Five More CrossFit Sanctioned Events Announced

Good morning and welcome to the Morning Chalk Up. Today’s edition is fueled by FITAID, the official beverage sponsor of the Morning Chalk Up. 

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“My sports made me a more focused, sharper, more determined and stronger person than I was before. It’s a mental game, the stronger you are the better you are.” — Kiran Khan

China, Australia and Iceland Sanctioned Events Added

Yesterday, CrossFit HQ announced four new sanctioned events for the 2019 CrossFit Games season and one for the 2020 season, bringing the grand total to 16. There are now sanctioned events across 11 countries on six continents.

“These new events are a true testament to CrossFit’s global reach,” said CrossFit founder Greg Glassman in a press release. “Whether athletes are competing in Wollongong, Reykjavik, or Shanghai, they represent the spirit of the CrossFit community—a community that today crosses more borders and contains more languages and cultures than we could have ever imagined at the start.”

In previous interviews, Glassman hinted at a total of 16 sanctioned events in the first year, while alluding to the possibility of surpassing that number down the road. Currently, fourteen of the sixteen sanctioned events are for the 2019 Games season.

Due to the 2019 CrossFit Open running from late February through March, sanctioned events are starting to bottleneck. There are now four sanctioned events scheduled in May in four separate countries: Brazil, Iceland, Australia, and the Netherlands. However, for the 2020 CrossFit Games season, the Open will take place in October freeing up the five weeks in February and March.

Here is the complete schedule for the 2019 CrossFit Games season.

How to Fix Anything, Part One

Editor’s note: This is part one in this three-part series by Dr. Sean Pastuch, founder and owner of Active Life Rx. Dr. Sean examines his own nagging injury incurred while training, and the lessons he learned through months of self-diagnosis and rehabilitation.

I’ve been there.

When I went to visit Rich Froning and Lindy Barber in Cookeville, we worked out, a lot. I had been doing some programming for Rich since the day after regionals 2017 for some knee issues he was dealing with (it was now December 2017).

We were introduced by another one of my clients and friends, Lindy Barber, with whom I had been working for over a year when she connected Rich and me. In order for you to more easily understand how to fix your body, I ask you to put yourself in my shoes for a moment.

Here I am at Rich Froning’s house. We had been working out all day long and I was exhausted. Rich and Lindy drew up this workout:

With a partner, complete the whole workload of the rep scheme then break while your partner does the same for time:

5×5 Bench Press 225/135 pounds + Sandbag over shoulder 150/100 pounds

8×4 Bench Press 205/115 pounds + Sandbag over shoulder 150/100 pounds

10×3 Bench Press 185/95 pounds + Sandbag over shoulder 150/100 pounds

I told Rich, “I have never been able to get the 150 pound sandbag over my shoulder before – that’s my body weight. I think I need to scale this.”

He replied “You’ll be a’rite.”

What would you do? I’ll tell you what I did. I shit my pants.

Continue reading…

Coffee Break Conversations

What to say the next time someone asks you if you heard the latest CrossFit sanctioned event news…

Of course you did, because you read the Morning Chalk Up. But did you know that we’ve also started a weekly live show, where your editors, Justin and Jessica, discuss some of their favorite stories from the week and perhaps a few things that didn’t make it into print. We’ll see ya again on Friday. 

Things To…

WATCH: Michael Glenn Easter on Greg Glassman

Armen Hammer got Michael Glenn Easter, who just recently wrote a profile piece on Greg Glassman for Men’s Health’s 30th anniversary edition, on the phone to share how that piece came about and his impressions on CrossFit HQ, Glassman’s new goals, and how people have reacted to the piece.

TUNE IN.

HEAR: Dani Urcuyo on Actual Health

Dani is a Family and Functional Medicine doctor, also a CrossFitter, who works with patients all around the country through SteadyMD. The three share their opinions on diets, long-term health goals, and the real things we all need to be focusing on when it comes to our health.

WHAT’S ACTUALLY IMPORTANT.

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EAT: Super Cute Monster Cookies 

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SPOOKY AND SWEET.

Today’s edition of the Morning Chalk Up is fueled by

Chalk Up Community

• BENEFIT FOR SON OF LIMO CRASH VICTIMS — CrossFit Schenectady is holding a benefit WOD and raffle for Isaac Dyson, the three year old son of two Crossfit coaches who died in the limo accident earier this month in upstate New York, Mary and Rob Dyson. 
• BRAZIL HOLDS FIRST MDL1 — Over the weekend, Brazil, home to the second largest number or CrossFit boxes and also the sanctioned Brazil CrossFit Competition, had its first MDL1 seminar, held at CrossFit No Brasil. 
• TWELVE HOURS OF CROSSFIT — CrossFit Grant Street held a 12 Hour WOD relay for Kids in Kenya this weekend. Fifty athletes participated for the full 12 hours, raising $1,700. 
• WOMEN FIT FOR A CAUSE — Sarah Aronson, who used CrossFit to stay physically and mentally strong through her battle with Glioblastoma, is being honored by Women Fit For a Cause November 2nd 6:00 – 9:00 at the Greenery in Walnut Creek. This will be a fundraising event to support Sarah’s family. 
• DOGGY NOSES AND YOGA POSES — Townson CrossFit hosted an event called Doggy Noses and Yoga Poses on Sunday. The class was a benefit event for Brandywine Valley SPCA rescue as they transport and care for animals left homeless by Hurricane Florence.

CHALK UP IN 2 MINUTES (a highlight reel around social media of CrossFit pros and average joes)

Happy five-year anniversary to CrossFit DNR • USA Weightlifting announced it will host an Olympic qualification event in Las Vegas • Ben Smith hits a 365 pound jerk • Coach Glassman walks into CrossFit Inferno and gives the 3, 2, 1 GO • Flashback to Kari Pearce’s first weightlifting meet where she failed a 70kg/154 pound clean • Coach Mike Burgener’s garage gym and house are finally back after the fire last year • Jacob Anderson cleans 380 pounds • Congratulations to Cayla Haney and Ben
Harper who tied the knot last weekend • Alessandra Pichelli joined the other Diablo CrossFit members doing Grace for Barbells for Boobs and did the men’s Rx weight • Sol Sigurdardottir hits a 225 pound clean • Red H Nutrition opens their first retail space in four days • Happy tenth anniversary CrossFit Adelaide. 

…and this is what a lactate threshold test looks like.

2018 CrossFit Team Series Crowned — CrossFit has officially crowned the winners of the fifth annual CrossFit Team Series. Here’s who gets to stake the official claim of fittest dynamic duo and also $5,000 each for first place, $2,500 for second, and $1,500 for third.

— Men: 1.) Travis Mayer/Noah Ohlsen, 2.)Connor Duddy/Dane Smith, 3.) Josh Gervais/Tyler Lee.

— Women: 1.) Meg Reardon/Kristine Best, 2.)Harriet Roberts/Jessica Coughlan, 3.)Justine Beath/Madeline Sturt.

— Mixed: 1.) Ben Smith/Laura Horvath, 2.) Lucas Parker/Carolyne Prevost, 3.) Travis Williams/Alexis Johnson.

Confirmed for Dubai — Here is the complete roster of 37 male and female athletes and 10 teams who will be competing in Dubai at the first ever CrossFit sanctioned event.

Wodapalooza Invites Sent Out — The first round of official invitations  have been sent out and athletes have until tomorrow 8:00 PM PT 5:00 PM ET to accept their invitations. If they decline or don’t respond then the invitation will be extended to the next athlete on the leaderboard. 

Worth Noting — With Wodapalooza and Dubai CrossFit Competition online qualifiers going on simaltaneously, we noticed ten athletes who qualified for both:

— Men: Paul Castillo, Samuel Cournoyer, Josh Gervais (fun fact: he also just took 3rd place in the team series!), and Jeffrey Adler.

— Women: Dani Speegle, Hayley Murillo, Gabriela Migala, Chantelle Loehner, and Keston Mendoza.

Radar Screen: Keep your eyes on Dani Speegle, who took the top spot in the Wodapalooza qualifier and third in Dubai. With a total of 13 scored events over three weeks, Speegle notched up two event wins, seven top 10 finishes, and never placed worse than 22nd. An impressive considering the roster of athletes she’s competing against. 

— FUN FACT: Dani Speegle has only competed in one Regional as an individual. In her rookie appearance at last year’s Atlantic Regional, she finished 8th overall. She also posted the 8th best time worldwide in the grueling Event 5 chipper. Ya the one with all those dumbbell box step overs. 

MUST READ: “Make That Bold Move Now — and Avoid Looking Back With Regret” —  Writing in this month’s Entrepreneur Magazine, Editor-in-Chief Jason Feifer hits the nail on the head:

“People say they like to push boundaries, but they rarely push those boundaries. They like the idea of change more than they like change. They call themselves risk-takers but always play it safe. You know the difference between successful entrepreneurs and everyone else? They don’t just flatter themselves with talk of their bold hearts and daring intentions. They make hard, necessary, real decisions. They produce things nobody has seen before. They push and they scrape and make holes in the wall. They act.

“I’ve always struggled to understand the disconnect. Why do so many people think of themselves as daring but fail to live up to their own self-­conception? I suspect it has to do with fear. An idea is easier than execution. It’s easier to imagine jumping out of a plane than it is to actually stand there, the ground a bazillion feet below you, and take the leap. That moment — the moment when it’s real, when it’s right there in front of you, when you either act or you don’t — is when we really learn about ourselves. That’s when we see how we fare against fear.”

“Seven weird food predictions from the past, including Churchill’s lab-grown chicken wings,” by Natasha Frost, Quartz

Lava-powered steak, chicken drumsticks from a lab, and wood fungus for dinner: All these dishes were once thought of as the foodstuffs of the future. They sounded comfortingly remote at the time, but as scientific innovation revolutionizes our diets, they’ve proven to be not so distant after all.

Long before many acknowledged the environmental cost of farming animals, the novelist T. Baron Russell predicted as much. “Such a wasteful food as animal flesh cannot survive,” he wrote in A Hundred Years Hence: The Expectations of an Optimist. In the dawn of the new millennium, Russell wrote that people would “cease to behave as if the resources of the planet were illimitable, and could be wasted at will.” Instead, we’ve mostly done the opposite: In the period from 1900 to 2000, one British study showed that the number of sheep had increased by 500%, with cattle numbers also on the rise.

Writing for Strand magazine, Winston Churchill envisaged a future in which scientists could grow individual chunks of meat. “We shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium,” he wrote. The article was written five years after a British scientist first used chemistry to synthesize artificial hormones, which was the methodology Churchill thought would lead to this invention. The soon-to-be British prime minister’s timing was a little out, but his gist was correct (though we grow individual cells into meat rather than using artificial hormones).

11/2: Wodapalooza Qualifier – Team (Online)

11/2: WOD League Mixed Doubles Edition (São Paulo, Brazil)

11/2 – 11/3: Women’s WOD Jam Individuals (Denver, CO)

11/2 – 11/3: Fenrir’s Mayhem at CrossFit Iron Legion (Ocala, FL)

11/3: The Battle of Port Royal Sound (Okatie, SC)

11/3: Battle for the Badges (St. Charles, MO)

11/3: PPS CrossFit Fall Throwsdown (Portland, OR)

11/3: CFT’s 2018 Strongman Classic (Carol Stream, IL)

11/3: WODamania (Riviera Beach, FL)

11/3: Barbells For Boobs at CrossFit Florian (Norwood, MA)

11/3: Bar Wars 2018  (Harker Heights, TX)

11/3: Masters Of The Midway (The Hills, IL)

11/3: Dynamic Duo Deathmatch 2018 (Southlake, TX) 

11/3: Inferno in the Forge (Lawrenceville, IL)

11/3: Perimeter Rowdown (Atlanta, GA)

11/3: Central Texas Showdown (Seguin, TX)

11/3: Rookie Rollout 3 at Troy CrossFit (San Diego, CA)

11/3: Masters of the Midwest (Greenwood IN)

11/3: Fit Wars Competition (Cedar Park, TX)

11/3: Super Awesome Fun Time Pairs Challenge (Toronta, Canada)

11/3- 11/4: Reignited Games 2018 (Wilmington, NC) 

11/3 – 11/4: Charlotte Throwdown for Mental Health Awareness (Charlotte, NC)

11/3 – 11/4: GameDay Championship (St. Paul, MN)

11/3 – 11/4: Clearwater Beach Brawl (Clearwater, FL)

11/04 – 11/05: WODNATION BR (Vinhedo, Brazil)

11/10: The Battle at Branded One (Las Vegas, NV)

11/10: Emerald Coast Honor Games (Destin, FL)

11/10 – 11/11: Extreme Games (Piauí, Brazil)

11/10 – 11/11: South Loop Games (Chicago, IL)

11/10- 11/11: Southie Showdown (Boston, MA)

11/10: Metcon 4 Hope (Reno, NV)

11/10: Best of the Wurst (New Braunfels, TX)

11/10: Warrior Affiliate League Delta Force (Duarte, CA)

11/10: USA Powerlifting Veterans Day Championship (Philadelphia, PA) 

11/10: Blue Cooler Throwdown (Deland, FL)

11/10: Bromageddon 2018 (Chandler, AZ)

11/10: Garage Games Masters Tour 2018 (McKinney, TX)

11/10: First Annual Sergeants Fitness Patriot Games (Caldwell, ID)

11/10: Boobs and Bells (Schaumburg, IL) 

11/11: Bonsai Brawl (Philadelphia, PA)

11/11: CFF Team Marathon Row 2018 (Metuchen, NJ)

11/15: Push Pull for Pancreatic Cancer @ Hybrid Athletics Bridgport (Bridgeport, CT)

11/16 – 11/17: Veterans Day Bash at CrossFit Wild West (Lubbock,TX)

11/17: MetCon Mashups CrossFit Lubbock (Lubbock,TX)

11/17: CrossFit TIG Turf Wars (Brighton, MI)

11/17: 2018 Energy Games (Houston, TX)

11/17: MetCon Mashups (Tulsa, OK) 

11/17: Green Valley Clash of the Fittest (Green Valley, AZ)

11/17: Push Pull for Pancreatic Cancer @ Invictus Boston (Boston, MA)

11/17: North County Fall Brawl (Watertown, NY)

11/17: BCF for Homeless Kids Kettlebells4Kids Fundraiser (Derry, NH)

11/17: Team SuperFit Charlotte (Charlotte, NC)

11/17: 2nd Annual Well Seasoned Masters Competition (Burlington, MA) 

11/17: Guardian Games National Championship (Ashland, VA)

11/20: Ben Marconi Memorial WOD (San Antonio, TX)

11/25: Carpathian Games II (Kosice, Slovakia)