The Fire Breather Workouts from Lynnwood Crossfit’s Cretus Ex Duellum Competition

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Cretus Ex Duellum "Born From Battle" CrossFit Competition

If you are looking to find a competition to hit in the North West next year, keep you ears opened for the announcement of the 2nd Cretus Ex Duellum at CrossFit Lynnwood.  It was one of the best CrossFit competitions I’ve participated in to date.  Between the amazing volunteers, fantastic box, and wonderful participants, the workouts were downright FUN!  In fact it is one of the few competitions where I actually heard a ton of people in the audience after the last event saying that they would have loved to try WOD 6 (‘King of the Jungle’ as I call it).

Jesse Ward and his high energy crew of volunteers, judges and kick-ass emcee, Baker (of 2Pood and Kill Cliff energy drinks), made for an incredible experience for all who happened to find themselves in Lynnwood CrossFit last weekend.

For those of you who asked, below is a summation of the “fire breather” workouts.  For a full list of all the open and master WOD’s, visit the CFL site here.

WOD 1:  For Time:

• 660 meter row;
• 5 rounds of 15 ring ball ups, 6 jerks at 155lbs

WOD 2:  “World’s Fastest USAW Meet”:

• 1st Minute: Snatch Attempt #1
• 2nd Minute: Snatch Attempt #2
• 3rd Minute: Snatch Attempt #3
• 4th Minute: Clean Attempt #1
• 5th Minute: Clean Attempt #2
• 6th Minute: Clean Attempt #3

The bar starts empty (sad) before the athlete. The event commences and the athletes will load and lift their bar. Minutes 1-3 are Snatches. Minutes 4-6 are Cleans. Each minute the athlete may attempt only one lift. If the bar leaves the ground in any amount it is counted as an attempt. Ground to overhead in one motion will be regarded as a Snatch. The clean is defined as from ground to shoulder in one motion. Best load is recorded. A missed attempt is a zero.

Scoring: The combined total of the athletes best Snatch and best Clean will be the athletes score.

My total was 185lbs on my snatch (missed 205lbs); 255lbs on my clean (missed 275lbs).  Total was 460lbs.

WOD 3:  AMRAP For Time (7 minute time cap)

• 25 x double unders
• 7 x Deadlifts at 275lbs
• 8 x pistols

I was a few reps short of finishing 5 rounds… the pistols are a goat of mine big time! (chalk it up as something I really need to work on).  The winner of this WOD did 8 rounds!

Sunday:  Day 2

WOD 4:  Ball toss

• Medicine Ball (20lbs) for height, 3 Attempts.

Athletes get three attempts to throw a medicine ball over their heads backwards (like a granny-shot reversed) over rope lines affixed at 11’, 14’ and 17’ high.

Judging: Only clean throws will count. All attempts count as attempts.

Scoring: Score based on height of throw, one of 4 results. >10’, 11’, 14’ or 17’.

I liked this one and nailed it on my first attempt – 17ft, no problemo!

WOD 5:  immediately following WOD 4 “2 minutes on the rings!”

• Athletes will begin standing, upon the “GO” signal athletes will grasp the rings and begin the Top Series: strict muscle ups, kipping muscle ups, ring dips, L-hold in dip support, once L-support can no longer be maintained the athlete without letting go of the rings will lower under the rings and begin the Bottom Series strict pull-ups, kipping pull-ups and finishing with an L-hang. Athletes have two minutes to earn as many points as possible in the Top Series and Bottom Series.

Scoring:  Top Score trumps the Bottom Score. Top Score consists of Strict Muscle Ups are worth 16 points, Kipping Muscle Ups are worth 8 points, Ring Dips are worth 4 points and every 10 seconds in L-Support are worth 2 seconds. Athletes cannot go out of order or back and forth. Strict, to kipping, to dips, to support. Bottom Score: Strict Pull-Ups are worth 16 points, Kipping Pull-Ups are worth 8 points, 10 seconds in L-hang is worth 4 points.

I managed to bang off 6 kipping muscle ups, 10 ring dips then went into lower portion and did 8 strict ring pull-ups followed by another 12 kipping pull-ups… then the judge called 2 minutes up.

WOD 6:  King of the Jungle (8 minute time cap)

This was by far one of the most fun workouts I’ve ever done!  And in speaking to some of the spectators, it was also one of the more enjoyable to watch all weekend.  The setup was simple enough, 4 ropes of 2 different diameters reaching to the ceiling (about 20ft), 3 individual rings, all of which are spaced out roughly the same distance to one another over a 30 foot span.  Your mission, should you choose t accept it, is to climb up the first rope, descend without touching the ground at the bottom, get onto the next rope, ascend then descend and then transition over 3 rings to another pair of ropes, which you in turn also ascent and descend – all the meanwhile not touching the ground because if you do, 15 burpee penalty.  After the 4th ascent/descent you have to make it all the way back… and if you managed to finish the last rope you made your way to a station where you had to hammer a 75lbs weight along the floor about 50ft with a sledgehammer.  Trust me, the 3 out of 24 guys that made it to that part had a tough time doing so based on the lack of grip strength from the rope climbs.

Below is a video of my attempt at this workout.  It was a gnarly one, but man was it fun!

I made it to the return portion of the WOD but couldn’t make the final ring transition back…

I placed 12th overall and I’m extremely happy with that.  I can’t wait for the open to start and to see how far I can make it this year.  Stay tuned, lots more to come in 2012!