Team WOD: Shared Reps, Shared Suffering and the Friend Who Makes You Show Up

Decoding CrossFit #13 — Because sometimes your training partner carries the motivation before either of you carries the workout.

Welcome back to Decoding CrossFit, the series where I translate the workout board and occasionally discover that the hardest movement is simply getting through the door!

This time, the board said Team WOD.

That sounds friendly.

It is friendly — if your definition of friendship includes shared suffering, strategic rest and encouraging each other while breathing like two malfunctioning accordions!

What is a Team WOD?

A Team WOD is a workout completed with one or more partners. The exact rules can change. Sometimes everyone works at the same time; sometimes the repetitions are divided between the team. Sometimes one person works while the other rests, holds a position or completes a different movement. The important part is that the final result belongs to the team.

You may not complete the same number of repetitions or spend exactly the same amount of time working, but you are contributing towards the same target. Which means your partner is no longer just someone suffering beside you...She is now legally involved in your bad decisions!

The first piece of teamwork happened before the WOD

Today I did not really want to go...My motivation had apparently taken the morning off and was showing no intention of returning. Fortunately, my training partner was more determined than I was. She pushed me to go, and I eventually walked into the box with her.

Then we looked at the board and discovered a Team WOD waiting for us!

So, before the clock had even started, she had already completed the first piece of teamwork: she got me through the door!

Sometimes a training partner does more than share the repetitions. Sometimes she helps you show up in the first place...

We had options… and chose the airbike

For the cardio portion, we could choose between rowing, running and the bike. Naturally, we chose the airbike — because apparently supporting each other also includes making terrible decisions together!

Our shared target was 9,000 metres.

The workout was in blocks of three minutes:

• one of us accumulated metres on the airbike;
• the other completed ten push presses with 30 kg;
• after the push presses, whatever time remained could be used to recover;
• at the end of the three-minute block, we swapped roles.

She started on the bike. I started with the push presses. Then we kept alternating, each adding approximately 1,000 to 1,500 metres during a turn, until our separate efforts became one shared total.

Resting, but still part of the workout

This is one of the interesting things about a Team WOD: resting does not feel completely like resting! Even when you are not on the bike, you know your partner is working. You finish your push presses, try to catch your breath and watch the clock move towards the next swap. There is a small sense of responsibility attached to every break...You want to recover enough to be useful when your turn comes, but you also want your partner to feel that you are ready to take over.

The rest is strategic, not decorative! Although searching for the fan remains a completely valid recovery technique!

Shared work feels different

If I had seen 9,000 metres on the airbike as an individual target, I might have quietly left the building and pretended I had entered the wrong gym! As a team target, it felt different.

The number was still big. The airbike was still maintaining its position as one of the most toxic relationships in my life! But the effort was divided into manageable pieces.

Three minutes on...Three minutes in a different role...One turn at a time...One person pushing while the other prepared to take over.

That is the strange beauty of a Team WOD: even when you are not doing the same movement, you are still carrying the same workout!

More than a shared score

The board records the metres, the repetitions and the time.

What it does not record is the message that convinced you to go, the encouragement between rounds or the moment your partner takes over when your legs are very ready to stop pedalling...

I nearly missed that workout because I did not feel like going...Instead, I showed up, lifted 30 kg, contributed to 9,000 metres on the machine I love to hate and left with another reminder that CrossFit is not only about the exercises!

Sometimes it is about having someone beside you who says, in one way or another:

We are doing this. Come on.

And somehow, you do 💜