Norway Brings Back An Old Favorite

In just over a week, the Norwegian CrossFit Championship will take center stage as the next event in the 2019-2020 Sanctional season. The event officially announced its first individual workout via Instagram last week, programmed by the team from Prepared Programming. The workout is modeled after one of the most notable Open workouts of all time, 13.1.

I’m new here, remind me: Open workout 13.1 was a 17 minute couplet of burpees and snatches. The burpee reps descended, while the snatch reps remained flat until the end while the weight increased each round. Athletes started with the burpees, then switched between the two.

• Burpee reps: 40, 30, 20, 10, all performed with a jump and touch to a target placed six inches above the athlete’s maximum reach.
• Snatch reps: 30 reps each at 75/45-lbs, 135/75-lbs, 165/100-lbs, and then with the remaining time perform as many reps as possible at 210/120-lbs.
• The workout was a literal mashup of the first two workouts from the 2012 Open that featured seven minutes of burpees in 12.1, followed by ten minutes of ascending load snatches in 12.2.
• A little nostalgia: The workout served as the platform for the first-ever live Open announcement at CrossFit Vitaly in Charlotte, North Carolina where Dan Bailey and Scott Panchik went head to head.

It’s a repeat, kind of: The workout this year in Norway will follow the 13.1 rep scheme, but the programmers have given it a bit of a facelift for the Sanctionals competition floor.

• Bar-facing burpees will be used instead of burpees to a 6” target, which will be a much easier setup for the event organizers, better presentation for spectators and viewers while providing a similar (if not worse) stimulus.
• The men’s snatch weight has been adjusted slightly to account for the conversion to kilos and to allow for cleaner setup and transitions.
• The women’s snatch weight has been beefed up a bit and made heavier across the board to better match the modern relative adjustment made for loading between genders, and because let’s face it, the women’s field is strong AF.

What to look for: The top mark for the men in 2013 was set by Neal Maddox with nine snatches at the final barbell (199 reps). Kristan Clever took the win for the women with 21 snatches (211) at the last weight.

• Expect a new record in the men’s division, as the loading is nearly identical with only a kilo difference at a maximum at any given barbell. Given the amount that the men’s division has progressed since 2013, it’s almost a guarantee.
• It’s a different story for the women, as the final barbell is roughly 10-kg (22-lbs) heavier than in 2013. Relatively speaking, the women’s division is lightyears ahead of where they were seven years ago, but a 15% increase in loading for a weight that would need to be hoisted 22 times to set the new mark will require a herculean effort.