Morning Chalk Up Community

Sell more tickets: Stop calling your divisions “Rx” + “Scaled”

May 26, 2022 by

Honest truth - no one is excited about saying they’re doing a “Scaled” division at a Comp and you will sell more tickets if you call your divisions anything except for Rx and Scaled.

I get it…in classes we have an Rx version of the daily workout and if someone has to modify some aspect of it we typically say the workout was modified or “scaled”. It might be subbing rowing instead of running, maybe they did single-unders instead of double-unders, or maybe they used a lighter barbell than the workout called for. It’s changing an aspect or movement standard to better suit the needs of a given individual.

In a Comp we have divisions, which is an important differentiation. 

Divisions may have different movements or requirements but everyone in a division does the workout to the same standards, or as prescribed for that division. Everyone squats to depth (or at least they should), they all use the weights set for that division, and you are not customizing the workouts based on each individual.

There’s also a stigma amongst athletes about doing the Scaled division which needs to be acknowledged. There are going to be people who are interested in competing who feel like they’re not quite ready for the Rx division but they’re also Rx’ing workouts in classes and feel like they shouldn’t be doing Scaled.

Yes - there is a Scaled division in the Open but I don’t think that should be looked at as an example. It’s the only division in the Open that ends after Open and doesn’t move on to any type of Quarterfinals or in person Comp. It’s basically a money grab from CrossFit to try and get more people to participate. 

So what should you call it?

Anything you want - but it should be on brand with the Comp. For example, at our Battle for the Bell event there was a Kettlebell theme. The winning team earned the right to claim the coveted golden Kettlebell for a year and we had two divisions … Big Bell + Little Bell. Looking at other sports you could go NCAA style and have D1, D2, D3, or take a page out of MLB’s book and do Majors and Minors.

There’s no right or wrong answer, it’s something you should have fun with and it can help make your Comp more memorable and differentiate your event from the others. I promise it will also help you sell more tickets, which is never a bad thing.

originally published on Compitecture

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