Specific CrossFit WOs for SS newbies?

[Robert Beckett]

Coach, I know that with Starting Strength-type programs you recommend adding metcon workouts (if any) very conservatively over a period of several weeks, with 2 or maybe 3 met/con WO's a week maximum.

Can you recommend any specific CrossFit met/con WO's that are least likely to interfere with Starting Strength gains? Especially for those of us who've never CrossFitted before and are currently met/con weenies? I love the uncanny strength gains I'm making w/ SS, and part of why I'm doing SS is to prepare myself to start CrossFit productively.

FWIW, I'm 40 YO, 240 lbs @ 6'3". And I'm a Libra.

[Mark Rippetoe]

I'd recommend adding one metcon per week until you can tell that it won't interfere with recovery, then add another if you can still maintain recovery. Most can handle one or two/week, I doubt that any novice could do three. I like Cindy for starters.

[howardw]

And nothing has made my legs more sore for more days than the first time I got 20 sets on Cindy. That's 300 bodyweight squats and I was sore for four days.

Dern.


howard

[Simeon Priest]

Coach,

Are you saying you'd recommend adding one met/con to a SS routine right off the bat? Or not until you've been doing the novice routine for some time?

If you DO recommend adding one, at what point during the week would you add it if you were doing SS mon/wed/fri?

Thanks.

[Mark Rippetoe]

Yes, Cindy is a vicious wretched bitch. And no, I'm NOT saying everyone should do a metcon workout with SS from the start. He asked what to do IF he wanted to add metcon and I told him.

[JakeVohs]

Rip, what are some other good crossfit workouts besides Cindy that you recommend while doing the SS routine? (I'm doing Cindy today for the first time) Also, I plan on doing one a week, possibly two - I do SS Mon/Wed/Fri so I'm going to stick a metcon workout on Saturday which will give me all of Sunday to recover. If I wanted to add another would there be an optimal day to do one or does it even matter as long as its not on a SS day? Thanks for any help.

[Mark Rippetoe]

It's very hard to recover from 3. Any of the benchmark "girl" workouts are very good. They are short, intense, and useful.

[Robert Beckett]

Thanks for the reply, Coach.

So:

Do only SS/novice routine for a few weeks. Then start doing one benchmark WOD (at http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/faq.html#WOD0 ) per week, on a non-SS day. Then a coupla/few weeks later, add one more benchmark WOD per week, for a total of two "girls" per week (except never Linda), always on a non-SS day.

If I ever start having trouble adding weight to the bar per SS, scale back one or more WODs per week.

Correct?

And I assume that being a metcon weenie w/ a body weight of 240 lbs, I'll have to seriously scale back the girls (in terms of reps & rounds) at first.

[Mark Rippetoe]

These are very good assumptions. Should work well.

[Andy Baker (KSC)]

If I could make one suggestion having had some experience running linear strength programs with CF style metcon wods....when you first start adding in the WODs, don't start with the ones that are overly muscularly demanding...they are more likely to interfere with your strength work....start with the ones that are more "cardio" intensive and add in the strength oriented wods little by little and usually scale them down a tad just to test your tolerances before you run them full speed....a couple more points....try designing your own WOD's using movements that you know won't wreck your body for the next few days....don't limit yourself just to the WODs on the website....you'll probably find yourself doing lots of rowing, medicine ball work, kettlebell swings, and abdominal stuff as all of these things can be trained really hard with little to no effect on strength training....also, olympic lifts at high reps are great conditioning tools and are fairly easy to recover from....these are just my observations from expirementing with this stuff for a while...feel free to disagree.