S06E183 Friday Night Lights: The Most Memorable CrossFit Open "Point One" Workouts

What does it take to keep the magic alive in a community that thrives on grit and perseverance? Coaches David Syvertsen @davesy85 and Sam Rhee @bergencosmetic invite you on a nostalgic journey as we count down to the 2025 CrossFit Open. Reflecting on our CrossFit Bison family, we share personal stories from past Opens, particularly the unforgettable "point ones," and how these moments have become a cornerstone in defining our gym's vibrant culture. As we look ahead, we discuss the importance of staying true to the core values of the Open, ensuring that every athlete, from novice to veteran, finds inspiration and meaning in the experience.

Remember the chaos of 16.1? It was more than just a workout; it was a test of creativity and adaptability as we navigated logistical challenges in our cozy gym space. The overhead walking lunges, bar-facing burpees, and chest-to-bar pull-ups pushed us to our limits while underscoring the power of community spirit. This episode explores how intra-gym competitions have evolved, adding a dynamic edge to our events. Yet, amidst the rising competitiveness, we highlight the essential balance needed to maintain a healthy and supportive environment where everyone feels valued and motivated.

Navigating the Open during COVID-19 taught us resilience and adaptability in ways we couldn't have anticipated. Competing in masks was a unique challenge, but it couldn't contain the fire within us. From memorable performances in 21.1 featuring wall walks and double unders, to the strategic lessons learned along the way, we relive those surreal moments that strengthened our bonds. Sharing our journey of recovery, growth, and community support, we aim to inspire all athletes to embrace challenges as opportunities for self-discovery and transformation. Join us as we share insights and stories that celebrate the indomitable spirit of the CrossFit Open.

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

S06E183 Friday Night Lights: The Most Memorable CrossFit Open "Point One" Workouts

TRANSCRIPT

David SyvertsenHost

00:05

Hey everybody, welcome to the Herd Fit Podcast with Dr Sam Rhee and myself, coach David Syverson. This podcast is aimed at helping anyone and everyone looking to enhance their healthy lifestyle through fitness, nutrition and, most importantly, mindset. All right, welcome back to the Herd Fit Podcast. I am Coach David Syrupson. I'm here with my co-host, dr and Coach Sam Rhee, and we are just two weeks away from the 2025 CrossFit Open, and our next couple of episodes, maybe even the next three, are going to be centered around the Open and the good and bad behind it, because it's a huge talking point in the space right now for a lot of reasons, and I want to make sure that we don't follow the crowd of just making it such a controversial topic and there is controversy around it rightfully so and we will get to it, but you guys are going to have to wait until next week for that. I think that's when we're going to air that. We'll see.

00:59

But we want to talk about some of the top moments the CrossFit Open has brought to the CrossFit Bison community and some of the early memories of our business and community, but also as recent as the last two years, and I believe in the Open for so many different reasons and I'm so about it right now because it's all I'm thinking about and I've been on all these calls with different community leaders, including Dave Castro and other gym owners from Europe, one from Africa about how much it means, and I think we've lost sight of what it truly is.

01:35

I really do think we've lost sight of it and I'm hoping that this year and next can bring back the open to where it belongs, and that's the community and that's the affiliates. And Sam, can you reflect a little bit on when you started CrossFit? You were one of the OGs of Bison and we were pushing this thing and you were probably at the time thinking, wait, what? Why? Why am I doing this? Do you remember some of like that kind of mindset that thought of? Why are we pushing this on me if I'm just here to work out?

Sam RheeCo-host

02:06

Yeah, I remember the first open was what? 2015? And I had just joined maybe a couple months before that, in the fall of 2014. And I didn't really understand it. But when we started doing it, and it was five weeks at the time, yeah, I can't believe it. And then I saw how everyone got together, how hard people tried. That made it realize, for me at least, how special the Open is.

David SyvertsenHost

02:35

Yeah, how unique it is, the energy that comes from it and it kind of ties a lot of loose ends together within the training, within the methodology, the coaching, all these things. I think it really does kind of funnel up to the open if you do it correct, and that's another reason why I believe in it so much. And so I started thinking about how I wanted to run this episode and I came up with the five best moments in CrossFit bison history around the open. And then I started realizing almost all of them minus one one was from point ones, meaning the first weekend, the first workout of an open. And I've kind of just changed my path of what I wanted to talk about and I'm going to have a list of the of the best point ones in CrossFit bison history when it came to the open, meaning the first week of the open, what made it so special. And I can tell you right now I'm gonna put myself on the spot Each workout from every first open has a really strong memory in my head.

03:35

14.1 was the first time we had the open at the at bison. It was basically me, tafaro, ashley, nick, benedetto, and I think I forced Aaron into doing some of the workouts as well, and I remember the gym was not really done being constructed yet and Ash and I would go to the gym on a Sunday night and she counted snatches and double unders and she didn't know how to count double unders so she was really nervous the entire time. 14.15.1 was the first open party. 16.1 was the first time we had to tape the floor. 17.1 was the first time we used dumbbells. 18.1 was the first time we used dumbbells. 18.1 was more of a personal thing. I was that was the year I was on the Coliseum team. That was like a really unique open for me. 19.1 was the last one. We had the old space, the wall ball in the row. 20.1 was the first one we had the new space. It had the ground to all over it and facing burpees. 21 was the year we had to wear the mask with the wall walks and the jump rope. 2022 was the first year we didn't have to wear a mask and everyone was so excited. 23.1 was the year that we hosted the open announcement, so there was extra juice in there. 24.1 was last year's and that was the last time I got to do the open with my brother, so that was.

04:38

I can give you these vivid memories of point ones and I want to kind of reflect on some funny stories that we have from the top five and maybe some of our personal experiences, sam, both as athletes, coaches, owners everything about what can we take from that and try to apply to our future.

04:56

Because the more we do this, you know we're going into year 12 now of Bison, where I always want to kind of keep track of what built bison and I want to kind of find some of the magic that we used to have and I'm always going to be like that. So I kind of want to reflect on that and kind of have that kind of scope on it before I get into the top five. Uh, because this was a a very just me decision on it. I was sitting in the sauna and I came up with it. Do you have one memory from the crossfit doesn't have to be a point, one that sticks out in your personal mind. It could be you, it could be your kids, your wife, the gym, just something that really sticks out in your mind in regard to what the Open is.

Sam RheeCo-host

05:35

Oh, wow, you put me on the spot. There are so many I think most of the parties is what I remember just because I just love seeing so many different people together. Most of us are in different classes at certain times of the day, that's all we really have time for, so if you're a 6am or a 4.15pm, you just know that crew. But every time, every year, I see everyone get together and I see people talking, hanging out. It just makes me feel really good inside. It just makes me feel like this is why we do what we do for this gym. It's because these people come together, they commiserate, they cheer. I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone push in an open workout where they fall down afterwards and they're like I didn't think I could do that. And having all these people cheer them, and to me that's the most special time and I've seen that every year. It's not like I've seen it once, I've seen it every year and to me that's what makes it special.

David SyvertsenHost

06:41

Yeah, I mean those moments of support, the moments of cheering each other on, picking each other up, all getting the stomach bug one night and being sick for the next two days. All those things have happened. And I agree, bringing the people together is truly what it's about. It is not as much about performance, although it does seem like it in the moment when you reflect on it. You don't talk about scores, you never do. You talk about bringing people together. So I have these in chronological order. It's not a rank of one to five, I'm just going to go back to chronological.

07:09

And the first one is exactly that 15.1, which is a two-part workout that had toes to bar deadlifts and snatches and then a one-arm max, clean and jerk after. And I remember one of my personal dreams of running the open at our affiliate was I always wanted to have like a big Friday night light type feel. Back then it wasn't as popular as it is now to run that. And Friday night lights, you guys all know, is basically you have classes throughout the day but you try to push as many people as possible to come do the workout at night. Some of you, yeah, leave work early, come do the. Yes, go get a babysitter come in and do the workout with each other.

07:47

And we had 42 people do the workout that night and I remember my anxiety was I didn't know if anyone would want to come that night. All day or I would say, the week leading up to, I did not know if people were going to want to come at night, because I was really into it. That didn't mean everyone else was into it. I believed in the energy you got from working out and lifting around other people. I didn't know if anyone else bought into it or even cared. So I remember having like super nerves leading up to the week and almost like asking my brother like hey, can you do the workout at night? He didn't. He came at 5am. Uh, but do those.

08:23

That was the first time we had everyone come together. And I remember looking back at the gym and you'd have eight people working out around our little dinky rig with no floor space whatsoever and you'd have 60 people and what made it special to me it was they weren't all members. People brought their families, people brought their kids, people brought their parents to come watch them do the workout. That was probably my biggest confidence boost I've ever had in one moment that hey bison was going to work out and I would challenge any gym owner out there to try and push something like this, even though there will be people in your gym that do not like to do that, they don't want to, they can't, they have zero desire but try to focus on those that do and that's a big reason why we're circling it back this year. We want as many people working out that first Friday night at 25.1 as possible. It's okay if you don't, we have classes all day, don't worry. But I really believe in the magic that comes from that night.

Sam RheeCo-host

09:23

This was the year that CrossFit probably was really starting to ascend in a huge way. This was the start of the peak for CrossFit as a sport in terms of its popularity. This was the first year Froning Frazier threw down for this one.

David SyvertsenHost

09:40

I was going to ask you if you remember that.

Sam RheeCo-host

09:42

Oh my God, I went back for prep for this episode. I went back and watched it and I was. I went back and watched it and I was like oh my god, this was insane.

David SyvertsenHost

09:47

The crowd was going crazy.

Sam RheeCo-host

09:48

I was going nuts. And so this workout was 15 toes to bar, 10 deadlifts at 115.75, 5 snatches at 115.75, as many rounds and reps in 9 minutes. And then you had 6 minute time cap for one rep, max clean and jerk. And so Froning, frazier, froning won by three reps that's crazy, like 224 to 221. So it was literally like eight rounds plus. And then they and then Froning also won the clean and jerk by just a couple of pounds 343 to 327. And so I remember now, looking at that, I was like, wow, this was so exciting. Wow, this was so exciting. Everything was so exciting about crossfit. Reebok was pouring tons of money. Um, I did, uh, worse than I. I look back I was like, wow, I think I could have done a lot better. What happened? I got 86 for hips, uh, which was less than 10 reps a minute sam pretty short.

10:39

You got um what that was 200.

David SyvertsenHost

10:41

No what it was over two yeah 209, or something like that 209.

Sam RheeCo-host

10:45

Yeah, so you got 582nd, and this is in the individual division. So you probably were thinking, ooh, I got, I got room to grow here.

10:53

Oh yeah, you're like I'm going for it. Yeah, that's right. Here I come froning. Yeah, far from 221. And I have to say when I watch these guys I'm like you know what? These guys now just look like really good regional athletes. Like it's so funny how the board has changed in 10 years. And I don't remember what your clean. I forgot to check your clean and jerk. Do you remember 286. Wow, yeah, Wow, You're a beast back then.

David SyvertsenHost

11:18

Yeah, I don't know if I could do that now, to be honest with you, I really don't, but I'm telling you, it was the energy in the room. It was also the no fear approach that you had back then he lifted.

11:27

I remember the video. One of my favorite pictures we ever had at Bison was when I was cheering on Dallas. Dallas was going for it back then too he was still at Hoboken at the time and he hit, he hit. I want to say he hit 297, or maybe even hit 300. And I'm sitting there next to him just screaming my face off as he locked it out above his head, his mouth wide open, my mouth wide open, and I get goosebumps thinking about it, man, because, like I really feel like those times where your sole focus is just your workouts, your lifting, you're not, not your kids, not your business, not your job. It was just like energy pushing each other, trying to beat each other. We always tried to beat each other left and right, but it was such a good, healthy relationship of trying to beat each other because we were trying to get the most out of each other and that I really feel like 20 pounds of that lift came from just the people being around me. Pounds of that lift came from just the people being around me. Yeah, so that that was a really fun way to say to show our community that was really growing at the time with CrossFit, that this is what this is. This is what it can be. This is what it can inspire us to do.

12:32

The next year was probably the first time we were really logistically challenged. It was 16.1 and it was a 20 minute AMRAP of 25 foot overhead walking lunges, eight bar facing burpees. No, sorry, hold on. 25 foot walking lunges, eight chest to bar. 25 foot walking lunges, eight bar facing burpees, and it was just a fight. It was such a nasty long workout. All of our butts were sore because it's so many lunges. But the the overhead lunges were with a barbell and they were walking and you had to tape five foot sections in the gym and for those that don't know about old bison, it was probably the width of one half of our gym right now and the rig was on one side of the gym. It was on the other side, so we couldn't even fit three people at a time unless we use the training bars. So all of us had to use these training bars and even with that, if you dropped it it was likely going to bounce into somebody else while we're doing a walking lunge.

13:37

And then we tried to fit two more people down at the end of the gym, like by door and I remember thinking, like, what do they do? It's a 20-minute workout, how is this going to work? We made it happen. I am strong believer that if you want to be a gym owner or a business owner, you have to be good at problem solving more than anything. You have to have that more before you have your finance degree. You just have to be a good problem solver. And that's when we really started to lean on our community. We got yellow tape and green tape. The gym looked awesome and I just remember the fear of it not working out probably overshadowed how good of a night it actually ended up being. And that was the first time like, hey, no matter what is thrown at us, we're gonna figure something out. Do you remember that workout?

Sam RheeCo-host

14:18

Very much so I have listed burpee, eight burpees and then eight chest-to-bar pull-ups. For that one, I don't know if I pulled it off a wrong website. It was 25-foot walking lunge, eight burpees walking lunge, chest-to-bar. I don't know.

David SyvertsenHost

14:31

I remember that the bar-facing burpees were at the other end of the floor. Okay, so I'll find it as you talk about it.

Sam RheeCo-host

14:40

The problem was you had to have a rig and then you had to have all this space and then you had the walking lunge with these barbells and 95 pound walking lunges for guys and 65 for women is that's a lot.

David SyvertsenHost

14:52

It is, it is.

Sam RheeCo-host

14:53

And I remember looking in fear as people were lunging that they were going to tip over one side or another and brain somebody with these barbells or hurt themselves.

15:04

I hope they never programmed this one again just because of that. And then the way you had to program it was that you had to bring the rig as close as possible to the walking lunges so you could actually run over there, do your rig work and then go back and I felt like I was so impressed because I'd never seen anyone do barbell walking lunges before and these athletes did an amazing job with it like much better than I expected. I did average. I got 130 reps, which is like 2,998 for my spot. You went down, you did 10 rounds plus a 10 foot walking lunge and you scored 2,651, which was a little bit of a wake up call.

15:46

I don't know how you felt about that.

David SyvertsenHost

15:47

I mean, I'm just I've never been good at single leg lunges, lower body stamina, and you're right, it was lunge, burpee, lunge, pull up. Now I'm thinking about we started on the other side of the floor. So yeah, um, yeah, that that definitely, when you're comparing 15 to 16 rank-wise, that first workout was very toes-to-bar dominant and that's where I've always been strong, and single leg is where I've not been strong. So I really think the predominant movement of that workout was the overhead lunge and I remember just thinking like holding on to it. Yes, but going fast is very difficult, really hard.

Sam RheeCo-host

16:18

But some people are really good at lunges, like they just just like fly through them now we just do lunges all the time we do a lot of single leg so I think if we were to redo it, people would crush that thing you know what, though?

David SyvertsenHost

16:28

we ain't doing it because it's too dangerous with the barbell. If we were gonna do it, I would say we're gonna hold like dumbbells or plates or something like that.

16:36

Yeah, yeah, I agree yeah, that that was, um, that was a big challenge for us and that was the second year of Friday nights. If you can kind of reflect back on what it was like to go from 14 to 15, now the community half the community, I would say knew what the Friday night lights was about. So once January hit, everyone was like dude, that's my time, I'm going to go. The intensity was higher and I will tell you this. I remember this clearly. I, I'm going to go. The intensity was higher and I will tell you this. I remember this clearly. I'm not going to say who.

Sam RheeCo-host

17:05

That's when some of the intra-gym competitions start to really get really nasty. I think we had a couple people do some intros, some walk steps with the music I wasn't even thinking about that and all the costumes. That was a lot of fun.

David SyvertsenHost

17:17

But even some of the like her foot's not over the line, like that kind of stuff. That started getting competitive, yeah, and I lean into it. I think it's healthy. I just think you have to be able to control it and not let it ruin your community. And I remember thinking, all right, this is now changing. This is no longer like, hey, we're all here having fun. It's like, wow, people are really paying attention to who's beating who and who's going to redo the workout on Sunday. That's when repeats started. That was the year we started to have to say, guys, no more repeats on Mondays. It was that year. I remember that. So that was 15.1. 16.1. Sorry, 16.1. 17.1 is probably one of my favorite memories just from a comical perspective is probably one of my favorite memories just from like a comical perspective.

18:02

17.1, about a month prior to that, crossfit put out an Instagram post saying hey guys, there's gonna be dumbbells in the open and everyone's like, oh, yeah, look at this, this is awesome. Back then I think we had six dumbbells on our gym. We didn't have an array of dumbbells, we didn't use them that much. And I remember thinking I always liked the open because it kind of tells affiliate owners like, hey, you should be doing more of this. So I took it that way, like, oh, we got to use more dumbbells as the open's getting closer and closer. Like we're looking at each other, we still don't have much money to work with. And we're looking at each other and say, hey, should we be buying dumbbells? And we're like, yeah, maybe we'll go get a few. And workout comes out 17.1, right away has dumbbell snatches and burpee box jump overs. And not only does it have dumbbell snatches, it had 150 of them. Oh my god. So we're looking at the workout, we're looking at the amount of people that are coming to the gym, which in some ways is 15 to 20 people at a time, and we're like we have nine dumbbells. This is not going to work. So we had gym teachers from our staff and from our gym stealing dumbbells from their high school gym for Friday night lights. I'm like, hey, we'll bring it back. Saturday morning I'm contacting Midland Park High School. I had a couple of connections there and I actually got a couple from them saying I'll bring them back the next day. If they break them, I'll buy more.

19:23

We went to Walmart. We were ordered. They were all out of stock everywhere because every CrossFit affiliate was trying to go from. It was very common not to have many dumbbells. They were all trying to buy them and we brought these like dinky ones from Walmart but like by the second time someone used it in a workout, the dumbbells were flying off the handles. They were just not made for that. To the point, guys, imagine this Imagine doing a workout with 150 dumbbell snatches and we had 40s and we were taping five-pound dumbbells on each side of it with duct tape. I remember Adam Ramson running into the gym on a Thursday night he's always there to help us out set up Duct taping with brown duct tape, steel plates to the end of the dumbbell and we're thinking I think it'll stay, do you remember that that was the jankiest looking thing I've ever seen, with people doing dumbbell snatches with duct tape and little plates stuck.

20:15

I will never forget that. I will never forget that and I'll tell you what man like when it comes to equipment and facility. Like CrossFitters now are freaking, spoiled, like and they don't even realize it Back then. Like if we had people in our gym right now use dumbbells with duct tape on it, they'd be like this is going to affect my score? No, absolutely not. But I remember Gavin Friday Night Lights. You know know, we had a huge amount of people there. That was another big. That was a big open it was a really big one for whatever reason.

20:43

It was just a ton of people. His dumbbell, the I think it was either the dumbbell head or his five pound plate came flying off mid-workout and he kind of just looked at me and ash and we're like, we just went, grabbed another one it was. It was so dangerous and stupid at the same time. It kind of just made it seem like, hey, we don't really have control of the situation. We're going to do our best to come up with solutions. The next week is when we got crushed.

21:08

Do you remember what the workout was the next week? No, what was it? Double dumbbell cleans, double dumbbell front walking lunges. So now it went to. Every athlete needed two and we were like, oh my god, we were like getting mad at CrossFit at the time. Reflect a little bit, sam on, you know, because at this, at this time, you're like a key member of the gym. I think this is when I started calling you like the mayor, or you and Susan, like the mayor and the mayor's, or no, susan was the mayor and you were the mayor's husband, the boss of the mayor is what she was.

21:38

Yes, yes, you had kind of like a different angle, a different approach. We had a friendship back then. You had people over you, were kind of like a leader of the community. Do you remember it being kind of like a negative that we had to use these dumbbells and tape it together, or was it like, hey, this is what we do.

Sam RheeCo-host

21:58

We figure stuff out and we go to and we do it together. I at the time it was terrible, but you look back, I guess, with the fog of time and you kind of reminisce more positively about it. Yeah, I just feel like we tried to roll with everything. I mean at the time it was a young gym we had. We were younger and we just wanted to get through it and so we just tried to MacGyver whatever we could and it was fun. It was a lot of people. The membership really really started to take off at that point. Like there were a lot of. It was no longer the three people at 6 am now. It was like now you had a fight to get in. It started to really take off.

22:40

And I do like the fact that CrossFit pivoted with the dumbbells, because the same from a from a fitness and um, from a fitness standpoint, using dumbbells is so important and I don't. It is almost so weird to think that we didn't really use dumbbells at a time, for a year at some point. Yeah, and now we use dumbbells all the time. I mean this is still a terrible workout. Oh my gosh. You go 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 dumbbell snatches and 15 burpee box jump overs in between each round of snatches. That was effing terrible Burpee box. I mean this was a burner and of course you did really well because you are into the burner workouts.

David SyvertsenHost

23:20

You did 1140.

Sam RheeCo-host

23:22

The time cap was 20 minutes. You did 1140. That was 508th at that time ranking. Redid it so I could beat Dallas and then Dallas beat me a second time Is that right? And I did 1444, which was 3,272. So I would say this was again pivotal in terms of us as a gym, growth wise, in terms of fitness, in terms of, you know, toughness, Like it was sort of a watershed moment.

David SyvertsenHost

23:55

Adapting to adapting, because that was not a new movement. I actually remember programming workout dumbbell snatches but I think it was for myself, I don't think the gym did it, and that was a lot, lot of reps and people didn't know how to transition back. Then we were trying to teach each other how to switch the dumbbell. Now people like throw it and then catch it is. It was like it's easy, now almost not easy, but um, people's backs were ruined after this workout because you would pick one up, you would reach back to the ground, switch with the dumbbell on the ground, probably not tighten up, and then just yank it back up and you're doing this over and over with the hinge.

24:27

Uh, favored movement of the burpee box jump. And what I liked about it like wish crossfit would do again, but I'm biased on this is that they threw something at us and they let us know like, hey, you guys better have this piece of equipment for the open. And I remember someone asking dave, right, but I do think I love having a higher power kind of look down on all of us and say like hey, you guys are probably not doing enough of this we're going to put in the open. At some point. You better start either budgeting it or just go get one right now.

Sam RheeCo-host

25:13

We used to have so many back issues with people doing dumbbell snatches, but now that we do so many, we coach that so much better and people know now don't hinge at that back Like, keep that dumbbell close. There's a way to do it. Yeah, and I feel like if we had to I mean not that I would ever want to reprogram this people would be doing so much better on that one 21.1 is our fourth .1 cross it open moment and this one is kind of special to me for a good and bad reason.

David SyvertsenHost

25:44

Um, the good behind it was the year prior was our first year at new bison, but that was the year they put it in the fall and it just it. It felt weird and I remember ash was pregnant back then and that kind of made it a little bit more not not bad, just like I just remember that, it being the first open, ash was pregnant blah, blah, blah. Then 21.1 comes, we go through the lockdown. I remember we did not. I'm pretty sure we did not do an open party that year because it wasn't technically allowed and we were still wearing masks. I'm pretty sure if we were still wearing masks, we definitely weren't allowed to go party with each other legally anyway, and doing the entire open with a mask on was awful. But we were so used to working out with the mask on and we were so thankful to be inside with each other. We worked out the entire fall September, october, november, december, january, february with masks inside and we were like, are we going to do the open? We have people that had serious, ambitious goals competing. Do we have to wear the open. Do we have to wear masks for this? And we did. We kept the masks on, we played by the rules back then and it really to me, looking back on it, it actually did not impact people the way I think they thought. It was just physically uncomfortable or more mentally uncomfortable, but I don't think it physically impeded that many people Reflecting on that open a little bit.

27:07

And also that first workout was wall walks and jump rope, which has just burned into my memory how bad I did in that workout and it's like I'm afraid to reprogram it. But I also on the other side of it taking myself out of it. That's a workout where I think some people crushed it that normally should have struggles in the open. I remember squats Sweeney annihilated that workout. I remember Kayla crushed everyone on that workout and I was so happy to see that.

27:33

That it it really is. It was a great, it's a great fitness test and I still remember after the 5 am it was either, I can't say the names, but there was someone that said, hey, I was standing by X, y, z, I just tested positive for COVID and I was still back in the day where I had to contact people Like, hey, just so you know, your judge has COVID and it was such a different dream that whole time. Can you reflect on doing the Open with a mask, but it also being back after us being separated and it being back in March where we really think it shines the best.

Sam RheeCo-host

28:11

It was a dream. It was like there was a feeling of unreality to the whole situation which I think all of us when we think back during that time. I remember people had so many different masks. Some people just wore bandanas, some people kept it, like their nose was always out, like I had three different masks, depending on what kind of it was really, really annoying. And you're right, we complied, we did what we needed to do. In retrospect it was probably the stupidest thing I could have imagined what we went through. But but you know, we sprayed everything down. We did this like every time we spray into the air after somebody worked out in that air.

28:59

I don't know why we just did, but this workout was, for me, what I remember the most was the, the value of pacing. Yeah, so this was a pace workout which I'd never it had never been hammered home to me so much until this one. So this was one double, one wall walk, 10 double, 10 double unders, three wall walks, 36, 69, 95, 15 wall walks, 150 double unders, 21 wall walks, 210 double unders. Time cap was 15 minutes, and so I remember and nobody finished In our gym, right.

29:31

So I remember going with CJ and CJ had this effing revelation, which he's a pretty stoic kind of guy and he just kind of pushes through, and I remember before we did it I said, listen, we gotta step this through. You can't just like go ham, like here are your scheduled timings, yeah that you need to get to here. If you go faster than this, slow down, stick to this, this will go. And he did it. And then he actually came back and he redid it and he did like orders of magnitude better the second time. And he goes Sam, this is crazy. I worked less and I did better. It was like a blow away mental moment and to me that's what the value of this was was you couldn't just go out and blow through these wall walks. You had to kind of time it rest, figure out, like, when to go next.

David SyvertsenHost

30:28

Like that was-.

Sam RheeCo-host

30:29

Avoid shoulder failure. Yeah, avoid, especially with the double unders. And so I did. Very well, I got what 377, which was 263 in my oh, I also Aged up, aged up.

David SyvertsenHost

30:44

So that really helped me placement-wise.

Sam RheeCo-host

30:46

I went into the 50-year-old category that year. You got 393, which was 6,450th place. That was just too short of finishing the 21 wall walks. What do you remember about that, Lloyd?

David SyvertsenHost

31:00

Just being at complete and utter muscle failure on the wall walks to the point where, like you, you can't even move your arms and just watching people. You know, like the people resting on wall walks, just laying on the floor with like dead arms and like nose to the ground like deb, t's always great with that, um, it's just, it's a funny thing. Like you, you feel like you're so fit and capable and like you just are laying on the ground because you can't do anything. You can't even walk four steps towards the wall and I remember being like that's such a. It was like I've always felt like my shoulder stamina is good, but then I realized in that moment like it's just not. It just wasn't very good and it was really tough to to do, but I still.

31:39

My number one reflection on that workout is watching people that normally don't crush others in open workouts crushed others in open workouts and I'm like there's a, there's a certain level of skill that combines strength, mobility and stability with the wall walk and then obviously, your double under capacity. That was really impressive to watch and I remember thinking, just like I remember texting our coaches about how happy I was to see other athletes at the top of the leaderboard on that workout and I think it has made a lot of people think twice about their gymnastics capacity, their skill level, which circles back to how fit are you actually?

Sam RheeCo-host

32:17

I see people now and their technique on wall walks is light years better than it was here, Like if we had to redo this I could see half our gym just destroying it because people have gotten so good at being efficient at wall walks.

David SyvertsenHost

32:29

Yeah, I've been trying to actually put this into programming the past couple of weeks but I just haven't been able to. With you know, we're doing a lot of other overhead stuff and jumping. It's just been tough. But I do think I'm going to throw it in on a Monday during open week, just in case it becomes as a repeat. I, if I had a prediction for a repeat this, is it? Well walked up on there? Just anyway, I'm going to go on the record saying that Okay, last one, last 0.1 memory that it's really burned in my memory is 23.1.

32:55

Because that week leading up to 23, there's always extra juice in the gym around the open.

33:01

But that week we announced to the gym that we were hosting 23.2. And we had some back and forth disagreements with CrossFit about when we were allowed to tell our community and I was like they didn't want us to tell anyone until after it was announced to the world where 23.2 was going to be, which is at CrossFit Bison, midland Park, new Jersey. And then we're going to announce that until after 23.1. I in Midland Park, new Jersey, and they weren't going to announce that until after 23.1. I was like, absolutely not, because we had to line up and we were signing NDAs and we were to line up where our gym was going to work out for a week. We were ripping our rig out. So we got to tell them, with their permission, a few days prior to the start of 23.1. And like, the juice was like out of control. People were so hyped and pumped and then 23.1 ended up being a repeat that goes down in many people's heads as just one of the most fun open tests ever.

Sam RheeCo-host

33:51

I mean define fun.

David SyvertsenHost

33:53

Well, just in that, a lot of different movements, variety, a combination of skills, very inclusive, until the end, give the workout, sam.

Sam RheeCo-host

34:00

It was 60 cal row, 50 toes to bar, 40 wall balls, 30 cleans and then 20 ring muscle-ups.

David SyvertsenHost

34:06

And it was an AMRAP. So if you finish, you went back to the rower.

Sam RheeCo-host

34:08

Yeah, and it was 95, 135 for the cleans.

David SyvertsenHost

34:11

Yeah. So basically it was very inclusive in that you would get to the ring muscle-ups or you would have a path to the ring muscle-ups and then you'd get there and you can do them or you can't. But everyone can row. You know, toes bar, even if you're doing singles, you can get there Wall balls even doing singles Cleans. It wasn't a heavy barbell and it's a chipper, and it's fun to watch too, because it's like all right, who's going to get there first, who's going to get there second?

34:33

But then pull ahead, you know, and it people are sharing them together like yes, I just remember the open party that night had so much extra juice we had. You know, we talked to the crowd before our group picture and everyone's just like hype. We had tyr in the building. Yes, crossfit headquarters staff was at our gym during open gym on that sunday. Yeah, and I just remember that was kind of like the euphoria. That was like the.

34:59

To me that that year was like the peak open for for crossfit bison individually, because we were hosting the next week. You just felt like a certain level of um, I don't know. You felt like bison like was really important back then, like our community felt was really important. And then we crushed the open announcement like rich froning's, like man, I want to work out in this place, like that. It just we felt very it wasn't even accomplished, like I don't want to go down that path. It was just like we felt bison was really truly on the map because we've always taken pride in how we've done things and how we like to showcase our community, like kathleen and joel, their whole story going up there. We always knew it was special, but now we got to show everyone else how special it was and I just remember it being really extra energetic that friday night I think this was sort of our coming out as a flagship for crossfit in terms of being out on the map.

Sam RheeCo-host

35:52

Like there's certain uh gyms out there that have been synonymous with crossfit crossfit diablo or a crossfit santa Santa Cruz or Invictus and this was sort of the year where people like if you would go out to other places, they might be like oh yeah, crossfit Bison.

36:10

Yeah, I heard of you guys, I know who you guys are and and that just came from. Not because we had an in geographically I mean, we're out in New Jersey and everyone else is West Coast. Yeah, because we had some famous games, athletes that worked out here, like CrossFit Reykjavik with Annie Thor's daughter and all those guys. Like we just had a bunch of people and participated like crazy every year and we were always one of the top affiliate participation. We always had one of the top numbers every year and it wasn't that we were so special in any other way other than the fact that we had a lot of members who bought in, who made this a big place, a fun place to work out in, and you're right, that open workout showed that to the world. But this was a really great workout beforehand for a lot of people and a lot of people were scared. They're like how do I get through 50 toes to bar?

37:08

How do I get through 30 cleans? That's insane, and when I watched people do this, or how do I even get a ring muscle up, and so there were a lot of like mini barriers mentally for people that they smashed in this workout, which was exactly what open workouts are designed to do. Like you think you can't do 30 cleans, guess what. You just did that and you just got to. You know, you got time to play on the rings if you wanted to, and so so for me, I got one ring muscle up, which, after all that and my I am so janky on the rings like that that was a win for me.

37:43

I thought I could have maybe gotten two or three, but everyone thinks that right, and so that got me 522nd place. You crushed this one in a huge way, maybe your best .1 finish ever. You got one round plus Second best oh, is that right? 18. Oh, okay, one round plus 28 cows on the come around, yeah, and you got 169th place. So I mean, from a personal best standpoint, this must have been a huge high for you as well.

David SyvertsenHost

38:10

Yeah, this was actually after just a few months after I hurt my knee at Mayhem for Legends. I just remember thinking like I hadn't squatted in months. I was doing PT, the wall balls. That was the first time I squatted with with uh exterior load in the workout, with with, like you know, repetitively over and over, like going back and forth, rebounding, and thank God it was just a wall ball, not like a heavy thruster is the next week we had heavy thrusters with the 23.2. And like I definitely kept my I didn't want to go heavy on that I stopped myself at a certain point, but that I really do think part of me doing well in that workout was that the juice, the energy that we had from hosting we were just like so it was just excited.

38:50

It just goes to show to me like when your mind is in the right place, when you're training, when you're working out, you bring yourself to new heights. I've been reflecting on this a lot with myself and others that when your head's not there, if it's kind of like 80% there, you're putting a significant reach, that goal there's just no shot and you can't guarantee that you're going to hit your goal by being mentally in it. But I really do think it's like a prerequisite to hitting that goal is you have to really be fully committed in your head to pursuing that. And it was really, and there are certain moments and certain environments where it becomes easier to put your head in it, and that year it was so easy to put your head in it because of what we had coming our way the week after. And that's something that I just want to wrap this up with is that, as the open is coming our way, just thinking right now, we're probably going to release this days before 25.1.

40:05

Just thinking right now, we're probably going to release this days before 25.1. Just try to be really present with all of the positive that comes from it and the energy, the juice, the personal ambition supporting others. It doesn't even have to be about you and your workouts. It could just be like what can you do for others and what can this environment do for people that haven't experienced? Because a lot of people that come to Bison now haven't been to a Friday Night Lights. They don't understand it, and if you don't kind of open the door and show them the way and support them, you're kind of robbing them of that experience that you got to benefit from for a long time, even if you're not that into it anymore. I would want I'd challenge a lot of you guys to view it as something almost like you're leading the way for others that haven't got to experience this yet.

Sam RheeCo-host

40:44

This is scary. I was thinking about every point one workout and I was never an athlete. I never sat there under Friday night lights, played football or had a big shot in a game or, you know, competed in districts or anything like that in my entire life. So I never sat there under the microscope like a lot of our athletes have. And if you have had that experience, it's invaluable.

41:09

When you step up there and they're going three, two, one and so every time I do a point one, I hate it. I'm always thinking why the F am I doing this? This is terrible, everyone's staring, this is awful. And this is the one time in the year where you kind of shove that all aside and you're like okay, this is growing the athlete part of me. So if you're like me, who you've never done this before and you, there's a part of you that really hates it.

41:33

It's the part that makes you better, like it makes you better If you've never experienced it. It's a safe environment. It's people who care and support about you and it's a place to push. And if you're an athlete who's been in that limelight before, it's a place to shine. It's a place to say listen, this is where I used to be, when I was in high school, and I had to run the 400 and I was in states. That's exactly what this feels like, and so I would encourage everyone, regardless of how you feel, get to that point one workout, support each other, support yourself, and you're going to have an awesome time at the end of it. Yeah.

David SyvertsenHost

42:11

All right, thank you guys. Let's create some more memories this year. We'll see you next week. Thank you everybody for taking the time out of your day to listen to the Herd Fit Podcast. Be on the lookout for next week's episode.