What Can the CrossFit Games Team Division Learn From the TYR Cup?

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Good morning and welcome to the Morning Chalk Up.

In today’s edition:

• What can the CrossFit Games Team Division take from the TYR Cup format?

• Contributor EC Synkowski talked to author Abby Langer about “diet culture.” Get the details below.

• Doing 1000 “Murphs” would change anyone. Royce Laguerta just completed this feat, and you can learn about his journey below.

Should your gym be featured as our Affiliate of the Month? Send us a note explaining why.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“How do you get your son to run with? You create fake swords, start running around, and tell him, ‘Hey, we're going to slash up some zombies!’ So he's done miles with me!” - Royce Laguerta, who just completed 1000 Murphs, on encouraging his son to join in

COMPETITIONS

5 Things the CrossFit Games Can Learn from the TYR Cup

CrossFit team competitions can be tough to watch. It’s an opinion shared by many commentators in CrossFit media. 

At least, that’s what I thought until I watched the TYR Cup last month in Huntington Beach, CA.

Remind me: The TYR Cup at the inaugural TYR Wodapalooza SoCal was a team-style exhibition featuring two groups of eight athletes, all of whom competed as individuals at the recent CrossFit Games. 

• OK, so maybe part of the reason the TYR Cup was so entertaining was because I knew all the all-star individual Games athletes on the floor. In contrast, I’m not generally that familiar with most of the team competitors at the CrossFit Games. 

But it was more than that. 

The TYR Cup’s entertainment value for the spectators went well beyond athlete familiarity. There are certainly some things the CrossFit Games organizers (in my opinion) can learn from the TYR Cup to make the Games team competition more watchable, especially from a spectator standpoint. Here are five of the biggest takeaways.

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SPEED READS

📺👂“Hear Their Stories”: CrossFit’s new video series, called “Hear Their Stories,” brings viewers into the heart of the CrossFit community. Episode three is out now, focusing on Lynne Knapman, the “Iron Woman” who has qualified for every CrossFit Games that has included a masters division. Watch now.

🚣 🚣 2025 Rowvember by Dark Horse Rowing: Back again this year, Dark Horse Rowing’s Rowvember challenge will kick off after Halloween. Get ready.

📚🏋️‍♀️ 2025 USA Functional Fitness Collegiate Championships: The individual online qualifier for the second annual USA Functional Fitness (USAFF) Collegiate Championships is open now and scores can be submitted until October 23. Athletes must be current college or university students and 25 years old or younger as of December 31. Register now.

• The top 10 Rx athletes (five male and female) will be invited to compete in person at the USAFF Collegiate Hypermedley on February 8-9, 2025, at CrossFit Reston in Reston, VA.

ICYMI: Rogue Fitness has been teasing the idea of stone lifts at the 2024 Rogue Invitational in Aberdeen, Scotland. So, we took a look back at all the odd objects and unique events that Rogue has featured in years past.

MEMBER EXCLUSIVE

From Restriction to Freedom: How to Escape Diet Culture

Society today is constantly bombarding us with messages about how our bodies should look and what we should eat to achieve an often unrealistic ideal.

• This pervasive influence is known as diet culture, and it can have devastating effects on our mental and physical health.

For an episode of the Consistency Project podcast, I recently talked with registered dietitian Abby Langer, author of Good Food, Bad Diet, to discuss the dangers of diet culture and how we can break free from its grip.

Understanding the Illusion of Diet Culture

Langer defines diet culture as "the thinking that thinness equals worthiness and that we should be thin at any cost."

She explains that the diet industry often sells the idea of wellness and health, but in reality, it promotes punishment, restriction, and a narrow definition of beauty.

• She says, "It's so screwed up. We are sold this philosophy around bodies and youth and beauty since we're born. It's so internalized and so tough to get rid of.”

Falling prey to diet culture can lead to a host of negative consequences, including disordered eating, body dissatisfaction, and a distorted relationship with food.

COMMUNITY

Meet the Man Who Did 1000 Murphs

If you do CrossFit, you have probably done “Murph.” 

The Memorial Day workout is a rite of passage for athletes in our sport, with thousands participating in the running, pushing, and pulling every year to honor Lt. Michael Murphy, who was killed in action while serving in Afghanistan in 2005.

It’s a brutal workout that tests the mind and body, and for many people, doing it once a year is plenty.

Then there’s Royce Laguerta. He didn’t just stop at one Murph — he did 1,000 of them.

The Beginning

Laguerta had been training CrossFit for a few years in the Las Vegas area. During the COVID lockdowns, his affiliate was doing “75 Hard,” a challenge that pushed participants to commit to a specific regimen of exercise, nutrition, and reading for 75 days. 

• “We finished all the phases of 75 Hard and decided to do ‘Live Hard,’ which is even more difficult,” Laguerta tells the Morning Chalk Up in an interview. “We started, and almost immediately, I smashed my back. I was getting strong, doing two-a-days, eating well, and not drinking alcohol, and I started to get cocky.”

HIGHLIGHTS

Celebrating a PR, hosting a fundraiser, this, that, or otherwise? Send us a tip.

• 🎂Happy birthday to Katie Udnick of Red Wolf CrossFit in Huntington Beach, CA.

• Check out Riley Martin with this 115-kilo/253-pound snatch complex E2MOM.

• It must run in the family 😉 — check out Bayley Martin, with his back squat progression, ending at 200 kilos/440 pounds.

• Charlotte Baldwin and Julia Hannaford are putting in work and getting ready for the Down Under Championship. Nice work, ladies!

• 🔥Congratulations to Maura from Brazil on this 73-kilo/160-kilo snatch.