Since “most” of the elite CrossFitters are in the mid-thirties I wonder what life experiences drove them to find their inner “high gear”. For me it was definitely my back ground in wresting. In that sport is is mono-y-mono. Their is no one else to blame if you lose. When the match is tied in the third round and you are DEAD on your feet but have to do something…..that is where the “high gear” decisions were made. We called it “Mad Dog”. Russell Berger who is our CFHSV trainer was a platoon leader in Ranger Battalion which should require no explaination for mental toughness. You are tough or you die.

So I guess the point that I’m interested in would be what background or life-experiences lead to the “elite” being able to embrace the discomfort and find the high gear?

Strictly out of curiosity I wonder how many top CrossFitters have a background in wrestling or one on one sports?

Thanks for the post Dutch. Hopefully I can see a seminar soon.

Kevin Lowe,
CrossFit Huntsville

Of course he knew what it felt like! That was my point! Your playful little compression of my question into “you can do it, buddy” misses that point. I realize Dutch is experienced. That’s why I asked him what goes through the head of an EXPERT. There were plenty of other crossfitters out there that day who had done 50-60-75 burpees in a row before, but many of them stopped at some point. And I’m not so naive to believe that if I just THINK what Dutch, khalipa, or Speal think, well then i’m gonna just smoke this next workout…of course not!

The whole topic of mental toughness is just interesting stuff. At the affiliate where I train, there’s a new guy who came into the gym about a month ago, completely deconditioned. At this point he does all the workouts, not yet rx’d, but man oh man can this kid battle. His heart must make up 80% of his bodyweight! He goes as hard as he possibly can and he’s never discouraged when he finishes minutes behind the pack, he just grinds and grinds and grinds. It’s like when Cool Hand Luke “wins” a fight by never staying down. No matter how many times his massive opponent pummels him, he gets right back up….and I think that may be the most admirable skill I can take away from crossfit.

Dutch, thanks for the little snippet of thought you gave us. Your little emotional paradox of simultaneously seeing the workout as glass half empty/glass half full is something I immediately understood. It’s funny how sometimes I arrive at the halfway point of a workout and feel completely overwhelmed with the task of doing everything again, except this round, I’m barely able to move my legs/arms/lungs/heart. But then 5 seconds later I’m 3 wall balls in or 20 yards out on my run and I suddenly have a sort of “light at the end of the tunnel” epiphany…. all the oh no’s turn into almost’s and things seem suddenly manageable. (of course this is precisely the point where I put down the wall ball and breath for 10 seconds, but oh well…I’ll get it next time!)

Once again, great topic and great blog!

Let’s demystify the subject for a moment (and I apologize ahead that my thoughts don’t agree with some of the previous comments). OPT, Dutch, Thiel, Cantuu, Speal, Everett are not ‘Gods’. They bleed, poop, and sleep just like everyone else. So since we are all reading this blog to get better and to pinpoint what it is that establishes superior performance, it doesn’t help us (and it’s not true) to say “he never slows down”. Everybody slows down, everybody is human. I can show you videos of all the guys listed above crashing and burning (not often but its there). I mention that again, because I don’t think it’s healthy and I don’t think it helps anyone to say “oh they’re just good because they’re born that way” – Bullshit.

Now that we got that out of the way, lets try to analyze what these guys have in common and try to define what it is that they are doing, so we can do it to:

-THE MAJORITY SPEND A SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT OF PRACTICE ON THEIR MENTAL GAME. How important do you think mental preparation is for competition? 50%? 90%?? Do you spend that amount of time in comparison to your physical training? There is a radio interview of OPT where is talks about taking about 2 hours the night before and a good hour and a half thinking about it before he gets into a workout like ‘Jackie’. Jeremy I hear goes through a similar prep.

-THESE GUYS ARE FOCUSED ON THE PROCESS NOT THE OUTCOME. How many of you guys out there are ‘stop-watch whores’? You put out a sub 3 minute fran but half of your thrusters you didn’t push your head all the way through, and 10 of your butterfly pullups were technically over the bar but not really? These guys aren’t like that. I get to workout with dutch pretty regularly and ALL his reps count. He is focused on the execution of the rep and not really the stopwatch. OPT – same way; look at all his videos and read the ROM requirements on the blog (borderline obsessed with the process). These guys focus FIRST on doing the movement flawlessly and SECOND on the clock. If your goal is to be the stud of your garage or gym, then this might not pertain to you BUT if your goal is to compete, then this has to be your mindset.

-EXPERIENCE. How did Dutch know he could do 50 burpees in a row? It’s not because he told himself before “you can do it buddy” it’s because he had done 50 burpees in a row before!!! He knew what it felt like! Everyone of those guys he mentioned in the original post workout and workout ALOT. Guess what? All the guys listed do this for a LIVING. Every one started crossfitting before there were 1000 affiliates, before there were 500 affiliates. They have all competed on some level in the past. That’s thousands of hours of practice. It’s not just “well, I’m going to tell myself not to stop and that means I won’t stop”. Its primarily that they’ve all been in a similar situation. Everyone has had their ass handed to them multiple times. Everyone has crashed and burned;they are used to pushing passed that limit, so that feeling or response isn’t new either (sorry dutch).

So what is the point of a post that has gone on and on?
*Train your mental game more. That might be visualizing the movements before you do them it might be going through the whole workout before it happens. Do what you do consistently.
*Think about doing everything perfect and stop worrying so much about the clock. Shut your brain off and enjoy the process.
*If your goal is to compete, then you better put yourself in some situations that are similar.
*Consistently train what you would hate to have come out of a hopper. Dutch says he only “trains what he likes to do” but I’ll share a little secret with you guys: HE LIKES PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING! (except running)

Thanks for stopping by everyone!
I’m travelling for the next couple days so posts may be erratic but when I get home I am sure to have somE great stuff.
Crossfit football cert is this weekend so ill fill you in on that as well.

http://www.performancemenu.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4196