3 Ways CrossFit Masters Athletes Can Train Smarter
By Coach Ryan Bucciantini
As more and more Masters athletes come to Conquer, the more I see how a large portion of the Masters community is working off old ideas and principles when it comes to training. Addressing the Masters athletes out there - I don’t fault you for it, it’s just what’s been/being offered to you.
To start, and I’ll just come out and say it, a lot of the training that's out there is not respecting the “miles” and reps you’ve put in, the injuries you’ve sustained, and the stressors that you’ve already accumulated throughout your life.
To help you better understand, I want to give you a few things that you can think about to keep you staying healthy, continually progressing, and staying in the game longer, so here we go.
Structure is King
This is a multipoint topic I’m going to address here. Depending on where you’re at in your athletic career, we need to look at this from a few different angles.
For the newer Masters athletes who may be new to CrossFit and this style of training, AND for Masters athletes looking to continually improve in the sport, it’s important to take the time and develop a solid foundation. Everyone wants to jump in and do fast, dynamic, and - for lack of a better description - “sexy” training. But before you do that, you need to make sure that you possess or are actively attacking the below training principles in order to build the widest foundation possible, to mitigate injuries and set you up to develop strength over the long term.
Make mobility, stability, and overall joint health a very high priority.
Slow things down and use tempo training to develop ligament and tendon strength.
Prioritize positions over weight in training. Proper positions = efficiency long-term and put less wear and tear on your body.
Don’t just train the Sport of CrossFit; do what’s going to make you more athletic.
Play the long game; there are no shortcuts, at least in developing your strength and conditioning.
Now, the second portion of this comes down to what program you’re following, or if you’re doing a personalized program. Before we get into this, I want to say that I love that masters athletes often prioritize community in training, but I also seen how this can become unproductive to training if gone unchecked.
Coaches who write intentional programming, and don’t just throw random shit on the whiteboard, are thinking about eliciting a specific response to improve a certain athletic quality within you. Training with friends is cool, and community/competition mentally can be beneficial, but you’re probably doing more harm than good by throwing random pieces of fitness into your training as they can detract from what your program is trying to improve. If you feel like you’re not getting what you want/need, it's important to talk with your coach about these concerns, not just try to solve the problem yourself.
I see a lot of athletes jumping into training with no real intent behind any of it, it’s just random reps and volume. No doubt, every athlete needs reps to learn, grow, and adapt, but if you’re following a structured plan from a coach or template, STOP adding or subtracting unless you’re working around an injury or have talked to your coach (and if you are working with an injury, still keep your coach in the loop on this).
Constantly varied high-intensity functional movement is not the end all be all
Training CrossFit is important if you want to get good at doing CrossFit, I’m not discounting that. Where Masters run into challenges is when they think they should/need to be doing it everyday and struggle to find balance and/or work on their weaknesses within their training.
To truly become a well-rounded athlete, one who has the ability to tackle any test/workout no matter the athletic qualities involved, requires a well thought-out program. A well thought-out program takes those athletic qualities of the tests into consideration and progresses them over a period of time to create long term adaptations for you, the athlete. I'm confident in saying that NONE of the best athletes in the sport today are training CrossFit all 52 weeks out of the year, especially not the top Masters athletes.
As a Masters athlete, it’s important to understand that training comes in cycles. Cycles that focus on structural (foundation) development, absolute strength, power, aerobic development, strength endurance, constantly varied training, etc. Start thinking about training and not just exercising… Each training cycle, when done properly, incrementally gives you the tools to build stronger specific athletic qualities to make you a well-rounded athlete for the sport. Skipping one because it’s not “sexy”, or because you don’t feel like it’s important, is limiting your long term progression and resilience as an athlete and will undoubtedly rear its ugly head on the competition floor leaving you discouraged and wondering what the hell happened.
If Structure is King, Communication is Queen
Now, to wrap this up in a big bow, the third trait I believe that will really help Masters athletes succeed in the long-term is communication. It goes without saying that you’re in a different place in life than the 20 year olds competing in the sport. You have different levels of responsibility, different stressors surrounding your life, and your body is at a different place in terms of reps, experience, recovery, and wear and tear - and your training can and should respect that - but no coach is a mind reader and the coach/athlete relationship goes both ways. Both must listen, both must speak up. Having open communication around your training will set you up for long term success because even if you’re under a heavy deadline at work, are dealing with an unforeseen family event, or are having some new aches and pains, open communication will allow your coach to adjust training in a way that you’ll continue to make progress but won’t be “stealing from Peter to pay Paul” by possibly causing an injury or leaving you feeling physically/emotionally burnt out because you didn’t say something. There’s gritting through something and then there’s training that just isn’t supporting your goals at this very moment. The sooner you speak up, the sooner we can tweak the program appropriately, so you aren’t trying just “to weather the storm”, but rather the sooner you can get back to what you’re doing, crushing it!
With that, continue to train smart, with intention, and do the things necessary to keep you improving, not just what is “sexy”.
As much as I want to beat a dead horse and continue talking about building a base, following a balanced, structured, and intentional program, and communicating with your coach, I believe I’ve made my points; if you feel like I’ve missed something please shoot me a message at Ryan@conquerathlete.com; I’d love to hear from you.
See you on the podium,
