Jan

VIRTUOSITY.

By Traver

Evan getting ready for a big pull!

This is an interesting quote that Eric came across the other day in the CrossFit Journal. For those of you that don’t have a subscription to the journal, it’s $25.00 per year and is literally filled with anything and everything that could ever want to learn about CrossFit. That being said take a look at this quote and post your thoughts on it to the comments section. I’ve talked before about Rickson Gracie, arguably the greatest Brazilian Jiu Jitsu practitioner to live and his absolute mastery of the basics of fighting. Eric and I don’t feel that we can stress the concept of “basics mastery” highly enough. Enjoy.

“Coach instilled in me and the other athletes under his guidance a concept known as “virtuosity.” According to Coach’s definition, this meant, “doing the common uncommonly well.” Movements I once considered as simple as a squat or push-up suddenly came alive with nuances and beauty. Coach believed there was magic in movements he described as “functional.” He taught his athletes these movements had the potential to create human power output that could not be matched by traditional bodybuilding isolation exercises.” – Greg Amundson

Today’s Workout:
10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1
Dumbell Thrusters
Ring Dips

Categories : Workouts

4 Comments

KJ
January 11th, 2010 at 11:53 am

I really love that quote. I think Greg says it best- that simple movements suddenly become alive with nuances and beauty. SO true!

This quote sparks a new way of thinking about everything. Do everything, even simple small tasks, giving your best effort that you possibly can. Put your whole self into it and give it 110%. I would say this even applies to working out, but also to work/ relationships/ cleaning… every aspect of life.

Baker
January 11th, 2010 at 12:12 pm

An understanding of “the basics” is the foundation for doing anything in life other then just existing. However, mastery of the basics is something that most people never focus on, in my opinion, because we tend to see ourselves as having mastered the basics when, most times, we’ve really just reached an intermediate level at best. It takes a certain rejection of ego for someone, whose been a practitioner of any discipline, to say “I need to focus on the basics” and then follow through with it.

Rickson Gracie is a great example of this and Coach was obviously able to inspire an entire community to reach a level no one had thought possible before. I would like to propose another quote to describe what we do in Crossfit. “Doing the common place, under uncommon circumstances.” While perfecting “the common” we also take those basic movements and perform them under circumstances that most people will never find themselves in and forge mental toughness that’s hard as steel. I mean really, who runs a mile, does 100 pull ups, 200 Push ups, 300 squats and runs another bloody mile as fast as they possibly can just for the hell of it?

We do.