WOD: The CrossFit workouts
If you are new to CrossFit you may have noticed that there are many acronyms and strange words. One of the most repeated is WOD.
In this post, we are going to explain everything related to the CrossFit Wods, and hopefully it will help you to better understand the chalk board when you go to the gym.
What does WOD mean?
WOD corresponds to the acronym for Workout Of the Day.
The WOD is a mix of CrossFit exercises that are combined for a set amount of time. and aims for class participants to strive every day to improve their physical condition.
Every day is different, so it is common to hear from fellow pit crew members asking <>
The WOD is only one part of the entire workout:
- Warm up
- Skill - strength
- WOD / Workout of the day
- Cool down / stretching
When the head coach schedules the class, he or she schedules it so that all parts of a CrossFit session revolve around the WOD.
Warm up
The warm-up helps to activate the muscles that will work more actively in the classroom.
Skill or Strength
Skills section is focused to work on improveing exercise technique for the WOD. Depending on the day, this part of the session may be dedicated to the forcebut it will also be related to the main movement of the wod.
WOD
The workout of the day can be presented in many ways as we will see below.
Cool down
Finally, a few stretching to lower the tension of the muscles we have involved in the wod.
It is common to see that many gyms leave stretching once the session is over. They do this to try to squeeze the most out of the class and recommend athletes who have done the WOD to stretch on one side while the next session starts. The fact that it is not guided along with the rush, is usually the part we skip the most.
Classification of WODs
According to the level of difficulty
The box board describes in detail the day's training by offering different levels of difficulty depending on skills of each one.
RX
This is the more demanding version. Dedicated to those athletes with a solid base of training and technical knowledge of the exercises.
SCALED
The WOD is modified to make it accessible to all athletes. Training is usually scaled to offer at least 2 levels: beginner and intermediate.
Depending on the objective
Not all WODs have the same structure that varies depending on the objective of the training:
AMRAP
These are the initials of As Many Rounds (or Reps) As Possiblewhich in Spanish would be "as many rounds or repetitions as possible" within the time cap or time limit.
AMRAP of 15 minutes:
20 Squats
10 Pull-Ups
5 Burpees
Result: 4 R + 23, meaning you completed 4 full rounds + 20 squats and 3 pull ups of the next round before the timer ran out.
EMOM
Initials of Every Minute On a Minute.
These training sessions define the work to be done within each minute. The time between the end of the exercise and the completion of that minute is your rest. The faster you are at doing the work described above, the more rest you will get.
EMOM:
1 snatch PR pull + 1 full snatch
This means that if you take 25″ to do a pull and a snatch, you will have 35″ left until the minute to rest is completed.
Versions: From here EMOMs are created using other time intervals. For example, EMOM every 2 min.
TABATA
These exercises always follow the same work pattern: 20 seconds of work + 10 seconds of rest. In total there are 8 rounds and 4 minutes. It can be performed by repeating the same exercise all the time or by alternating different movements.
Back extension + hollow rock
In the first round you perform the extension for 20″, rest 10″, for the next 20″ you perform the hollow rock, and rest another 10″. So on until all 8 rounds are completed.
Here are more Tabata workout ideas.
DEATH BY
In Spanish it would be "muerto por". you start with a set number of repetitions and with each passing minute you add one more repetition. When the work to be done in a set cannot be completed in that minute, that is when the training is over.
Death by burpees:
minute 0-1: 1 burpee
minute 1-2: 2 burpees
minute 2-3: 3 burpees
Score 12, means that you made it to round 12, because you didn't have time to do 13 burpees in one minute.
According to the type of main exercise
This classification names the different classes of the box. It is common that in your gym's schedule you will see these options:
ENDURANCE
WEIGHTLIFTING
These are the wods in which main focus is olympic weightlifting. They are aimed to work on strength and technique snatch and clean and jerk. You can learn more about these for free with these tutorials here.
GYMNASTICS
Focused on exercises involving the control of one's own body to be able to perform the movement in question. We work to improve skills and time is devoted to gaining strength for a specific movement.
Examples: bar muscle up, handstand walk, or other movements of which you can learn here.
According to the number of exercises
SINGLET
Training sessions consisting of a single movement.
They are usually the less common in a CrossFit class. However, we can find some benchmark with this style.
For example, Isabel consists of 30 snatches.
COUPLET
Training consists of two movements.
For example, Diane consists of 21 - 15 - 9 repetitions of deadlift and handstand push ups.
TRIPLET
Training consisting of three movements. Jackie for example, is maximum rounds of: 5 pull-ups, 10 push ups and 15 squats.
What is a Chipper?
When the training is composed of more than three different movements, we call it a chipper.
Wod by pairs or teams
Partner/team wods are workouts that are designed to do with 2 or more people.
Some of these WOD's allow you to divide the work according to the skillsof each member to the team. In some variatios, the workload per team member is already pre-established.
Training in pairs or teams is a good way to increase the demand, since the team's result depends on your work. It is a way to increase the bonds of community.
In many gyms, Saturdays are reserved for this type of wods.
Wods at home
This option used to be reserved only for a few, nowadays many people train at home. Depending on the space available, you can have more or less material and more or less creativity.
You can still train if you don't have equipment. Here are some examples:
5 Rounds of:
10 Hollow Rocks
10 V-Ups
10 Tuck Ups
10 sec Hollow Hold
1 min rest between rounds
4 Rounds of:
40 Air Squats
30 Hand-Release Push ups
20 Burpees
400 m race (street?)
50 Rounds for Time:
1 Burpee
1 Push-Up
1 Jumping-Jack
1 Sit-Up
1 Handstand
For Time:
20 Push-Ups, 1 Sit-Ups
19 Push-Ups, 2 Sit-Ups
18 Push-Ups, 3 Sit-Ups
...continue until you reach...
2 Push-Ups, 19 Sit-Ups
1 Push-Ups, 20 Sit-Ups
If you are interested in setting up a training corner at home, we recommend you to read this article where we talk about some options if you are looking to train at home..
What are CrossFit Benchmarks?
CrossFit Benchmarks are workouts that are used as a standard in order to be able to measure your progress. While the day-to-day WOD is always varied, Benchmarks are used to measure your progress periodically repeated to be able to compare previous scores.
Benchmark Types
The CrossFit Girls
The CrossFit Heroes
