S05E137 The Best Time of the Year: The 2024 CrossFit Open with Guest Coach Adam Ramsden

Ever felt the rush of adrenaline just before the beep signals the start of a CrossFit Open workout? That's exactly where coach "The Professor" Adam Ramsden, takes hosts David Syvertsen @davesy85 and Sam Rhee @bergencosmetic, discussing how competitive spirit can lead to greater self-awareness, especially when it comes to pacing and performance in a high-intensity event like the CrossFit Open. Sharing the struggle with peers, maintaining rigorous standards, and leaning on the seasoned pros for guidance—it all culminates in a special blend of integrity and inclusiveness that defines the CrossFit ethos. Beyond the sweat and reps, we highlight the importance of rest, recovery, and strategic approach to workouts.

Join us as we unpack the emotional rollercoaster that comes with participating in such an event. We're not just talking about the butterflies in your stomach—though they're certainly a fixture—but also about the profound sense of belonging fostered by the CrossFit community. With Adam's insights and our personal tales, you'll get an inside look at the Open's unique ability to bond gym-goers and push individuals to new heights, emotionally and physically.

This episode will have you appreciating the Open not just as a benchmark for your physical capacities, but as an annual celebration of your dedication to fitness and growth. Join us for an episode that's more than a discussion—it's a tribute to our fitness journeys.

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

David Syvertsen

Host

00:05

Hey everybody, welcome to the Herdfit Podcast with Dr Samri 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 Herdfit Podcast. I am Coach David Syvertsen. I'm here with my co-host, dr and Coach Sam Rhee, and our first ever three-peat guest on the Herdfit Podcast, coach Adam Ramsden, aka the Professor Adam. Welcome back, thank you.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

00:38

Thank you for having me. I've gone through all the stages. We were out in the gym the first time we were in here, and now we've got the backdrop and everything like that.

David Syvertsen

Host

00:45

I can't wait to see what happens next time. I'm telling you, yeah, maybe we'll have a satellite location somewhere where it's really warm and not rainy and not cold. We'll be doing it from a beach Sam. What do you think? I would be up for that for sure. We're going to dive into the most talked about topic right now in CrossFit, which is the CrossFit Open. We are about a month away a little over a month away from the 2024 CrossFit Open and the three of us Coach at CrossFit Bison in New Jersey.

01:14

Not that I check every day, but we do have the most people signed up in the United States of America as of right now for the Open, and it is something that we do take some pride in, for reasons that are beyond the obvious. It's cool to have a lot of people, but I think that's less important. If anything. I think the most important part in terms of numbers from a gym, or how much of a percentage of your gym sign up. If you have 100 members and you have 98 people signed up, that's more impressive to a gym that has 300 people at their gym and they have 200 signed up. I really think it's important to try and get the message out that why our entire community should be doing the Open without throwing a guilt trip on someone's shoulders. We don't want to go down that path. I think there's benefits and reasoning behind the Open that do more for you and your gym and for the CrossFit brand than you might initially think. Adam, can you recall your first CrossFit Open?

Adam Ramsden

Guest

02:12

Yeah, so we joined, my wife and I joined in the middle of the Open in 2015. And I remember seeing, probably the first workout we started coming a couple times a week was a Friday and I was just like, well, I can't do any of that, I'm not going to do it. We hadn't signed up for the Open, it was in the middle, so I just skipped that day. So that was not knowing what the Open was. At that point it was kind of just like all right, well, there's more workouts will come in tomorrow or whatever. My first Open workout was 16.1, which was 20 minutes of overhead walking, lunges, chest to bar and burpees, barface and burpees. Okay, and if you know me, when I started CrossFit at all, I could not hold the PVC pipe directly overhead because lunch or squat, because I had no mobility?

David Syvertsen

Host

03:08

Yeah, absolutely no mobility. Very strong, good on the ray, good on burpees, but the mobility overhead was not there.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

03:15

So I, probably 20 times during that workout, was questioning why I decided to sign up for this thing and it was a slog to get through it and I said this was a mistake. Everybody's looking at me doing this workout. There's a lot of people here. But after you get through it, then the next week you have a good workout or something that fits into your mold, or it's gone the next day, or you do something to repeat it and get bad. So it's a humbling experience. It can be humbling, but it can also be rewarding.

David Syvertsen

Host

03:52

In the same vein, I have a memory of that workout too, of you doing it, struggling, visibly frustrated, but you never lost it. Personality didn't change. You were still helping out after and I could tell you this, I mean eight years later. That was one of those moments where you watch someone and you're like that dude can coach here, Just so you know just how you act during the open brings out a lot of truth about you, Sam, do you remember your first open? I don't.

Sam Rhee

Co-host

04:22

Actually, it's been nine years and they all blend. I can only tell you, though, it hasn't changed. I just imagined this year's open, the first workout, standing there waiting for three, two, one go. I just had that same butterflies like what am I doing? Feeling like I can feel it like, just imagining it. Right now it hasn't changed, and I guess that's good that I still care, because every workout I've done in the open, I'm always the same way Just before it starts, I get so nervous, more so than in any other time of the year, and I'm wondering am I going to be able to do this? Am I going to, you know, crap the bed on this workout? Am I going to do? Okay, like, and I guess that's why I keep doing it. It's because of that feeling.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

05:14

And just to say something you said you'll be nervous by three, two, one. I'll be nervous at 3 pm on Thursday when they announced the workout, because now they announced the workouts earlier. I'll be nervous from then until I get into the workout. You know, because thinking about like, oh, how am I going to break this up? How am I going to you know, attack that and stuff like that.

David Syvertsen

Host

05:33

So that's those nervous feelings I always tell people. It just means you care. It means nothing more or less. It just means that you care and I think it's a good thing. We are outside of the gym, outside of CrossFit, outside of the open. We have those feelings elsewhere in our lives. Right, it could be watching, you know, your kids play sports and hoping they do well. It could watch your kid go through a college application process. It could be something with your own personal career, right, and you know if you can buy into the whole. Train your mind, train your body inside the body, so it helps you outside of the gym.

06:06

This is something that I think you should put a serious thought into. What is the open? Right? We don't need to dumb it down. Most of our crowd already knows what the open is.

06:14

To me, it's the most unique fitness test in the world. It is the most unique fitness test in the world. Beyond that, it's the most unique fitness event in the world where you're going to have almost a half a million people around the globe, right Including in your gym and on the other side of the country, doing the same exact workout and the same exact time period you submit a score to a website, your name gets thrown amongst all those half a million people, or almost, and for those that like it, you get a worldwide rank. You can get a rank for your profession, within your profession, within your age group, within your state, within your country, within your gym, right, and that's kind of why it adds a little bit of extra emphasis to what you're actually doing, performance wise.

07:00

Now, if I'm someone that does not come here for performance, I don't care about my scores. I don't care about the whiteboard that we write your result down. I don't look at other people's scores. I just want to be healthy, happy, live long and work out. If someone came up to you and said, hey, that's why I don't want to do the open, I don't care about performance, adam, what's your response? Someone asked you on the spot.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

07:21

Yeah, I would say that part of longevity and being able to live a long, healthy lifestyle is how you deal with stress. And so this is just. You know it's a little bit more stress than a Friday workout most of the times, because you have a judge, you have somebody looking at you, you have somebody counting your reps maybe no repping you, but that's difficulty, that you know. Again, at the end of the workout they're going to say, hey, great job, you know, whereas somebody that cuts you off on the road is going to give you a finger and they're going to drive faster past you, you know. So there is stress in that, but we're dealing with stress on a daily basis and the more stress you can put yourself into and come out on the other side feeling positive about it, the better it's going to be.

Sam Rhee

Co-host

08:08

Sim. Yeah, we have a lot of athletes here that just want to stay healthy, they just want to work out, they want to just make sure that they're moving. And I think if you see people who do that year after year after year and not a whole lot changes, or you don't introduce new things into that routine, it gets tedious. And I don't know a lot of people over maybe a couple years tops who have done that without finding new challenges. I mean, I know people and they'll say you know what? I'm going to put a new challenge for myself, I'm going to run a marathon or I'm going to do a triathlon or I'm going to do different things. This allows you to put a new challenge in front of you to help you maintain that interest in being healthy, help you maintain that interest in your routine.

09:02

And every time you get that little bump, just from the open, even if you are someone who's like I don't want to spend more time doing this that will help your daily routine. Just if you've never done it, try it. Even if you are the 5am or who just comes in, works out, goes home, goes to work it's like brushing your teeth or something that's okay. This will help that, even if you have no interest in competitive CrossFit, knowing what your limits are or stressing yourself out this if you've ever felt that this is repetitive or that exercise needs a little bit more to you, this has kept things fresh for me.

09:46

Again, nine years, and I'm still challenged every year by the open. It always makes me think about something. Even if I didn't do my best, even if I did worse this year maybe than last year, it just makes me think about how am I moving? What is my exercise capability? How functional am I? And I think that, whomever you are, if you are exercising in any capacity, this is such a great way, an easy way, a very, very easy way of checking to see how you're feeling about it.

David Syvertsen

Host

10:17

When you start CrossFit, you started because you're looking for something new that's going to challenge you. That's the word that I think needs to always be thrown at us. Both you guys bring you up. Adam brought up the word stress, right. Go through it, come out on the other side. That's how you really find personal fulfillment. Going through bad times, right. A bad time in this reference is a 10 minute workout, right. That is benefiting you physically for the most part. But then the challenge of coming in here starting this program I just did two beginners just wrapped them up on Thursday and every time I do those, I fully appreciate doing those because it brings me back to starting.

10:54

We were talking about wall balls and handstand pushups and I always give the story that I've played sports and played with baseballs and footballs and basketballs my entire life. The I-hand coordination is there. My first time doing wall balls, I couldn't catch it, like it kept hitting me in the face and I couldn't squat, I couldn't hit the target and I felt so unathletic. That line came up the other night with someone that Adam knows. He's an athlete, I can tell by the way he moves and we're trying to teach him how to do a Toast Bar and he's like I feel so unathletic, right. A story that I tried to go upside down for the first time during my fundamentals CrossFit Hoboken called. Didn't really know what to expect, how it was gonna feel. My elbows bent and I fell on my neck and I probably hurt it a little bit and I was in front of other people and back then I was just more embarrassed, right.

11:40

But when you do these sessions with this right and then you circle back to the open, what I like about CrossFit when you start, what these guys are, and what I like about CrossFit open is we all are drawn together, feeling very similar levels of anxiety, stress and struggle. You can be the best athlete in the gym. You're gonna be hurting just as much as the person that's doing for the first time, and that's why one of the reasons why we haven't fractured the gym into competitors over here, health over here, experienced over here, inexperienced over there. We are literally zones away from each other, next to each other, judging each other, counting for each other, and I think that's one thing about the open that can truly especially this is more for the people that have been doing it a long time and they're kind of over the whole, like I'm gonna try to get a muscle up this year. I'm gonna try to PR my clean. You know, and at some point that's gonna happen to all of us.

12:32

Right, you can't really chase after physical progress in every single area, but can you view the open as something that ties us together and it's gonna give you an opportunity to help somebody else out, like the more? I do this and I know our perspectives are different. We're coaches, it's kind of our job. But take the coach out of it. You know your presence and advice and support. Right, adam's saying good job after the workout. I don't think we can truly measure how much that means to someone that's doing it for the first or second or third time, or for the first person, for the person that's crying for the first time after the open workout Because they thought they would do this but they only did that.

13:09

They were gonna do this and they failed. Muscle ups for eight, 11 minutes straight. You know like, hey, bro, I've been there, blah, blah, blah. That's an opportunity, because I always say a true community here is that you're here for yourself. We know you're paying your membership. You're here for yourself. You're also here for the people next to you, and that's what makes a community strong. It's not you being here for yourself. And then, if you have a room full of people here for others, that's where this stuff really starts to strengthen. Touch on a little bit what you guys as coaches, but also just people what do you view the open as? What you can do for others? Take the workouts out of it.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

13:43

Go for it. So what can we do for others? In a competition setting is something that sometimes it's just calming those nerves at the beginning of the workout, somebody that's really like, oh, this part of the workout is scaring me, or this part I'm not nervous, or working out for 20 minutes. I hate these types of workouts. If you can just talk to the person and just say, listen, it'll be over in 20 minutes and then we'll go and have a beer, or I've been there before.

14:16

I struggle with these movements, don't worry about it, I'm gonna judge you to the standard, but maybe I help you with that. One thing we've heard in the past couple of weeks is that as we get more focused on working to the standard, moving up to the open is a lot of people don't realize that they're not hitting standards on certain movements, they're not getting the full depth on a wall ball, and they just don't know Cause you feel like you're hitting that full range of motion, whereas somebody that's judging you is like, listen, you gotta get a little bit deeper into your squat. And then all of a sudden you're like, okay, this is something I have to look forward to, or look for moving forward.

David Syvertsen

Host

14:59

I love that. I mean that whole standard talk. I mean we just talked the coach has talked about this recently right, that had before classes. Guys, let's put a little extra emphasis on what you're supposed to do, because we don't wanna be the people that, oh, we never told you that your chest actually has to touch the bar and chest where I pull up, like the guy Stan asked me the other day, you go, do you actually have to touch? You know, like he didn't know, and I was like wow, the guy's been here for six months. Like you know, it could actually make us feel like we should do a better job at doing that.

15:24

But I think Adam brings up a great point that you'll ask people in the middle of July, like why do I need to squat down here? Well, it's the standard in the open. We talk about the open in June. You know, like why do I need to lock out my elbows before I bring the barbell back down? Well, I mean, a, that's the movement, b right, but B, like when you have a judge, that's what we're gonna expect you to do. And again, it puts the thought of the open into people throughout the year, not just in January when we wanna start a marketing campaign about it. Right, sam? What are some things you look at coach person, father, husband that you can do for others during the open?

Sam Rhee

Co-host

16:01

Yeah, so the first thing is is you're absolutely right in terms of standards. The standards are important, not just for the open, but they're held because they functionally help you move better. So if we never had standards for an air squat and you did like a quarter squat, are you really getting the most out of the workout? And most of the times these standards are not. Are they a little nitpicky? Sometimes Absolutely Like, but overall, if you hold to standards for any workout, you will get a better workout than if you didn't hold to those standards. And being able to control your body, move well, move through space, know what you're doing, is important. If you just didn't care how your body moved during any kind of exercise, you're not going to get the most benefit. So I realize sometimes you know, does it matter whether the wall ball hits, like right there or maybe an inch below, like how is that going to help your workout? You know what, if you at least for me, if I try to make sure I hit well above that target, that's going to make me a better athlete. Every time I guarantee it, it's going to make me a better athlete. So holding to standards is really important. It also makes you look better if you care about that to others. I don't really care how many reps you do, but if those reps look great, I consider you a great athlete. I consider you someone who moves really well, who knows how their body moves through space. That is important to me as a coach.

17:33

In terms of others, I think I have found in my life I've always done better for myself. If I think of others, if I'm in service to others, then I myself benefit. If I'm only caring about me, me, me, me, me, I don't end up really benefiting as well. I've always, for whatever reason, if I take me out of it and I'm helping others do things, that lifts me up. That makes me a better athlete person. Father, coworker, you name it.

18:08

So in this setting, when I don't focus so much on myself because that makes me crazy, I get too nervous about it. But I'm thinking about all right, let me help Adam, or let me let them know. You know what I really did like. Listen, it's okay to do really poorly on a workout. I've done that. I understand that I support somebody through that. That makes me a better athlete too. I would say, if you've ever wanted to be a better person yourself, or a better athlete if you just pick even one person Be the guy that you work next to in class every day and you help them in the open, or meet someone new during the open, because that happens all the time. You're a five-ammer and then you meet all these evening people and you hang out with them and you cheer them on. That takes you out of yourself and makes you think about others and that's super helpful.

David Syvertsen

Host

19:09

We spend a lot of time talking about and thinking about and discussing and trying to help those that are just on the fence, because the people that love the open and want to compete, they're going to do the open, so you don't need to spend that much time on them. I do want to spend just the last portion of this episode on what this does for people that are already in it. They don't need to be told to do the open. There is a competitiveness to this that is really healthy. I think about the coaches chat that we have going on right now, that we just joke around about scores with some of the guys that are going back and forth and the playful trash talk, but the fact that these workouts mean a little bit more and if someone rises with the tide, everyone is going to benefit, right, every boat on that water is going to be elevated. So if someone gets this score oh guess what that person's going to try to one up them and then I'm going to come back on Sunday and try to one up them. We can criticize that and joke about it all we want Dowson.

20:07

I did that for years, but know what it did? It made you really learn about yourself, pacing, efficiency, where can I pick up seconds? And, at the end of the day, crossfit 101, that is what fitness is is trying to achieve more work and less time, and there are lessons that you can, really you can learn this in any workout, but again, when there's a meaning behind them, right? The example I like to give I've given it before. I'll make it quick 21, 18, 15, 12, 9, 6, 3, thrusters, barfacing burpees, one of the worst open workouts ever, one of the worst, and I remember doing it the first time and doing the 21, 21 in like a minute, 40, minute 45, just like sprinting. The time was, I think, in the 12 somewhere and I almost died, like literally. I felt like that was one of those like moments where, like I should never do that again. I watched you.

Sam Rhee

Co-host

20:56

I have never seen someone go so dark on a workout before.

David Syvertsen

Host

20:59

The next time I did it I got two minutes faster because the 21, 21 took me just under three minutes. So I started a minute slower and I ended three minutes faster, almost, and like I only learned that because the competitor mindset in me wanted to shave 11 seconds off my time. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but let's touch on. You know the mindset of someone being competitive and why it is a good thing for their fitness. If you have competitive goals, it's pretty obvious why being better is better for you, right. But even take out you caring about quarterfinals, semi-finals games being competitive what can that do for you?

Adam Ramsden

Guest

21:40

So I think one of the things we can touch on here is is the fact that not only pacing in a workout, but let's take a longer look back, let's look at the week before that, right? Because if you want to do your best on Friday, you're going to need to scale it back on Wednesday and Thursday. Probably A lot of people don't do that when they start here. They're like let's go 90%, let's redline every single workout because that's how I'm going to get the fittest I can be, and that's just wrong.

22:08

You know, if you run the race car into the ground, if you're constantly flooring it, you know injuries are going to happen, things are going to pop up. You're just not doing. You're not going to benefit the most for yourself and your fitness. So I think you know, going through the open process of saying, okay, let's go 60% on Wednesday, let's go 65% on Thursday, so that way I feel really good for Friday. I think that's something that you can stretch across the year. I've picked those workouts that you really want to attack during the week and then figure times to say, okay, I'm still going to go in, but I'm just going to really pace, maybe over pace, and see how that does for me, you know, going back to those workouts that I really want to hit hard on Love that?

Sam Rhee

Co-host

22:54

Yeah, the first thing is I just realized there might be some people who just started and who's like, what's the open? And so I just wanted to recap by saying, if you've done the open, obviously you know what it is, but it's basically a three week event where every is it Thursday night. Now, thursday afternoon, thursday afternoon, they announced the workout and then you have until Monday to do the workout and then record your score, send it to CrossFit and they put you up on a leaderboard based on your age and you know everything and whether you scale it or X foundation. So they're different levels, so you don't have to. You can find the level that you've that works for you. And the best thing about it, I think, over the years, is that it's gotten more and more accessible, like they really want everyone to do it. It doesn't matter at what capability you think you have or you know where you are in terms of your path to fitness, but the best thing about it is that that inclusivity goes from top to bottom, so you will see the most elite athletes do the workout, because it is the path to the game. So if you want to see Tia Claire, too me, do the workout, you're going to see what our score is, and I think that that gives you, gives me, perspective when I see how amazing all these people are and maybe you care about that or maybe you don't, but I think it gives a nice perspective to see how amazing we have, like, how many great athletes we have here. How many are in the world. You know where I stack up, even if I'm, you know, 25,000th or 100,000th in the world, like. I think that's that's a great perspective to have. And these workouts you're going to do them if you come to the gym Friday anyway, so you might as well sign up, you might as well. It helps the gym because you know it. It helps CrossFit, which helps us in the long term, and it gives you an opportunity just to see once a year what your numbers are.

24:52

And I use that absolutely Whatever movement I feel like, yet sticky for me during the open, wherever I sit, ranking wise and I'm not a particular, I don't do competitions like some of our athletes here do but it does give me that chance to sort of take a check and see where I am. And if I'm reseeding, that's okay too. I don't mind that. I mean, I do mind it, but I don't mind seeing that. I wanna be honest with myself. I wanna know. And so I think, when we look at the open and what we're doing every year with it, it's important.

25:33

Even if you are someone who has absolutely no interest whatsoever, you're brand new, or even if, let's suppose, you're injured. For example, I have a lot of people who are slightly banged up or maybe their hip has been bothering them and they're still gonna do it, and they'll still do it scaled. Why? Because they care about other people. They wanna work out. You'll still get a workout in Just because you're you tweak.

25:56

Just because I tweak my shoulder or my knee does not mean I'm not working out. I have to figure out ways to work out even if I'm not feeling at my best, and the open will help you figure that out. I mean, there's always gonna be something you can do. So I feel like, regardless of who you are, I cannot. I can find an answer for pretty much anyone who's like why should I do the open? This is not helpful for me. Trust me if at least try it once and then come back to me and say, okay, I got nothing out of it, this was totally useless. I hated it. I'm never doing it again. We'll talk then, but otherwise please just give it a shot.

Adam Ramsden

Guest

26:38

Yeah, foundation movements for last year were rowing, sit-ups, wall balls, push-ups, burpees, shuttle runs, bear crawls, jumping jacks, cleans and snatches with an empty barbell. That's all stuff that we do in fundamentals class. So if you come in for those two beginner classes, you've done, you've run the gamut of what you're gonna see in the open for fundamentals. So I think that is a reason that, even if you're brand new, you just hop in because you'll be able to do the movements in the workout.

David Syvertsen

Host

27:06

Right, yeah, and to wrap it up, I mean I wanna use a story from a couple years ago and relate to something I had a conversation with Katie Caparis yesterday. She's been doing the open a few years now and she's like I really want an honest answer from you Do you think I'm ready to do the workouts RX? And she goes? I know the answer is depends what the workout is like. I know that she goes, but like generally speaking, because two years ago I did this.

27:28

Last year I did this, I was on the fence and it reminded me of a situation where Jackie Hellfrict did a workout with the Wall Walk Dumbbell, snatch, box, jump Over workout, air MAP 15 back in 2022. That was horrible, tough way to open, but a very fun way to open up the workout and it was the first time she ever RX'd an open workout. Because of the 35 pound dumbbell, she was very scared prior to. I don't know if I should do this. I shouldn't do this. She ripped through the entire workout multiple sets of 12 dumbbell snatches with the 35 pounder, and she started crying after how proud she was and I really feel like if that was a normal Monday Wad in the middle of October, it would have been like, ah, I'll do 25. But because this meant something and because she had been training and she didn't really get to actually prepare for this moment, we're gonna talk about dark week in our next episode and I think that's something that we need to keep in track of.

28:25

Crossfit is about being fit enough to take on tasks that come up, that you don't expect the unknown and the unknowable. If you are gonna run away from something because it's uncomfortable, unknowable, unknown that's a problem that you're gonna suffer consequences, not in the gym and the open. We're not gonna consider you less of a person. It will impact you and the people that are around you, whether they're kids, husbands, friends, wives, whatever that. If you can't handle stuff that's unknown, you can start to train that by doing the open and the benefits that come from it.

28:58

Katie compares what's gonna happen this year, jackie, back two years ago. It's a special thing that you can experience for yourself. So that's gonna wrap it up, guys. We really strongly believe in the CrossFit Open and what it can do for you, your community and the larger CrossFit community worldwide. It's something that it is truly. To me, it is a pillar of CrossFit and it always has been and I hope that it always is, but it only stays a pillar if the coaches, the owners and the athletes out there truly understand the benefits for you and others behind it. I hope you guys get involved and we can't wait to hear about your experiences and also support you through it. Thank you guys. 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.