Welcome to ‘Artemis’! The Goddess of the Hunt – because it’s officially the time of year to start hunting down those goals.
This 12* week cycle, broken into two 5 Week Progression Blocks, will be the main portion of our preparation for the CrossFit Open and Quarterfinals. For our Affiliates, these are the two main targets for the year as our nice little fitness check up and for those athletes deciding to test themselves here at this time of year.
During Artemis, we will transition to more specific preparation for the types of workouts and fitness tests typically seen during the Open and Quarterfinals, while keeping our structure well rounded for the general population. We’ve built the base during this previous cycle and now it’s time to take that progress and make sure we learn to apply our new capacities and strengths in our yearly fitness check-up. *Please note the exact length of the cycle will be dependent upon the Open dates being released, which we will know pretty early on in this cycle.
Programming Approach: Our weightlifting work this cycle will be a blend of heavy singles, barbell cycling & battery work, and more moderate loads under fatigue. This mix of approaches will help build our confidence and capacity with every possible application that we see in the Open.
Our powerlifting work will focus primarily around the Back Squat, with much of our other lifting being more volume focused as we again keep our ability to express strength under fatigue front of mind. Our Back Squat will follow an undulating style between targeting 5×5 style lifting sessions and 3-4 x 8-12 lifting sessions to develop more muscular endurance and resiliency heading into the Open.
You will see 2-3 gymnastics skill and capacity sessions under fatigue each week, to help you learn the best strategies and approaches in a variety of workout settings. These will either be solo sessions, mixed modal workouts with the focus on gymnastics density, or in an EMOM format that tackles interference work between multiple components. During these sessions, we will also have skill development options for our Level 1 athletes to ensure we continue to move the needle with our technique.
Lastly, when it comes to our conditioning, you will see a variety of time domains with a high emphasis on threshold efforts – we’re going to go short, moderate, and long week in and week out. You see a continued emphasis placed on our strict gymnastics push and pull capacity, as well. This will be mixed in throughout weeks and a lot specifically targeted in our optional accessory work or finisher style work weekly.
Weightlifting + Strength Programming Goals:
-5RM Power Snatch
-5RM Power Clean
-5RM + 10RM Back Squat
Our challenge for you all is to focus on following RPE guidance with applicable weightlifting pieces, and to learn the hard lessons of what works best for you when it comes to executing workouts and lifts under fatigue. Do not be afraid to adjust percentages slightly based on your capacity with certain movements in these progressions.
Conditioning Work:
We will target multiple previous Open workouts during this phase and workouts with the style and feel that you have become accustomed to throughout the year. We will also target the Specific new “PRVN Benchmarks” that we are working on during our Transition Week as well as Week 1 of the new cycle. Overall these will serve as a good basis and guideline to help progress and monitor training.
*Competitor / Extra Work Monostructural Focus: -1k Row -20:00 FTP Bike Test -Mixed Threshold Work
