S05E136 No RX, No Scaled: The Impact of a Levels System
What if there was no RX or Scaled workouts in CrossFit? Coaches David Syvertsen @davesy85 and Sam Rhee @bergencosmetic discuss instituting a Levels System at @crossfitbison - a potential game-changer for athletes and coaches.
We delve into the nuances of workout prescriptions, unraveling the complexities of scaling, and challenge perceptions on Rx categories, and offer another way to personalize your fitness journey.
What did it take for Coach Syvertsen to program Levels System? We share firsthand experiences of the trials and triumphs it brings, acknowledging the potential confusion yet celebrating the clarity it offers to athletes' progress. Could a nuanced Levels system guide you to smarter, more effective training decisions?
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S05E136 No RX, No Scaled: The Impact of a Levels System
TRANSCRIPT
David Syvertsen
Host
00:05
Hey everybody, welcome to the Herd Fit Podcast with Sam Rhee and and myself, coach David Syvertsen. His podcast is aimed at helping anyone and everyone looking to enhance their healthy lifestyle through fitness, nutrition and, most importantly, mindset. Alright, welcome back to the Herd Fit Podcast. I'm Coach David Silverson. I'm here with my co-host, dr and Coach Samri. We are going to dive into a topic today, right away. That is something that is very relevant to what we've discussed several times. We've done an actual episode on Rx for scale. This actual conversation comes up on a near weekly basis, whether it's banter in the gym, in this podcast room with the coaches, and sometimes I feel like it's not enough. This is a hill I will die on.
00:54
I think every workout and cross-it should have a prescription with weights, movements, volume, loads, times. To just throw movements and say, hey, go pick your own weight every single day, go pick your volume every single day. It just wouldn't be cross-fit if that's what it was. In the effort to make everything better in time, we never want to settle. I've been thinking about this for well over a year, about getting away from just Rx and just scaled. The cross-it open has done this. When I started, there was just Rx. Here's the workout guys Can't do it. Okay, here's the workout. There's no scaled. And then they brought in a scale division about five years into it, six years into it, and now there's foundations. So cross-fit is kind of doing this with the open and I've always used cross-fit and the way they prescribe workouts, especially in the open, to use as a barometer for what we're doing. We're trying to match the open caliber workouts and maybe in some cases quarterfinal.
01:56
But I think there's something left to do. I think it's not good enough and I don't have the solution yet. And, like any problem that comes up, you come up with potential solutions and you try it out. So cross-fit bison is trying something January, february, once, twice a week, once or twice a week, and it's called the Levels System. I mean there's specific workouts that have Level 1, level 2, etc. And we'll talk into how many levels there can be. Complicated, yes, complex, yes, new. Yes, uncomfortable for some, yes, confusing. Absolutely Don't fix. What isn't broken is the thought that keeps coming into my head. Have our X scale down from there. Sam, this relates to something we've disagreed on in the past Having a master's RX, having age group RX. They're very, very much against that idea and does this approach, that conversation, or because it's not doing with age, it makes a little bit more sense.
Sam Rhee
Host
02:55
It makes more sense because it's not I don't want to say discriminating, but it's not stratifying people according to some criteria. So that would be the equivalent of saying if you weigh 150 pounds plus, you got to do it this way. If you're under 150 pounds, use it this way. Like, why would you do that? That makes no sense. Same with age. We have some 35 plus athletes that are crushing the under 35. So why would you use an arbitrary number of age to figure out who's doing what?
03:32
Now, that being said, once I hit 55, am I going to jump for joy because I could do better in the open? Absolutely I will, and I'll take it because that's the way they set it up. But for an everyday evaluation of myself, I don't like that age. Masters, rx Now levels, and we'll talk about this too, because I have now we've done a couple levels workouts, at least one, and I have some mixed feelings about it. And I want to talk about one of the workouts and sort of where, like, how you stratified it, what you thought about it, and then my experience with it, and then also looking at the whiteboard, because it really means a different way to look at the whiteboard more than anything else, because if there wasn't the level system I might have scaled the workout to this, that or the other thing. But depending on the workout, but I think the levels, it has some pluses and minuses in it and I think that it was so interesting to me looking at the whiteboard that first day.
David Syvertsen
Host
04:34
So let's introduce the actual concept behind the level system. This actually idea, I want to say, was probably first put into my head during the LaRong challenges. If you remember back to these January February pre reset challenges that our gym did, they released a workout every Monday for the entire challenge. Like there was five or six of these, there wasn't just one, and each one of them had different levels and it was basically RX plus RX and scaled, and you essentially had to pick one of those, but then we would have to modify a couple things for a couple of people. So, and back then, level three was the hardest. I'm going to tell us why we're doing it this way. Level one is the hardest way of doing a workout here and because I'm not sure how many levels there should be. So if you know this week, you know this episode is going to come out after we did a workout this last Tuesday that had hang cleans, sit ups and jump rope, and level one was the hardest. It had weights that I don't know. Maybe three to 5% of our gym can move in a workout. Then you have level two, which is equivalent to what a normal bison RX would be. Level three would be a little bit easier. But now and that's where I was going to end it where you have three levels and then you have skilled, hey, I couldn't do any of those. I had to scale or I had to mix and match them. But now, because I did this with the bison benchmark workout, the reset workout, I created five levels where I think 95% of our gym could pick one of those levels, and you're going down to really lightweight, empty barbell caliber weights, and, because of our experience and how many people we see work out on a daily basis, I have a very good feeling that everyone in our gym can can hit one of these levels. And, in time, though, you can add levels. If it's, hey, we need something easier, let's add level five, let's let's add level six. So that's why I'm starting with.
06:28
Level one is by far the hardest level, and it's a little bit harder than what we're normally used to going. If you looked at our bison program from the outside, you would say pretty hard programming, not the hardest We've seen, the hardest, mayhem, proven right. And then level two would be where we bison arches, bison, sorry, level one is harder than that, all right, and I would say gotta be careful for saying this. It would be more for the people that are competing or trying to compete at the highest level Quarterfinals, semifinals, maybe even the games. Right, that's who that programming is for. Level two would be hey, I'm really fit, I can pretty much do everything across it. I'm never going to have to scale, work out in the open. I could. I'm going to make quarterfinals. I'm level two all day, every day.
07:16
Level three would be for those that have been bison for a long time hey, what was bison arcs like six, seven years ago? And you've been here long enough that you would know that contrast between now and then. Some of you guys don't know. But it's a little lighter, a little less volume, a little bit less complexity. Still not easy by any means. But then you start going down to level four, level five At some point it's got to end, but you're also trying to keep this inclusive. Sam, when you start hearing level one, level two harder, easier, is this too complex?
Sam Rhee
Host
07:46
It's not for the athletes. I would say when you look at it, because you can choose where it actually helps the athletes on one level, Because you can look at it and be like, oh, I can do all of those things. When you stratify it like that, it does take some time, if you're just arc scale, to figure out what your scaled is Right. This helps you if you typically scale workouts where you should go with it as a programmer. How much extra time does it take to put together a workout with levels versus arc scale?
David Syvertsen
Host
08:16
Not as much. Other people have offered advice and guidance on with me on this and they said it's going to be too much work for you. It would be a lot of upfront work because essentially I would just take all of the weights, just put them to a spreadsheet and say when level two is this, level one is this. Basically what I would do is program level two because that's what bison RX would be, and then I would just say, all right, when I see this weight, level one's got to be this, level two's got to be that, level three's got to be that, all right. And like that would be some upfront work. But I already have some stuff on my computer, on a spreadsheet that makes that process a little bit easier. So it wouldn't be a lot of upfront work.
08:50
The problem with work and complexity for at the programmer is you have to find consistency and really when you're looking at levels, I would say nine out of 10 times it has to do with the weights. You know every now and then you could throw some more complicated or strict gymnastics in, but you don't want to play with the volume too much. You don't want to play with the time of a workout too much, because now you're really starting to separate the gym and everyone's doing different workouts and you never want to do that. But that's getting kind of ahead of myself right now in terms of why I don't want to do this. I want to talk about why I want to do this, and the reason why is the gap between, let's say I hate using this term, I use it very seldomly the best and worst is bigger than it's ever been. I would even say the gap between goals in this gym is more than it's ever been, and as the gym grows, the membership grows.
09:48
Now you're seeing a, it's one thing if you have one or two people shooting for something and they're at a certain level. When you have 15 to 20, when you have 30, when you have you know the amount of people that we have that are really pursuing something at a high level you feel more pressure to serve them, right? I feel a lot of pressure programming to protect people, especially new people, especially people that are older and they have no desire to compete. They don't want to push that hard, they just want to work out and not get hurt. That's the majority of our gym, all right, the vast majority, I would even say.
10:16
But I still feel a lot of pressure to serve the people that are on the opposite side, where they're not just pursuing health, they are pursuing performance, they're pursuing sport and they need to be pushed. What? For some of them, one workout per day it's not enough. So I feel like I'm leaving them short as a coach, as a programmer, as a guide, whatever. If I don't try to push them um with the other guys, I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to push them as a coach, as a programmer, as a guide, whatever. If I don't try to push them um without just adding more workouts to their day.
Sam Rhee
Host
10:52
I see this as a coach and it's my job as a coach to make it a real experience for the top and the bottom of performers regardless and to make them see the meaning and the value in it. That is the challenge as a coach executing your programming. This past week we had. The workout I coached was very light hang power snatches at 50% of a one rep max and then followed by a 2K rope. Now that wasn't, on paper, the most exciting workout, and if you're someone who just comes in and you want to get a sweat on and you just want to work out, you would look at that and be like, why on God's green earth would I do this? And it was my job as a coach if you stepped in that door to show you that there was value in working on your snatch technique and thinking about how to drive your hips quickly in order to move that bar fast.
David Syvertsen
Host
11:45
You did a very good job of that, but I'm not just saying that you did a very good job of that.
Sam Rhee
Host
11:48
Thanks and to see that that will help you, even as an athlete who just wants to work out for the day, like there's going to be tremendous value in that to move well with that. And then to figure out how to convince those guys that you know, instead of just rowing 2K at 50% of your effort, like really trying to give a max effort, strategizing, thinking about it, when you put even the most casual athletes into a position to perform, you are pushing their envelope so that even their most casual workouts are going to be better. And when you can do that, you've brought value to them and they can see that Even the top performers you know they might want to go. You know what. I know how to snatch at 50% of my weight. I need to. You can do better. You can improve your technique. You can do fat. Listen, don't go up on the weight. Just check your ego and see how fast you can drive your hips, how fast can you move that barbell, and if they bought into it, that helped them.
12:53
And then the 2K Rove. It's actually a little bit harder sometimes to convince the best athletes to do that because they know how awful it can get. So when you show up at a 6 AM and you convince someone to maybe go 10% harder than maybe they would have, like they thought. You know I can give an 80% effort. I'm going to give a 90. There's value in that too, and so I think every day and we see that more and more there is a challenge in finding people to buy in at both levels, and I think the level system will help with that. Honestly, I think, instead of just saying I was scaled, to say I was level three or level four brings more meaning and value to your workout.
David Syvertsen
Host
13:37
So those are the pros right there, that it does, it keeps you on track, it keeps you in check, based on where you are and what your goals are. And some of the cons of doing this is obviously complexity for the programmer, right, which, if you're going to do it, you're going to have to accept some of that. It's also some complexity for coaches too, because here's the situation. I'm going to give a mixed modal workout example, and this is just going to add stress to a coach. Let's say there's a workout Amrap 20, five ring muscle ups, 10 hand cleans, 35 double unders. All right, there's the workout Five muscle ups, 10 hand cleans, 35 double unders. Mixed modal, level one. That's your workout. That's the toughest version. Your Rx weight is 205, 135. And you have to do crossovers instead of double unders. Level two by Sennar X ring or bar muscle ups, rx weight 135, 95, double unders.
14:38
We have people in this gym that want to do those ring muscle ups and crossovers, but they can't lift that weight. So now they really can't do the level one workout. But they could do everything, but they just there's one thing they can't do. So what do you do in that situation? Right, I could think of 20 people in this gym that would have to. They want level one, but there's one thing in there they can't do, so they're going to modify it. They're going to take the level one gymnastics. They're going to take the level two weight, or vice versa. They're going to take the level one gymnastics sorry, the level one weight, level two gymnastics.
15:07
And now what is that? Are we going to have a coach write one dash, two ring muscle? No, we're not. We've gotten away from that years ago. We're not writing down every detail of your workout. There's too many of you Right. So in my eyes, it's you're picking level one and level two period. That's it. It's like the open right, or you're skilled, so you're going to have level one, level two, level three on that whiteboard. You're the one moving to the workouts. Or you're skilled. And what I like about this? I'm going to reverse the con that this will help negate, get rid of. Rx is good and skilled as bad, because you will have some of the best athletes in this gym that will have an SC next to their name. And now, because I've been trying to preach this and I think it's a losing battle right now, but I will not give up. You know, when you scale workout, it doesn't mean you're bad at CrossFit, it doesn't mean you're out of shape. It just means you changed it. All right, here's the RX prescriptions. You had to change it.
15:56
You know this is quoting Rafi last week. It's like, yeah, because you couldn't do this. You know he didn't get doesn't get an acting job because he's too good looking or not good looking enough, too tall or not tall enough, right. It's like anytime you can't do level one because you're not strong enough, that's okay. You couldn't do level two because you couldn't do the gymnastics. So you're going to scale, but that doesn't mean you're not good enough. It's just the truth of the matter in the moment. So the con is that it can make things more complicated, more thinking for the athlete and the coach. But the pro that comes from that con is that it can really change the perspective of athletes and coaches of what this actually is. It is stimulus training. We're trying to get everyone in the room on the same page.
Sam Rhee
Host
16:39
Let's go through. Can we go through a real life example here? Because I want to talk about this week's workout Well, last week's, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, yeah. Because I will tell you what my thoughts were, figuring out what to do and how I thought about it, looking at the whiteboard Compared to other athletes the reset one.
David Syvertsen
Host
16:58
Shoulder overhead, yeah, ground overhead. Burbitt's target, yes.
Sam Rhee
Host
17:01
Yeah, so if you could go through the different levels and then I would tell you what I thought about choosing my levels and what I thought about going through the whiteboard afterwards and what I think people might think about it.
David Syvertsen
Host
17:19
Here we go. 12 minute workout 12 ground to overhead, 18 burpees to target, 18 ground overhead, 12 burpees to target. All right, change weight 8 ground to overhead, 12 burpees, 12 ground to overhead, 8 burpees. Change weight again 4 ground to overhead, 6 burpees to target, 6 ground to overhead, 4 burpees to target. Change weight for the third time MAX ground to overhead and remaining time. It is a 12 minute workout. Level 1, the hardest starts off 75-55, 125-85, 175-115, 225-145. Level 2, 75-55, 95-65, 135-95, 185-125. Level 3, 65-45, 85-55, 115-75, 155-105. Level 4, the final level right 45-35, 65-45, 75-55, 95-65. So you come into the whiteboard, you see that workout, the burpees and ground to overhead, which means cleaning, jerk or snatch, combination of the two. And then they say, hey, this is where you change weights. Well, what are my weights? You have to pick a level level 1 through 4, choose your battle. We gave some guidance at the whiteboard. There's your level workout.
Sam Rhee
Host
18:36
So that was an easier one to program, because the only thing that changed for the levels were the weights for the ground to overhead, and the hardest one was what was the initial weight for level 1? 75-55 was the initial weight, and you finished max ground to overhead at 225-145, right. And then the lightest one was similar right.
David Syvertsen
Host
18:59
The lightest one was 45-35 start, 95-65 end right.
Sam Rhee
Host
19:05
So, looking at that you're looking at to determine what level you need to be at as an athlete. You need to see what kind of weights you can move for a ground to overhead. And the first thing you always look at is because the light weights are easy for anybody, even for most like for a lot of people, even the ones who are level 4 athletes, they're like I could probably do 175-pound whatever, and we struggle with that all the time as coaches Right. And you're looking at it like Can I do one?
19:35
Yeah but can you do it over the course of a?
David Syvertsen
Host
19:37
workout. Sorry, let me interrupt. Yeah, this is exactly why the level system is a good thing. Someone will see that 75, 55 in level one the hardest level, right, and be like, bro, I can RX this because they think they're good, because RX will be next to their name, right, but they're not getting the feel out of the workout, of what it's supposed to be right.
Sam Rhee
Host
19:59
Cause they're capped out at maybe the first or second weight Exactly and they're like 30 reps.
David Syvertsen
Host
20:05
Yeah, they did 30 reps in the workout. We're really we're trying to get you guys like 90, 100, 120, 130 in that workout and we tell people we have to say this at the whiteboard of the time that first barbell should feel like a piece of paper, not your 80% of your 100 max.
Sam Rhee
Host
20:20
So then the other thing is you look at the heaviest weight and you're like, can I do? If you're a guy, 225 ground to overheads, can I do 185? Can I do whatever? And so personally, I was like I don't think I can do 225. That's my PR and that was years ago. I haven't even gotten close to that right now. Right. But do I do level one, knowing it's a challenge just to get through and maybe I don't even get to that last barbell?
20:53
And I know a bunch of people who did level one did that, or maybe they just got one. How many reps is it to get to the max? 125? 120 was to get to the max, to the max, okay. So there's some people that got capped at 120, doing level one. So a lot of 120s, yeah. And I said I could probably do that. Or do I try to push myself and get level two and know that I can do 185 at the end, even though it's a lighter barbell, and just move faster? And I chose to do level two because I said I really want to see if I can get to that last barbell and see how many I can do. I don't feel like I should just try to go and get capped out without getting to 225, without having any intention on it. Right and a smart decision. And I might be a little scared because I might try to hit 225 and hurt myself or something at the end.
21:47
Absolutely so I did that and I did well for myself. I don't remember I got into the 185s and I did, I mean maybe without about a minute left or so you get to get to there. I got Two or three, I got more than that. Yeah Well, you said you had a minute left.
David Syvertsen
Host
22:05
So, like About a minute 30 and I. That changes things, because a minute, you just don't have that much time to look at that point. Dude, I got six done. Okay, awesome, let's go.
Sam Rhee
Host
22:11
All right, there, you go so and I looked at the whiteboard and there were not that many guys that did level two, maybe like four or three. Okay, most of the people I look at the whiteboard, who I compare myself to, did level one and they might have gotten one or two. A lot of them got capped out of 120. Didn't even try it Right, and so it was really hard for me to compare myself with anyone. Now, does my happiness with a workout depend on who I who might compare myself to? It does not, although I did look at it and I did see Aaron, your brother. He got one more rep than me, he got 127. And I said I did pretty well. Yeah, compared to Aaron, I'm really happy with that. But but I was unable to sort of compare myself to others whom I sort of wanted to.
David Syvertsen
Host
23:06
It's kind of rough, though, because you come at six, so there's only been one class there.
Sam Rhee
Host
23:10
No at the end of the day when I look at it.
David Syvertsen
Host
23:11
Oh, look, because I feel like there's a more than that on level two.
Sam Rhee
Host
23:15
I wish there were some people that had done level two that didn't.
David Syvertsen
Host
23:19
So here's a downfall of this level system is you're leaving it up to them, right, like if we were really. I mean, this is an option where I tell you what level you're doing, but that's probably a little too in-depth, a little too controlling. But if I did that, I think you would have been more fulfilled from this regard where, like you know, we say, because we did give the approach, hey guys, you should be able to lift that last barbell, but you might not even get there. So as long as you can get through the third one, it's okay. But again, it's a guess. So I understand what you're saying, that you wish more people did level two so that you can compare yourself.
Sam Rhee
Host
23:57
And that's a selfish reason. And did I get a great workout? I absolutely did. Did I push myself? Yes, am I happy that I did it at level two and not level one? Yes, do I wish if this happened every day? Would that start to change the way I chose my levels? It might Right, it might.
David Syvertsen
Host
24:19
And that's. I've seen this before where we have a, you know, a pretty hard workout that the whole gym does. It's not heavy, it's not light, it's just kind of in the middle, right, like most of our programming is. It's balanced. And you'll see some people that RX plus it and we've had episodes we've talked about RX plus the good, the bad. You know, mind your own business, kind of stuff, right, don't let the ego control it. Like, do you really have an intention behind doing it? But I truly do think there's some very honest, real reasoning behind it. It's like hey, I'm trying to get to this level of CrossFit sport or this level of fitness. Take the sport out of it. I need these weights to be heavier. And you're gonna have some old school CrossFit truthers say, no, just go faster, just go intense. I use that line sometimes, right, like no.
25:03
Nick Squier asked me if he should use a 30 pound ball for this last bison benchmark. Oh right, the wall ball, perpiboxium pover one, yeah. And I said, no, go faster. And I'll tell you what. I think that he did more work. He worked harder because he went with a 20 pound ball.
25:21
Some view it as nope. 30 pound ball is a better workout because it's heavier. It's more than it's 50% more weight Every single rep. Think about all those reps. Dave, you probably went slower. You probably broke it up. There are some people that could have done that with a 30 pound ball, so should they be doing it? This is where this this is like a nonstop, always present thinking process that you're probably never gonna have a clear solution to, but I think the intention of thinking about it this way like Sam thinking about other people should have done level two. I'm thinking certain people should have done level two, but that person could have done level three. You know, level one, whatever right it almost is it too much complexity for what it's worth. What we're trying to do here is across it by some affiliate.
Sam Rhee
Host
26:06
That I think we're gonna have to answer. Well, I think we can answer that question better. Like months into trying this, I will say I talked to Nick Squire after that and you heard him more. By making him do multiple rounds of 31 wall balls on broken, which beat the living tar out of him, and he would not have been able to do that if it was a 30 pound wall ball. He admitted it was a better or he acknowledged not admitted it, it acknowledged it was a better workout to go at 20 and go faster, go unbroken, which that is where some of these complexity subtleties about the level system is going to be dependent on the coaches.
David Syvertsen
Host
26:50
And I don't wanna put all that on coaches, because it can be really tough to explain this when we're already pinched for time in a lot of cases.
Sam Rhee
Host
26:57
You have to know the athletes well in order to help guide them, and otherwise these athletes are gonna self guide and they will do what we just worry about. They'll go too heavy or too hard and not get the required stimulus, or they'll go too light and also not get the required stimulus.
David Syvertsen
Host
27:14
A way to combat that is you come up with I've seen gyms do this before. Don't love it, but there's Mary behind it you create a chart, you put it somewhere in the gym, you send it to people, put it on your phone. This is, these are the things you have to be able to do to be a level one athlete here. Can't do one of them. Sorry, you can't do level one. You gotta stick with level two. 10 unbroken ring muscles will be up there. That's probably a little too controlling, but you could come up with because we need objectivity here, right? You don't want someone coming in and be like, oh dude, I crushed snatches and muscle ups like I can do this, but I can't walk on my hands, so I can't do level one. It's. You can come up with certain rules for people and it can be movement based as well, and we try to do this at the whiteboard. Hey guys, you should be able to snatch this unbroken if you're gonna do this.
27:59
We just did sumo dead of pipe holes yesterday and it caught a lot of people off guard and I said guys, make today's weight change, weight choice on the sumos, not the hand cleans. I know you can hand clean it. Can you do eight sumos in a row and I saw people doing singles from the beginning because it was too heavy. I'm like yep, too heavy, you know, and like you guys really slowed down because of it. So you can give some guidance per movement, per kind of workout to the entire gym and take because you do. Part of this is you gotta protect people from themselves, right? And I actually think another reason why I wanna keep trying this is I think this can help get people healthier and protect them.
Sam Rhee
Host
28:35
The problem is is that when you stratify it like that, it's going to be where, as an athlete, I'm going to say I will never be able to do level one. Why do I? It kinda caps me or puts a ceiling on things, and I know a lot of people who are scaled athletes. It means a lot to them to be able to do a certain workout, not every day, but a certain workout as RX. I see people cry and so you take that away from them. And now they're like well, I'm never gonna be a level one athlete, I'll always be level two, or I'm always level three, I'll never be level two. And now that incentive to go a little harder or keep improving or trying might not be as obvious to them.
David Syvertsen
Host
29:25
But maybe it could. But if I take away the hey, if you can't do this, you can't do level one period you could say, hey, certain you can pick every day what level you are based on what kind of athlete you are. Maybe it can give someone that will never be a complete RX athlete they're never gonna get to that point, it's not even goal there's. But there's that one movement, those two movements that they can crush, and they see that workout three days ahead of time. Like yo, I'm going level one today. I'm one of the big dogs today because I can do this.
29:51
But it takes away the pressure of needing to do everything to be a level one athlete. Right, you throw pistols into that level one test, I'm out. So that means I can never do level one again. If anything, it's gonna make me less inspired to work on other things. But if I'm allowed to pick level one today, level three yesterday, level two tomorrow, right, it can really almost expose objectively what my weaknesses are like on a very truth basis. And if I want to get better at these movements, hey, I can never level one. A workout that has strict handstand push-ups in it sucks. Well, guess what it's gonna make you do. If you care a lot about it, you're going to put extra work into those strict handstand push-ups so that when it comes up, I'm gonna go. And one of the things that we always want to teach people you should work on your weaknesses.
Sam Rhee
Host
30:37
Do you think the cache or the allure of being a level one athlete will be the same as being an RX athlete at some point?
David Syvertsen
Host
30:45
Yeah, absolutely Like you only get to wear this shirt. If you're level one, you get a blue shirt. If you've done a hundred level one workouts, you get there at gyms that do stuff like no, absolutely, and I teach their own. I think more than that it would. This is one of my cons that I'm actually probably more worried about than anything is people staying not in their own lane and looking at what other people are doing what levels they're doing and like that person shouldn't be doing level one.
Sam Rhee
Host
31:14
I'm better than them, that was me.
David Syvertsen
Host
31:16
Yeah, and that happens on a day-to-day basis. Why did that person Rx? You know I was like why do you care?
Sam Rhee
Host
31:22
Shut up, yeah it's just gonna work out. I had to tell myself that that's hard.
David Syvertsen
Host
31:26
And if it's an everyday, you got that one next to your name, one next to your name. Oh, I crushed that person in the open. Why are they doing one? I'm doing two. You know it's like that. It can get us. It can create issues that don't currently exist right now. You know it's a quote Ryan Radcliffe like is that net negative or net positive? There are positives that will come from this. There are negatives, which one is more? And that's basically what needs to make the decision on whether or not we do level workouts from here on out.
31:52
The last thing I wanna say is that, before we wrap this up is, I don't want this to turn into every single workout that's gonna have levels. There are, like, what if the workout is seven minutes of burpees? Like you're gonna make level one do eight minutes and level three do five, because now you're really fracturing the gym. You know a lot of rep schemes and workouts have flow to them, like numerically there's mathematical relationships between schemes and numbers and you know we're not gonna make 21, 15, nine that's Fran, but level one. You're doing 24, 17, 11,. You know, with 100 pounds instead of like you're starting to get away from the togetherness. So it can't be an everyday thing, it can't be an every movement thing. Most of it would center around loads on the barbell and then complexity of gymnastics, but everything else, I think, would remain the same. So again, this is just an ongoing topic in my head. I've had a lot of conversations with people. I always want feedback, because I do.
32:46
At the end of the day, the people determine what we're gonna do. You know, if everyone hates it, we don't do it. But you know we've talked about this with MastersRX. You know a lot of people come at different angles. There are people passionately on both sides because it makes them feel good, it makes them feel bad and again, majority rules in a lot of cases in it. So your opinion matters to me on this subject. Do you like the idea of levels? Is it too complex? Does it make your decision making easier or harder? Does it make it easier to get to your next level? Fitness? Does it impact your ego, your decision making? All that?
Sam Rhee
Host
33:18
I do appreciate the fact that, as a programmer, you're taking on these different variations and challenges because it's time consuming. Yeah, if you wanted to go easy, you would just be like, why bother, let me just stick to RX scale. We know that works. I do appreciate this. I know I'm gonna take a lot as an athlete out of trying levels. I may effing hate it, but at that point. But regardless the fact that if you as a gym or as a programmer want to experiment with this and see if it works for you, that I think we can all appreciate is an effort that is worthwhile trying.
David Syvertsen
Host
33:51
Absolutely All right. Thank you guys. We'll see you next week. Thank you everybody for taking the time out of your day to listen to the Herdfit podcast. Be on the lookout for next week's episode.
