Concerned what effect the 2010 programming will have on future competitors :(

[Marcus Allen]

How about they just add weight classes, age divisions, and experience level divisions?

Then we can all go and get crowned the fittest athlete in our own little microcosm.

If they would just program for a 39 YOM with 3 kids, a full time job, a farm, little time to work out and poor self control with regards to diet then I could be a winner too!

[Ryan Hoegner]

I`m still ****ed the NBA got rid of all the 5'10 white guys.

[Paul Casimir]

With this scoring system, if you pile on a lot of points in one event you are out of contention. That means a competition with a pure strength event and a pure endurance event would eliminate most big competitors and most small competitors from winning.

Does a scoring system exist that can handle that problem? (Besides weight classes)

[Katherine Derbyshire]

Originally Posted by Paul Casimir

With this scoring system, if you pile on a lot of points in one event you are out of contention. That means a competition with a pure strength event and a pure endurance event would eliminate most big competitors and most small competitors from winning.

Does a scoring system exist that can handle that problem? (Besides weight classes)

Is it even a problem? Since Crossfit is supposed to measure well-roundedness, it seems to me that the scoring system *should* punish glaring weaknesses.

Which means, of course, that it will also punish specialists, since a specialist in one area probably has weaknesses elsewhere.

If you need a solution at all, the Crossfit answer is triplets and couplets: combine a strength-favoring exercise (like thrusters) and a bodyweight exercise (like pullups) in a single event (like Fran).

Katherine

[Stu Christensen]

Originally Posted by Katherine Derbyshire

Is it even a problem? Since Crossfit is supposed to measure well-roundedness, it seems to me that the scoring system *should* punish glaring weaknesses.

Which means, of course, that it will also punish specialists, since a specialist in one area probably has weaknesses elsewhere.

If you need a solution at all, the Crossfit answer is triplets and couplets: combine a strength-favoring exercise (like thrusters) and a bodyweight exercise (like pullups) in a single event (like Fran).

Katherine

Exactly. Actually program the way that CF was first preached. Even mainpage now has no real plan or methodology - at least nothing that has evern been discussed or is easily recognizable.

The fact is, this years games WERE biased away from any larger athlete having a true shot. Chan, who is a beast, did well in spite of the events and not because of them.

Like I said before...if CF were to actually follow the "Template for CrossFit's Programming" available in the journal, and then tested the athletes by the methodologies it preaches, you could seriously argue that the person really was the fittest on earth. Until that happens, its a pipe dream and a waste of time.

[Justin McCallon]

Originally Posted by Paul Casimir

With this scoring system, if you pile on a lot of points in one event you are out of contention. That means a competition with a pure strength event and a pure endurance event would eliminate most big competitors and most small competitors from winning.

Does a scoring system exist that can handle that problem? (Besides weight classes)

Yeah.
http://www.board.crossfit.com/showthread.php?t=58723

But if you're gonna suck at the 5k run, then you better lift a really heavy weight.

[Stu Christensen]

Originally Posted by Paul Casimir

With this scoring system, if you pile on a lot of points in one event you are out of contention. That means a competition with a pure strength event and a pure endurance event would eliminate most big competitors and most small competitors from winning.

Does a scoring system exist that can handle that problem? (Besides weight classes)

No, it would have eliminated the poster kids for CF HQ, hence the programming. Like others have said, if you suck at an endurance event or a 1RM, then you aren't the fittest person on earth. That's what CF says, but then they went and protected against that happening this year with their screwed up programming.

[Stu Christensen]

Originally Posted by Justin McCallon

Yeah.
http://www.board.crossfit.com/showthread.php?t=58723

But if you're gonna suck at the 5k run, then you better lift a really heavy weight.

Your system is flawed. The only real way to do it, is to have PROPER programming, and leave all competitors do all events. Period.

[Justin McCallon]

Originally Posted by Stu Christensen

Exactly. Actually program the way that CF was first preached. Even mainpage now has no real plan or methodology - at least nothing that has evern been discussed or is easily recognizable.

The fact is, this years games WERE biased away from any larger athlete having a true shot. Chan, who is a beast, did well in spite of the events and not because of them.

Like I said before...if CF were to actually follow the "Template for CrossFit's Programming" available in the journal, and then tested the athletes by the methodologies it preaches, you could seriously argue that the person really was the fittest on earth. Until that happens, its a pipe dream and a waste of time.

Using couplets is one way to test strength but it shouldn't be the only way.
Let's say you have 3 people: 700DL, 500DL, 400DL.
You're going to do Muscle-ups and DL. If you make the Deadlifts 300lbs, the 700lb DL guy is going to have no noticeable advantage over the guy with a 500lb DL. If you jack that up to 400, then there will be a small difference, but the 400lb DL guy won't even be able to do 2 rounds. If you make it 500, then there's a big difference, but you've programed out 2/3 of the field.
Point being that you need 1rm tests or something really close to really test strength.

That out of the way, you shouldn't be testing all individual measures. "Work capacity across broad time and modal domains" is a much better definition of General Fitness. Some measures aren't as important as others. And, if you're just isolating one, it's not a good test. Displaying reasonable strength at a high heart rate (i.e. the DL/Run/Pistol workout) is never tested, and it should be.

I think you should get a bunch of task-based events. Make them very different tasks:
Parkour (clearing walls, jumping stairs, etc),
Strongman (tires, fingers, stones, sandbag moves but not cleans or whatever, farmer's carries, sled push/pull, etc),
Throwing (discus, shotput, javalin, kettlebells, dumbells, kegs, over height or for a distance or whatever, etc),
Running,
Rowing,
Swimming,
Jumping (long or high, for a typical vertical test or a high jump test or whatever),
Maybe biking,
Military-type tasks (rope climbs, wall jumps, rucks, etc.),
Construction-type drills,
General sports (shuttle run timing, catching something, throwing something accurately, etc)
etc.
You can have multiple types of movements in one event.

Then make the tests span a wide range of times, making sure to include:
1-3s
10-30s
60-90s
4m
20m+
and make it span a wide range of weights and "reps" (i.e. lots of stones or lots of sandbags or whatever).

Doing tricky things like 3 events in one or a high-heart-rate 1rm is good.

Until then, we're really having a test of the World's Best CrossFitter and not the World's Fittest.

[Justin McCallon]

Originally Posted by Stu Christensen

Your system is flawed. The only real way to do it, is to have PROPER programming, and leave all competitors do all events. Period.

Could you explain why?

And no you don't need all the competitors to do all the events and saying "Period" doesn't mean you're right. I agree that proper programming is (obviously) essential and I never said that. If you go with rank-based scoring then you can still fix it by reassigning ranks when you make cuts.