WOD:

Thrusters
5-5-5-5-5

Skill work:
Ring support or ring L-sits

USA Reigns Supreme in NYC!
by Dan Hollingsworth

If you didn’t already hear, Meb Keflezighi is almost single handedly returning the USA to the long distance running glory days of the 70′s and 80′s. Today he became the first American since 1982 to win the ING New York City Marathon.

Amy and I sat and watched the race this evening after dinner. Even though we already knew what the outcome was, we watched with great anticipation. The women’s race also included a great finish and was fun to watch, but today was all about the Good ‘ol US of A and Meb Keflezighi.

As we watched the race we both felt the stirrings of wanting to toe the line for another endurance race. Between the two of us we have plenty of experience in long distance racing with 10 marathons, 4 Half-Ironmans, 2 ultramarathons and countless triathlons under our collective belts. While we had fun training for those races, neither of us have any plans to return to the days of countless upon countless hours and miles of Long Slow Distance training. We have “seen the light”, if you will, and both have experienced firsthand the benefit of CrossFit training for endurance performance.

Amy successfully set a half-marathon PR (personal record) by greater than 6 minutes on nothing but CrossFit training. During the months before the half-marathon she did not perform one mile of dedicated run training. The only running she did was what was included in the WOD. Not only did she set that PR but she recovered quickly and was back in the gym hitting WODs with a vengeance within a couple of days.

I utilized the methodology of CrossFit Endurance this summer to complete my first 50 mile ultramarathon. During my training, my longest run was just under 13 miles and weekly mileage rarely went over 20 miles. Every run was, however, very intense. This training, coupled with 4-5 CrossFit WODs per week earned me a top 25% finish in my first ultra.

This was supposed to be a brief post and it is not intended to be a bragging session for Amy and me. Rather, it is intended to be a testament to the potency of the CrossFit methodology. On a daily basis people around the globe are blasting through previous benchmarks and achieving things they never thought they were capable of because of this program. We look forward to continuing to apply the principles of CrossFit and CrossFit Endurance to our own endurance aspirations as well as those of our members. We fully anticipate that PRs will be dropping like flies in 2010!