Legion Strength & Conditioning Podcast

Legion Strength & Conditioning•legionsc.com

Coaches Jon, Luke and Todd have decades of combined coaching experience, and they've each worked with multiple CrossFit Games athletes. They’ve seen every coaching method, programming trick, and mindset hack under the sun, and, in the Legion Strength & Conditioning podcast, they deconstruct what works best to get CrossFit athletes results -- better and faster.

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Episodes

#65: Is Heart Rate Valuable for CrossFit Athletes?

We recently received a question about using heart rate in training, so we though it might be useful to record a podcast on the topic. People often wonder whether they should be tracking their heart rate in training—especially if they have a background in endurance sports like running, cycling, or triathlon. Should CrossFitters be tracking their heart rate in a similar way? Are heart rate zones applicable to mixed modal training in the same way that they’re applicable to running intervals? As alw...

Feb 01, 2021•39 min

#64: Planning for the 2021 Open

While we are still waiting for some details to be announced, the 2021 CrossFit Games season is starting to take shape. In an ideal world, we will see the best aspects of the Regionals system and the best aspects of the Sanctionals system combine. In a less than ideal world, Covid will throw a wrench in the 2021 season much like it threw a wrench in the 2020 season. With the uncertainty in the air, how should athletes approach training for the 2021 Open? What should change for people who are prio...

Jan 18, 2021•40 min

#63: Structure Without Hand-holding

Having spent time in a lot of different gyms and seen people following a lot of different competitive programs, I know for a fact that many of the coaches who write those programs would have a meltdown if they saw what was being done in their name. I’ve seen athletes in my own gym who I personally coach doing things that have made me freak out. And, when I’m like “Ok, wait how long have you been doing this that way?” the answer is sometimes, “Well, basically the whole time.” Misalignment on how ...

Jan 04, 2021•36 min

#62: When to do Targeted Skill Work (and When it's Unnecessary)

As athletes improve in the sport of fitness, their weaknesses become obvious and apparent to them. “Man, I really struggled on those handstand push-ups.” “My weightlifting numbers just aren’t up to snuff.” Driven athletes home in on their weaknesses and will want to work on them obsessively. However, especially for a lot of intermediate athletes, improvements will come over time simply from more exposure to the movements and the demands of the sport. How can athletes and coaches know when they n...

Dec 21, 2020•25 min

#61: Is it OK to Leave Something in the Tank?

Intensity and volume reign in the competitive fitness landscape. While debates go back and forth about which is more effective for adaptation (Hint: It depends ), very few people are asking whether they should just stop training when they still have something left in the tank. In fact, many athletes who we coach often ask if it’s ok that they feel like they could have done more. In some cases, they want to add in more accessory work. In other cases, they wish they had done more intensity and/or ...

Dec 07, 2020•34 min

#60: Science with Sergio - Lactate Myths

We’ve got another episode with Sergio going deep on the metabolism of lactate—and its underrate role as a signaling molecule and a preferential fuel source for many internal organs. In this episode of Science with Sergio, we review some of the highlights for performance-based athletes in George Brooks’s extensive 2018 review of lactate shuttle theory in Cell Metabolism: The Science and Translation of Lactate Shuttle Theory As we discussed in our previous Science with Sergio episode, lactate gets...

Nov 23, 2020•56 min

#59: 2020 Games Review

Like everyone else in the CrossFit world, all of the Legion coaches wasted at least a few hours a few weekends ago streaming the CrossFit Games instead of doing whatever work we should have been doing. And, like everyone else in the CrossFit world, we all each have some opinions on the programming and the testing—some positive, some negative, and some just flat out armchair pontificating. Check out this conversation with Jon, Todd and Luke to get our take on the design of the events for the 2020...

Nov 09, 2020•27 min

#58: Science with Sergio | Lactate, Metabolic Flexibility, and Fat Oxidation

And now, for a new segment on the Legion podcast: “Science with Sergio” Lots of CrossFitters talk about lactate or “lactic acid,” like joggers from the 1970s—saying things like “my legs were burning with lactic acid” or “my lat are so sore from the lattice acid from that workout yesterday.” Our understanding of the metabolism of lactate has progressed quite a bit, so we wanted to dig into a paper from Iñigo San-Milán and George Brooks that gives a more detailed and accurate framing of how lactat...

Oct 26, 2020•55 min

#57: What About People who are in between "Class" and "Competitor"?

Athletes who are in between classes and being high level competitors can often feel “homeless” in their training. They may also struggle with calling themselves a “competitor” if they’re not interested in trying to qualify for higher level events or if they still struggle with certain aspects of their fitness. Still, these athletes often enjoy using the framework of CrossFit as a sport to guide their training and tap into their competitive energy. In this episode, we try to give these athletes s...

Oct 12, 2020•28 min

#56: Should Gyms Write Their Own Programming?

The Morning Chalk Up recently posted an article by Hilary Achauer called “ Remember When Gyms Programmed Their Own Workouts? ” Since all of us Legion coaches have combined decades of experience programming workouts for group classes at gyms, we felt it only right that we vent our thoughts on whether gyms should write their own programming into our microphones for your listening pleasure. With the rise of several very high quality online programming options available for gyms, it can seem like a ...

Sep 28, 2020•31 min

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