CrossFit Open WOD 17.2 Strategy

For the first week of the 2017 CrossFit Open, we saw dumbbells for the first time ever, so of course Castro felt the need to step up his game for week 2 and double the dumbbells.  Week 2 of the Open brings front rack walking dumbbell walking lunges, toes-to-bars and dumbbell power cleans, with a bit of a twist after round two by switching the toes-to-bars with bar muscle-ups.  Fu

Complete as many rounds and reps as possible in 12 minutes of:
2 rounds of:
– 50-ft. weighted walking lunge
– 16 toes-to-bars
– 8 power cleans
Then, 2 rounds of:
– 50-ft. weighted walking lunge
– 16 bar muscle-ups
– 8 power cleans
Etc., alternating between toes-to-bars and bar muscle-ups every 2 rounds.

When looking at this workout, the first thing that comes to mind is “holy forearms.”  The only time that you get a break from holding something is between movements, or when you voluntarily take a break.  This is also the first workout that holds one of the higher skilled movements, the bar muscle up, which will slow down a lot of athletes.

As the bar muscle ups start in round 3, this workout is done different for athletes that are proficient in muscle ups vs. those that aren’t as good, or who have never done one before.  If you are the athlete that has never done a bar muscle up before, but might be close, push yourself to do the workout RX and get that first one.  You’ll never forget that feeling when/if it happens, and with the adrenaline of the Open, there is a good chance you might see it!  That being said, if you aren’t as good at bar muscle ups and think you might get stuck at the first set of 16, your strategy is to go as hard as possible until you get to the muscle ups.  This will give you as much time to work on the muscle ups and will also help with the tiebreak, which is the time at the end of the round.

For those of you that are proficient with bar muscle ups, as stated above, this is going to be a forearm buster.  The only place that you might have a chance to hide is during the lunges.  Try to find a position with the dumbbells that is comfortable so you can rest them on your shoulders to take as much of a break as you can on your grip.  Although there are only 8 cleans, this is something we would recommend you hook grip.

Take calculated small breaks.  Once your grip goes, it is going to take time for it to come back, so make sure to take small breaks.  As you may have seen with the games athletes, neither one of them completed all of the toes-to-bars unbroken and the dropped on the lunges after the first one.  Set the dumbbells down on each trip to give your self a quick breather.  If you are feeling good jump straight from the toes-to-bars into the cleans and set the dumbbells down on the SEVENTH clean.  This will give you a small break and have you use the 8th clean to get you into the front rack for the lunges.  It is ok to break between the toes-to-bars and cleans, but you should still set down the dumbbells on the 7th rep.

This will be a completely different feeling workout than last week.  Push, but make sure to take small calculated breaks to save your forearms.  If you are on the fence about scaled or RX, go RX.  Five feet of walking lunges puts you ahead of all scaled scores, and if you get that first bar muscle up, this could be your favorite workout.