that teach these and how many people attending for their L two will dictate how many people are teaching. And that's a pretty standard size group. Mm-hmm around 17 and three seminar coaches. What were your key takeaways on those three coaches?

And did you see a huge separation between what you've seen at CrossFit gym, people coaching and those guys

[00:38:25] Sam Rhee: huge separation? Absolutely. Mm-hmm these guys are the template. They are the coaches coach. They're the ones that yep. Espouse the most classic, fundamental tenants of CrossFit. They are the model upon which everything else is based on they're the bar setters.

They are the standard setters.

[00:38:44] David Syvertsen: Yeah. I mean, if you go to a cross the gym anywhere and you just find a coach, they might be terrible. They might be great. They might be in the middle. Right. These guys. There's no question that they're top, top shelf, top shelf. It's a very, very demanding group too.

I've, I've heard podcasts, Austin, James, Joey dill. Good friend of ours is gonna be on here on the podcast at some point where they get so much constructive criticism they give and get so much of it. So's podcast with Dave cashier, they even talked about that, that culture that's within that group, they're called the red shirts.

They criticize each other constructively nonstop. And that's part of, one of the key takeaways that you probably had is Sam's a pretty good coach. He's been coaching for a few years, has a decent amount of experience, pretty demanding gym, not necessarily from me, but just, it's a bar that has a high expectation that if you're a bad coach, you're gonna get exposed here in my opinion.

All right. And I think that. That initial pressure. When I took my L two, a couple years ago, that was like the first surprise to me was within like 15 minutes. I was like, oh boy, I'm going to get roasted here. How many situations? And what was maybe one of your more specific situations where you of got a lot of constructive criticism, but at the time you felt like you were getting roasted.

[00:39:59] Sam Rhee: They were nice. I know in the past they've been really brutal at these L two S mm-hmm and I have to say that they are. They are kind yeah. When they are roasting you. Yeah. Oh yeah.

[00:40:09] David Syvertsen: So I'm not coming across as like roasted, like you're, you know, you suck yeah. Your football coach in high school who just like yelled at you for every little thing.

When I say roasted, just like really showing you what you're doing wrong and telling you what you're doing wrong in the moment

[00:40:21] Sam Rhee: in front of other people. Absolutely. So part of it is. about evaluating your coaching. Yeah. And one of the situations, which is pretty typical, and this was the second day.

Yeah. So I had time to prepare. Yep. They have the nine fundamental movements, which you did learn in L one. Yep. You know, the shoulder, press push, press, push jerk, dead deadlift, all those movements. Yep. The nine you picked one and you had to coach it to a small group, like five people mm-hmm and you had already done this on an individual basis on day one.

So you have plenty of time to prepare and know what you're gonna do. And they've already taught you a bunch of things, right? So you think, you know what you're, you've learned some stuff, even if you didn't know anything before day one, and you're

[00:41:06] David Syvertsen: coaching people that know CrossFit

[00:41:08] Sam Rhee: pretty well. They know CrossFit.

These are your fellow classmates. Yeah. And. I chose the simplest movement that I could think of, which was the strict press, the shoulder press, because I was like, I don't have to teach any push jerking or,

[00:41:19] David Syvertsen: or squatting kept extension.

[00:41:21] Sam Rhee: Yeah. Nothing. It's just like, it's just your arms. Right. and I

[00:41:24] David Syvertsen: got destroyed

[00:41:25] Sam Rhee: I got destroyed.

My three coaches the seminar staff were Uh, Dennis Marshall and uh, his spouse Jennifer Hunter. Marshall. Yep. Both of them own CrossFit, garden city. And then Larry Thomas who's outta Boston. He owns two boxes up there. He ran with the CrossFit Reebok crew for a real long time.

Yep.

[00:41:41] David Syvertsen: So, you know, mall both know them while.

[00:41:44] Sam Rhee: Yep. Yeah. So I'd sit there and I'm, I'm coaching and I have my whole thing laid out and I do it and I'm like, okay, I'm doing it. I I'm showing everyone and up and, doing the demo and all that. And he is like about halfway through, maybe he's like, okay, I've heard enough.

Okay. And you know, it's funny because the coach, the day before on my feedback initially review all the points of performance and I got crushed, cuz I did not do any points of performance at all on the strict press. I ran through it the night before. I was like, how many points of performance are there?

You know? Okay. Lumbar curve, right? Yeah. When you're standing. Heels down, obviously on a strict press, you know, bar frontal plane, which is basically above your head, not forward or not back full range of motion, active shoulders. Right. Mm-hmm and. Did not realize how crap my teaching was. And, and not only that evaluating and looking and finding fault.

Yeah. That's tough. And, and for the simplest movement. Yep. And Larry broke it all down for me. And I was like, did you check for this? Did you check for this? Did you check for this? Yeah. It's like, Nope, Nope, Nope. Nope. I thought, I mean, I was like,

[00:42:56] David Syvertsen: Nope, like being humble,

[00:42:58] Sam Rhee: humbled in a good way. Did you mention this?

You mentioned this, but did you check for it? Nope. And so at that point I was like, whoa. Yep. Like I got. Now, I know what, I don't know. This is bringing back

[00:43:07] David Syvertsen: like nightmares is my, my level two, a couple years ago. Yeah. So that was, that was a

[00:43:11] Sam Rhee: definite teaching

[00:43:12] David Syvertsen: moment there. Yeah. So now like reflect a little bit on this.

Like you now see the purpose from it because you're, you're removed from the whole weekend. You're, you know, in the comfort of your own gym at the podcast table in the moment, do you start to feel. All right. I need to improve this for X, Y, and Z, or is it all right? There's a little bit too much analysis.

Like I'm fine. The way I do it,

[00:43:33] Sam Rhee: The first thing is, is that it's like everything else. You have to be good at every, at it in order to throw away the things that you're not good at. Right. Right. So, you know, it's like every other, I'm trying to analogize it to something else, but if you're a painter, if you look at Jackson poll just looks like fucking paint, throwing up on the wall.

Yeah. And you think you can do it. Yeah. You know, maybe there's a specific order in which you do. Like, you have to know what you're doing in order to make it like, to know that maybe that's it's professional to be professional. Yeah. And so do you need to coach exactly the way the seminar staff coach? No.

Right. Like there are subtleties in which they are pointing out. Mm-hmm . In, or that you don't necessarily need to point out mm-hmm on the other hand, if you can't even triage. Yeah. What it is that you're looking for and if you don't look for it and if you're not looking for it yeah. And identifying and be like, okay, that's not important, but the hip extension's more important.

Right? Like then what's the point. Yeah. You're missing all of it. Yep. So, no, you don't have to coach exactly the way you do, but you need to know what you're seeing mm-hmm and then the deciding what it is that you're going to to coach.

[00:44:44] David Syvertsen: Yeah. And that, that, that's a great way of putting it. And that's where there's, I think experience of a coach means so much.

And I do think like in time, because again, there's so many movements and so many different people and situations and workouts and CrossFit, that the experience that accrue over the years, it really does mean something. But only if that coach has, you know, like if you're across a coach for six, seven years and you're not looking for stuff, you're not really thinking critically, and you're not being humble about the fact that like you just don't know at all, that really can impede your progress as a coach.

But if you are humble about it and you can take constructive criticism and you do look for all these things and you are trying to enrich, you know, your own understanding of CrossFit, methodology and movement and cues and people psychology. Right. You really can become like a better and better and better coach over time.

[00:45:35] Sam Rhee: It's about the fundamentals. Yeah. Most everything that you break down in life, if you. Do the UN the common uncommonly. Well, right. Virtuosity. Yeah, virtuosity. If you don't even know what the points of, like, if I don't even know the points of performance for something like that, mm-hmm , how can I even say it's important or not important in a particular athlete?

Yep. You know, if I'm not knowing that their heels need to be down and maybe on that strict presser pushing up with, or they're not keeping their midline stabilized. Yep. Then how do I even know what it is that I'm looking for? Yeah. And how can you help and how can I help? And the other thing is is that there are some basic teaching principles.

I mean, if you're a really good teacher, you probably know some of the things that they teach. It's the fundamental stuff. Tell, like I like half the class, when we first started in small group in there, we would just be like, okay, do a push jerk. And. And we wouldn't actually show what a push jerk is. Right.

Or we wouldn't actually say, okay, I'm, we're learning push jerk today. Yeah. You know, all right. Do the push jerk and let's take a look at it. Mm. You know, queuing people, just the simple stuff to guide people. And it's the most fundamental things I know. Yeah. And, I could only think as we were going through all this, the seminar staff must be like, We are teaching idiots every weekend.

these guys are so

[00:46:52] David Syvertsen: stupid. I give them credit. I've always felt like that's gotta be a really hard thing to do. I mean, I apparently yes, hard, but you, you know, they're so passionate about it, but they do the same thing every

[00:47:01] Sam Rhee: weekend and the same dumb mistakes are being made every weekend. We're not reading the manuals, we're not learning the fundamentals.

We're not, incorporating this stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And so the fact that they're not sitting there being. Yo dumb ass. read what you're supposed to learn. Yeah. Is keep it fresh. Yeah. Keep right. Is, is, and the fact that they're enthusiastic and they're giving us the feedback over and over and over and over again, you know, I really am very impressed.

And then the other thing is, and then you start to see the stuff that they see that is critical, for example, and this is on me as an athlete, and then I'm starting to see it in others. Is the hip extension. So I'm, I know you see it in me and you said it to me a million times. I heard you as they were telling me.

Yeah. In terms of fully extend the fully extending the hips,

[00:47:48] David Syvertsen: don't start to extend the hips and then

[00:47:50] Sam Rhee: go try to catch the bar. Right. And then catch the bar. Don't start with the arms before I'm fully up. Yeah. And I wasn't looking for it in my athletes and I wasn't doing it in my, in my movements.

Yeah. And the key with them is that even on really fast athletes, they can see it. Yeah. And they have little cues and tips that they see, but it's also repetition. Right. And looking for it. For example, one of the tips they gave me is, is that when you see someone squat set up on the bar, there's a triangle where their arm.

Leg and body is right. Okay. When they're squat. Got it. And then when they stand up that triangle disappears mm-hmm . If they start pulling with their arms before they're fully extended, you'll still see that, that space in between. Got it. Their, oh, that's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. So they're like, wait for that.

You gotta see if that triangle disappears. Okay. Before they start pulling. Okay. And, and moving their arms. And I said, oh, well, that helps.

[00:48:45] David Syvertsen: Stuff like that. Yeah. That's a nice, like objective thing to look for. Right. They're like look for the triangle because it is, it can be hard to coach sometimes and look for hip extension because it's so fast, so fast.

It's a millisecond, it's a millisecond. So if you can see something objective, Hey, I see a triangle. I don't, it could cut that out a

[00:48:59] Sam Rhee: little bit. Right. And so. These guys have more knowledge in their pinky than, than I do in my, like, and I know it's gonna, it would take years and years, but that's the good thing about an L two.

Is there a couple things I learned that and this was actually kind of bad for my first Wednesday class when I started. Yeah. One of the things that they said is, and one of the feedback is like, you know, you just say good job. Yeah. What the F does. Good job mean to an athlete, good job.

If you're gonna give either correction. Or praise make it specific. Yeah. And so I remember that. We, the Wednesday it wasn't really technically hard. It was like burpees and a floor press. Yeah. And hollow rock and double hollow rocks and double. Yeah. So I'm trying to get compliments about floor press and I'm good full extension on the plate. Yeah. Way to touch your chest and thighs on the burpees to the ground. Yeah. I felt like a, like an idiot saying it. Yeah. But I wanted to practice it anyway. No, I mean,

[00:49:53] David Syvertsen: honestly, I think, I do think that's gonna mean more on a simple workout like that to someone that just started, you know, like we, you know, we have a lot of new people right now, but you have this Wednesday, you have running Keta bells and burpees too.

Like that's, well, this is gonna air in a few weeks of mind,

[00:50:06] Sam Rhee: but you know, it's like way to keep that core tight on the hollow rocks. Like, but you know what? I don't care if I, if I sound stupid. Yeah. I'm just gonna keep practicing

[00:50:15] David Syvertsen: it. Yeah, no, it's a good skill to practice. And I, I do remember that cause I do that all the time.

I'm notorious for that. So one of my biggest weaknesses and is it a bad thing? I don't, I don't think so, but it is a shortcoming like nice work. Awesome. Good work. That look great. That look great. It that doesn't help them other than it just makes someone feel good. Right. You know, is it physically, technically gonna help them?

That's one. I want to ask you

[00:50:36] Sam Rhee: next, but keep going. Yeah. So, the other thing is, is Mike verbal queuing needed to be better. Sometimes I'm super wordy when I try to help someone same and they're just like chest up knees forward, hips up, the other thing is, and I, I didn't do this, but I saw another classmate do it is do the same cue over and over again.

If it's not working saying, you know, keep your knees back. No, no, no. Keep your knees back. Yeah. Back. Yeah, no back. And then they're like, no, that's not helping. It's not working. It's not working like figure out something else to do.

[00:51:10] David Syvertsen: Coaches have to find different ways to say

[00:51:11] Sam Rhee: the same thing.

Right. So it's, you know, this is obvious stuff. It's not rocket science. Right. But it is stuff that you forget about when, when you're in the middle of it.

[00:51:19] David Syvertsen: Yep. Now a lot of this, this critiquing and coaching and education. It's very technical. How, how do you become a better technical coach with cues and, and all, and what you're looking for?

Do they go into at. The emotions of a human being and, and the subjective part of coaching, like relationship building trust building, try to play to someone's attitude and self-esteem, and, and when you have a room full of people that are all over the place with their confidence levels, do they touch on that at all?

[00:51:51] Sam Rhee: They do. One of the things that they did do is, is talk about enhancing the group experience mm-hmm . One of the things they did was we did a workout. And one of the seminar staff took us through the whole workout. They explained what their lesson plan was, how they were gonna do it. And then they ran us through it.

And the workout itself not that it really mattered was three rounds 30 dumbbell snatches, 20 toes to bar 15 burpees over dumbbell. Okay. Okay. And so Larry, Thomas Good workout. Yeah, it was, it was tough. Tough. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so, so he, they do the things that you. Do they talk about the programming a little bit.

Yep. I mean before the actual thing and they said you, as if you are handed this programming as a coach, you should estimate how long this is gonna take mm-hmm , which is what all athletes really should do. Right? Yeah. It's like, okay. So how long is this gonna be? Yeah. Somewhere between nine and minutes for your best athletes.

13 minutes for your slow athletes. Yeah. So now you know how much time you can allocate, you know, so there's lesson planning involved, right. And so they talk about all of that. Yeah. Then they talk about the general warm. and then the specific warmup. Yep. They don't stretch actually. Yep.

Which I, I found interesting. Mm-hmm and then they go through the workout and afterwards they asked us questions and one of the questions was how many people got specific cues or feedback from Larry? Everyone. Yeah. And not only that, but multiple, like they said, you should shoot for somewhere up to about five.

They call it touches, which basically contacts ver

[00:53:13] David Syvertsen: yeah. Verbal or mostly verbal right. Contact. Right.

[00:53:16] Sam Rhee: With, with an. Each athlete. And we had 17 people in class and he was masterful at like, I mean, sometimes it was something really little or simple. Yeah. Yeah. But both heads touch. Yeah. Right,

[00:53:28] David Syvertsen: right. Yeah.

Exactly. Now, when they're talking to you, was it like, was he trying to always, was he always giving you something that you were doing wrong with your movement or was it. Sometimes araise a mix. It was

[00:53:37] Sam Rhee: a combination. So one of the things was my setup on my dumbbell snatches, like how I, my static start stance.

Yeah. And he actually remembered from my squad cleans before, like my hips weren't, you know, positioned high enough so that my leg, my knees could come back enough. Yeah. And he remembered that like, oh, you're doing that now. Good job. Yeah. Like, all right, cool. He, so that was cool. Yeah. That's cool. The other thing is, is they talk.

A coach's personality. Yeah. Right. So amplifying yourself being the big version of you. Yeah. And this was a funny one. I thought they said you should be the person that your dog thinks you are. . That's awesome. I was like, that's pretty cool. I was like, alright, that helps sort of solidify. What, what, what kind of personality I am

[00:54:18] David Syvertsen: now, now?

Is that more Right. Like specifically, is that more like your alpha or your you're like the playful per you're kind like the mix of like, what, what exactly would that mean to someone? I don't know. What did it mean to you? Like what, well, like what, how did you see yourself when you were like all, what would my

[00:54:35] 2022_0619_1055: dog

[00:54:35] Sam Rhee: think of me?

It's basically the more upbeat. Like, like play, play happier version of me. Yeah. Okay. Like, you know, like I'm not gonna sit there and yell at my dog. I'm not gonna grow like frown at my dog. I'm gonna be like, Hey, right, right.

[00:54:48] David Syvertsen: Cuddly, but also demanding.

[00:54:49] Sam Rhee: Right. That version of me. And then they also basically said, which I thought we do a good job here at bison.

And they did mention care and empathy. Yep. And service it. You are, you, you don't the knowledge and, and you could have the most knowledge and the most teaching skills available to you as a coach. But if you don't care, mm-hmm , if you don't have a passion for service. forget it. Yeah. Agreed. And they emphasized that.

And that resonated strongly because that gives me hope because listen, I may not have the most knowledge, you know, and even within bison, like I look, it also gave me a new perspective at, with the coaches at bison. Got it. And I told de tore this. And honestly, he, it. It runs the closest to seminar staff model coaching.

Completely agree than anyone else here. Completely agree. And, and that is great. Yep. And before I was like, Hmm he's, is picking on little things or this and that. And I was like, oh, now I know why he does those things. Yeah. Yeah. And those are good things to

[00:55:51] David Syvertsen: do. Yeah. Yeah. Mike is as. He's cross a truther, not, not, not in the way that we talked about in this Castro Savan conversation.

He's so old school in such a good way. I actually wanna say he interned on seminar staff at some point.

[00:56:04] Sam Rhee: I think it reflects. Yeah. So what, what was your thought and how did okay. But it's also hard to incorporate L two stuff into your own daily flow, like unique flow.

[00:56:14] David Syvertsen: Yeah. And like, that's why that you have to, so what

[00:56:15] Sam Rhee: did you do when you, when you did

[00:56:16] David Syvertsen: that?

I mean, it did. I remember mine very well. I think it was 2019. Yeah. That I did mine. And where was it? New York city. I forget the name of the gym. Hell's kitchen. CrossFit. Hell's kitchen. Yeah. And Joey dill. Oh, he was, your staff was one of the staff members actually stayed in the hotel with them. Oh, you did?

Yeah. Yeah. In the city. Did they party that time? They went out, but they Wait, did I? Yeah, we stayed with them. But I think it wasn't like a big party. I think it was like a dinner and a beer kind of thing. Okay. So, and it's funny, I remember what the workout that did. Yeah. Strict. I think it was muscles and shoulder press was cool.

Yeah. Ascending weights. And I think it was strict muscles because him and James Hobart just bang them out. I was like, yeah, I'll I'll, you know, I'll do that next time. But anyway, the, my biggest takeaway from that L two and what I tried to implement into the gym as a coach, not as a programmer, we can talk about the programming talk as well was you really do need to find different ways to say the same thing to different people.

And you need to have this blend of you need to be able to read people very well to see if they're taking in what you're saying. You should always take the responsibility on yourself that if they're not adjusting what you're telling them to adjust, you can't always say, oh, well, they're idiots.

They're not listening to me. It might be because you're not delivering it the right way. And like, that's one of the bigger things. I mean, I consider myself a humble person, but I got humbled coaching because I didn't go in there cocky at all. But I went in there and been like, I know how to do this. I know how to do this.

Blah, blah, blah. We're good. Let's skip over this and get to the programming talk. Right. Mm-hmm and it really did show me. Hey, the people that you're teaching your push, my movement was the push press was like, they all know it and you're not doing a good job correcting it. And that was like the eye-opening situation to me was I need to find different ways to say the same thing, rather than just saying, Hey, maybe another coach can help them when they go to that class.

And that was one of my biggest key takeaways. And I've tried to implement that into my coaching that if there's something I'm trying to fix movement wise with someone. And it's not clicking. I have backup option number two, backup option number three, instead of just saying, all right, well, they're not listening today.

And that that's one thing I tried to implement into my coaching is a lot. I also started changing my warmups a little bit after that. I remember we didn't stretch as well. We can talk about that a little bit. I still like to stretch. I like to stretch personally before I work out. I know a lot of people do too, but I did make my warmups more movement.

After my L two, that was when my warmups changed after I went there. And just understanding why they do certain things, getting people into movement patterns rather than just stretching patterns. I do think there's a value in both. I've always thought that and But let's what, what are your thoughts on that in regard to how they warmed you up?

Because again, they, for the people that don't know, you learn a lot, most of it's sitting and listening, but they do get you up and move a few times. And there are workouts that you do both days and they bring you through this whole circuit of warmup. Like you said, mm-hmm, . What were your thoughts on that whole process?

[00:59:10] Sam Rhee: I think, I think we do a, generally a good job at bison in terms of our warmup. I think the things that they want us to keep in mind as coaches is that your specific warmups can also be your scaled options, which we do all the time. Right? Yeah. Like knee raises for toes bar Tobar yep. Yep. Stuff like that, you know, practice the, the movement in your warmup.

Yeah. The

[00:59:29] David Syvertsen: tipping knock two birds out with one

[00:59:30] Sam Rhee: stone, right? Yeah. And, and we do a great job with that. The stretching. Yeah. So the stretching they don't do, and someone else asked about that. They say, can you incorporate stretching in your, in your wad or your warmup?

And they say, you can, if you want, if you allocate time. Yeah. And for me, that out, right. And for me personally, I feel like we should always have stretching. I love stretching in it. Mm-hmm , it's weird not to have

[00:59:53] David Syvertsen: stretching. And I always say this about stretching. It's not only about that workout. Like I just think stretching would be, should be part of your daily exercise regimen.

You know, like that. That's I tell my classes that sometime like, guys, like. This stretch, this stretch. Hey, just so you know, like it might help you today. It might not, but that's not the reason why we're stretching. It's a reason, you know, you should just always be stretching. Right. You know?

[01:00:15] Sam Rhee: I think in terms of that, part of it, I think.

It seemed very apropo to what we were doing at

[01:00:21] David Syvertsen: bison. Okay. Now, were you, do you see these coaches, like, you know, I look up to these red shirt coaches, right? Like I really tried to take in like, had Keith wet and sign. I had him for my level one, two, which is cool. Just seeing him five years later where, and he's a level four now guy, I just saw on Facebook that, you know, I try to, I try to take some of what they do and try to like, let it impact my coaching a little bit.

Like again, being humble and like just saying like, Hey, you don't know everything, try to fix things. do you ever, did you feel like that they were overly technical and not enough personable? You know, like, can that, is that a good thing? Is that a bad thing?

[01:00:54] Sam Rhee: To the extent that they got to know us for those two days.

Yeah. They were personable enough. Okay. I think everyone has their own, I think the big takeaway is everyone has their own coaching style. Yeah. Like,

[01:01:02] David Syvertsen: and it's okay to have a different one. Totally

[01:01:04] Sam Rhee: different. Yeah. Like Dennis is a little drier. Yep. Maybe a little more sarcastic. Yep. Funny. Yeah. Jen is just really charismatic rockstar.

Oh my God. She's so charismatic. I had her

[01:01:15] David Syvertsen: for

level one. She goes, she's beautiful. Yeah.

[01:01:17] Sam Rhee: She. You know, there's just huge smile. Yeah. Just the magnetism, like the things and the, you know, she says is just so funny and, just there's a presence about her. Yeah. Agreed. And Larry's just really low key.

I, I, you know, I think kind chill. Yeah. Very chill. Very knowledgeable. But approachable. Yeah. He's a very approachable kind of

[01:01:36] David Syvertsen: guy. I would love to know how they put the teams together. Like, do they really try to mix and match like personalities and, and body types and a, and athletic backgrounds?

Like, I would love to see if, if that's part of their process of putting teams together. I

[01:01:49] Sam Rhee: don't know. I, I felt like they were personable, you know, they have, they always work out during lunch. Yep. And

[01:01:55] David Syvertsen: yeah. Did you get to watch

[01:01:56] Sam Rhee: them? I did. Yeah. And one was like, A a row dumbbell workout, like lunges, push, press cleans.

And then another one was like a run and thruster workout. Yeah. Not super long.

[01:02:08] David Syvertsen: Now how fit are they?

[01:02:09] Sam Rhee: Would you say all of them are extremely fit. Yeah. That is a fit group actually. Yeah. Dennis actually made the games in the master's division a couple years ago. Jen is extremely like, if you've ever seen her

[01:02:20] David Syvertsen: back, she's sculpted.

Oh my gosh. Yeah. She's one of those people like muscles on muscles. Yes.

[01:02:24] Sam Rhee: Like amazing. Yeah. And Larry's just like a, you know, he doesn't have muscles bulging, but performance wise

[01:02:32] David Syvertsen: move well, move, move really well. Yeah. Because I, I I've been to seminars before. I think when I watch them work out and they're not.

Not all like fire breathers, like huge, strong do everything, but they move well. And like, I love seeing people that practice what they preach. That always means a lot to me. They have to,

[01:02:51] Sam Rhee: I, I feel like they could teach this with their eyes closed. Right. If you put them underwater upside down, they could still teach it.

Yeah. And write like. No, no cues, no memory aids, everything is written and, and coached and done. Literally they could be half drunk into it. I don't know. Maybe in the past they might have even.

[01:03:10] 2022_0619_1055: Yeah,

[01:03:11] David Syvertsen: that's possible.

[01:03:12] Sam Rhee: Like I heard stories. Oh yeah. Of the old days. Not, not now. Yeah. And in order for them to really do it, they have to believe it.

Yeah. I will say the one thing probably that. It's funny because they go off of a, a manual that's really old. Yep. It's like 10 years old or I don't know, 20 13, 15, 16. And there's so much in there that I'm gonna keep looking at. And they say that like, pull out the fundamentals until I know all the points of performance for a push press for a right.

You know, whatever. Like, and if I can rattle it off, at least at that point, I have a starting place. Yeah. But the nutrition part of it was that one, like the programming was not that big. Mm-hmm, the, you know, they basically just mentioned enough for you as a coach to be able to recognize, are these movements complimentary?

Are they different? Yes. Varying right. Heavy volume. That sort of stuff. Yeah. Listening to you over the years. Feel like I've gleaned at least as much, if not more from then what I read in this thing. Right. Hearing you talk about it, but then the second part with the nutrition was it was more psychology.

It wasn't really espousing. Okay. Greg Glassman's, you know, meat, vegetables, zone, diet, right. Or little, you know, little sugar, all that sort of stuff. It was really how do you get someone to change their behavior. Okay. And what are your thoughts on that? It was uh, An intro. Okay. And obviously, if you really care about trying to change someone's behavior, you can go down that rabbit hole.

Mm-hmm, very, you know, good things like, have them have little victories mastery, right. Over little steps mm-hmm and then that helps them with the big steps. Right. You know, give them verbal encouragement, give them other. You know, have models like other people in the gym who maybe lost 60 pounds too, and, use connect them.

Yeah. Connect them. And there's a lot of jargon, which I always hate cuz I'm, I've been in medicine and there's so many effing jargon and they always like to use certain terms. Yeah. And they, they're not any different in, in the CrossFit manual. Like if you wanna say self-efficacy fine, say self-efficacy or you could just use it like a better

[01:05:10] David Syvertsen: vocabulary.

So do you think there's some margin there that could be had just like improve the. The nutrition component of the weekend, nutrition is like such a, it's such a deep and diverse multiple direction topic,

[01:05:22] Sam Rhee: you know, I, or do you think they should exclude it? No. I mean, it's part of the manual and right.

They're not never not going to include it. Yeah. I think Jen's anecdotes were very. Helpful because, she actually has a huge life as a trainer outside of CrossFit. Right. You know, helping people. And and now they have a dedicated nutrition coach at CrossFit garden city. Okay. Uh, So they don't specifically do huge nutrition challenges and all that stuff.

Got it. Um, I feel like they could probably have dropped that part of it. Okay. But they never will. Just because it's, it's part of the L two. Yeah.

[01:05:55] David Syvertsen: It's yeah. It's hard. I would never get to a point where you ignore it. You know, I, I thought I walked away. That was my one. Someone asked me for a constructive criticism of it and I just thought there should be more time put on it.

I don't, again, don't have the solution for. But I just think there should be like, maybe like an hour, hour and a half designated to the nutrition. But what are they gonna say? That's the thing that like, who's your clientele, like the people that the, the Sam Ree at that thing, there's so many different levels of understanding.

Like you are, are very well educated, man. Like there's a lot, you know, that. Is like, you know, at the, you always have this information in your head because you have such a, an extensive background.

[01:06:29] Sam Rhee: Well, no, honestly my nutrition information came from all the freaking challenges. No. Oh, okay. Our, the wrong stuff and experimenting with paleo and macro stuff.

No, the stuff that I learned on myself. Yeah. Over the years at bison, right. Taught me a lot. Personal experience with nutrition. Okay. But that doesn't necessarily apply to everyone else in the room, the science of nutrition and, you know, listen, the science of nutrition is pretty complicated. It is. So I don't know what they could deal with in an hour.

That would be helpful for me. Yeah. Or I

[01:06:58] David Syvertsen: wonder if they would even bring back. I think they had it for a very short amount of time, like an actual nutrition seminar. Um, Like they have all these different

[01:07:05] Sam Rhee: seminars. Oh, they do. They, I think that's one of the courses you can take, you can

[01:07:08] David Syvertsen: take a nutrition

[01:07:09] Sam Rhee: seminar online.

I think, I don't know. I, they have so many courses online. Yeah. They, I actually signed up for a couple before the L two, like spot the flaw fundamentals, and I took, I did some of it. I'm gonna go back and look at more of it. There's a ton of stuff online. Yeah. Old journal stuff, mostly. Yeah.

That, that

[01:07:25] David Syvertsen: is worthwhile. The, the clientele that was with you. So the other coaches that were taking the L. What was the general feel for who they were that were they other coaches, affiliate owners high level athletes that were just trying to understand a little bit more. Who were they? And did you have, you know, in the nicest way possible, did you have a, a good feeling that they understood what they were doing?

[01:07:48] Sam Rhee: Did they have a good understanding of what they felt like they were doing? I would say in general, yes. I would say everyone who came got something positive away from it. Okay. There was a large range of different people. Yeah. So there was a granite games competitor. Okay. Justin hung. Cool. Who was from Boston?

Cool. So one of our wads was five by three squad cleans. Yeah. Five by three squad clean. Yeah. So his last round of three squad cleans 3 0 5 touch and go wow.

[01:08:11] David Syvertsen: Touch and go. Wow. Impressive. Like pretty, pretty fucking

[01:08:14] Sam Rhee: good. That's pretty cool. Yeah. And then Then we had new, relatively new affiliate owners.

Okay. Like there was a guy down in Staten island. Okay. Great guy. Kyle was you know, trying to get his whole crew together. Yep. And then there were just some affiliate, other affiliate owners and then just like coaches, like a lot of coaches, all varying levels of skill and ability. I would say most of them were actually pretty good.

There was no one that was awful. Awful. Okay. Like I asked Larry, like, have you had really he's like, yeah, we've had some like, yeah.

[01:08:43] David Syvertsen: So that, that was of what I, to bring up. I had a couple people that were in my group that were. In that category awful. And one of 'em was getting into an argument with, with one of our, with James Hobart.

Oh yeah. About programming and like what stimulus actually means. And you know, that that's, I do get discouraged sometimes and that there are people out there coaching and owning gyms that, you know, think for, should take 12 minutes because it's RX and that's where. I, I don't know if CrossFit can do this where it is a little bit harder to, or you do a bigger separation between trying to really find the cream of the crop gyms and coaches, you know, like you can, if you have some money, you'll get your oh one, you can open up a gym.

And CrossFit has always said cream will rise to the top. Yes. You know, so if you are a bad coach, it's eventually there are good gyms now, pretty much everywhere. And if you run a bad gym, it's eventually gonna crumble or close. And for a lot, there's a lot of reasons you could have a bad gym. And one of them, my, my biggest thing is coaching.

Like I think the coaching's gotta is gonna run the ship. So I, I just wanted to get your feedback on that. Where there anyone there. And do you think the L two teaches enough or is challenging enough or could there be another angle to this and get people to become a better coach before they go out and coach the.

[01:10:02] Sam Rhee: Well, the first thing is, is that you're absolutely right. There's such a wide variety of quality gyms and staff out there for CrossFit, but that's by design and by intent, the barrier of entry is very, very low. You don't even need an L two. You can have an L one. Yeah. Which, honestly, how many people with Justin L one are fully, like, would you trust your kid to go train with at, at a CrossFit gym?

Like one or 2%? Yeah. Like very few. Yeah. But eventually, like you said, the, the good ones survive and the bad ones die and, and sooner or later you'll you'll have really good ones just by sheer force of elimination.

[01:10:38] David Syvertsen: Do you think that there's something else that should be added to the L two or requirement to be considered an L two coach that someone should have before they can go call themselves

[01:10:47] Sam Rhee: an L two coach?

Right. If they had actual a real test that I would've. Failed mm-hmm the stakes would've been higher. Yeah. And I would've tried a lot harder probably. Yep. Okay. The, when they told us that first morning, the first hour that, you know, we're gonna go through all of this, you will take an online assessment course at the end, but you can't fail it.

Yeah. And we're just here to make you a better coach just for the record.

[01:11:11] David Syvertsen: My L two, we didn't have to take a test at all. It was just go. Okay. Yeah.

[01:11:14] Sam Rhee: And so. With that I didn't study as hard as I could have. Right. I didn't prepare as well as I could have. And I probably should have, because I was paying a thousand dollars and it was two days of my life.

Yeah. That being said, I'm sort of lazy sometimes. And, and who wants to sit there and read this thing and, and cover it when you, if you don't have to, right. When they're gonna

[01:11:34] David Syvertsen: teach it to you, supposedly that's just been a conversation I've had with other coaches from other gyms is, you know, they, they think that it should be a little bit harder to become.

Or uphold your status as a coach. And like, I agree and, and disagree. Like, I don't think like it's tough. I just, I just like talking about it. I like hearing other peoples all time. Well,

[01:11:51] Sam Rhee: the thing is, is just taking this alone. Did not suddenly make me an awesome coach.

[01:11:55] David Syvertsen: Yeah. If you're a good test taker.

Right.

[01:11:57] Sam Rhee: You know, and the other thing is, is that what it did was it jump started me. So for the foreseeable future. I'm going to be looking at the points that I didn't know. Yeah. Layer them in constantly. Yep. And constantly think about what I

[01:12:10] David Syvertsen: did. I remember exactly telling Ashley this once my L two was over, I was on the phone with her saying, Hey, we're leaving the city.

You know, I'll be home an hour. And I remember, so I can't wait to coach this week. Like it just kind of like motivated me and opened my eyes a little bit to like, wow, there's so much I can do to become a better coach.

[01:12:26] Sam Rhee: Right. And I'm gonna continue to become a better coach just because I will do that. I'm gonna go back and look at this, and this is

[01:12:33] David Syvertsen: why you did it.

Right. You did becoming a coach. Like you don't, it's not like you're gonna go home and like put like Sam Rhee, cross L two coach on your Instagram, like right. You know, that's not why you do it. It's not a status thing. Like you did it for self-improvement. I think everyone should know that. Yeah.

[01:12:45] Sam Rhee: I listen. I know I'm not the best coach.

I might be the 10th or 12th best coach at our gym. And so for me to, how many coaches do we have 12 now? Okay. So I might be the 12th best coach at our gym seriously. Well, I

[01:12:58] David Syvertsen: mean, Nick starts Thursday night as, as a real CrossFit coach this Thursday night, 6, 15, 17. So just because he's new, he's 12.

All right. So maybe you're 11.

[01:13:06] Sam Rhee: No, I can't not just because of seniority. I actually wanna be. So for me, it was. How, how can I be a better coach mm-hmm and this is helping me continue that process. I was, I'm a better coach before I took the L two than I was a year ago. Cool. I will now accelerate that process.

I hope and continue to become better. Yeah. I will never be as good as some of these coaches that I've seen. Mm-hmm just because that's their job. That's their life and their, they, they, some of them like, Jen just have a talent for it. Yeah, I agree. But I can try to be the best coach that I can be. Mm-hmm and you know, what's exciting to me is that I wanna see my athletes get better.

Yeah. Like if I, if I spend an hour with them, I should be able to make them better. Yeah. In a, more efficient way. Yeah, absolutely. One of the things I did take away is I can be everyone's friend. Yep. And. I know I might piss some people off . Yep, yep. And that's okay. Yeah, that's definitely okay.

I might make a bunch of mistakes and not exactly execute this to form. Like they say, emphasize the point of performance and I might be yelling at someone for something so stupid because I'm not even really seeing the forest for the trees. Remember

[01:14:11] David Syvertsen: the word you told me what it said. Be relentless with it.

Yes. Like just relentless with how, like how hard you're trying to coach someone, even if it looks like you. Even from the outside or the athletes, like, yo stop telling me to squat lower, like not do squat deeper, bro, like,

[01:14:25] Sam Rhee: right. Yeah, exactly. And, and at the end of the day, if I care about that athlete and I want them to do better.

Yeah. If, if they're not, if I'm not their best friend at the end of the class, I'm okay with that. Yeah.

[01:14:37] David Syvertsen: Yep. I've always said, I've always told our coaches that we have all our, their backs with this stuff. If you are really coaching someone hard and they get pissed off to the point that they leave the gym, you know, because they'll, you're, they're, you're just coaching them to the point like, Hey, you gotta squat deeper.

Hey, you gotta hit standards unless they're injured, which most cases they're not and they don't do it and they get pissed off. Then that's on them. You know, I don't, I support our coaches in that they're in that I don't think I

[01:15:00] Sam Rhee: will ever get to that point, but , but, but I do really wanna focus on making athletes better, but you know what, they also mentioned about the group experience.

Yeah. And, really getting to know your athletes. Mm-hmm . And I think that's the one thing that we do do well at, at bison. When I see the coaches is they know they're athletes. Yeah. You, I mean, you particularly know every athlete, but even I'll take a Chris Tafaro class every once in a while.

Yeah. And he remembers me, he knows what I'm doing. Yep. You know, I agree. Same with Ash. Like these guys, the

[01:15:29] David Syvertsen: conversations our coaches have with each other about the athletes in the gym. It's, it's amazing. Like if you really sit back and watch, like we do, we have, I think to be a good coach, you have to have that kind of like visual memory was with like how people move.

and also have the personable side to understand how they act. Mm-hmm I think our coaches do that really well here.

[01:15:45] Sam Rhee: I ask you all the time, Hey, you know, this guy or that girl, like, you know, this woman, like, have you seen? And you're like, yeah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, yep. Yep.

[01:15:53] David Syvertsen: Snap your fingers

[01:15:54] Sam Rhee: right there.

Yeah. Right. So it did a couple things. It made me show myself how to become a better coach. It also showed me. Actually how good our coaches are. Okay. I am very, very, very impressed with all our coaches and it, also lets me look at all the coaching that I see at our gym and assess it and take away points from them in a framework that now I have.

Yeah, that's cool. And, it, like you said, it makes me excited to be coaching. Yeah. That's awesome.

[01:16:18] David Syvertsen: Last question. Do you recommend this course for all CrossFit coaches, all CrossFit coaches get the L one. Do you think all of them should get just your opinion, not telling you what, like what telling, ask me to tell people what to do.

Do you think all CrossFit coaches should get their L two?

[01:16:35] Sam Rhee: My short answer would be, yes. Okay. Leave

[01:16:38] David Syvertsen: it at that. Let, let

[01:16:39] Sam Rhee: them think about it. how many of our coaches have the L two? I think five. Okay. Okay. I mean, listen, the long answer is way more nuanced because there's so many factors involved.

No, there's so many factors and I will never tell anyone that they're not a, like, we have L one certified coaches that are awesome coaches, outstanding coaches, outstanding top shell. Yes. And

[01:17:01] David Syvertsen: so it's not even about them becoming a better coach. You know, like I think the coaches that do have an L one both in this gym and other gyms, I didn't know that don't have the L two they're awesome coaches.

They're always gonna be awesome coaches. And if that you wanna end the conversation there, end the conversation there for their own good. Just for their own sake. Yes. I think the L two would help them all out everyone. Yep. Everyone. Cool. All right. Thanks Sam. See you guys next time.