Why Does Fitness Hurt So Much? | Jordan Wallace, Paul Warrior and Tim Briggs

Chris Williamson 0:06 What we need, this is a problem because we've done it late and...

Jordan Wallace 0:08 Red Bull's made.

Chris Williamson 0:09 A Red Bull's, mate, I'm... We're gonna do that. We're gonna fill you full of blue Smarties.

Jordan Wallace 0:12 When?

Chris Williamson 0:13 We're gonna... This isn't tonight. It's too late. It's too late.

Paul Warrior 0:16 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 0:16 I couldn't-

Jordan Wallace 0:17 What do you mean it's too late?

Paul Warrior 0:17 I've been all night programming. I've ca-

Chris Williamson 0:18 Some, some Lucozade's in there.

Jordan Wallace 0:19 I've canceled programming for this. I've gotta go back and program.

Paul Warrior 0:22 Well, you've got to go back and program. Get that Lucozade out.

Chris Williamson 0:23 Get whatever you want, mate.

Jordan Wallace 0:24 Get that sugar out.

Chris Williamson 0:24 There's, I think there's some tequila in there as well.

Jordan Wallace 0:26 Can we just put a coffee up?

Chris Williamson 0:27 There's some Ciroc in there. (laughs) Some pineapple ci-

Jordan Wallace 0:28 Mate, that sounds really nice. All right.

Paul Warrior 0:29 Can, can we make a coffee go-

Chris Williamson 0:30 Pineapple Ciroc.

Jordan Wallace 0:31 You training as well, Tim?

Tim Briggs 0:33 Mate, stacked up. I need to.

Paul Warrior 0:35 Tim's got everything, mate.

Jordan Wallace 0:36 He's fit.

Paul Warrior 0:36 Made more money. Made too much money, mate.

Chris Williamson 0:39 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 0:39 You two between yous, honestly. You two between yous, he's got more money than he's know what to do with.

Tim Briggs 0:43 No.

Paul Warrior 0:44 He's rocking a brand new hat this morning.

Jordan Wallace 0:45 But did he drop, but did he drop them in the mud?

Tim Briggs 0:47 Same hat there, yeah.

Paul Warrior 0:48 When walking my dogs. It dropped in the mud and he, he almost looked at it and he almost didn't pick, pick it up.

Tim Briggs 0:52 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 0:52 He was almost like-

Chris Williamson 0:53 Paul, we found out, I found out today that you've got a pair of joggers that have got semen and blood on them.

Jordan Wallace 0:58 As a dia- as a picture?

Chris Williamson 0:59 No.

Jordan Wallace 1:00 They're not actual semen and blood?

Chris Williamson 1:02 Let's, let's say, let's, let's-

Tim Briggs 1:02 That's a print.

Chris Williamson 1:03 ... let me say, is this sentence correct or not?

Paul Warrior 1:05 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:05 Paul has a pair of joggers that have got someone else's semen and blood on them?

Tim Briggs 1:10 That's correct.

Chris Williamson 1:11 Thank you.

Jordan Wallace 1:11 That's the, that's the right phrase, but it's not.

Paul Warrior 1:13 It's a fucking statement.

Chris Williamson 1:14 It's a, it's a saying-

Paul Warrior 1:15 That is a fact though.

Jordan Wallace 1:16 Yeah. But it's the, it's the cover off the Metallica album. The one that's like a weird graphic.

Chris Williamson 1:20 Mate.

Jordan Wallace 1:21 Mate, you should know my music.

Chris Williamson 1:22 Don't bore me with, don't bore me with the details.

Paul Warrior 1:23 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:23 Details, details.

Jordan Wallace 1:24 Skip around listening to fucking Old Island.

Chris Williamson 1:27 Don't bore me with the details. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 1:28 Fucking, you over there.

Chris Williamson 1:29 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 1:31 Didn't he have something dodgy in them as well? Didn't you... ?

Chris Williamson 1:34 What, dodgy, dodgy-

Paul Warrior 1:36 Didn't he have a dodgy trousseau in there? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:40 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 1:42 So there might be three things in there.

Chris Williamson 1:45 (laughs) What else was in there that was worse than the blood and the semen?

Paul Warrior 1:47 Just adding to the list. Adding to the bodily fluids.

Jordan Wallace 1:51 For fucks sake. I messaged, I messaged him to tell him I was a bit worried because I'd had a dicky tummy (laughs) and I didn't have my good, I didn't have my good pants on.

Chris Williamson 1:57 Are they your good pants?

Jordan Wallace 1:58 No.

Paul Warrior 1:58 Oh.

Jordan Wallace 1:58 I was going to say if they're not really that, could they have Supreme ones so they were like, they're quite-

Chris Williamson 2:01 300 quid, mate.

Paul Warrior 2:02 They weren't.

Chris Williamson 2:02 We checked them out online.

Paul Warrior 2:03 I thought you guys were full of shit. They were 154.

Tim Briggs 2:06 I've just Googled them. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 2:08 They're fucking hell, bro.

Jordan Wallace 2:11 They're not 300 quid.

Tim Briggs 2:11 100 and fucking shit.

Paul Warrior 2:11 I've just Googled them. 275 quid RRP.

Chris Williamson 2:13 For fucks sakes.

Jordan Wallace 2:13 Not RIP. Resale.

Tim Briggs 2:15 Oh, okay, okay.

Chris Williamson 2:16 Resale? I thought you got worse with resale.

Jordan Wallace 2:19 No, they get more expensive with resale.

Chris Williamson 2:20 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 2:20 I didn't pay that for them. I bought them brand new.

Chris Williamson 2:23 Fucking hell.

Paul Warrior 2:25 It's too much money, mate.

Chris Williamson 2:25 We're just not in the fuck- we're just not in the right place fucking thing to be at all.

Paul Warrior 2:27 Not in the right game?

Tim Briggs 2:29 You're not in the right game. I'm not quite in that game. Gotta put myself out there.

Paul Warrior 2:33 Tim's getting there though.

Chris Williamson 2:34 You are wearing more hats. Just wearing more hats makes me really happy.

Tim Briggs 2:36 More hats, mate. That's his thing. That's his thing.

Paul Warrior 2:37 You were ignoring the fire safety officer's lecture just so you try and cop some pa- cop some Supreme.

Tim Briggs 2:44 The other day.

Paul Warrior 2:45 Sitting on the fire... We're having, we're having this fire safety thing, right? And these two are sat there and they're watching... The fire safety guy's talking with them and they're both sat there like this going, "Yeah."

Chris Williamson 2:56 Browsing.

Tim Briggs 2:57 Not browsing, they're Supreme drawing.

Jordan Wallace 2:57 We're browsing. We don't have time to browse. What he's doing? Supreme drawing. Nevermind.

Paul Warrior 3:01 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 3:01 You don't get time to browse?

Jordan Wallace 3:02 I'm like, "Is he drawing right now?"

Chris Williamson 3:04 In Supreme you just buy?

Paul Warrior 3:05 You just buy.

Chris Williamson 3:05 Is that what it is? You just-

Tim Briggs 3:06 First thing.

Chris Williamson 3:06 You either buy or don't buy.

Jordan Wallace 3:08 You've got about 15 seconds.

Chris Williamson 3:10 Fucking hell.

Jordan Wallace 3:11 You should know this.

Tim Briggs 3:12 But no shit, mate. Fire safety, I told Hope what the difference between foam and water was the other day.

Jordan Wallace 3:17 I love it. Incredible work.

Tim Briggs 3:18 She's like, "What is the difference between foam and water?" Well, foam's a lot better. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 3:23 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 3:23 It acts as a blanket. Acts as a blanket.

Paul Warrior 3:25 Stars in the oxygen doesn't it?

Tim Briggs 3:26 Exactly.

Chris Williamson 3:27 For fucks sake.

Paul Warrior 3:28 So we did learn. Obviously I learned more on these because these were on foam bars pretty, but-

Jordan Wallace 3:32 We've learned a lot. Ben Kennedy knew it all anyway.

Chris Williamson 3:34 He did.

Jordan Wallace 3:34 Ben Kennedy actually knew it all.

Chris Williamson 3:36 Ben's like a fucking walking Swiss army knife, isn't he?

Jordan Wallace 3:39 He is. He knows everything, mate. Absolutely everything.

Chris Williamson 3:42 Between him and Stu Morton, I reckon I could survive almost any environment on the planet.

Jordan Wallace 3:48 I'd probably take Stu outside like rather than Ben.

Tim Briggs 3:50 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 3:50 Got more chances to fight with me.

Chris Williamson 3:51 Ben's, Ben's more like of an inside dog and Stu's an outside dog.

Jordan Wallace 3:53 I think Ben would be really good at making a tent, but then he'd get really angry and tear it down, that tent down when you're out with something.

Paul Warrior 3:57 Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he would, wouldn't he?

Jordan Wallace 3:59 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 3:59 Ben's, Ben's got a really like... His emotions are like a pane of glass, and he was doing some massage on me once and I said like, "It's... Has someone pissed in your porridge today?" And he was like, "Is it that obvious?"

Jordan Wallace 4:14 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 4:14 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 4:14 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 4:15 Yes. Yes it is.

Paul Warrior 4:16 Yes it is, Ben.

Jordan Wallace 4:17 Or he's punching your back. Punching your glutes.

Paul Warrior 4:20 Just driving you nuts.

Chris Williamson 4:20 That was it, yeah.

Jordan Wallace 4:21 Sorry if it's my glutes, it's my shoulder.

Paul Warrior 4:23 I, I thought, I mean, I guess we've kind of st- (laughs) We've kind of started.

Jordan Wallace 4:26 That is not how we've started it, by the way.

Chris Williamson 4:28 We haven't started with that, have we?

Paul Warrior 4:29 It'll just-

Tim Briggs 4:29 About blood and semen?

Paul Warrior 4:31 It's just-

Tim Briggs 4:31 That was the opener.

Paul Warrior 4:31 At some point it will start. At some point.

Jordan Wallace 4:34 All right, that's cool. Let's do a little intro now then.

Paul Warrior 4:36 Make it Volvic. You're all Volvic.

Jordan Wallace 4:38 All sponsorships, yeah.

Paul Warrior 4:39 Turn it around. Face the camera.

Jordan Wallace 4:42 So we get that. Six layers of volcanic filtration.

Chris Williamson 4:43 But that's not Volvic, is it?

Jordan Wallace 4:45 Uh, it's my other sponsor, Robinsons.

Tim Briggs 4:48 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 4:50 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 4:50 Fruit and barley. They go together. Synergistic.

Chris Williamson 4:52 They, they really do.

Tim Briggs 4:53 See Stef Dekkers post today? She's-

Paul Warrior 4:55 I did.

Tim Briggs 4:55 She's, she's hammering-

Jordan Wallace 4:56 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 4:57 Do you follow Stef Dekker on, on Instagram?

Chris Williamson 4:59 I don't know who that is.

Paul Warrior 4:59 She's like the Scottish version of you.

Jordan Wallace 5:00 She's like a Scottish version of me.

Paul Warrior 5:02 Right.

Jordan Wallace 5:02 Yeah, she's a beast. Um, but anyway. I'm it then.

Paul Warrior 5:04 She's a bit... No, no, no. I should take that as an insult. No offense.

Jordan Wallace 5:08 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 5:09 But, uh, so basically she's like, she's hammering all the people in not just CrossFit, but in like fitness who have got all these sponsors.

Chris Williamson 5:16 Right.

Paul Warrior 5:17 Who like are all just like-

Chris Williamson 5:18 Just shooting them down.

Paul Warrior 5:18 ... thank you, like thank you for this, it makes me like so much better, da-da-da.

Chris Williamson 5:21 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 5:21 God, they're brilliant. She's going on about training 36 hours a day and that, makes me laugh.

Tim Briggs 5:25 It's all about Aldi. It's all about Aldi.

Jordan Wallace 5:26 It's all about Aldi, Tim.

Tim Briggs 5:28 Aldi tuna chunks.

Paul Warrior 5:29 Power.

Chris Williamson 5:30 So she's just like a ma- like a massive trog?

Paul Warrior 5:32 Yeah. Basically her, but it's funny.

Jordan Wallace 5:33 Yeah, but she's a mint athlete as well. So she can reach my back-

Chris Williamson 5:36 So she can like back, she can back it up with...

Paul Warrior 5:38 She can tie. Yeah, she's good.

Jordan Wallace 5:39 She doesn't give no fucks, that's all.

Paul Warrior 5:40 She's good. She's okay.

Tim Briggs 5:41 Didn't our Ness confuse her with you?

Paul Warrior 5:45 Yeah, she takes once.

Tim Briggs 5:46 The original. Come from behind.

Chris Williamson 5:48 Confused her with you?

Paul Warrior 5:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:49 Because she's got short hair.

Paul Warrior 5:51 She's got short hair.

Chris Williamson 5:51 Right.

Jordan Wallace 5:51 But she's got more jack than you.

Paul Warrior 5:53 She's more jack than me, to be fair.

Chris Williamson 5:55 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 5:55 She's stronger than me.

Chris Williamson 5:56 Is she?

Paul Warrior 5:57 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 5:57 Holy hell.

Paul Warrior 5:58 She's got like a... She's got ridiculous numbers.

Jordan Wallace 6:01 She's definitely stronger than you.

Chris Williamson 6:02 That's also true. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 6:04 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 6:04 And Paul. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 6:07 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 6:07 That's, like, everyone anyway. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 6:10 Fucking hell. Um, so, I guess by way of introduction, what would be probably quite nice would be to hear... I'm gonna guess that out of the three of you that sat round the table, you've been involved in CrossFit the longest?

Jordan Wallace 6:23 Yeah, the longest. So me, and then Paul, and then probably Tim in that, in that order, obviously.

Chris Williamson 6:27 Mm-hmm. Um, so can you tell us a little bit about your introduction to the sport?

Jordan Wallace 6:31 Yeah. So I started back in like 2009, like late 2009.

Chris Williamson 6:34 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 6:34 Um, I did like r- running before that sort of about six to eight months before coming to CrossFit. I used to do like longer distance running, so not super long distance like what Stu did, but, um, like 10 milers, half marathons, things like that.

Chris Williamson 6:48 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 6:49 And basically, I had like a goal that I wanted to achieve, um, which I did. And then I just-

Chris Williamson 6:54 What was the goal?

Jordan Wallace 6:54 Uh, so it was run the Great North sub one-twenty. Um, so I ran it-

Chris Williamson 7:00 I can't believe that.

Jordan Wallace 7:00 ... in one... I ran it in one-twenty. But I, I was a lot younger than that.

Chris Williamson 7:02 How old were you then?

Jordan Wallace 7:03 I was like 17. Was a lot smaller though. Um...

Chris Williamson 7:07 Smaller than now?

Jordan Wallace 7:08 Smaller than now. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 7:09 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 7:09 It's hard to imagine. But, um, so I, I did that, and then I, I just... I was just bored of it really, and kind of... Obvious training for like that sort of distance, you have to put loads of miles in. It's loads of time.

Chris Williamson 7:21 Yeah. Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 7:21 So, I just got bored. So I was looking for something else to do. So I was, I was messing around with a bit of like kettlebells and stuff. And then, I read an article which I think was in like Men's Fitness or Men's Health.

Chris Williamson 7:32 What year are we talking here?

Jordan Wallace 7:33 Like 2009. 2000... Like late 2009, early 2010.

Chris Williamson 7:37 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 7:37 So I read an article in, I think it was Men's Health or Men's Fitness, about the 300. The, the, um, the 300 guys.

Chris Williamson 7:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 7:45 Like how they trained in CrossFit was mentioned in it, and I thought, "Oh, what's that?"

Chris Williamson 7:48 Right.

Jordan Wallace 7:48 So I Googled CrossFit, um, and just f- found there was two, there was two gyms in the North East. So there was one called CrossFit North East England-

Chris Williamson 7:57 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 7:57 ... which is just up in, um, Wigan view. And then there was CrossFit Tyneside.

Chris Williamson 8:01 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 8:01 So, um, I went to both of them. The CrossFit North East England guys were great, but it was just too far for us to travel.

Chris Williamson 8:07 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 8:08 CrossFit Tyneside was based in, uh, Northfield, so it was a lot closer-

Chris Williamson 8:11 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:12 ... for, for me. So I went there. Um, after about a year, uh, not even that, after about six months, I actually ended up buying the gym. So I ended up buying the affiliate just through circumstances. Obviously, at the time, it was, it was a lot different to, um, what it is now.

Chris Williamson 8:25 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:25 So there was like no equipment.

Chris Williamson 8:27 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:27 Like literally like one bar-

Chris Williamson 8:29 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 8:29 ... some bumper plates and some kettlebells and some mat in, and that was it. So it didn't cost a lot of money.

Chris Williamson 8:32 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:33 And, um, that was it, yeah. Just bought that and then just kept on training and kept on kind of trying to grow the business.

Chris Williamson 8:39 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:39 And then we moved to Benton. Um, uh, we had a, we had a unit in Benton, and then not to kind of interrupt or well intrude on what Paul's gonna say, but back in like 2013 maybe's, 2014, Paul came on full time-

Chris Williamson 8:53 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 8:53 ... as like our head coach.

Chris Williamson 8:54 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 8:54 At Rebook CrossFit Tyneside. So... And then that, that's been him since then. So for me really, back, got back in the, got into it back in 2009. Um, started kinda competing in 2010, uh, and then just competed all the way through that. And-

Chris Williamson 9:08 When you say started, sort of started competing, what you mean is-

Jordan Wallace 9:11 Well it was like-

Chris Williamson 9:11 ... made it to regionals like however many years in a row.

Jordan Wallace 9:14 Yeah, but it was... But it was a lot different then though. So like the first year that I went to like s- there, there wasn't an open, so it was a sectional.

Chris Williamson 9:20 Right.

Jordan Wallace 9:21 So you just put your name in a hat. You literally just paid, and you, you put your name in a hat, and you turned up and competed. So there was no qualification process, you, for the sectionals.

Chris Williamson 9:29 So this is like... This is kind of like a, like a seeding would be for a local competition

Paul Warrior 9:33 Yeah, so-

Chris Williamson 9:34 ... now, I guess?

Jordan Wallace 9:34 Yeah, so you, you basically paid your money, you rocked up. It was like three workouts in one day.

Chris Williamson 9:39 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 9:40 Um, and then from there, it was like the t- at the time there was three sectionals. So there's like one in the UK, UK and Ireland. Then there was one in like Western Europe, one in Eastern Europe. And then all those three, there was three people from each I think went to... No sorry, 20 people from each went to a regional. And then from the regional, I think there was three people from that then went to the games. And then-

Chris Williamson 10:03 So this is before the open?

Jordan Wallace 10:04 That was 2010, yeah. Then after that, 2011 the open came along. So this was like pre-open. So that was the first proper competition that I did was sectionals.

Chris Williamson 10:12 Wow.

Jordan Wallace 10:12 So I think it was 20 qualified for regionals, and I think I was... came like 21st. So just missed out 4 times the regionals that year.

Chris Williamson 10:18 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 10:19 Um...

Chris Williamson 10:20 So you must've taken into... to- taken to it pretty quickly?

Jordan Wallace 10:22 Yeah. Well, again, at the time, like it was super low skill. So like that year, that 2010 was the first year that GHD sit-ups and chest to bar pull-ups came on the workout. So I wanted that competition. But I didn't have chest to bar pull-ups, so I was basically doing strict pull-ups-

Chris Williamson 10:36 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 10:36 ... in the middle of the workout. Um, like strict pull-ups, and it was, it was... We had... We were doing it on a basketball court with like... in the middle of a park.

Chris Williamson 10:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 10:45 It's like totally different to what it is now.

Chris Williamson 10:47 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 10:47 Where you have like a proper stadium-

Chris Williamson 10:48 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 10:49 ... make up judges, and it's all online and all that stuff. It was like a completely different world.

Chris Williamson 10:53 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 10:53 So back then it was like li- literally just on a school field in a park. It was cool.

Chris Williamson 11:00 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 11:00 But it's obviously totally different to what it is now.

Chris Williamson 11:02 A lot less polished.

Jordan Wallace 11:03 Yeah. Well, it was just make it up as you go along.

Chris Williamson 11:05 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 11:05 Trying to get it in before it went dark.

Chris Williamson 11:07 So Paul how about you?

Tim Briggs 11:08 Um, actually some of it's a bit same as Jordan in the sense that, um, probably the 300.

Chris Williamson 11:13 Yep.

Tim Briggs 11:14 I think that's probably a pretty big moment for most people in fitness-

Chris Williamson 11:16 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 11:17 ... um, when it all wasn't CGI. I think a lot of people were kind of like-

Chris Williamson 11:20 Yeah. Mad, mad to think that-

Tim Briggs 11:21 ... "Shit."

Chris Williamson 11:21 ... Geor- Gerard Butler's formed the basis for a several hundred million dollar-

Tim Briggs 11:25 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 11:25 ... business -

Tim Briggs 11:27 And, and he wasn't even done, really did do CrossFit really. It was, um... So I'd done that. I'd kind of watched that film. I'd already realized I was pretty overweight, and I'd already started trying to like go to Global Gyms and things to try and change that. And as a result got into the fitness side, or like got interested in the fitness side. Um, lost quite a bit of weight. And then, um, I think when the 300 went like, you know, I don't know, whether it was on the internet or the DVD with the extras or something like that, there was an interview with Mark Twight who was Jim Jones?

Chris Williamson 11:56 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 11:56 Um, at the time he did it and he started talking about functional training and functional movement, and ca- training with kettlebells and ropes and sleds and all that kind of...... all that kind of stuff. So from that, um, I actually bumped into a friend one night, um, a guy called Finn. He was doing some strongman training kind of with Jordan at the time, or like in the facility.

Chris Williamson 12:15 In the facility, yeah.

Tim Briggs 12:16 Yeah, eh, in the same facility. And, um, he was like, "Oh, man." I was like, pulling out kettlebells and he was like, "Oh, you should, uh, come down and try this gym." Uh, so I kind of went on the internet. Saw it was run by this little kid-

Chris Williamson 12:26 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 12:26 ... who was like doing double unders with an InfaDel T-shirt on. I was like, "All right, okay. I'm gonna, I'm gonna... all right, I'm gonna go see what this is about." Dropped him a message, um, and that was it. Went down, um, got through a, p- put through like a seven-minute workout which like-

Chris Williamson 12:41 Ruined his life.

Tim Briggs 12:42 ... hi- hid my ass totally. Um, like signed up the next day. Signed up there and then actually. I was like, I was like, "I've got the money in the bag." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 12:49 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 12:49 The money... I've already got the money.

Chris Williamson 12:49 Because you'd paid for the money.

Jordan Wallace 12:50 You've just been paying, gonna do it... This was pre-Supreme as well so... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 12:54 So you actually had some money, yeah.

Tim Briggs 12:56 Yeah and I had the money, yeah. I had the money in my bag there and then. I literally was just like, "I'll pay for a month." Um, and, um, kind of just went, went from there.

Chris Williamson 13:04 Yep.

Tim Briggs 13:04 Um, again, like he, like he says, I, I eventually just kind of got more involved. He was really involved in the competitor side.

Chris Williamson 13:10 Yep.

Tim Briggs 13:10 And, and I think like he says, like it was easier to get into the competitor side at the time. And even I did okay in the first ever open.

Chris Williamson 13:16 Fucking 400th in Europe first year, innit.

Jordan Wallace 13:18 Amazing.

Tim Briggs 13:18 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 13:19 Strong.

Chris Williamson 13:19 So you've got that title for the rest of time.

Tim Briggs 13:21 Yeah, I know.

Chris Williamson 13:21 400 fittest in Europe, 2011.

Tim Briggs 13:23 So er-

Chris Williamson 13:24 Get it in the Instagram bio, mate. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 13:27 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 13:27 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 13:27 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 13:27 (laughs) Gotta be done. (laughs)

Tim Briggs 13:29 (coughs) It's going in. Um, and then, um, as like the guys got more interested in that, I got more interested in the coaching side and like listening to the Mark Twains and reading and all those things like that. So-

Chris Williamson 13:40 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 13:40 ... I just kind of, kind of naturally wanted to go across that, "Okay, how do we program for people?"

Chris Williamson 13:45 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 13:45 Um, so we just kind of like... As he grew as an athlete, I kind of just focused more on the coaching side. That interested me a little bit more than being an athlete personally.

Chris Williamson 13:53 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 13:53 I wanted to train, I wanted to do it but-

Chris Williamson 13:55 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 13:55 ... I just wanted to... I was interested in how things went together and what people were doing.

Chris Williamson 13:59 Mm-hmm. Tim, how about you?

Jordan Wallace 14:01 So mine's a bit of a weird one. So my friend started it, just started doing CrossFit in a global gym at his garage. So I started just doing it with him.

Chris Williamson 14:09 Right.

Jordan Wallace 14:09 Just tagged along, joined in and, um, I was like 18 at the time. So 2012.

Chris Williamson 14:16 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 14:17 There wasn't really much going on. Like we couldn't do any wall balls, we couldn't really lift heavy, we couldn't go overhead, especially in his garage if it rained.

Chris Williamson 14:25 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 14:25 We couldn't snatch. So we'd never done a wall ball or a snatch really. We'd done some cleans, but like horrific cleans. And, um, then he started to open his own affiliate.

Chris Williamson 14:37 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 14:38 Then we kind of traveled from there to Teesside every now and then until he opened up his own.

Chris Williamson 14:43 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 14:44 2013, came to Tyneside for uni. And from there it's a bit like history.

Chris Williamson 14:50 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 14:51 So, um, just started training. Trained, trained twice a day.

Chris Williamson 14:54 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 14:54 Between uni, between lectures. Came here and there then, um-

Chris Williamson 14:58 Just tumbled straight into it?

Jordan Wallace 14:59 Yeah. Got on with Paul quite well. Did my level one so I could train at my friend's gym back home.

Chris Williamson 15:05 Yep.

Jordan Wallace 15:06 Then the year after, just kind of stuck here. Started to train... Started to coach at Tyneside.

Chris Williamson 15:11 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 15:12 Every Wednesday.

Chris Williamson 15:13 Yeah, Wednesday night was training.

Jordan Wallace 15:15 Then a little bit with Paul on Mondays.

Chris Williamson 15:17 Tim, Tim Wednesdays.

Tim Briggs 15:18 Tim Wednesdays. Yeah, started off didn't it and you just kind of like-

Chris Williamson 15:22 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 15:22 ... you just kind of co-coached with me for a bit, didn't you?

Chris Williamson 15:23 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 15:23 And then it was like, "Okay, Wednesdays."

Chris Williamson 15:26 Wednesdays were in it.

Tim Briggs 15:27 Wednesdays were in it.

Chris Williamson 15:27 I think one of the things that struck me when I started was CrossFit has managed to brand itself so effectively. And I think when anything's that polished, there's an element that people have got that makes them feel reserved about something. You know, the, the, the style looks so good that the substance can't be up to scratch. Does that make sense? That people are sometimes a little bit suspicious when it looks... And using the tag, the fittest on earth, like it sounds, it sounds impressive and also un- unbelievable in the same sentence.

Tim Briggs 15:55 Yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 15:56 So in your opinion, are CrossFit athletes the fittest athletes on the planet?

Tim Briggs 16:00 No, I do think it... I do think they're kind of pre- like trying to produce the fittest on earth in the sense of it's such a broad, broad spectrum.

Chris Williamson 16:06 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 16:07 And it's the only thing that's really challenging or testing this broad, broad spectrum.

Chris Williamson 16:11 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 16:11 There isn't anything else that is. So it's like-

Jordan Wallace 16:12 It's a middle ground, isn't it?

Tim Briggs 16:14 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:14 It's a middle ground of everything.

Tim Briggs 16:15 Yeah. And I think the people it's producing who are like, you know, pretty damn awesome weightlifters and pretty damn, re- pretty, pretty strong powerlifters and can run mar- and can run half marathons.

Chris Williamson 16:24 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 16:25 Can do all of that stuff. I mean, there just isn't a test, like-

Chris Williamson 16:27 Now you're talking about a

Jordan Wallace 16:28 they're probably talking about like, Tia-Flair Toomey who last... Not this year obviously when she won, but the year before, like did the CrossFit games, came second and then went and competed in Rio, the Olympics.

Tim Briggs 16:38 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:38 In less than two weeks.

Tim Briggs 16:39 In less than two weeks.

Chris Williamson 16:40 Where did this come from?

Jordan Wallace 16:40 So she's competed at the highest level in two sports-

Chris Williamson 16:43 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:43 ... within two weeks of each other.

Tim Briggs 16:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:45 She hasn't... She obviously hasn't peaked for the, for the, for the Olympics. You know what I mean?

Chris Williamson 16:48 Not at all.

Jordan Wallace 16:49 She's just been to...

16:51 She's just pushed herself and has-

16:51 ... herself a full week.

16:51 She's just pushed herself in the phase for a full week.

Chris Williamson 16:54 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:54 Like Dave Castro just went, "Right, what can I do to make you feel like you want to die?"

Tim Briggs 16:57 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 16:58 So like when you look at it like that, from that point of view, yeah, they're probably are the fittest on earth.

Tim Briggs 17:02 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 17:03 But it depends what you define fitness as 'cause, you know-

Chris Williamson 17:06 I think the, the, the definition of fitness that CrossFit has used seems quite appropriate to me.

Tim Briggs 17:14 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:14 Like it's work capacity ac- across broad time and modal domains, right?

Tim Briggs 17:18 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:19 Yeah. Um, I suppose that based on that definition of fitness, and I can't think of one that's better. Like-

Tim Briggs 17:25 No.

Chris Williamson 17:25 ... not that it's really my area of expertise at all.

Tim Briggs 17:28 He chose the terminology and then you could have like, you know... You can argue semantics or whatever. You can be one of these people who can just delve into it and try and pick it apart. He's just making a point about... You should be able to-

Chris Williamson 17:38 Different time domains, different lo- different load domains, different movements, you know, er, different planes of movement.

Tim Briggs 17:44 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 17:44 Functional stuff. I mean that's pretty... I mean it is pretty broad. I mean it is a broad description.

Tim Briggs 17:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 17:49 And you can argue it and you can go into it. And you see people all the time trying to pick it apart.

Tim Briggs 17:53 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 17:53 It just is what it is.

Jordan Wallace 17:54 I think the main thing though is like there shouldn't be anything that you can't do.

17:58 Yeah. For sure.

17:59 You know what I mean? Like-

Chris Williamson 17:59 I think that's like where, where the broad thing comes in.

Jordan Wallace 18:01 I think like with Dave Castro obviously at the games, like he's constantly trying to test that.

Chris Williamson 18:06 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 18:06 And then it like blurs the lines of like...... competitor in terms of, you don't necessarily have to be the, the fittest to be the best at the sport. So, like-

Chris Williamson 18:15 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 18:15 What I mean by that is like, Katrin in 2000 whatever when there, when there was the peg boards.

Chris Williamson 18:19 Mm-hmm. Still is.

Jordan Wallace 18:20 Like, everybody was on the peg boards smashing themselves trying to get at the top and failing. She just rested.

Chris Williamson 18:25 She sat down.

Jordan Wallace 18:26 'Cause she knew she was, she wasn't going to make it.

Chris Williamson 18:27 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 18:27 Took this high as like-

Chris Williamson 18:29 The middle ground.

Jordan Wallace 18:30 Took it as rest.

Chris Williamson 18:30 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 18:31 So it's like-

Chris Williamson 18:31 Then crushed the lot's work.

Jordan Wallace 18:32 You look at it and go, "Well, she's not actually the fittest 'cause she can't do it." But she won.

Chris Williamson 18:36 Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 18:36 So, do you know what I mean? It's like, it, it, it blurs those lines a little bit.

Chris Williamson 18:40 I think what's interesting watching from, um, the Open to Regionals to the Games, is that there's actually a lot less CrossFit that goes on the higher up you get.

Jordan Wallace 18:50 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 18:50 Completely. It's a lot more CrossFitey at the local level than it is at the top level.

Jordan Wallace 18:55 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 18:56 Which is interesting, isn't it?

Jordan Wallace 18:57 I mean, at the Games, at the Games as well though, they're so like lucky. Obviously for the, for the Open and Regionals in some respects, you're pretty limited with what you can do. Because like in the Open you can't expect people to be like carrying D-balls and-

Chris Williamson 19:10 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 19:10 ... running up hills and stuff like that because you just can't.

Chris Williamson 19:13 How can you measure that? Like how can you measure running ...

Jordan Wallace 19:16 Yeah, it's, yeah, you're limited by what you do within those four walls and with kit as well. And then Regionals it gets a little bit more kind of out there. But still, I mean this year they added like the D-balls.

Chris Williamson 19:26 Mm-hmm

Jordan Wallace 19:26 But in the past it's really just been-

Chris Williamson 19:28 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 19:28 ... dumbbells, barbells, kettle bells.

Chris Williamson 19:30 Rig.

Jordan Wallace 19:31 Um, rig, yeah, ropes, you know what I mean? And then the Games it's like, right, anything's fair.

Chris Williamson 19:36 Yeah. Hay bales this year.

Jordan Wallace 19:37 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 19:37 People had everyone stretchers, cyclo-cross.

Jordan Wallace 19:39 And I think with the new, with the new arena, I think it's only gonna get like more out there. I think the stuff's only gonna get better.

Chris Williamson 19:47 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 19:47 'Cause obviously they've moved from LA to, uh, Wisconsin.

Chris Williamson 19:50 Yeah, it is.

Jordan Wallace 19:50 So I think, I think it's gonna get even more out there and different things that they can do.

Chris Williamson 19:54 Mm-hmm. So I think it will drop down as well. I think it will feed down to Regionals a little bit more.

Jordan Wallace 19:59 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 19:59 I think swimming's gonna be in there pretty soon. More odd objects and it's kinda gonna challenge everything. But how, how heavy were the kettle bells that, those kettle bell deadlifters at Regionals this year?

Jordan Wallace 20:09 Uh, 90 kilos.

Chris Williamson 20:11 They were pretty heavy, yeah.

Jordan Wallace 20:11 90 kilos. 205 I think each one, so like 93. Heavy. One and a half me's.

Chris Williamson 20:17 No one wants to pick that up. No? With either hand. Nope.

Jordan Wallace 20:19 So there's a question-

Chris Williamson 20:20 Prepping it for shopping though.

Jordan Wallace 20:22 Yeah. Oh, help.

Chris Williamson 20:22 Make the winter sales.

Jordan Wallace 20:24 Functional, isn't it?

Chris Williamson 20:24 That's what, that's what is best. But that, but you know that number's actually the exact same as an ASDA bag for life.

Jordan Wallace 20:28 Oh, without a doubt.

Chris Williamson 20:29 Max-

Jordan Wallace 20:29 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 20:30 ... load. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 20:32 That's fair.

Chris Williamson 20:33 Science.

Jordan Wallace 20:33 But your mum could still lift it. Yeah, well.

Chris Williamson 20:35 So anyone that's tried CrossFit or has done a few of the workouts, like hey, regardless of whether or not people like or don't like CrossFit, I don't think anyone can deny that it's really, really fucking hard. Like it, like there's some of the workouts that want to end your world. And what I'm really interested in, that we've got three guys who understand the physiology and understand the training methodology as well. I wanted to see if you guys can try and explain why CrossFit is so hard. Like why it hurts during a workout to the level that it does. And if you can try and take us through maybe some of the workouts and what it is about them that just wreck your world. Because obviously people can go and run a marathon and they can come out the other side of it and maybe the next day they have their aches and pains and this, that, and the other. But during a marathon there's, a lot of people would perceive as, you know, a pinnacle of realistic-

Jordan Wallace 21:25 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 21:26 ... local level fitness. Like, you know, I, if you gave me the option of doing that or doing a couple of the really nasty hero workouts, I'm like give me the marathon. Do you know what I mean? Because although it's- Do you say it?

Jordan Wallace 21:38 I don't know. I just think because it's chuggy.

Chris Williamson 21:40 As a non-runner?

Jordan Wallace 21:41 It's just chuggy. Oh yeah, okay, maybe not, maybe not me. But d- you understand my- I know what you're saying.

Chris Williamson 21:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 21:46 I think from like, not from like a sciency point of view. Tim's probably best to do that, he's the one with the degrees.

Chris Williamson 21:51 With the degrees. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 21:52 Um. Degrees.

Chris Williamson 21:53 Got bare degrees of that.

Jordan Wallace 21:55 But like from a- From what? ... from a pra-

Chris Williamson 21:58 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 21:58 (laughs) ... degree.

Chris Williamson 22:00 Too well.

Jordan Wallace 22:01 But from like a, from like a practical point of view, I think it's just the fact that it's like so, there's so many different aspects of it. So like you're saying with a marathon, it's one foot in front of the other, that's it. Like if you can keep putting one foot in front of the other, even if you're walking it, you know you're gonna finish it.

Chris Williamson 22:14 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 22:15 Whereas like with some of the WODs, some of the hero workouts, like some of the stuff in there is pretty challenging. So, um, for example, like a lot of them are combiner movements like that a normal person in the gym wouldn't combine. So like there's one called Mr. Joshua which is like running, um, heavy deadlifts and then GHD sit-ups. And it's, it's a pretty simple workout. I think it's like five rounds, 400 meter run, 15 deadlifts at 115 and then 30 GHDs.

Chris Williamson 22:42 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 22:42 It's like, it's a world beater, it kills you.

Chris Williamson 22:45 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 22:45 It's like the extension of the deadlift and then the flexion of the GHD sit-up just brutalizes you.

Chris Williamson 22:50 And then you've got to stabilize as you, as you run, as you get into the run and then you run up.

Jordan Wallace 22:53 Yeah. You're like all of that, you're all of that and then you're all of that and it's like through a full range of motion. Um, and then obviously you're running after that. So you're out of breath coming in, picking up a moderately heavy load-

Chris Williamson 23:02 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 23:03 ... and then jumping on the GHD sit-up which in itself is a pretty brutal movement. Like it's a massive range of motion. And it's not really something that a lot of people have done before anyway.

Chris Williamson 23:11 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 23:11 Um, great way to get rhabdo. Um, but I think those types of like combinations of movements are just brutal. Just brutal.

Chris Williamson 23:21 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 23:21 And it's the same with like, there's another one called Bull which is like a mile run, 50 overhead squats I think at 60, 200 double unders and then 50 pull-ups I think.

Chris Williamson 23:32 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 23:32 Like all that overhead work and then double unders and then running so your shoulders are gonna be tired on that. And your legs, obviously for the squats it's like the combination of movements are just brutal, horrific.

Chris Williamson 23:42 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 23:42 Throw that in with like the attitude of the environment you're in as well. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 23:45 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 23:45 Even if you're not training with other people, it's the environment of you know other people are doing this workout or have done this workout.

Chris Williamson 23:51 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 23:51 So, you know, there's times to beat, there's scores to beat, you're not gonna drop your 400 meter running pace, you're gonna keep the intensity there. So psychological aspects of it thrown in with the sort of like that competition environment-... you know? And I'm not saying that the competition is good or bad, and people have a comment about that. But the, it is, you will maintain a high level of intensity during-

Chris Williamson 24:11 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 24:11 ... that workout as a result of, like, external factors.

Chris Williamson 24:14 Well, it's irrelevant whether or not other people in the class are doing it. There's a heritage of other people that have benchmarked-

Jordan Wallace 24:19 Yeah, exactly.

24:20 ... the workout, right?

Chris Williamson 24:20 Also, as well-

Jordan Wallace 24:20 And when it's a hero's, someone, someone's died because of this, like-

24:23 Exactly. That's what I was about to say, like, that's like paying, you're paying tribute to somebody.

24:26 Yeah.

24:26 You know what I mean? It's a hero workout. And even if you don't believe in that type of stuff, you're still gonna go hard.

24:30 Yeah. Because you know the reasons for it.

Chris Williamson 24:32 It's like saying, call it a tribute workout, call it whatever you want, yeah.

Jordan Wallace 24:34 So, CrossFit does do long runs. But when I'm doing that long run against somebody, you're doing it against your previous score. You're doing a 5K, you're doing it against your previous score. Doing it against Timmy and his super wide running gait. And (laughs) like-

24:46 (laughs)

24:46 Do you know what I mean? You're doing-

24:47 Just screw it up a horse move.

24:48 You're doing against, you're doing against like the 6:30 AM class.

24:51 Horse, horse, start.

24:52 Um, so your intensity is going to be high. Like your intensity on that 5K, you're going to apply yourself quite hard on that 5K.

Chris Williamson 24:57 But you could argue, you could argue, could argue people that run 400 meters, they, I think, I'm right in saying-

Jordan Wallace 25:02 Let me just say-

Chris Williamson 25:02 I'm right in saying that 400 meters is quite commonly known as one of the worst running distances in terms of pain.

Jordan Wallace 25:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:08 In terms of-

Jordan Wallace 25:08 Then you've got to go pick a battle.

25:10 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:10 Right, okay. But my point is that if someone's gone to exhaustion on 400, on a 400 meters-

Jordan Wallace 25:14 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 25:14 ... like obviously you can add loads and you can do all the rest of the things. Is it, is it the combination of movements? Is that what makes it so terrible?

Jordan Wallace 25:21 I think, yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:21 Is it the fatigue with the muscular endurance, with the whatever?

Jordan Wallace 25:24 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 25:24 Like can-

Jordan Wallace 25:25 I think let's put it out there as well, like newbies go anaerobic quick. And trying to breathe when you go anaerobic, it's not gonna happen.

Chris Williamson 25:32 Explain what happens.

Jordan Wallace 25:33 So, you just go off really hard.

Chris Williamson 25:36 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 25:36 And, um, heart rate's through, through the roof. Try and hold something on the front rack?

Chris Williamson 25:40 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 25:41 Compressing your breathing. And for you trying to breathe when you're anaerobic, it's not gonna happen. Like Jordan, he's like a master at pacing. He doesn't go anaerobic at any point.

25:51 Or aerobic.

25:52 All aerobic.

25:52 Can't go anaerobic.

25:53 Yeah.

25:54 Kills me.

25:55 So-

25:55 Kills me.

25:55 ... he saves himself, like oxygen's flowing through his body.

Chris Williamson 25:58 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 25:59 He's not restricted at any point, so he can move throughout it. Whereas, say your first session.

Chris Williamson 26:06 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 26:06 I'll put you on the assault bike to start off with.

Chris Williamson 26:08 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 26:09 You're probably gonna go out the gate pretty hot.

Chris Williamson 26:11 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 26:12 Then you've got your deadlifts, then you've got your burpees.

Chris Williamson 26:14 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 26:14 'Cause you have no idea of intensity-

26:16 Yeah.

26:16 ... you have no idea like-

Chris Williamson 26:16 What your limit is.

Jordan Wallace 26:17 ... what, what, what, you don't know what's coming.

Chris Williamson 26:18 But I think the thing is as well that you don't even know what going anaerobic means.

Jordan Wallace 26:23 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 26:23 Like it took me six months to find out that you're supposed to ri- I'm right in saying you're supposed to try and ride, unless you're sprinting or finishing, ride just below the ana-

Jordan Wallace 26:32 Red line.

Chris Williamson 26:33 ... uh, aerobic threshold.

Jordan Wallace 26:35 Thoroughfare. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 26:35 Right, okay. So what, and, and for anyone who needs advice on how to pace, what is the aerobic threshold and how do you-

Jordan Wallace 26:43 I'm definitely the wrong person to pace and-

26:45 He's not a man for talking about pacing.

26:45 Like, so, so for me-

Chris Williamson 26:47 Okay, so, but I was thinking physiologically, you might be able to explain-

Jordan Wallace 26:50 I go anaerobic in a, in a wall wall.

Chris Williamson 26:51 So, what happens? What, what is it that causes you to go anaerobic, and what is it?

Jordan Wallace 26:55 So, anaerobic is literal definition without oxygen. So, your body doesn't have oxygen.

Chris Williamson 27:01 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 27:02 So it's trying to contract muscles here and there.

Chris Williamson 27:04 So, this is when you've done-

Jordan Wallace 27:05 It can't do it.

Chris Williamson 27:06 ... this is when you've done too much work in s- a short space of time.

Jordan Wallace 27:08 Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 27:09 And you're now working instead of being aerobic, which is more efficient?

Jordan Wallace 27:12 Sh- more, yes.

27:12 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 27:13 You're now being-

Jordan Wallace 27:13 In the presence of oxygen, now you're working at anaerobics, you, you basically don't have any oxygen.

Chris Williamson 27:17 You're in emergency mode, so to speak.

Jordan Wallace 27:18 Yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 27:18 Right. So, how, how is it... What is pacing and how do you do it?

Jordan Wallace 27:22 Well, I think a lot of it is like knowing what you can do. So like, in a lot of the open workouts, people will be like, with, with me especially in past, like, "Go faster, go faster." I'm like, "No, I know what I'm doing."

Chris Williamson 27:33 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 27:33 "I'm going at my pace."

Chris Williamson 27:35 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 27:35 "I don't want to go at your pace, I'm going at my pace 'cause I know at this pace I can go hard for 30 minutes."

Chris Williamson 27:41 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 27:41 "14 minutes, whatever it may be."

Chris Williamson 27:43 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 27:43 If I go a little bit faster-

Chris Williamson 27:44 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 27:44 ... I know that, that, that's the workout over. Like, let's talk, uh, let's take what, 17.4, is that the deadlift one?

27:51 Yeah, the 55.

27:52 Me, me and you did that opposite each other.

Chris Williamson 27:54 You, you put me in the same heat. Just on a side point, Jordan put me in the same heat as him the three out of the five open ones.

Jordan Wallace 28:00 What, you were told, you were given it big licks? You gave him the big licks?

Chris Williamson 28:02 I, who gave us big licks?

Jordan Wallace 28:03 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 28:03 I did not give it big licks at all.

Jordan Wallace 28:06 (laughs)

28:07 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 28:07 Oh, (laughs) such a bullshit giver.

Jordan Wallace 28:08 Give me big, give me big licks. (?)

Chris Williamson 28:09 Right, okay, so we were... And I've, I've got a funny story about this that I'll dip in very quickly. I got off the, uh... 55 deadlifts at 100...

Jordan Wallace 28:18 102.

Chris Williamson 28:19 102 kilos.

Jordan Wallace 28:20 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 28:21 And you programmed this for me earlier in the week.

Jordan Wallace 28:23 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 28:23 55 deadlifts, 102 kilos, and then straight onto the wall balls afterwards, 55 wall balls-

Jordan Wallace 28:27 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 28:27 ... at nine kilos. And I broke on the wall balls at 30 to hear your judge going to you, "28, 29." And I was like, "Oh my god, what have you done?"

Jordan Wallace 28:39 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 28:40 Like, "Fa- fa- fa- fa- fa- fa- " Like just thought-

Jordan Wallace 28:42 Also, you beat me off the deadlifts as well. You and Matt, I think you did them like one broken.

Chris Williamson 28:46 Shhhit. What the fuck have you done? And I was like-

Jordan Wallace 28:47 Yeah. That, that's, that's anaerobic.

Chris Williamson 28:50 ... you know like when you just allow, so it was like, "Oh, go past, go over like..."

Jordan Wallace 28:53 Go again, go again.

Chris Williamson 28:53 You waved him through. I'm like, "Right, okay, do not pace ahead of Jordan."

Jordan Wallace 28:56 Exactly.

Chris Williamson 28:57 "Fuckin' idiot." So yeah, you were saying in that?

Jordan Wallace 28:59 So it's like, like on those deadlifts, obviously I've done that workout before.

Chris Williamson 29:03 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 29:03 Uh, three times before 'cause it was a repeat. I did it twice in 2015 I think it was, 2016. And then I did it once in training on the build up to last year's open.

Chris Williamson 29:13 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 29:13 So I'd done that workout, and I knew how to pace that workout, so I knew that the 55 deadlifts needed to be done in a certain amount of time.

Chris Williamson 29:19 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 29:20 The 55, like I'm not very good at wall balls, so I, I can push a little bit harder on the deadlifts and I can pace it on the wall ball. And then the classic thing which always trips people up, which is one thing that we're always trying to communicate across to people, is the row. So like on the rower, you could sit, I'd say like 80% effort, and pull say 1200 calories on the, on the monitor. 1200 calories. So that might take you, let's, this is not the exact number, let's say it takes you-

Chris Williamson 29:47 Three minutes or four minutes.

Jordan Wallace 29:48 Let's say it takes you two minutes 30 to row 55 calories.

Chris Williamson 29:51 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 29:51 Or you could sit at 95% effort and have it at 1400 calories and finish it in two minutes 15.

Chris Williamson 29:58 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 29:58 But then you need to take 45 seconds after to have a rest before you get on the handstand pushup. So it's like knowing where to push and where to not.

Chris Williamson 30:05 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 30:05 Does that make sense?

Chris Williamson 30:06 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 30:06 So, there'll be like certain movements...

Tim Briggs 30:08 ... within a workout, where you can go hard and where you can r- relax, basically.

Chris Williamson 30:12 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:12 And it's just through experience, just like anything, uh, through experience of knowing where to push and where to relax.

Chris Williamson 30:18 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:18 So like, in that workout, that's actually quite a good example to use for me, personally. So the deadlifts I'm quite comfortable with, obviously small r- like short range of motion.

Chris Williamson 30:27 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:27 The weight's not that heavy. It's quite, it's moderate.

Chris Williamson 30:29 (clears throat)

Tim Briggs 30:30 Um, the wall balls kill me because I'm a midget and it's high target.

Chris Williamson 30:33 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:34 The row, not great at because I'm small-

Chris Williamson 30:36 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:36 ... and I've got small range of motion again. So obviously-

Chris Williamson 30:38 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:38 ... I can't move the, the handle as well as someone who is taller.

Chris Williamson 30:41 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 30:41 But then the handstand push-ups are really good because, um, it's a short range of motion again.

Chris Williamson 30:45 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 30:45 Um, and I'm light. So it's like there's two out of the four that are good and two out of the four that are bad.

Chris Williamson 30:49 And you need to know where you can capitalize-

Paul Warrior 30:51 Exactly.

Tim Briggs 30:51 ... and where you need to kind of-

Paul Warrior 30:51 Where you can capitalize and where you can't.

Chris Williamson 30:53 But again with that, there's two, should be, there's two elements on that, that you can catch your breath more by going more easily on the movements that are easier to you-

Tim Briggs 31:00 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 31:00 ... or, and not pushing as hard or do you need to compensate just because someone -

Paul Warrior 31:03 This is, this is too easy, this is too easy.

Tim Briggs 31:04 I mean, there's like, there's like-

Paul Warrior 31:05 You've got to find it for yourself, though.

Chris Williamson 31:07 Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Tim Briggs 31:07 This is, this is, like, stimulus, like, based on, based on, like, that's competing.

Chris Williamson 31:14 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 31:14 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 31:14 You know, like, we do workouts that are anaerobic on purpose.

Chris Williamson 31:16 Yes.

Tim Briggs 31:17 Because, yeah, we're trying to trai- train all domains, right?

Chris Williamson 31:19 So give me, give me-

Tim Briggs 31:19 So we've got, we've got, we've got strength workouts. We've got the power workouts. So we've got those anaerobic efforts, those sprint ones.

Chris Williamson 31:25 Yeah, I forgot about that.

Tim Briggs 31:26 Which... Oh. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 31:27 Oh, oh, yeah. It sounds like you're punching someone in their sleep.

Tim Briggs 31:29 That's all right. I am. (laughs)

Paul Warrior 31:32 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 31:32 Uh, so, let's, so, yeah, so-

Tim Briggs 31:32 So let's take it from the start. There's... I wanted to ask this question. There's... the workouts that are in CrossFit, as far as, uh, from what I know, are split up into broad categories. Is that right? Yeah, they break it down in-

Chris Williamson 31:44 Is that right, Stu?

Tim Briggs 31:44 They break it down into three. We break, probably break it down into four, which is-

Chris Williamson 31:49 Take, take me, take me through that.

Tim Briggs 31:50 So we're talking, like, strength work.

Chris Williamson 31:52 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 31:52 So we've got, like, your maximal efforts, usually, like, a compound movement or we might train Olympic lifters that. So you're talking, like, your heavy back squat days.

Chris Williamson 32:00 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 32:01 Um, we-

Paul Warrior 32:02 There's your ATP and phosphocreatine as well.

Tim Briggs 32:04 It takes science boys.

Paul Warrior 32:06 Phosphocreatine.

Chris Williamson 32:06 Science bitches.

Tim Briggs 32:06 Science bitches.

Paul Warrior 32:07 Let's move on.

Chris Williamson 32:08 Rocking knowledge boys.

Tim Briggs 32:09 So then we go with our, um, so our power work, our sprint work, our, um, glycogen work.

Paul Warrior 32:16 Glycolytic.

Tim Briggs 32:17 So there you go.

Paul Warrior 32:17 There we go.

Tim Briggs 32:17 Right, there we go. So our anaerobic capacity work.

Chris Williamson 32:20 We know this one.

Tim Briggs 32:20 So these are the short, sharp workouts.

Chris Williamson 32:22 Sub five minutes? Sub three minutes?

Tim Briggs 32:24 Uh, sub, more than, like, sub less than that even, like, 45 seconds type work.

Chris Williamson 32:28 Okay.

Tim Briggs 32:28 Like any minute work. This is those-

Paul Warrior 32:30 Remember this is just training.

Tim Briggs 32:31 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 32:31 Yeah. Yeah.

Tim Briggs 32:31 This is just training. So this is training adaptation. So these are... Do you know on Fridays when we put you in teams? So you've... We guy- we like, we try and force you into breaking it down into these ridiculous little sprints, which-

Chris Williamson 32:41 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 32:41 ... ruin you.

Chris Williamson 32:41 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 32:42 You know, I've done it with you before a couple of times.

Chris Williamson 32:44 Yep.

Tim Briggs 32:44 Yeah. Well, it's a, like anaerobe development.

Chris Williamson 32:46 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 32:46 I mean, it just looks like comradery and good fun.

Chris Williamson 32:48 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 32:48 But it's actually your entire bit and energy system-

Chris Williamson 32:50 So you're talking about max effort intervals there then?

Tim Briggs 32:51 Max effort intervals, yeah.

Paul Warrior 32:52 Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 32:52 Underneath-

Tim Briggs 32:53 Working on-

Chris Williamson 32:54 ... repeated movement.

Tim Briggs 32:55 Yeah, exactly. And, like, the more are in your team, the more people in your team, the more rest you get-

Chris Williamson 32:59 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 33:00 ... the more, the more maximal your effort can be.

Chris Williamson 33:01 It's the higher you go on each one.

Tim Briggs 33:02 So the better adaptation we get. Then we've got the power endurance work. So that aerobic, kind of, uh, like high-end aerobic work, which is more like your four minutes, your eight minutes, your 12 minutes workouts.

Chris Williamson 33:10 Is that something like Helen? Is like a workout, like a-

Tim Briggs 33:12 Wait.

Chris Williamson 33:12 What's that?

Tim Briggs 33:13 So it's 400 meter run, 21 kettlebell swings, 12 pull-ups, three rounds for time. So it's like really quick, no excuse to break, really.

Chris Williamson 33:20 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 33:20 Um, should be like sub eight minutes.

Chris Williamson 33:22 This is what we call sport as well.

Paul Warrior 33:24 We're also... Yeah. So we call these sport, because like playing CrossFit, but that's... Because in the open, typically workouts are between five minutes and 20 minutes long.

Chris Williamson 33:30 I was gonna say, so it's, it's obviously longer-

Tim Briggs 33:32 Yeah. So, so, so we know.

Chris Williamson 33:33 ... than four minutes.

Tim Briggs 33:33 So, so, so we, we, we treat that for mixed modality full to like, uh, five to... I think there was a workout that was five minutes clean and jerks, wasn't there?

Paul Warrior 33:39 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 33:40 In the 70 kilos back in like-

Paul Warrior 33:41 Back in like 2010 or 2011.

Tim Briggs 33:42 ... 2010, 11. It was funny.

Paul Warrior 33:43 When we first opened.

Tim Briggs 33:44 Um, and then workouts typically now, like, 20 minutes kind of vibes. Um-

Chris Williamson 33:47 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 33:48 These are where you're like 80%, you're working aerobically. I think if you go, like, into anaerobic in those workouts, that's when you've gone off too quick and you spend the next-

Chris Williamson 33:55 So is this one of the ones-

Tim Briggs 33:56 ... 20 minute-

Chris Williamson 33:56 ... where pacing would be super, super important.

Tim Briggs 33:57 Yeah, yeah. This would be it. But obviously... But then as you're not going to be pacing, if you get to a barbell and it's at 80% of your one rep max clean, because you're doing a sport that's, you know, they've scaled it in a way aimed at a hard, like, you know, like top tier athlete.

Chris Williamson 34:11 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 34:12 All of a sudden, you're going to hit that barbell and you're not going to be tapping into the same e- energy system as the big strong guy who's got-

Chris Williamson 34:17 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 34:18 ... 120 kilo snatch.

Chris Williamson 34:19 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 34:20 You know, you're going to be tapping into something a little bit different, the workout is going to feel different, you... you know, that's when it's like game over time. Um, and then we've got our aerobic development work. So that's pure aerobic, that's our, um, Jane Fonda long workouts, kind of like, you know-

Paul Warrior 34:34 Bang the neon.

Tim Briggs 34:34 ... big long runs-

Chris Williamson 34:35 (laughs) .

Tim Briggs 34:36 ... um, things like that. So we've got these domains that we're hitting all the time. So to say pacing is, is relevant to where you are.

Chris Williamson 34:42 What you do, yeah.

Tim Briggs 34:42 Does that make sense?

Chris Williamson 34:43 Yes.

Paul Warrior 34:43 Gotcha. And that's when we program as well, like, with the Warrior Program that we do, um, we just have like a tick list.

Chris Williamson 34:50 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 34:50 We just tick one of those off.

Tim Briggs 34:52 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 34:52 Depending on the periodization of the year. Now we're getting into the sport neck of the woods with the open seven, eight weeks away.

Tim Briggs 34:59 So wait, we're totally biasing that like eight minute work, that 12 minute, that 20 minute work.

Chris Williamson 35:03 Because that's zeroing people in two month s-

Tim Briggs 35:05 Well, that's because, that's because we're approaching the open now.

Paul Warrior 35:07 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:07 We're approaching for... The people we're working with who have like decided that they're competitors-

Chris Williamson 35:10 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:11 ... they're the people where they're like, "Okay, you, you guys need to be practicing your sport."

Chris Williamson 35:14 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:14 "We need to be working in that domain that you're going to be using because we get you to just before the open and we've never had you hitting that high end, like, aerobic work."

Chris Williamson 35:24 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 35:24 "And you don't know what that feels like." Then you know, you're going to go into the open super revved up, super excited on Friday Night Lights with everyone cheering for you. You're gonna try and beat-

Chris Williamson 35:33 Gotta go be self-made jolting.

Tim Briggs 35:33 You're going to try and beat Jordan. You're gonna get off the deadlift before, before you hear it, you know.

Chris Williamson 35:36 I think what's really interesting point being said there about the multiple body types thing, and I think this is what for me makes it a really interesting spectator sport, that it kind of feels... You know a little bit like when you used to play Mortal Kombat or Tekken and everyone had their special move?

Paul Warrior 35:49 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:49 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 35:50 Each, each character had their own special move that they came with.

Paul Warrior 35:52 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:52 So each character was equal and also unequal-

Paul Warrior 35:55 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 35:55 ... in different ways. And I think that watching the games and watching it generally as a sport, and also even, uh, you have the guys in the gym, there's the levels of, there's the characters within the gyms-

Paul Warrior 36:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:07 Mm-hmm. Yeah. Within everyone's local affiliate that have got these, "Oh, he's the strong guy. He's the-"

Paul Warrior 36:11 Burpee ninja guy.

Chris Williamson 36:12 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 36:12 It's like Trumps, it's like top Trumps innit.

Paul Warrior 36:14 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:14 He's the, he's the gymnastic sort. Yeah, for sure.

Tim Briggs 36:16 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:16 And I think-What's really, really interesting is the fact that you have these people, because this sport is still relatively young, that are coming to it from so many different disciplines-

Jordan Wallace 36:25 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:25 ... that some people have got unfair advantages in some areas that lead to chronic weaknesses in others.

Jordan Wallace 36:30 Yeah. Yeah, something... Yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:32 Uh, and so at the moment, like, you know, watching Zach George, who is a, a, is a youth athlete that's winning sort of local comps at the moment, but he's fucking huge.

Jordan Wallace 36:41 He is a big boy, yeah.

Chris Williamson 36:42 He must be, what, 220, 230 pounds, something like that?

Jordan Wallace 36:44 I think he's like 100 kilos, big lad.

36:46 Yeah, he's gotta be 100 kilos.

Chris Williamson 36:48 He's such a big-

Jordan Wallace 36:48 But he's tall, he's tall as well though, so he's like got long limbs, so things like handstand pushups and stuff-

36:53 Yeah.

36:53 ... they're not going to be great for him.

36:54 I'm gonna put this out there. We programmed a workout at the comp he, he was at last. It was, um, weighted bar muscle ups with a vest.

Chris Williamson 37:03 Yes.

Jordan Wallace 37:04 I still cannot do one of these.

37:07 (laughs)

37:07 (laughs) Throw that out there as well.

Chris Williamson 37:08 And I've done the sport for like six years.

Jordan Wallace 37:10 Yeah.

37:10 And I've done one-

37:10 He's done one.

37:11 ... ever.

Chris Williamson 37:12 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 37:13 This, this, this, this, this lad put one on, and I was stood at, stood to the side. I was thinking, "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."

37:18 (laughs)

37:19 Not gonna make nine unbroken-

Chris Williamson 37:21 Shit.

Jordan Wallace 37:22 ... with a vest. So that... Say he's 100 kilo, so that's 110.

37:25 110.

37:26 Then-

37:26 Strong boy.

37:27 Yeah. Strong boy, so we can't-

Chris Williamson 37:29 So, so, so here, here, here is my point, right, that we've got these people that are coming into the sport from multiple different disciplines.

Jordan Wallace 37:35 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 37:35 As this sport develops, what's going to happen is that people are no longer gonna be transitioning from a background. Their background is going to be CrossFit.

Jordan Wallace 37:43 Yeah.

37:43 Yeah.

37:43 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 37:43 There's now a, like a under 14s club, basically.

Jordan Wallace 37:47 Yeah.

37:47 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 37:47 There's like a juniors at the games, and there's-

Jordan Wallace 37:48 Like, well, to, to touch on that, like, I did strength in-depth earlier in the year with Reebok.

Chris Williamson 37:52 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 37:53 And there was a guy, a, a young lad who we competed with called Reece Mitchell who went to the games. I think he's in the fort- 15 to 16 age category, I think.

Chris Williamson 38:01 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:02 I think he came second or third.

Chris Williamson 38:03 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:04 Legit like ridiculous.

38:06 Incredible.

38:06 Like 33 bar muscle ups unbroken, like snatches, 70 kilos, clean and jerks, 105, 16. Like-

38:14 Just ludicrous.

38:14 When I was 16, I was like running, just running. You know, this kid's got like so much potential to get to where he wants to be, but he's also so far ahead of like loads of CrossFitters. You know, you think about people in the gyms-

Chris Williamson 38:25 The normal guys, yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:26 ... you know, people in the gym. You know, if someone in our gym was snatching 70 kilos and clean jerking 105, they're a pretty decent athlete.

Chris Williamson 38:33 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:33 Mm-hmm.

38:33 You know, they've got pretty good capabilities. This kid's 16.

Chris Williamson 38:35 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:35 So imagine what he's gonna be like when he's my age.

Chris Williamson 38:37 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:37 He's 25.

38:38 What you gotta think about coaching as well, like when I started at 18, it was just jump up and do it. I'm sure it was the same with you guys.

38:45 Yeah.

38:45 It was more just go do it.

38:46 When I look back, yeah. Things were different.

38:47 Now, now the coaching above this guy is just huge.

Chris Williamson 38:50 So much better. Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:51 Like, he'll have a dedicated Olympic weightlifting coach, his CrossFit coach. He'll have programming on the side. He'll have everything on the plate for him-

Chris Williamson 38:58 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 38:59 ... which is gonna make him even better.

Chris Williamson 39:01 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 39:01 I mean, I think back to some of the stuff that I used to make Paul do. Oh my God, I'm surprised they're still alive.

Chris Williamson 39:06 So this was something else that I wanted to really touch on. So I've seen like some of, some of your throwback Thursday images and stuff-

Jordan Wallace 39:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:13 ... from like 2010. Can you give me a rundown of some of the most CrossFit stuff, or some of the most stupid CrossFit stuff you've done? Because what's happened now, it feels like 2017, 2018, we're... the sport's in maturity now.

Jordan Wallace 39:27 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:27 It feels like the sport's in maturity.

Jordan Wallace 39:29 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:30 And although that's fantastic because you can livestream the games on Facebook, and it's, it looks like the Olympics, and there's a... I'm sure that there will be a full opening ceremony pretty soon. There's gonna have to be.

Jordan Wallace 39:41 Mm-hmm. Yeah, without a doubt.

Chris Williamson 39:41 Do you know what I mean? Like, there's gonna be all manner of different bits and pieces, but what you don't get are the mad funny shit mistakes-

Jordan Wallace 39:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 39:49 ... that occur during the adolescence of a sport, so I-

Jordan Wallace 39:53 I know. I think we were super lucky. We were super lucky that, you, no, but like you met like...

39:59 Shh.

39:59 We were super... No, we were like... No, we were very lucky 'cause like, you, you know, the stupid stuff we've done, we did it ourselves.

40:04 Yeah.

40:04 You know.

40:04 I've had some pretty like... I, I've been really lucky that I've been surrounded by a lot of really good people, so like I had a coach called Carl Steadman. I had him for like four, I think he was my coach for like four and a half years.

Chris Williamson 40:13 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 40:14 Him and James Jowsey, both super knowledgeable guys. I learned a load of stuff off them two, um, that has helped me so much.

Chris Williamson 40:22 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 40:22 Like a lot, like one thing I was gonna say was I used to just think that more was better, like the more you did, the better you'd be.

Chris Williamson 40:30 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 40:30 And then I remember like-

Chris Williamson 40:31 Volume, volume is more.

Jordan Wallace 40:32 Yeah, vol- vol- volume, volume is king. And I remember like probably about six years ago now, Carl said it was like, "More isn't better. More's just more."

Chris Williamson 40:39 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 40:39 Like intensity always trumps volume, so you're better doing less well than doing loads crap.

Chris Williamson 40:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 40:45 And that was one thing that stuck with me for like quite a l- a, well, a long time. Um, but I mean, I think back to some of the stuff that I used to do, like I don't know how I did it. So I don't know how it couldn't harm.

Chris Williamson 40:54 So tell, tell, tell me, tell me, tell me some of the, the s- stupid CrossFit stuff. Tell us some of that.

Jordan Wallace 40:57 I did like all of the girls in one day, so there was like 15 female workouts.

Chris Williamson 41:01 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 41:01 So it was like Nancy, Ama- uh, Nancy, Kelly, all those things, did them all in one day.

Chris Williamson 41:06 How much work, volume was that?

Jordan Wallace 41:08 Made too much. It's like 1,000 pull-ups, like ridiculously hard pull-ups.

41:11 That's another one that can take 12 hours.

41:12 Like all day. Yeah, I was the, I was just like doing it day. It was just stupid.

41:16 By itself?

41:17 Yeah, and it was by m- on my own. I didn't even like have help.

Chris Williamson 41:19 So there was no one doing it with you.

Jordan Wallace 41:20 No.

41:20 I'm sure I was doing about-

Chris Williamson 41:21 You can get six of them.

Jordan Wallace 41:21 ... three members at the time.

41:23 Did you do... Did you say I was doing one every hour or something?

41:25 I did one every... I can't remember. It was like one every hour. Or the short ones, I think I did every half an hour, so like Grace, Isobel, stuff like that. Um...

Chris Williamson 41:31 And this isn't, this isn't for-

Jordan Wallace 41:33 I mean, just for the crack.

Chris Williamson 41:34 Literally just because... yeah.

Jordan Wallace 41:34 Just for the crack, yeah.

Chris Williamson 41:35 Did you, did you and Alex Yungin not do a ridiculous number of burpees once?

Jordan Wallace 41:39 Did a thousand. Tim does that every year.

41:42 Four years running, mate.

41:43 Tim does it every year Christmas Eve.

Chris Williamson 41:44 You did a thousand burpees on Christmas Eve?

Jordan Wallace 41:46 Christmas Day this time.

41:47 Christmas Day. Christmas day two.

41:47 I think... Let me look if I can post them.

41:50 Me and Alex did it in Christmas Eve once. Um, but I mean, we've done some stupid stuff.

41:54 That, that Clovis was retarded.

41:55 Me and Paul and Alex Murr did, um, half marathon roll straight into Clovis. Clovis is a 10-mile run, 150 burpee pull-ups.

42:04 That was pretty bad, that- that was a-

Chris Williamson 42:05 Un- un- un- partitioned as well?

Jordan Wallace 42:06 No, not partitioned.

42:07 I, I, I did it unpartitioned.

42:08 Yeah.

42:08 Paul did it partitioned.

Chris Williamson 42:09 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 42:09 Alex did it partitioned.

Chris Williamson 42:10 How fast is, how fast is a half marathon roll?

Jordan Wallace 42:12 Uh, 21-

42:14 21-97.

42:15 ... I think. 21-97, yeah, there you go, 21,097 meters.... so that took, like, an hour and 25, or whatever.

Paul Warrior 42:20 We did bring a TV into the gym and we watched-

Jordan Wallace 42:22 We did the same.

Chris Williamson 42:23 We watched into the galaxy while-

Jordan Wallace 42:24 But I finished it.

Paul Warrior 42:25 But that was great, but then when you've gone and turned my room, I can see you hanging out your ass-

Chris Williamson 42:28 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 42:28 ... because you've just rolled half marathon. Um, so that was stupid. Someone saw me running down the street and started saying that you w- are you unwell.

Jordan Wallace 42:35 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 42:35 So I had to listen to this, like, like about eight miles in, and then I had to go sit in... I sat in the office for 10 minutes and ironed it, all the butt load of spots.

Jordan Wallace 42:41 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 42:41 And then run back out. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 42:42 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 42:42 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 42:43 Alex Moore came in, got in the shower, we had one shower at the old place, just sat in the shower with hot water on him.

Paul Warrior 42:49 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 42:49 And then realized he didn't bring a towel, so he had to dry himself with blue roll.

Chris Williamson 42:52 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 42:52 In a complete state.

Chris Williamson 42:54 Well, I'm glad, I'm glad to see, me and some of the guys who went to Vegas with my business partner, Stagdo, and we created, or we thought we created the sit-down shower there.

Paul Warrior 43:02 Oh, actually, you know what? I do this a lot, me.

Chris Williamson 43:04 But the sit-down, the sit-down shower, it would appear, is so versatile.

Paul Warrior 43:07 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 43:07 Yeah. I use it all the time.

Chris Williamson 43:08 And it is applicable for Vegas hangovers-

Jordan Wallace 43:11 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 43:11 ... for doing 100 row in a stupid, stupid CrossFit workout. I mean, if, if anyone is feeling bad at the moment, all they need to do is sit down and shower.

Jordan Wallace 43:19 Sit down and shower.

Chris Williamson 43:19 And then they're... You can level up from that, which is the lie-down shower.

Paul Warrior 43:22 Oh, mate.

Chris Williamson 43:22 But it needs to be face down.

Paul Warrior 43:24 Face down?

Chris Williamson 43:25 Face.

Paul Warrior 43:25 Which end?

Chris Williamson 43:26 Face down, so you get the shower on the back of your head face down.

Paul Warrior 43:30 Mate, is that-

Chris Williamson 43:31 It's a face-down shower.

Paul Warrior 43:31 Isn't that a level of torture?

Chris Williamson 43:33 No, no, it's not hitting you in the face. You're face down, face down on the mat.

Paul Warrior 43:36 Yeah, yeah, but I'm sure that's-

Jordan Wallace 43:37 Oh, yeah.

Chris Williamson 43:37 It's fine, it's fine, don't worry.

Paul Warrior 43:38 It's a bit dripping though.

Chris Williamson 43:38 It's nice. It's nice. Did you do your, did you do your burpees?

Paul Warrior 43:42 One, one hour three minutes, 47 minutes this year.

Chris Williamson 43:45 That's quick.

Paul Warrior 43:45 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 43:45 I can't believe you couldn't have took three minutes off that.

Paul Warrior 43:48 Th- that's the slowest I've ever done it. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 43:49 You could do that in under an hour. It is.

Paul Warrior 43:50 (laughs) I- I've gone, I've got like, uh, I- I've got less fit every year.

Chris Williamson 43:54 Took me like one hour 25 minutes.

Jordan Wallace 43:56 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 43:56 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 43:56 Put it in perspective.

Chris Williamson 43:58 What does this say about your training methodology? Coach-

Paul Warrior 44:01 Yeah, we've got worse.

Chris Williamson 44:01 ... nutritional advisor.

Jordan Wallace 44:02 We've got worse. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:03 Everyone's got worse. Wow.

Jordan Wallace 44:05 Sorry.

Paul Warrior 44:05 Stupidest thing I've ever done is, um, try and do a clapping strict handstand push-up. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 44:11 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 44:11 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 44:15 Awesome. That's great.

Paul Warrior 44:17 N- nearly made it, mate. (laughs) Nearly made it.

Jordan Wallace 44:20 Oh, my god.

Chris Williamson 44:21 A clapping strict handstand push-up?

Paul Warrior 44:23 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:24 But I'm sure that everyone can imagine what happens when you don't make that one.

Paul Warrior 44:28 Oh, there's an element of risk involved.

Jordan Wallace 44:30 Oh, it's broken neck if you don't do it right.

Paul Warrior 44:31 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 44:32 It's, it's... You're landing on your hand.

Paul Warrior 44:33 Like, I'm pretty sure I lost an inch of height.

Jordan Wallace 44:36 (laughs)

Paul Warrior 44:37 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 44:37 I'm gonna sleep with him as long as

Tim Briggs 44:38 We've been lucky, I think, like-

Paul Warrior 44:40 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 44:40 ... injuries and stuff in the gym have been minimum.

Jordan Wallace 44:42 Minimal, yeah. We've been like... CrossFit does get a really bad name for, like, injuries and stuff, but I think it's, like, anything, like any training in the gym, like, I could take you to any commercial gym and show you loads of crap PTs who don't know what they're doing.

Paul Warrior 44:56 People wearing braces left, right, and center as well.

Jordan Wallace 44:58 Yeah, it's like, it's the same with CrossFit, like, there will be coaches out there that are crap.

Paul Warrior 45:01 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 45:01 But you're gonna get that in everything. We like to think that we're, we-, we're decent, we're good, you know. Um, obviously there's always things that we can improve on, but we try and do our best with everything, and we think we do a g- good job, but...

Chris Williamson 45:14 I'd agree.

Jordan Wallace 45:15 It's just... It gets a bad name through the-

Chris Williamson 45:17 So, here's, here's my, sort of, two pence on it, as someone who's now been in the sport for a year and I did... Around about 10 months ago, so just as the open started, after I'd been doing it for two months, I went and did a podcast with the guys from Propain Fitness.

Jordan Wallace 45:29 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 45:30 And we kind of reassessed it, everything from there. And that was-

Jordan Wallace 45:32 CrossFit, yeah, that's where CrossFit was.

Paul Warrior 45:34 That was when.

Jordan Wallace 45:34 When CrossFit was born.

Chris Williamson 45:35 When CrossFit was born.

Jordan Wallace 45:35 CrossFit was born.

Chris Williamson 45:36 I'm really tempted to call this one Chris Fit, but we'll see.

Jordan Wallace 45:38 I think you should.

Paul Warrior 45:38 Definitely.

Chris Williamson 45:39 Um-

Paul Warrior 45:39 And rename your podcast, maybe.

Chris Williamson 45:41 Just CrossFit. I'm so tempted, you know.

Jordan Wallace 45:43 (laughs) Just do it. It'll be fun.

Chris Williamson 45:44 Nah. Anyway, so I went in and, and they, as... Bodybuilding and power lifting background.

Jordan Wallace 45:50 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 45:50 Had a bunch of questions. And, uh, you, you, you are right that CrossFit gets such a bad rep, and we tried to, um, dissolve down what it is that we think makes CrossFit, first, so polarizing in terms of opinion, and then, kind of, what- what gets it the bad reputation. And we came to a number of conclusions. One of them is the fact that I think a lot of people that go to the gym now, especially the guys that are in Global Gyms, they're conflating an interest in exercise and sport and fitness with going and doing bodybuilding.

Jordan Wallace 46:25 Yeah.

Paul Warrior 46:25 Mm.

Chris Williamson 46:25 They think that the only thing that they can do is to go in and do the curls and do the rest of it, because that has been the prevailing training methodology for the last 30 years.

Jordan Wallace 46:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 46:34 And the other side of that, which makes it super attractive, is it's got mega low barriers to entry. So I'll bring this back to my industry. It's like club nights. If you have 1,000 pounds and a DJ and a venue that's prepared to let you in, you now have a business.

Paul Warrior 46:48 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 46:48 Like, you cannot go and start the new iPhone with 1,000 pounds and the contact of someone who wants a licensed venue.

Jordan Wallace 46:54 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 46:54 Whereas, you can go in with a PT for five minutes in a Global Gym and you can master a supinated bicep curl to 80% of the, the, the, uh, standard that someone who's been doing it for three years can do. However, when you go into a CrossFit gym and someone says, "Right, okay. We're going to try and do a snatch."

Paul Warrior 47:10 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 47:10 And it is such a technically complex movement-

Paul Warrior 47:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 47:13 ... that the barriers to entry are so high that people's egos get shot down very quickly. People don't like to go and do things that they're bad at, right? They don't want to go in and have... Do something that's difficult. They're, they're happy with difficult, but within the parameters of not necessarily feeling silly-

Paul Warrior 47:28 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 47:29 ... or feeling like it's unachievable.

Jordan Wallace 47:30 I think a lot of that, though, comes down to... There's several factors. So first of all, the person's attitude. If they've got an ego, CrossFit's probably not the right sport for them.

Paul Warrior 47:37 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 47:38 If they've got an ego where they- where they think that they should be able to do everything, that's never gonna happen.

Chris Williamson 47:43 You're gonna get humbled very fast.

Jordan Wallace 47:44 Look at, look at, look at Olympic lifting. There's people who just do those two lifts, snatch and clean and jerk. They spend their entire life-

Chris Williamson 47:51 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 47:51 ... getting better at the snatch and the clean and jerk.

Chris Williamson 47:53 From the age of, like, four as well.

Jordan Wallace 47:54 They're never, they're never perfect. So how does Jimmy, who's 53 and an accountant, think he's gonna walk in and be perfect at the snatch? No, 'cause her haven't.

Chris Williamson 48:01 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 48:01 You've gotta accept that you're never gonna be... you're never gonna be perfect at it. Like, I've been doing it, what, nearly eight years now. My clean and jerk and my snatch, still crap.

Chris Williamson 48:08 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 48:08 You know what I mean? Still needs work. Everything does.

Paul Warrior 48:11 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:11 I think that, I think that that's, that's what's interesting, the fact that, uh, I think there's a CrossFit documentary from like 2014.

Jordan Wallace 48:17 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 48:18 And I can't remember who the narrator is on it. I'm tempted to say it's a voiceover from Dave Castro where he says that-... very, very soon we're going to see someone who's got, like, a 500-pound deadlift and a sub five-minute mile and a this, and a this, and a this, and a this. And he was explaining this, the fact that the sport, in terms of progression for athletes reaching-

Jordan Wallace 48:33 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:33 ... the ceiling is still in its infancy.

Jordan Wallace 48:35 Yeah, definitely.

Chris Williamson 48:35 Which I, which, which I would absolutely agree with. Um, but yeah, I think the, that, that was one of the first things that I was like... I, I think that it gets a, a little bit of a bad rap, uh, from some people because it's daunting.

Jordan Wallace 48:49 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:49 Because there's a sense of elitism associated with the people that can do it, because there's a little bit of jealousy.

Jordan Wallace 48:55 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 48:55 And there's this, there's a quite rightly... Like, if someone can walk into a gym and do a muscle up, and you've been training bro splits for six years-

Jordan Wallace 49:04 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 49:04 ... and all you can do is a really well consoled- controlled eccentric on a seated, like, shoulder press, right?

Jordan Wallace 49:09 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:10 There is an element of you thinking, "You fucking cunt." Like-

Jordan Wallace 49:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:13 ... you look cooler than me.

Jordan Wallace 49:14 That looks good. Yeah, yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:15 Yeah, that looks cool. And irrelevant of how you look-

Jordan Wallace 49:18 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:18 ... you're like, "Fuck, that looked like... That looked really, really good."

Jordan Wallace 49:21 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:21 And do you know what it is? For me to, to look at CrossFit as a training methodology, last year if you'd told me at the start of the year that I would have seen the progress I saw physically from a-

Jordan Wallace 49:31 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:31 ... bodybuilding program-

Jordan Wallace 49:32 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:32 ... I would have told you that you were lying.

Jordan Wallace 49:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:34 And I don't know exactly what it is that was the difference, because I've been training for 10 years before that, roundabout, in varying degrees of, um, cerebral-ness and getting it wrong an awful lot.

Jordan Wallace 49:46 (laughs) Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 49:47 But you know what I mean? You, you, you, there's a weight in your hand.

Jordan Wallace 49:49 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:49 And you're going, you're going and lifting things moderately regularly and you're trying to eat some protein. Like, it just gets-

Jordan Wallace 49:54 Bro science in. It's bro science. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 49:55 ... moderately better as you move towards it a little bit. And I think what was interesting was that you now have formalized progressive overload. You have a formalized amount of intensity. Like, you have, in a basket, all of the things that everyone's trying to achieve on the other side of the gym in any case.

Jordan Wallace 50:16 Yeah, I think, like, our gym, in particular, is quite a good example of it because we have obviously, like, three areas of our gym. So you have our global gym, our regular gym, he Boxer room, and we also have our boo- our boot camp area which is like, you know, it's like, it's like CrossFit but-

Chris Williamson 50:30 CrossFit lite.

Jordan Wallace 50:31 ... not as much... Kind of, yeah, not as much, like, complex movement. So, you're not, we're not doing-

Chris Williamson 50:34 It's all pretty simple.

Jordan Wallace 50:35 Yeah, we're not doing snatches or clean and jerks, we're not doing kip- um, muscle-ups and stuff like that. But if you look, the CrossFitters look the best. They do. The lads are big, they're shredded, they're jacked. And they're not doing bicep curls like the guys in the, in the, in the global gym.

Chris Williamson 50:51 (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 50:51 Um, but they look the best and ultimately that's everyone's goal. Everyone wants to look good.

Chris Williamson 50:55 Man, does it-

Jordan Wallace 50:56 And the guys who are sneaking in the bicep curls and they're bettering up off, like, too much bench press are the guys, who are still CrossFitters and the guys who come in and they're sulking because their snatches are shit. And they can't, and they can't do muscle-ups.

Chris Williamson 51:06 It's just... Like, you literally, you literally go up to them and you're just like, "Dude, you've been bodybuilding, haven't you?" And you're just like, "Oh, well, that's not much."

Jordan Wallace 51:11 "You know, just a little bit."

Chris Williamson 51:12 Just a little bit.

Jordan Wallace 51:12 Just a little bit and it, that's always the same thing. And, like, that doesn't mean they can't be compa- compatible. You know there's a lot of people who are doing that now and that's, like, the new trendy thing, isn't it? It's like everyone's, like-

Chris Williamson 51:21 Functional body building.

Jordan Wallace 51:22 ... functional looking bodybuilding.

Chris Williamson 51:23 Well, I mean, there's, there's, you know, look at, look at, um, Brute Strength's Fruit Body program-

Jordan Wallace 51:27 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 51:27 That's really, really popular.

Jordan Wallace 51:28 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 51:29 Um.

Jordan Wallace 51:29 Marcus Philip.

Chris Williamson 51:30 Marcus Philip's, uh, I just think as well, I just, that's, like, the evolution of that is that people have, are starting to admit that the fact... it's okay again to say that, "I wanna look good."

Jordan Wallace 51:38 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 51:38 Because I think over, like, CrossFit and, like, people working their way through CrossFit, I think a lot of people... We aren't, aren't quite nailed it all yet. And a lot of people were like, "Oh, I don't look good but I'm fitter than you." Or, "I don't look great."

Jordan Wallace 51:48 That's great.

Chris Williamson 51:48 And I think, and I, and I think, and I think now- Now push your front out.

Jordan Wallace 51:51 I think now a lot of people, I think now a lot of people are saying, "Look, like, maybe I don't need to be... Maybe I'm not going to be, like, Rich Froning and maybe I need to just step back on the volume. And I do want to just look better." Mm-hmm. But that's functional.

Chris Williamson 52:03 "And be functional in the thing, but I, but I still want to train and I still want to actually be able to do the cool shit." So, you, you're able to capitalize on the methodology whilst not wanting or necessarily, um, having to have the competition. Like, outside of necessarily a class.

Jordan Wallace 52:14 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 52:14 Like, within class to class you could be competitive.

Jordan Wallace 52:16 That's also a common misconception, I think, with CrossFit, everyone thinks it's competitive. It's not.

Chris Williamson 52:22 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 52:22 It's only competitive if you want it to be competitive.

Chris Williamson 52:23 Against yourself as well, yes.

Jordan Wallace 52:25 If you do a Chris Williamson and give a big licks, it's going to be... I'm only joking. I'm only joking.

Chris Williamson 52:31 You don't give a fuck.

Jordan Wallace 52:31 But, no, if you, if you wanted to be competitive, you know, and you seek out, like, the big competitions-

Chris Williamson 52:35 You can make it competitive.

Jordan Wallace 52:36 ... you can make it competitive. But if you just want to turn up, train and go home, it can just be that as well. That's why we don't let people look at the whiteboard though, right? Yeah, and that's why we don't post workouts, like, the night before because we don't want people being like, "Oh, tomorrow I'm going to smash on that workout." It's like, turn up, do the class.

Chris Williamson 52:50 Yep.

Jordan Wallace 52:51 That's it.

Chris Williamson 52:51 No, I understand.

Jordan Wallace 52:52 And also, nobody cherry picks their workouts anymore.

Chris Williamson 52:54 I agree. Um, so, yeah, I think, I think what's really, really interesting is that you've got this, you've got this training methodology which appears to be producing guys that have got bodies year round that are better than the physique competitors-

Jordan Wallace 53:06 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 53:06 ... or at least on par.

Jordan Wallace 53:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 53:07 The only difference is the fact that they maybe need to go through... Like, to step on stage, if you had to take-

Jordan Wallace 53:13 Just need a water cup, probably.

Chris Williamson 53:14 Just literally just need, you literally just need to do a...

Jordan Wallace 53:16 James Scott.

Chris Williamson 53:17 Yeah, James Scott.

Jordan Wallace 53:18 James Scott, he's probably four weeks out all year round.

Chris Williamson 53:20 He's going down in there. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 53:22 Even if he took it, if he took it... If you tell him, he's one big piss away from CrossFit. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 53:25 If you tell him, he's one big piss away. (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 53:29 (laughs) Always shredded. But I mean, like, let's talk about, like, Lauren, for example. So when Lauren came and trained with us, like, what, 18 months ago, she'd literally just got off the back of doing all the bikini stuff on stage.

Chris Williamson 53:40 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 53:40 She's in good nick, don't get me wrong, but she was lean, but she was, like, weak.

Chris Williamson 53:44 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 53:44 She wasn't weak, but she was nowhere near where she is now.

Chris Williamson 53:47 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Wallace 53:47 She's lean all the time. She's a lot stronger.

Chris Williamson 53:49 A lot.

Jordan Wallace 53:49 Yeah, she looks jacked-

Chris Williamson 53:51 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 53:51 ... in a good way.

Chris Williamson 53:51 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 53:51 But, you know, like, she looks better now-

Chris Williamson 53:53 Look at her now.

Jordan Wallace 53:53 ... than what she did then and she's not even doing any physique sport now.

Chris Williamson 53:56 So look at, look at someone like Dan Bailey. Like, if you peeled Dan Bailey down a little bit-

Jordan Wallace 53:59 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 53:59 ... and did a two, and did a two-month cut on him.

Jordan Wallace 54:02 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 54:02 A hard two-month cut, he'd be 27- (laughs)

Jordan Wallace 54:03 Just on his arms.

Chris Williamson 54:04 He'd step on stage at Classic Bodybuilding-

Jordan Wallace 54:06 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 54:06 ... he wouldn't step way... He'd be too big to step on stage for physique.

Jordan Wallace 54:09 Exactly, yeah.

Chris Williamson 54:10 And you're like, and many-

Jordan Wallace 54:10 I think, I think people are like that though.

Chris Williamson 54:12 And this guy's well renowned as the fastest man in CrossFit at the moment.

Jordan Wallace 54:16 He is, he is, he is.

Chris Williamson 54:16 In terms of just, like, straight line speed over a short distance.

Jordan Wallace 54:18 But the memes, the mil- memes are still, "CrossFitters, lose your gains."

Chris Williamson 54:21 Yeah.

Jordan Wallace 54:21 Like, do you know what I mean? Which is...

Chris Williamson 54:23 So here's the thing, right? This is what we drilled it down to.

Tim Briggs 54:26 ... there is not a brand behind a push-pull leg split.

Chris Williamson 54:30 No.

Tim Briggs 54:31 No one hashtags-

Chris Williamson 54:33 Push-pull.

Tim Briggs 54:33 ... push-pull legs today.

Chris Williamson 54:34 Yeah, yeah.

Tim Briggs 54:34 Like, in their Instagram thing. And people love to hate on something that has an identity.

Chris Williamson 54:39 People love to hate?

Tim Briggs 54:39 Yes.

54:39 And this is, this is what we think it is.

Chris Williamson 54:41 And it's different as well.

Tim Briggs 54:42 It is. It is different. And yeah, like it's, it's definitely high visibility.

Chris Williamson 54:47 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 54:48 You know what I mean? Like, people can see when you're doing it. And the clothes are-

Chris Williamson 54:51 Even by Reebok-

Tim Briggs 54:52 People, people-

Chris Williamson 54:52 ... neon.

Tim Briggs 54:53 Yeah, people buy into it-

Chris Williamson 54:53 It was neon for years.

Tim Briggs 54:54 ... as well. Like-

Chris Williamson 54:55 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 54:55 ... people love it. But people love it because it's cool-

Chris Williamson 54:58 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 54:58 ... and it's good.

54:59 But it, it came from as well, though. The whole thing. Like it, like, they totally caught the wave right. I mean, they've been doing it a really long time but-

55:05 Yeah.

55:05 ... with the social media thing.

55:06 Yeah.

55:06 So they did it all up... All their websites went. All this stuff went online. Think who found out through like a chatroom or whatever the, the guys- I found out through, I found out through... Um, I just went online.

55:16 Yeah.

55:16 Just Googling "push-pull".

55:16 Put chatrooms and stuff, wasn't it? Like those people were talking about-

55:18 It was like a ball-

55:18 So all this stuff-

Chris Williamson 55:19 Bodybuilding.

Tim Briggs 55:20 So all, so all this stuff happened-

55:22 Yeah.

55:22 ... and then off the back of that, that means that a lot of people post stupid shit on Instagram and tag it in CrossFit.

Chris Williamson 55:26 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 55:26 Do you know what I mean? And, and then all of a sudden, that's the stuff that gets the attention.

Chris Williamson 55:30 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 55:30 Yeah.

55:30 Do you know what I mean? Not the, not the thousands of okay, but mediocre like loaded snatches that like-

Chris Williamson 55:36 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 55:36 ... people have done really well on, or PB'd, or improved their technique. But the one where the lass gets a ponytail caught in it and gets dragged across the gym.

Chris Williamson 55:42 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 55:42 Or CrossFitters have put out there.

55:43 Or CrossFit now are doing a really good job, I think, of bringing that perception of it back around. So they're not really on, on crossfit.com now posting like elite level CrossFitters. They're posting your everyday CrossFitters.

Chris Williamson 55:54 Yeah, yeah.

Tim Briggs 55:54 They're posting, like I said, Jimmy who's 53, his accounts.

Chris Williamson 55:57 Very inclusive, isn't it when you look at social media?

Tim Briggs 55:58 Mm-hmm.

55:58 Who sits at a desk like for eight hours and then goes and does a little workout. That, that's what they're posting now. So it's making it... It's showing people that it is accessible and that, that it is achievable for them to be able to like go and do a class.

Chris Williamson 56:10 Mm-hmm.

Tim Briggs 56:10 Whereas in the past it, all used to just be, um-

Chris Williamson 56:14 Games, games, games.

Tim Briggs 56:15 ... games, games, games athletes.

Chris Williamson 56:16 Elite, elite guys.

Tim Briggs 56:17 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 56:17 Who are getting-

Tim Briggs 56:17 And then again, look at what we're talking about now. It wouldn't surprise me in, in five or 10 years time, could you see there being different stratas of CrossFit gyms? Would there be ones where you've got the guys that are already-

Chris Williamson 56:25 CrossFit compete kind of thing?

Tim Briggs 56:27 ... CrossFit physique. Do you know what I mean? Like, CrossFit health and stuff or maybe classes that are... You know, you guys at Reebok CrossFit Tyneside have got Gun Club, right?

56:34 Yeah.

56:35 We know which is, which is like a, a sort of hypertrophy-based eight to 12, 14 rep kind of... But still using the methodology, right?

56:43 Yeah.

56:44 And still kind... Like compound-y, functionally, stuff like that.

Chris Williamson 56:48 It's definitely less functional.

Tim Briggs 56:49 Yeah, it's definitely less functional.

Chris Williamson 56:49 Essentially you... Yeah. (laughs)

Tim Briggs 56:51 You know what I mean, like-

56:51 I think he picks stuff up off, up off the ground. That's about the only functional thing he does.

Chris Williamson 56:54 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tim Briggs 56:55 ... Charles and Charles.

Chris Williamson 56:56 And you curl it whilst looking at your phone.

Tim Briggs 56:58 You do... Yeah, but only do curls for an hour. That's it. Just curls.

57:00 Mm-hmm.

57:00 I mean, that's like-

Chris Williamson 57:01 With an arm wrap so it's CrossFit.

Tim Briggs 57:04 (laughs)

57:05 An arm wrap.

57:05 It's an arm wrap.

Chris Williamson 57:05 Arm wrap.

Tim Briggs 57:07 Terrible, terrible.

Chris Williamson 57:07 Just it's a massive community. There's going to be people in it that you don't like, or people whose opinions people don't agree with.

Tim Briggs 57:08 Yeah.

57:08 I know. And whether you jump on board, I mean, I can imagine PTs... Some PTs, I mean, not so much now, you know. We went and got... did a weekend course. That's always a big deal on everyone as if, as if the personal trainer course is that fucking difficult either. Do you know what I mean? Like, people just pick up on these things. "Oh, well, they've opened up a gym." Oh, yeah. It was like... Yeah, we opened up a gym. Or John O'd opened up a gym, and then we spent the next seven or eight years-

57:09 Yeah.

57:09 ... going on every course. I mean every single coach-

Chris Williamson 57:09 Five years.

Tim Briggs 57:09 ... like traveling, like working with people. Working with people at a high level to get where we are. Do you know what I mean? And you know, and you did a level whatever PT a couple of years ago-

Chris Williamson 57:09 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 57:09 ... and you're still jerking yourself off over it. Like sit back in your box, mate.

Chris Williamson 57:09 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 57:09 That's one thing as well-

57:09 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 57:09 We've warmed him up now. (laughs)

Tim Briggs 57:09 There we go.

57:09 Cannon is going to... (laughs)

57:09 It's an armor up. It's an armor up.

Chris Williamson 57:09 Armor up.

Tim Briggs 57:09 Terrible, terrible.

57:09 It's, it's a massive community. There's gonna be people in it that you don't like, or people whose opinions people don't agree with.

57:12 Yeah.

57:12 And, uh... And whether you jump on board, I mean, I can imagine PTs... Some PTs, I mean, not so much now, you know. We went and got... did a weekend course. That's always a big deal on everyone as if, as if the personal trainer course is that fucking difficult either. Do you know what I mean? Like, people just pick up on these things. "Oh, well, they've opened up a gym." Oh, yeah. It was like... Yeah, we opened up a gym. Or John O'd opened up a gym, and then we spent the next seven or eight years-

57:33 Yeah.

57:33 ... going on every course. I mean every single coach-

Chris Williamson 57:36 Five years.

Tim Briggs 57:36 ... like traveling, like working with people. Working with people at a high level, to get where we are. Do you know what I mean? And you know, and you did a level whatever PT a couple of years ago-

Chris Williamson 57:44 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 57:44 ... and you're still jerking yourself off over it.

Chris Williamson 57:45 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 57:45 Like sit back in your box, mate. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 57:48 (laughs)

Tim Briggs 57:48 That is... We've warmed, we've warmed him up now. (laughs)

57:51 There we go.

57:51 Cannon is gonna... (laughs) It's just like... It's always-

57:54 It's just been... Just been lit the fuse has been-

57:56 I think that's a, that's a good point as well that Paul's brought up there, which I was gonna... I was actually going to mention earlier on, which has reminded us of, is like with CrossFit now, there's so many different like certifications that you can do. There's a certification for everything.

Chris Williamson 58:09 Yeah, there's-

Tim Briggs 58:10 Anatomy and physiology certification. There's Olympic weightlifting certification. There's, you know, kettlebells, nutrition. There's all this stuff that a load of CrossFit coaches are going and doing. Like, I'm not saying that there isn't, but there's not many PTs who work in the commercial sector, who are going away on weekends-

Chris Williamson 58:24 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 58:24 ... and doing extra courses and actually spending money.

Chris Williamson 58:25 Like once they get their level three-

Tim Briggs 58:27 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:27 ... they just stick there.

Tim Briggs 58:28 Actually spending money on learning and getting better.

Chris Williamson 58:30 I think the... I think the fact of the matter is that most of the, um, most of the guys that are doing the PT stuff have got one thing on their minds and that is, "I need to maximize the money that I can make."

Tim Briggs 58:40 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:40 Revenue.

Tim Briggs 58:41 Yeah, it's money or-

58:41 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:41 How can I... How can I get as much as possible-

Tim Briggs 58:43 It's investments.

Chris Williamson 58:43 ... for as little as possible?

Tim Briggs 58:44 Well, I think that's going to be anyone in any job. There's going to be those people, 'cause that's like saying that PTs are bad 'cause like there's some incredible... We're lucky enough to work with people who aren't CrossFit coaches who are bloody good at being incredible PTs.

58:55 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 58:55 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 58:55 But you know, we're lucky as well that they're around us, so they're more open-minded about what we do.

58:59 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 58:59 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 58:59 They know that we've got our jam and they know that they've got their jam.

Chris Williamson 59:02 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 59:02 And if I wanted to go do a physique type thing or a bodybuilding thing, then you know, those are the guys I'd be speaking to.

59:06 I'm sure I saw a video of you doing curls.

59:09 No, they were flies.

59:09 Sorry, yeah, flies.

59:10 Flies.

59:11 Standing dead straight up.

Chris Williamson 59:11 Make sure there isn't a manageability image of flies, flies, yeah.

Tim Briggs 59:13 Getting coached through flies, you know. Some boy.

59:16 Um-

59:16 But, um, you know, there's people who are going to be good at it, uh, whatever they do.

Chris Williamson 59:20 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 59:20 And I just think, you know, you can't... Gos... CrossFits got a brand. It's easy to just tie everyone underneath that.

Chris Williamson 59:26 Exactly, man. They've got to... That's the good and the bad.

Tim Briggs 59:28 And that's what... That's the push-pull leg brand that someone can target and hate on.

59:31 Should we just put it down there? Should we make one?

Chris Williamson 59:33 Of pushpulllegs.com? (laughs)

Tim Briggs 59:35 Let's just do it.

Chris Williamson 59:35 Let's go round the table.

Tim Briggs 59:36 Ban the domain now, get it done.

Chris Williamson 59:37 Get it done.

Tim Briggs 59:37 Let's get it.

Chris Williamson 59:38 PPL.

Tim Briggs 59:40 PPL.com. I'm gonna guess that a typical CrossFit membership is probably somewhere between £50 and £70 a month?

59:46 Uh, depends where you are, mate.

59:47 Depends where you are.

Chris Williamson 59:48 I mean, okay, so, so you could-

Tim Briggs 59:50 So that's a good thing to say. So like we... When we first opened, our membership was 40 quid. Now it's 80 quid.

Chris Williamson 59:55 Yeah.

Tim Briggs 59:55 Because times have changed. We're offering more services, more competitors, where, you know, we're still, we're still reasonably priced within, within Newcastle.

Chris Williamson 1:00:02 There's investment in the gym as well.

Tim Briggs 1:00:03 Yeah. You know, we spend a whole budget on equipment.

1:00:05 You get a bigger floor.

1:00:05 Exactly.

Chris Williamson 1:00:06 My, my point is that for, for that... Even at the absolute top end, like even if it was 100 pounds, that's three hours of PT.

Tim Briggs 1:00:12 Yeah.

1:00:13 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:13 And when you think of the service-

Tim Briggs 1:00:14 You get, you get-

Chris Williamson 1:00:15 ... that you can get in comparison to some-

Tim Briggs 1:00:16 ... every day. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:17 Exactly.

Tim Briggs 1:00:17 Every day. For however long you want.

Chris Williamson 1:00:19 And I think, you know, uh, this is... This shouldn't