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6 Key Takeaways from the PFAA Interview on Talking Elite Fitness

September 12th, 2024

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Good morning and welcome to the Morning Chalk Up.

In today’s edition:

  • PFAA President Brent Fikowski and board member Pat Vellner appeared on the Talking Elite Fitness podcast earlier this week. They provided a lot of information about the organization, its actions, and its plans. Get the key takeaways below.

  • Can a more individualized approach help your gym grow, expand, and become more profitable?

  • Learn how “The Progrm” became an official HYROX programming partner.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“It's not just about the results of the investigation. It's about this long-term systematic behavior...Our demands won't change based on the results of the investigation...This just goes a lot deeper than that.” - Pat Vellner on Talking Elite Fitness earlier this week.

CROSSFIT GAMES

Credit: @thepfaa / Instagram

Inside the Professional Athletes’ Association: 6 Key Takeaways from the Talking Elite Fitness Interview with the PFAA’s Brent Fikowski and Pat Vellner

On Monday, Talking Elite Fitness shared an interview with Professional Fitness Athletes’ Association (PFAA) president Brent Fikowski and board member Pat Vellner. 

The interview dug into the inner workings of the PFAA and their recent demands to CrossFit, one of which included asking for the removal of Dave Castro from CrossFit’s Sports Team in the aftermath of Lazar Đukić’s death at the 2024 CrossFit Games. The interview also touched on CrossFit’s response to the demands and more. 

Remind me: The PFAA was formed in July 2020 amid uncertainty surrounding the sport due to the global pandemic and CrossFit’s very public ownership change. The group has since been officially incorporated as a Washington-based nonprofit. 

Here are six key takeaways from the podcast with interviewers Sean Woodland and Tommy Marquez.

1. Why Make Demands Before the Investigation Into Lazar Đukić’s Death Is Finished?

Vellner’s response: “I think it’s important for people to know that the demands that were made are not exclusive to what has happened this year at the 2024 CrossFit Games. It’s not decided in singular to one incident. It’s not just about the death of Lazar.”

  • Vellner went on to reiterate that CrossFit’s “willful disengagement” from listening to athletes’ concerns, largely regarding athlete safety, led to the demands.

As a result, this year’s events were the final “breach of trust.” The PFAA argues that athletes are fed up with CrossFit’s culture, which has too often silenced their concerns.  

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SPEED READS

🎬 🎥 “Through Our Eyes”: Yesterday, the team at B.Friendly Fitness released their video on the 2024 CrossFit Games. Check it out now.

😎🏆 TYR Wodapalooza SoCal Update: The team at Loud and Live has released the TYR Cup competition schedule. Find it here.

🏃 🏃 HYROX ‘24/’25 Rulebook Updates: The World Series of Fitness Racing has updated its rulebook for the ‘24/’25 season. The updates include movement standards, women’s wall ball volume, and the Elite 15 qualification process. Read the rulebook here.

🦣 🏎️ Constantly Varied Conversations x Known & Knowable: Earlier this week, John Wooley, host of Constantly Varied Conversations and the creator behind Wooley Memeth, held a live Q&A with Mike Halpin from Known & Knowable about the timeline of Event 1: “Lake Day” he researched and published.

💪📋 Rogue Invitational Update — “The C”: Athletes can compete in this community challenge through the month of September. Registration is open now. Learn more here.

ICYMI: The 2024 Adaptive CrossFit Games by WheelWOD is coming to San Antonio, TX. Check out our event preview.

MEMBER EXCLUSIVE

Credit: @xfit_insane / Instagram

“A Long-Term, Sustainable Business” — Meet Three Gym Owners Who are Flourishing with an Individualized Approach to Fitness

This is the first part of a three-part series about gym owners, coaches, and clients who have turned to a more individualized, problem-solving approach to training, one that goes well beyond the group class model. 

This part looks at the gym owner's perspective, while the second part digs into the coaches’ and in the final part, the clients’.

In Carlisle, Pennsylvania

After two years of affiliate ownership, Angi Halvorson realized she wanted to move in a “more holistic,” individualized direction to helping her members, as she didn’t feel the group class model was ideal for most of them.

  • “I knew there was more to helping people get well than just giving them programming,” said Halvorson, the owner of Carlisle Core Fitness & Health in PA.

That’s when, in 2020, she came across Active Life, a company founded by chiropractor Dr. Sean Pastuch, that provides gym owners and coaches with education and mentorship to develop the tools they need to build financial freedom and to help their clients get out of pain and live better lives.

Halvorson immediately related to the way Pastuch spoke, so she enrolled herself and three of her coaches to become Active Life Professionals. 

Four years later, her business is barely recognizable from what it was.

Today, every new member begins with some sort of personal training. Some do 12 sessions; others do 16, Halvorson explained.

  • “It’s very individualized and it’s developed through conversations and understanding their goals, recognizing their limitations,” Halvorson said.

COMPETITIONS

Credit: @hyroxworld / Instagram

How “The Progrm” Became an Official HYROX Programming Partner

CrossFit athletes train for the unknown and unknowable. 

HYROX athletes, on the other hand, know exactly what’s coming. 

When John Singleton, founder of The Progrm, was approached to lead an official HYROX training program, he saw it as a welcome change of pace from traditional CrossFit training modalities. 

The two sports can be looked at like sisters, but they’re certainly not twins. 

Each has unique characteristics and differs greatly in terms of training methods and the areas of fitness they center around. 

  • HYROX, a sport that originated in Europe, is a set workout event that involves a mix of running (a lot of it) and cross-training station work. It’s an endurance event that, on average, takes athletes a little over an hour to complete. 

Its growth in the United States is notable, and the crossover from CrossFit to HYROX is also becoming increasingly common. 

What sets HYROX apart from other fitness races is that it has developed an elite tier of competition on top of the community divisions in each event.

  • “[HYROX] has been quite clear in their specifics. They focus on one specific event. You know the course, you know the stations you’re going to be doing, and although there are similarities [with CrossFit], the fundamental difference is quite big,” Singleton says.

HYROX approached Singleton to become an official partner and he immediately jumped on board.

HIGHLIGHTS

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