0:05

Hey everybody , welcome to the Herdfit Podcast

0:07

with Dr Sam Rhee and myself , Coach

0:10

David Silverson . His podcast is

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aimed at helping anyone and everyone looking

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to enhance their healthy lifestyle through fitness

0:16

, nutrition and , most importantly

0:18

, mindset . Alright

0:22

, welcome back to the Herdfit Podcast . I'm Coach

0:24

David Silverson . I'm here with my co-host , Dr

0:26

and Coach Sam Rhee , and we are making

0:28

history here on the Herdfit Podcast

0:31

. We are doing our first ever virtual

0:33

interview with the one and only

0:36

Bob Jennings , who is a co-director

0:38

of the Legends Championship . We

0:41

are now just days away from the 2023

0:44

event . Bob , a former

0:46

Games athlete himself , is

0:48

joining us from California , kind

0:50

enough to join us just a couple of hours

0:52

before he actually has to fly out . He

0:55

has a business trip ahead of him before

0:57

he meets us in Tempe , Arizona

0:59

, for the 2023 Championship

1:01

. Bob , thank you so much for giving the time

1:03

. Really do appreciate it . Can't

1:06

wait for Thursday . How

1:08

are you ? And again , thanks for coming on .

1:11

Yeah , guys , thanks for having me on . It's

1:14

always a pleasure to talk to both of you

1:16

. And how am I ? Before

1:19

we got on air I was bitching about

1:21

Oregon football going down

1:23

and Villanova basketball

1:25

going down . So

1:28

look , I mean , if those are the big problems in my life these

1:30

days things are pretty good

1:32

, absolutely .

1:34

Who do you think should be in the top four for

1:36

the college football playoff ?

1:40

It's crazy to keep Alabama out . I

1:44

mean they've won 11 in a row . They've looked really

1:46

good . I think their loss to Texas was

1:48

kind of a fluke . You

1:50

know a different team , but

1:54

I think they're going to go Michigan

1:57

one , washington two

1:59

, texas three

2:03

and then Florida State four . I mean in

2:05

Florida State look , in Florida

2:07

State they played anybody . That was any kind

2:10

of competition or all . They wouldn't even be considered

2:12

. But you can't keep an undefeated

2:15

team out .

2:15

Especially out of the ACC .

2:16

So yeah , I know , yeah

2:19

, I know it's crazy man .

2:20

It's .

2:23

You know who's going to be there versus who I

2:25

think should be there . Right , who I think

2:27

should be there are Michigan , georgia

2:30

, alabama , washington

2:32

, mm-hmm , yep .

2:33

Those are the four best teams . Strong case . Yeah Well

2:36

, we'll find out tonight . So , Bob

2:38

, have you really

2:40

had time to reflect on how far Legends

2:42

has come ? Like I know you guys really , we

2:45

had Joe here a couple months

2:47

ago . Give us the whole backstory

2:49

of Legends and how it started as a local comp

2:51

inside of the gym . Then you guys did an online qualifier

2:54

, Then you had the COVID situation in Goodyear , Arizona

2:56

, San Diego , Mayhem this

2:59

year , back to Arizona State , Tempe , Arizona

3:01

Next year , the games or whatever we're going to call it . I guess

3:03

we don't know that yet . Have you had time to reflect

3:05

on this yet ?

3:09

It hits me every once in a while . So , and

3:12

it's almost always some weird

3:14

moment with Joe or I'll be thinking

3:16

about Joe and then

3:18

it'll kind of hit me and I'll send him a text message

3:20

like shit man , this is crazy

3:23

. I mean , I can't believe

3:25

that . This started off as

3:27

a puny little one

3:29

day comp and

3:32

now here we are , we're

3:34

running the CrossFit Games for the Masters

3:36

and we're going to keep running Legends

3:39

. So we definitely

3:41

wanted to make sure that the

3:43

community was still being serviced

3:45

the right way . So

3:48

keeping Legends in December and

3:50

keeping the CrossFit Games in August

3:52

.

3:53

That's awesome man .

3:54

It's crazy , it is really it's

3:56

pretty nutty to think about it .

3:58

It is . And you yourself , you've

4:00

been a Games athlete . You've qualified

4:02

three times , competed twice , minus

4:04

the one because of the COVID year . What

4:08

is it like to go and you no longer compete ? I'm

4:10

sure you could know , if you really wanted to right , what's

4:15

the transition been like from athlete

4:18

, elite athlete to organizing

4:20

events for everybody else ? What's

4:23

that ?

4:24

been like for you ? Yeah , it was kind of

4:26

funny , man . I was thinking about this the other day

4:28

and I

4:32

think during COVID or maybe

4:34

slightly after COVID , when

4:37

I was doing the podcast with Justin

4:39

, and those guys , one

4:42

of them asked me like , hey , man , why

4:44

don't you just why don't you figure out how

4:46

to go run the games ? I was like , well , I could never go run

4:48

the games because then I would have to stop competing

4:50

and at that point in time I

4:52

just couldn't imagine ever having to give

4:55

it up . But coming

4:57

out of the games in 21

4:59

, my back was

5:01

destroyed . I mean , my bottom

5:03

five discs were just complete garbage

5:05

and mentally

5:08

I just I didn't have anything . It

5:11

takes a lot of dedication to get

5:14

in that gym and there

5:16

were just a lot of other things I wanted to do . My

5:18

son's going off to college . She's up in Oregon

5:21

. I season tickets for football games . My

5:23

wife and I fly up every other weekend for that

5:25

. My daughter is on

5:27

the cheer dance squad

5:29

at her school and I want to make sure that I get to

5:32

all her events . She

5:34

and I are big Swifties and so traveling

5:36

around the country to go see Taylor Swift concert

5:39

formula one races

5:42

with my son and just

5:44

spending more quality time with my wife . You

5:47

just started adding all those things up and it

5:52

just didn't fit into the schedule anymore

5:54

to be an athlete , and

5:59

you know it . Mentally it really didn't fit into

6:01

the schedule more than anything else . And

6:03

so , you

6:06

know , transitioning over to just

6:08

running the event it's

6:12

always a little hard , you know , especially

6:14

the , I would say , like on

6:16

day two of the event , like once everything

6:18

is kind of humming along and

6:20

I have some chances to watch some heats

6:23

. You know it's

6:25

a little hard to sit there and watch everybody out

6:27

there and be like , oh man , I can totally take this event

6:30

, you know . And then you just

6:32

realize like shit , dude , that's ego talking

6:34

. You know , like

6:36

, just settle down , go back

6:39

. And you know , focus on

6:41

what you're good at right

6:43

, which is putting

6:45

this event together . I think that Joe and I

6:48

have figured out what

6:51

the community is looking for and

6:53

how to support their Ruan

6:55

and you know

6:57

, putting what limited extra time

7:00

and energy I have putting it into , that is

7:02

just a little bit more fulfilling at this point .

7:04

Hear . That that's a great answer and I think

7:06

that's something . One of the key reasons why I love that

7:08

you and Joe are so you guys are at the top

7:11

of legends is that you really can

7:13

relate to all of us that compete

7:15

and that's an answer

7:17

that that's a thought , at least that I believe

7:19

many masters athletes have at some point

7:21

it's like , hey , I can , but

7:24

should I ? And

7:26

it does priorities , family work

7:28

they start to have to take priority

7:31

over training and you know

7:33

I think there's a lot of competitors out there that in the

7:35

back of their head they know the

7:37

end is here or the end is near and

7:39

but they just want it , they still want to go after

7:42

. That , you know called a dopamine rush of

7:44

competing that weekend and getting that feeling . But

7:46

we know , and Bob saying himself

7:48

, it's much more than showing up to a comp

7:50

and doing well in an event . It's a lifestyle

7:52

that really you have to revolve around training for

7:55

the entire year , or at least

7:57

most of the year , to get to that kind of level and

8:01

things that yeah .

8:04

And it's great for people

8:06

you know . I mean the I

8:09

don't , I don't , I don't begrudge people that

8:12

are still able to do that , and

8:14

I think it if it fits into your life

8:17

. Like you know , 100% , the

8:19

competing lifestyle is a lot of fun

8:21

.

8:21

Yeah .

8:22

And you know , but to your point . At

8:25

some point you have to , you have to put that

8:27

on the scale against everything else and see

8:29

where it comes out .

8:31

So , before we get into the Legends 2023

8:34

event , I just what's the why

8:36

? Because we do have some backstory that Joe shared

8:38

with us about . You know , the

8:40

investment , finance time

8:42

stress that you put into it , that both

8:44

of you guys have put into it . What's

8:46

the why behind it , like what truly is ? Why

8:48

do you keep coming back for another round ?

8:54

So the why , the why has changed over

8:56

time , and

8:58

in the beginning , the

9:01

why was everyone

9:04

else is doing this wrong . You

9:08

know , somebody needs to do it right , and

9:11

I'm tired of just saying

9:14

out loud , you know , screaming in the shower

9:16

right , somebody's doing it wrong , right

9:19

, like I'm time

9:21

to go fix it . And so that was the original why

9:23

. And then it became

9:25

, you

9:29

know , then the hyper competitive aspect kicked

9:31

in and you know , there

9:34

was a couple of years . There is

9:36

, joe and I were growing the event where

9:39

it was . You know , we

9:41

want , we want to be the best , this needs to be the

9:43

best , and we're going to do whatever it takes to

9:45

make it the best . And

9:47

now that

9:49

we've established that

9:51

right and

9:54

I don't think that it's

9:56

, I don't think that it's bragging

9:58

to say that , like , this is the premier

10:00

Masters CrossFit

10:03

competition in the world .

10:04

I'll say it . I'll say it this is the premier CrossFit

10:06

Masters competition in the world .

10:08

Well , I mean , you never went to MFC , so

10:11

just to provide a counterpoint

10:13

, and you won this one . So why wouldn't you say

10:15

that ? But OK , right , sure

10:17

and exactly .

10:18

All right , so it's

10:20

you know . So

10:22

now that we're there , we're at the pinnacle of the mountain

10:25

, right , we ? We've been asked to run the CrossFit

10:27

games . You

10:30

know , now it's really more about

10:33

, you

10:36

know , continuing to service

10:38

the community . You

10:41

know , picking up and

10:43

giving back to the sport that we both

10:45

truly love . You

10:48

know , it's really a lot more selfless at

10:50

this point where

10:52

I would say you know everything

10:55

. Prior to that it was

10:57

. It was very selfish

10:59

and ego driven , despite the fact that we put in , you

11:01

know , tons of time and money

11:04

into building up the event . It

11:07

was really more to satisfy ourselves than anything else

11:09

.

11:09

Right , yep , I understand

11:11

that . Respect that answer , respect the honesty

11:13

. Now , a

11:15

few days away , legends 2023

11:17

as an event , who from CrossFit should we expect

11:19

to see there ?

11:23

Well , probably , probably people that

11:25

you don't know right , like a lot of the behind

11:27

the scenes folks , will be there , ok , but

11:30

Dave's coming in , boz

11:33

is coming in , and you

11:35

know just , I think they're

11:37

, but Boz

11:40

was there last year so he knows

11:42

what to expect from one of our events . Dave

11:45

, back when he lived in Carlsbad

11:48

, he saw the event growing

11:50

up , ok , and

11:52

in the first three years in the gym , and you

11:55

know . So I think it'll be good

11:57

for him to see what it looks like now

11:59

. But

12:01

mostly it's kind of the behind the scenes folks

12:03

that you won't recognize that

12:07

are there really to

12:09

figure out . Ok , how

12:12

do we support a Masters competition that is this big right , that's

12:15

420 people in the

12:17

RX division . You know what are some of

12:19

the things that Bob and Joe are going to

12:21

need extra help with to

12:24

make sure that 2024 is the best

12:27

experience and

12:29

the best CrossFit games for Masters there's ever been

12:31

. Ok .

12:33

Now are you trying to ? I do feel any extra pressure

12:35

with these eyeballs there , like

12:37

that you're almost trying to show them and press

12:39

them and like , hey , you

12:41

guys made the right call in letting Joe and I run the games for the

12:44

Masters . Is there

12:46

any extra pressure here ?

12:49

I would lie if I say there wasn't . Yeah , but

12:51

I would say , you know , I'm

12:54

a big fan of therapy

12:56

. I mental , you

12:59

know , emotional therapy , right , and

13:03

so I've been going to a therapist for the last couple of years

13:05

and what ? One of the things that I've

13:07

learned is that more than one emotion and

13:12

more than one thing can be true at once

13:14

. Right , got it . So , you know , yes , definitely feel

13:16

a little bit more pressure , you

13:22

know . But at the same time , you know they made

13:24

the right choice , they're

13:28

fully in with us . We

13:33

totally know what we're doing , and you know

13:36

, and I'm proud of what we

13:38

really built . So I'm also kind of in the who gives

13:40

a fuck mode to

13:42

do .

13:43

So I'm just kind of , you know , I'm just kind

13:45

of , you know so yeah

13:48

, I mean we had a little bit

13:50

of experience with the behind the scenes CrossFit guys

13:52

at the open announcement . Yeah , and

13:54

I will say everything that I saw with those guys was

13:57

it blew me away how

13:59

professional and efficient

14:02

and experienced

14:04

they were at doing this at

14:07

a brand new location setting

14:09

everything up . I was blown away by

14:11

the logistics and how

14:13

good the staff were all of

14:15

them . What I'm interested in is

14:17

that you guys have a ton of experience and

14:20

I know from meeting Joe

14:22

and meeting you that you guys are also

14:25

very confident , sort of self

14:27

assured people who have

14:30

run this multiple years and you know

14:32

what you've been doing . You did it at Mayhem , you

14:35

did it during COVID , you did it , you know

14:37

. Now you're doing it at a brand new location

14:39

and it's just gotten bigger and bigger . So

14:42

I know you guys are on the same page in terms

14:44

of like making this the best competition possible

14:47

next year . But it's also

14:49

going to be sort of an interesting

14:51

interaction to see what

14:53

CrossFit HQ's sort of goals

14:56

. Are they completely in line with your guys' goals

14:58

or are they not ? Like where are

15:00

those little differences going to be ? And

15:03

this is going to be the first year , so obviously it's

15:05

not going to be perfect next year , but

15:08

I'm so glad that they're going to be there and you guys

15:10

have a whole long run up of basically

15:12

a year plus to sort

15:14

of get all those things ironed out , hopefully

15:16

.

15:18

Yeah , so

15:21

we're totally alive . Like

15:24

we haven't had a single meeting yet I

15:26

don't think where we

15:28

differed too significantly

15:31

. Like nobody's thrown out the

15:33

veto card , and

15:36

what's cool about the relationship is we

15:38

both have it . I

15:42

would say the veto card is definitely bigger than ours , but

15:45

we have one as well , and

15:48

I would even say like some

15:52

of the decisions that have been made , like

15:57

some of the little bit more controversial

15:59

ones , have

16:02

kind of come from both of us . So

16:06

the 200 per division

16:09

for this Emmy finals so

16:12

that number was originally

16:14

lower

16:17

from CrossFit and

16:20

Joe and I pushed back

16:22

on that because it

16:28

was only going to be 100 , I think . And

16:32

when it's 100 per division and you have 40

16:34

people qualifying , like it just

16:36

didn't , it wasn't enough

16:38

, right . Like in our opinion , you need at

16:40

least 4X the

16:43

number of qualifying spots in order for a

16:45

qualifier to make a lot of sense .

16:47

Do you realize that you're ? Yeah , but did you

16:49

realize you're going to F them in terms of video submissions

16:51

and how many people they got to look at now ?

16:54

No , totally , yeah , like we all walk

16:56

through all of that , right , and

16:58

it's not , we're doing the video submissions too , right , like

17:01

it's , this is all of us that

17:03

have to manage that . Right , but

17:07

it's just , it's funny to watch

17:11

the interweb blow up with

17:13

anger every time some decision

17:15

is made that it goes out there . And

17:19

that was one to me that I was like . So

17:21

we came back where like , oh , we think it should be

17:24

. Like , we originally

17:26

proposed going back with

17:29

a graduated participation based

17:31

model , right , and and you

17:34

know , like , basically , habit at 4X

17:37

for each number of qualifying spots

17:39

, and and you know , and then CrossFit came

17:41

back and we're like you know what ? Let's just , let's make it just

17:43

200 across the board . It goes back to the way

17:45

AGOQ used to be and

17:48

like , yes , they're definitely going to be . It's going

17:50

to be more difficult , to you

17:53

know , do do the video review , but

17:55

that's what we're signing up for . And

17:58

and you know , let's just do it the best

18:00

we can . And to your point , sam , like , is it going

18:02

to be perfect next year ? Absolutely not

18:04

. Is it going to be perfect in 10 years ? Absolutely

18:07

not . Something goes wrong

18:09

every single year , right , expecting perfection

18:11

is just , it's not realistic . And

18:15

you know , striving for

18:18

perfection , right , is clearly the goal

18:21

. But

18:23

in all the businesses that I run , like , one of the

18:25

things that I like to say is it

18:27

celebrate small failures

18:29

right , because that's how you learn and

18:31

become better . You don't ever want really big

18:33

failures that blow everything up , but you want

18:36

to celebrate the small ones , and so

18:38

we're going to have a lot of small failures and

18:40

we're going to celebrate those and we're going to be really proud

18:42

of those small failures because they're going to help us do it

18:44

better the next year .

18:46

I'm sure Hiller will celebrate right along with me .

18:50

Well and like , look , man , you know , guys like Hiller

18:53

and and Savon , and

18:55

um , you like they

18:58

, they , they got to , they have a business

19:00

to run right , and their business is kind of

19:02

built on on negativity and

19:06

um , that's not the energy

19:08

that I want to bring in . And so

19:10

, um , you

19:12

know , they can say all they want

19:14

, they can criticize our programming . They can

19:16

criticize is , you know , me

19:18

and Joe , is people right ? Like they

19:20

can criticize my dog , I don't , really , it doesn't

19:23

matter , you know , um

19:25

, you know , look

19:27

, if they're so disappointed , disappointed with it

19:29

go go running yourself , right

19:32

. Yep , I'm

19:34

just realizing you're wearing a Michigan shirt .

19:36

Yeah , interviews over . I

19:38

was there .

19:41

I'm not Michigan . He's a Michigan guy . He's

19:43

a uh uh . It's cool . He has ties

19:45

to Michigan , so he's not just a front runner .

19:48

No , I did my residency yeah .

19:50

No , that that's awesome . That's awesome . So

19:52

you practice , you're helping them steal signs

19:55

and , you know , doing whatever it takes to

19:57

win .

19:58

He's trying , he's trying . He's trying to figure out a way to figure

20:00

out the uh , the legends , workouts , uh

20:03

, by by your notepad , on on on your

20:05

desk or whenever Michigan against the world .

20:08

So I look this is welcome to Edd

20:10

, right ? So my programming and

20:12

what you guys just experienced is very much

20:15

a part of it , right ? Like I am , you

20:17

know , I see something . I'm a , I'm a squirrel

20:20

now , or if you're the squirrel , I'm a dog

20:22

. Right , it's like Michigan . I can't get out

20:24

of my head . I'm not hyper focused on it . That's

20:27

kind of my programming too . I'll I'll

20:29

get a little hyper focused on one

20:32

movement that I

20:35

really want to be in the event

20:37

, and then I'll construct everything

20:40

around that one movement . You know , nice

20:42

, why do

20:44

that ?

20:45

on . Oh , you're good at it , so

20:47

I , you're good at you , and Joe have

20:49

always put on a good cross-it program

20:51

. I do want to dive into

20:53

that at some point . But speaking of the media

20:55

, will there be ? I

20:58

know there's not going to be a broadcast this year , for obvious

21:00

reasons Will there be any sort of media

21:02

coverage ? Do you know anyone's coming in

21:04

to help ? You know ? Just show what's

21:06

going on , show you your display there .

21:10

Yeah , there is actually quite

21:12

a bit of media coverage coming in

21:14

and I don't have any

21:16

of the names that I wish I did . Yeah , this

21:19

is Joe's department so

21:21

I haven't really paid

21:23

attention to it , but I know that there

21:26

are . You know there's

21:28

multiple photographers , videographers , you

21:30

know all that stuff is coming in to help promote

21:33

the event .

21:33

But no streaming . Like we can't watch it

21:35

where , at where ?

21:38

No , no streaming this year . This

21:43

is one of the funny things about the

21:45

community that I always find is like

21:50

if people knew exactly

21:52

how much it costs to run a stream yeah

21:55

, we talked about that . Yeah

21:57

, they wouldn't there's no way that they would bitch

21:59

about . You

22:02

know , crossfit trying to

22:04

make more money right , and

22:06

operate as a business . Or you

22:08

know legends right , trying to operate

22:11

as a business ? Like you

22:13

can't run a professional level

22:15

stream without major , major

22:18

sponsorship . And

22:20

, given that this is a transition

22:22

year into the game's next

22:24

year , like it , just it didn't happen . And

22:27

in the past , when it didn't happen , I

22:29

wrote a check and I'm

22:31

not writing any more checks .

22:34

Yeah , you've lost money every year , especially with that

22:36

high level streaming stuff you guys did , especially

22:39

last year and before that .

22:42

Yeah , that definitely needs to be known .

22:43

Cool about that . Again , it's , like you know , fail

22:45

small . So that is

22:47

, it's allowed us

22:49

to A get

22:52

experience with it prior to going into

22:54

next year's games , got it ? And

22:59

B understand a little

23:01

bit about you know , what

23:03

do we need to put together in

23:06

order for the stream to

23:09

be more widely viewed , right

23:12

, like , we get

23:14

a lot of feedback on it every year and

23:16

you know a lot of it is like , hey

23:19

, you know how come ? You

23:21

know , joe Schmo , who came

23:23

in 39th place , didn't

23:25

get a lot of airtime and it's like , well , you

23:28

know , he came in 39th place . Man , I'm really

23:31

sorry , you know , I don't know what to tell you about that . Like

23:33

, streaming it needs to tell a

23:36

story , you know , and

23:39

in order to do that , in order

23:41

for it to be effective , right , like me personally

23:43

, you guys tell me and I think I'm taking us

23:45

wildly off course here but like I'm

23:48

not a big fan of the set

23:50

up a camera , a really wide angle

23:52

, no content , you know , no

23:54

context , no live announcers , like

23:57

it . Just , you

23:59

might as well just look at the leaderboard and see

24:01

what happens after that .

24:03

Agreed . Because even in that situation , bob

24:05

, if you put the camera , that's

24:07

no commentators , just put it in the corner

24:09

you're still gonna have 10

24:12

people that are on the other side of that floor that you

24:14

can barely see . They're like little ants . You know like

24:16

that that you're gonna get complaints about

24:18

that . You know , like , if you could rotate

24:20

through multiple cameras you could do

24:22

that . But now you're talking about manpower to do that

24:24

. You can't just set up a phone or a camera on a

24:26

stand and hope for the best . So I agree

24:28

, I mean I think the way that you guys did it was

24:31

the best possible way to

24:33

have a broadcast . But again , the

24:35

money always at some point

24:37

has to come into play .

24:39

It also will affect your programming . So

24:41

since you're not streaming anything this year , you don't have to

24:43

worry so much about how it looks visually

24:46

. But I assume next year you're really

24:48

gonna have to think about how

24:50

you could see how the athletes are progressing and

24:53

how far they are and who's against whom

24:55

, and all these things which you

24:57

didn't even have to worry about this year when you programmed

24:59

this year , right ?

25:03

Yeah , so the previous two years we always

25:05

had to think about flow , but flow

25:07

from the perspective of

25:10

a visual audience . And

25:13

this year we still have to think about flow

25:15

. We still have to think about people moving through

25:17

the floor and first

25:19

thing is always safety , right . So we're

25:21

always thinking about flow from a safety perspective

25:23

first , right . But then in

25:25

the last two years it's been

25:27

okay once we have safety nailed

25:29

. Now we have to think about the camera and

25:32

where the cameras are and making sure that

25:34

it tells the story

25:36

. That way , it's so much easier

25:38

just to think about safety and

25:43

a live audience when

25:45

it comes to floor flow . When it comes to floor flow

25:47

and programming yeah

25:50

, next year it's . I

25:53

mean , look , we've already started programming

25:55

for next year .

25:56

That's awesome , right ? Does

25:59

that include quarter-final , semi-finals ? Are

26:01

you just right now focused on games programming

26:03

when you say we're racing ? Yeah

26:07

, right now really focused on games , but

26:10

we will be involved

26:12

in the previous rounds

26:14

, so you can really have a stronger

26:16

case for reverse engineering , right

26:18

Like you do the games . And then you're like

26:20

all right , now that we have this at the games , what

26:22

do I wanna test at semis to make sure that

26:25

people get to the games able to do that , and then you have the

26:27

quarters in the open . That's really cool . I mean , I've

26:29

always thought that's what you should do , that you

26:31

program the final event first , at

26:33

least most of it , and then you reverse

26:36

engineer .

26:36

Yeah , but that's more complicated . That's what we , they're

26:39

doing . All the events the same

26:41

too right For individuals

26:44

and for quarter-finals .

26:46

I believe they're all the same . Right For the quarter-finals

26:48

. Masters and open division are the same workouts

26:51

. They'll probably change according

26:53

to what division , but I think semi-finals are separate

26:55

. Do you have input on quarters for next year ?

26:59

Yeah , so it basically our input

27:01

. It's

27:04

a curve based on our

27:07

. You

27:10

know how much it becomes

27:12

exclusively masters , right . So

27:15

you know , open very

27:18

little input quarters . We

27:20

got a little bit more input . Semis

27:22

will be

27:24

more of a collaboration between us and the team

27:26

division , right . And

27:29

then you know , the

27:31

games will be us , you

27:34

know . And obviously CrossFit is

27:36

. They're weighing in

27:38

all along the way , you

27:41

know , because they wanna make sure that you

27:46

know they're brands on the line , absolutely . So

27:49

, you know , and we're still feeling each

27:51

other out a little bit right , and

27:54

while they think that they know

27:56

and trust Joe and I , they

27:59

gotta make sure that we're not lunatics too

28:01

, right .

28:02

So , the right kind of lunatic .

28:04

So I mean with that in mind , because

28:06

I've heard you speak about programming for Legends

28:09

and just competition in general , and one

28:11

thing I like about you guys is that you do stick to

28:13

CrossFit , Like you don't try to get

28:15

too cute . You are creative , but

28:17

it's still classic CrossFit when

28:19

you dumb it down . Do you have a rank

28:21

without giving anything up right now , Because I know the workouts

28:23

are coming out in two days and

28:26

do you have a rank , if you will , in terms

28:28

of what you think is most important to

28:30

test , or

28:32

is it , or do you try to really evenly distribute

28:35

?

28:38

Yeah , we try to make it as even

28:40

as possible . Yeah , because

28:43

, you

28:45

know , you , just , this

28:48

isn't a powerlifting competition , it's

28:50

not a strength competition , it's not a

28:52

endurance competition , right , it's

28:54

CrossFit , right . So

28:56

, you , really , we , every

28:59

time we put it together and every revision that we

29:01

go through and , like Joe and I will go through hundreds

29:03

of revisions Wow , we're

29:07

always looking at it

29:09

holistically and saying , okay , do we have

29:11

balance right ? And

29:15

not only balance from ? You

29:19

know , are we testing

29:21

endurance versus power , and

29:23

you know , high-skilled gymnastics versus

29:26

, you know , pure

29:28

strength ? And but also

29:30

, we'd

29:33

like to make sure that we have balance across

29:35

the impact on the athlete's

29:37

body as much as possible as

29:39

well . Right , there

29:43

are definitely years where we come out and we're like

29:45

, oh , wow , that was a really grippy year

29:47

. Or like , wow , we really , you know , we hammered

29:50

the posterior chain there . But

29:52

again

29:54

, we'd like to make sure that

29:56

we're not . We want to test people

29:58

as hard as we possibly can without breaking

30:01

them long term .

30:02

Yeah , we saw Joe a couple months

30:04

ago and they hadn't you guys hadn't

30:07

finalized everything for this year

30:09

when we talked to him . I assume they're

30:11

all finalized now . So now

30:13

you're looking at your programming coming up , are

30:15

you better ? It's like in a couple of days Out

30:18

of a scale , here's

30:20

what . Well , go ahead and ask your

30:24

question . I was gonna say on a scale of one to

30:26

10 , 10 being like this is the

30:28

perfect , ideal programming for this comp , and

30:30

I am so psyched versus like one , like

30:32

we made so many compromises and there's so many issues

30:34

here , like how happy

30:37

are you with this year's programming , say versus

30:39

last year's or the year before ? Like how complete

30:41

, how good of a test , how safe , like

30:44

all those things .

30:46

Yeah . So

30:48

I

30:51

think our best programming ever was

30:53

two years ago , San Diego , I thought

30:55

San Diego , San Diego , yeah , that

30:57

was great . I thought last year was pretty good

30:59

. I

31:06

really like this year's programming . I

31:11

think last year we tested

31:13

a little bit like

31:15

we didn't have anything heavy really last

31:17

year , which is outside

31:20

of the norm for us , and

31:25

so I think we got some good heavy back in

31:27

there and

31:30

I mean , look , the movement standards

31:32

are out , so I'm not really giving anything away . Where's

31:35

the machine .

31:36

No-transcript . There

31:38

there was a deadlift in the movement standard

31:40

that has been released to everybody . Better

31:42

lift heavy dude , yeah well . Well

31:45

, there's heavy there , yeah , and there's different ways

31:47

to go at it . Can I , can I make it ? Can I make

31:49

a predict ? Can I make a prediction ? Sure

31:52

, so the equipment vendor is Titan

31:54

. Is that what they're called ? No

31:56

, first of all , they are called giant giant

31:58

. Sorry , sorry , sorry , sorry , sorry , sorry , giant , yeah . Yeah

32:01

, I've followed their Instagram ever

32:03

since Joe came out and announced that that was the equipment vendor

32:05

and they've been putting a lot of , a lot

32:07

of action , a lot of videos into their trap

32:09

bar . Oh , trap bar deadlifts

32:11

. That would be a really cool test . A

32:14

trap bar at one rep max deadlift , or

32:16

or they they on their Instagram

32:19

videos they had them carrying them back and forth

32:21

. Unlike visualizing Like a trap

32:23

bar deadlift , work out where you have to

32:25

advance the barbell , carry it X amount , but you

32:27

can't really do that with a barbell . You can't carry a barbell , yeah

32:29

. So that that's that's my , my

32:32

out-of-the-box prediction that we're gonna be

32:34

using a trap bar .

32:35

I Wish I

32:38

thought of it .

32:42

All that practice .

32:45

I'm telling you , it's already giving me ideas for next year

32:47

.

32:47

Cool , I think . I think trap bar trap bar

32:49

would be a cool test Because it's different than a deadlift

32:51

.

32:52

Yeah yeah , for sure . Just

32:54

, has Bob ever repeated workouts

32:57

from year to year ?

32:58

That's a better question for you Because I've only competed

33:00

there three years . I know you guys went creep . So

33:02

here's another fellow . I

33:04

spent too much time thinking about this shit but they

33:07

were very repeat happy in the qualifier

33:10

this year they switched the

33:12

workouts up a little bit but they were very

33:14

and Joe put that out there that they were

33:16

all , yeah , either like past

33:18

workouts or different versions

33:21

of past workouts . And again

33:23

, if these guys were reverse engineer I

33:25

could see , you know a repeat

33:27

. And I do think Joe did say on our podcast

33:29

there is a repeat this year . But then

33:32

he said it could be from a legends event

33:34

or any games event ever . That

33:37

that really heard . My spreadsheet there went

33:39

when he said that . But I like repeats

33:42

philosophically . Yeah , what's your thought on repeats

33:44

?

33:45

Um , right , so I

33:47

don't like pure repeats , right ? So , as

33:49

you can tell from the , the qualifying

33:51

programming , right , like I Don't

33:54

think there was anyone that was a

33:57

Sure repeat either we

33:59

like reverse them and change the

34:01

weight a little bit , swapped

34:03

out a movement . You know , like

34:05

I , because to

34:07

us it's it's fun to watch

34:10

, to

34:12

watch the stimulus change just by

34:14

making a small tweak , yeah

34:17

and and , and

34:19

it's fun to show people that , like , you can have a totally

34:21

different event or Qualifying

34:24

, you know , just by making a couple

34:26

of really small tweaks it did , it

34:29

will completely shuffle up the leaderboard and

34:31

also impact the athletes in a different way . You're

34:33

right ? Um , so

34:35

here's kind of my general

34:38

thought on that . So

34:42

there's

34:46

, there's

34:48

a Following

34:51

that same philosophy of a tweak , right

34:54

, there is one workout that is similar , but

34:59

it's been tweaked , which means it might

35:01

be totally different stimulus wise .

35:03

Yeah , similar to what to add , your favorite

35:05

programming from San Diego .

35:07

No , it's actually from Arizona . Oh , arizona , okay

35:10

, yeah

35:12

, it's kind of like a mesh of two from Arizona . Okay , that'd

35:16

be cool , you know . And look , you know I

35:18

, like you guys know that I love the two parters on Sunday , right

35:20

, so

35:23

, yeah , expect a two parter on Sunday

35:25

and and I and I and you know that I love them to be , you

35:33

know , like two very different stimulus

35:35

is , yes , right , and so kind of expect that . It's

35:37

the thing that we're always challenged with

35:41

, like there are , there

35:43

are events that I really really want to do

35:46

that I've seen

35:48

programmed elsewhere that we're

35:54

just never really able to do because

35:56

of with a 420

35:58

person event and Having limited

36:00

fields of play , right

36:02

, you

36:05

can only like there's just

36:07

not enough time to do them

36:09

, right , and so , you know , like one of the events

36:12

, that that I'm

36:14

a hundred percent building the games around next year

36:16

. Okay , it's something that Joe and I tried to

36:18

get inserted this year . Okay

36:20

, and we had we we had to modify it a lot because it just

36:22

it couldn't fit into Understood

36:25

. Yeah , I mean this is . I mean you guys think the

36:27

games are big , the amount of games .

36:29

Athletes compared to the amount of

36:31

masters athletes at the games , it's like 10% . Yeah

36:35

, that's why masters is so hard to run . Yeah , even for when the CrossFit

36:40

guys did .

36:40

It is just so many more athletes , yep , for

36:42

every division . I know it hasn't been Sorry

36:45

. A lot of that right , yep , it's .

36:48

Judges and volunteers right , like

36:50

you're a hundred percent limited by judges and volunteers

36:53

. Yes , so I , I , I mean

36:55

if , if that wasn't a problem , if we could use AI to do judging

36:57

right Some day , the

37:00

shit that I could do Now

37:03

. Now my mind speculating what

37:05

they wanted to do this year that they couldn't

37:07

do Logistically

37:09

. We'll have to combine some thoughts there , yeah

37:11

.

37:12

What have been some of the struggles of the

37:15

the

37:19

, the , yeah , what

37:21

have been some of the struggles when ? So again

37:24

, just in on the whole logistical side , now

37:26

you guys are introducing scaled and team

37:28

division this year and while it they're not

37:30

, they're not big divisions , they're still there's

37:32

still something you have to really put into

37:34

the plan . Has that been

37:37

Net

37:39

, net positive , net negative in terms of and

37:42

planning of the event ?

37:44

Net negative . Yeah , you're 100%

37:46

and and it's not that the team so

37:48

much team the . The

37:50

challenge of a team is , you

37:54

know , making sure that you can have four athletes safe wheel

37:56

right . Yeah , and and

37:58

so , you know , for the legends event

38:00

next year Not for the CrossFit games worth

38:04

, we're probably going to

38:06

include , we're

38:13

gonna include Team

38:15

, but , you know , maybe like partner instead

38:18

of teams of four , right , because it's just

38:20

you gotta , you gotta think about safety

38:22

and equipment , you know , and all that other stuff . For

38:24

stuff on this , on the scaled

38:26

side , we've tried

38:28

so hard , guys , you know , and and

38:30

we just we really want

38:32

to support the community , but it is just

38:35

so hard to get them to

38:37

To show up

38:39

right I mean , they just

38:41

don't show up Right the numbers that you need

38:44

in order to make them , you

38:47

know , not a a Financial

38:49

drain right and a resource drain on

38:52

the event , which Unfortunately

38:54

they are right , right , are

38:56

you gonna ?

38:56

are you making money this year ? You think finally Breaking

39:01

it Okay ? Okay , good good for

39:03

you progress all that work for zero

39:05

dollar exactly . Net profit zero .

39:08

Yeah , we receive the movement list

39:10

from Joe , and is there

39:12

? Are there any expects ? Should we expect

39:15

any surprises that are not on

39:17

that list ? Should Crossfitters be ready for

39:19

anything ?

39:21

No .

39:22

Hashtag no , no machines from Joe's email

39:24

last night .

39:26

Yeah , no machines , right , which this

39:28

is definitely the the year of no

39:30

machines , interesting , which We've

39:34

talked . We've talked about no machines

39:37

since year one , okay , and

39:39

, and

39:42

it originally it was because

39:45

Machines are

39:47

totally unreliable . Yeah , right

39:49

, and , and we're , and we , like

39:53

all we can think about is fairness , fairness , fairness

39:55

all the time . Right , like we want to make sure that the event

39:57

is is fair and and

40:00

you know , people

40:02

are spending their hard-earned money to come computer

40:05

at at this event , for you

40:07

know very relatively little

40:09

prize money and you know no fame

40:12

or you know anything that comes along with winning

40:14

an event , right , and so

40:18

when you have equipment

40:20

failures , that introduces

40:22

a level of unfairness

40:24

into Into play

40:27

, right , and so for it . For years we

40:29

had been looking to get rid of it . Also , like the

40:31

unreliability of the actual

40:34

manufacturers of

40:36

the equipment to deliver the equipment

40:38

to us and Assemble

40:40

that equipment , and you know all

40:43

of the stuff that comes along with that . But

40:46

then also this year it just kind of became like

40:48

you know , this would be , it'll

40:50

be fun , right , like people , people

40:52

are so used to machines , yep , that

40:54

they forget that there's so many other ways

40:57

to . You

41:00

know , really , we use machines primarily to

41:02

spike your heart rate . Yeah , right , like I

41:04

can spike your heart rate , you know

41:06

a lot of different ways . Yeah , I don't

41:08

need an external stimulus

41:10

to help that's awesome , especially masters

41:12

athletes .

41:13

I think I find myself on the machines

41:15

almost every day and it's it's kind

41:17

of like because it's easy , it's kind of like a crutch

41:19

, like it's . Yeah you know , and masters

41:22

athletes , we feel safe on it and

41:24

I like that . I mean , I'm a machine guy but

41:26

I respect going . No machines

41:28

, just like that year , one year at regionals were crossing

41:30

with no barbell . You know , like they

41:33

, they found ways to test strength

41:35

, right , and I , you know , I remember Dave Castro

41:37

talking about how everyone just gets

41:39

so caught up in barbell , barbell , barbell

41:41

. Like if you want to be strong , there are so many ways

41:43

to test it other than that . So if you want a good engine

41:45

, there are so many ways to test

41:47

and train that other than be on the machine

41:49

. All right , get off the machine and start doing more burpees

41:51

. Yeah , I guess .

41:53

Come on . Well , look , I mean event

41:56

beat . I can tell you for

41:58

certain , like I , I'm

42:02

gonna spike the shit out of every single

42:04

person's heart rate , right ? And everyone

42:06

is gonna heat my guts after event

42:08

you better get the deep .

42:09

That be sat mission Is that is that Saturday .

42:13

No , it's Sunday , so it's 78

42:15

, are the two-part around .

42:18

Okay , um when

42:20

? So I know Joe said that he's gonna start

42:22

releasing these workouts on Tuesday . Last

42:24

year , and I think previous years , you

42:27

guys released a lease until Wednesday , but

42:30

okay so because I'm a last day

42:32

, it's Tuesday last year I do you guys release

42:34

them all at once . Will you be sporadically releasing

42:36

them to make it a little more dramatic , like here's one at a

42:38

time . One at a time .

42:41

No , I think we're gonna release them all at once . Yeah

42:43

okay , I like to buy

42:45

preferences to release them the night before

42:47

, yeah .

42:50

Mess with our sleep .

42:52

Yeah , so it's part of the

42:54

event , right , right , oh , it's huge . You know

42:56

, like you know you , you get

42:58

the event at the athlete . Yeah , and

43:00

that's that is cool .

43:02

There's an element , I don't know , maybe .

43:05

Well , I can talk to you .

43:06

Well , that also is nice , because then you can't

43:08

game your whole Four days . You you have

43:10

to like just do what you can

43:12

for that day . You don't know what's happening the next

43:14

day . So if you knew , then you're like okay , maybe

43:16

I can like dial back this day , because I know

43:19

I could kill it the next day . Like that

43:21

just means you got to go ham every day and just

43:23

wait and see what comes out the next day .

43:25

How are you guys announcing email , instagram

43:27

both ?

43:30

Yeah , email . Instagram , okay , you

43:32

know , and like competition quarter

43:34

automatically notifies , okay

43:37

.

43:38

Last question about the event . I have free

43:40

if Sam has anything . Yeah , are

43:42

you guys ? You guys gonna be doing briefings each night at

43:44

the end of the event , at the end of each day ? Is

43:47

that ? Last time I saw you do that , it was the most

43:49

angry and closest closest

43:51

I've ever seen you and Joe to wanting to punch them on

43:53

the face . Those are rough , I'll

43:56

tell you those are .

43:58

They are pretty rough . I

44:00

don't think so . Also with the schedule , with the

44:02

addition of team

44:04

and and and

44:07

Scaled like

44:09

we're going until I Got

44:13

in front of me right here . We're going

44:15

on Saturday

44:17

. On Friday we go until like

44:19

seven o'clock at night , and

44:22

Saturday Saturday we're going until

44:24

nine o'clock . Wow .

44:27

So I'm

44:30

sure the briefings are fine .

44:31

I did doing a briefing at that

44:33

10 writer

44:36

. The last seat ends at 850

44:38

. So you

44:40

know , I don't know that would be

44:42

kind of rough . Um , you

44:44

know , but we have you guys out of there . Last heat

44:46

ends on Sunday at

44:49

2.48 .

44:50

Great , that's awesome , that's great

44:52

.

44:52

Yeah .

44:53

I know some of the people we have . I think we have dozen or

44:55

a dozen people coming out from Bison well

44:57

over a dozen , yeah and they all want to know

44:59

when we can actually go out for fun Sunday night

45:01

. So I'll let them know that

45:04

we will be good for dinner time . Where's the

45:06

nearest bar ?

45:08

Yeah , well , you got to collect your podium

45:10

, man , and then head out .

45:12

Right , I hope so , I hope so .

45:16

How many games , athletes or names

45:18

are going to be there competing that ? I'll be sorry

45:20

that I will be missing on no streaming

45:22

for this .

45:24

Uh , dozens , I

45:26

didn't actually count up for this year . Who

45:29

are you excited to ?

45:30

see out there .

45:32

Dave oh early .

45:34

Okay .

45:35

I mean Dave was probably . He's honestly

45:37

, I sent Joe a text message yesterday

45:39

and I said you know , I know I'm not allowed to root

45:41

for people , but

45:44

I do . Man , he's just , he's

45:46

such a he's . You

45:48

know I'll

45:50

say it to your face , since you're here like you're a

45:52

model of what every

45:54

athlete should be like . You're just , you're

45:57

super humble , you . You put the work

45:59

in . You're such a great guy . You

46:01

never complain . You understand the business aspects

46:03

of it . You're very appreciative of what we

46:05

do . You're just , you know , you're

46:07

fucking awesome . Do appreciate

46:10

it . You know David Johnson . David Johnson's

46:12

another guy like that . Unfortunately

46:14

, he can't compete this year . You

46:18

know the the the

46:20

women 50 to 54 is

46:22

going to be a pretty good battle this year

46:24

.

46:25

We got one coming out . We got one coming out Kathleen

46:27

.

46:27

Yeah .

46:29

I'm really looking forward to seeing that . Did

46:32

I see Jen Ryan's competing ? Jen

46:35

Ryan , dan Dan Dan Bailey

46:37

is barely going to compete in .

46:39

Dan Bailey just dropped out . Really

46:42

, that's the yeah , yeah and

46:46

no . I think it's because he's afraid of you .

46:51

Right , oh , that stinks . I was looking

46:53

forward to competing against them .

46:56

Yeah , yeah , I

46:59

don't know the reason why you had to drop

47:01

and it's not . You know , sarah Mead

47:03

it's a job and he's not here . Yeah

47:06

, it's

47:08

going to be . You know it's

47:11

going to be like it is every year , right , you're

47:13

going to have , you

47:15

know , probably 50 , 60

47:17

games , athletes , if not

47:19

more , you know

47:22

, and then the

47:24

, the , the best people who have never made

47:26

the games right , you yourself included

47:28

that go out there and actually show

47:30

those guys that in

47:32

a , in a 40 person competition , it's

47:35

a lot different than a 10 person competition . Absolutely

47:38

. You can't have holes

47:40

anywhere in your game .

47:44

So let's , let's wrap this up just talking about the future , Bob

47:46

, it's kept you a little bit longer than

47:48

we thought , but I mean

47:51

you already talked about you beginning on the 2024

47:54

masters games , or whatever you guys are calling it . Do

47:57

we ? When , do we , can we expect a certain

47:59

time or date to hear when

48:01

the actual date and location of the event will

48:03

be next year ?

48:05

Yeah , so when will that be ? So yeah , so

48:08

, the first thing is it

48:11

is the

48:13

masters CrossFit games by

48:17

legends , right ? So that is the the

48:19

name of the event . Oh , so

48:21

it is going to be the third week of August

48:24

. Okay , and

48:28

you

48:30

know , or at least that's what we're

48:32

shooting for , right , we still

48:34

do not have a venue

48:36

yet . That's

48:38

that is to

48:41

. So we're

48:43

we kind of had to put those

48:45

efforts on pause a little bit over the last

48:47

couple of weeks , just leading , you

48:50

know , leading up to the

48:52

event this year . But

48:55

I want to have the venue wrapped up

48:58

by the

49:01

Friday after , after

49:04

legends Got it , and

49:07

you know , just so we can it

49:09

. Really , that affects everything else , Absolutely . It even

49:12

affects programming , right ? Yep , so

49:15

you know interesting

49:17

environmental options to to

49:20

throw into an event , like I'm going to

49:23

want to do , as long as it's not giving you .

49:25

Yeah , I mean part of that

49:27

thought process is is heat related , right ? I mean there's certain

49:29

parts of the country you just really can't can't

49:32

play around with too much outside . If

49:34

you're in August , other parts of the country it's fine . But

49:37

I mean that's . That's going to be

49:39

interesting to hear that . So I empathize

49:42

with that and that you do probably need to

49:44

put all the attention on the event that's coming

49:46

up in just a few days and then , and

49:48

then you really kind of make

49:50

that font a call a few days later .

49:51

Is this going to be next year the 2024

49:55

Nobel masters games ? By

49:58

legends or Rogue or Giant

50:01

or you don't know ? Like , how are

50:03

you ? Like ? How does that ? How

50:06

do you decide that ? Or is that CrossFit deciding

50:08

it ? And the other thing is is finance has

50:10

been such a big thing in the past

50:12

couple of days about CrossFit HQ ? Like are

50:15

they like you better make this break

50:17

, even at least next year , or you guys

50:19

are out or you know whatever . Like

50:21

, are there financial constraints that

50:23

you have in mind when you're thinking about

50:26

next year ?

50:28

So the first question again was

50:31

sponsorship , naming , naming

50:33

rights , sponsorship , right . So

50:37

that's primarily driven by

50:39

CrossFit , and

50:42

so I'm sure there will

50:44

be an announcement coming out in

50:46

the near future , probably in December

50:48

, around naming rights

50:51

, the

50:54

and I'm not being coy there , I

50:57

actually don't know , yeah , who

50:59

the main sponsors are The-

51:06

financial .

51:07

I guess right ADD and Action man , financial

51:09

constraints considerations .

51:17

CrossFit's a business right . Legends

51:20

is a business . Businesses need to be profitable . I

51:25

empathize with all of

51:27

the affiliate

51:29

owners that had their affiliate fees

51:31

raised on them in the last couple of weeks , but

51:34

I really see it more from

51:37

the business point of view . And

51:39

you know , in one of the businesses

51:41

that I run , for example , we

51:43

raised our rates for

51:45

the first time in six years , and

51:48

you know , inflation

51:50

is a big factor in that right . While

51:53

the consumer , of course , is being impacted

51:55

by inflation and

51:57

the rates of the goods and services

51:59

that they consume , businesses

52:03

are as well , and those costs have to be passed

52:05

on somewhere , or else you stop

52:07

providing services right , and

52:10

so we expect to operate

52:13

at a profit for , you

52:16

know , for a legends for next year and or

52:20

sorry , not for legends for the CrossFit

52:23

Games for next year . I mean , that's

52:25

our goal , but that's only going to come from sponsorship

52:28

and participation .

52:31

And you know this based on the fact that this

52:33

year might be the first year you're going to

52:35

break even after all these years . Like

52:37

that's a huge order

52:39

for anyone to execute on . Like

52:42

the CrossFit has not been able

52:44

to do that for themselves . So

52:48

what is your confidence

52:50

coming from ? That you can do this next year , like

52:53

make it profitable , make it

52:55

work , make

52:57

it a real event that's huge and

53:00

successful and all those that's

53:02

like a huge order for

53:04

anyone to execute .

53:07

Yeah , so

53:10

it comes from the

53:12

marriage of legends

53:14

and CrossFit . Right , so

53:16

we're able to tap

53:21

into their scale and

53:24

their network , you

53:27

know , to provide cost

53:29

efficiency on scale and then

53:31

increase revenue opportunities on

53:33

you know their network . Right , so

53:36

you know , and then with us

53:38

we

53:42

operate a much leaner operation

53:44

and we can

53:47

, you know

53:49

, when you get into an event

53:51

, right , and you have 420

53:54

people , you

53:56

know , signing up and participations

53:58

and

54:00

things like that , like just the

54:02

way they come together work well

54:04

, I think , where both companies

54:07

at a minimum will break even

54:09

. You know , certainly , you know should

54:12

operate at a profit and I don't think anybody

54:14

should be embarrassed to say that , right

54:16

, it

54:18

blows my mind that the

54:21

people on you know the interweb

54:24

again going after the CrossFit

54:26

HQ for operating a for-profit

54:29

business . It's like you know , what'd you expect ? Right

54:32

, like you can't . You

54:34

cannot get better service

54:37

from your provider if

54:40

you don't pay , then for it .

54:42

Right , it's just yep . I mean

54:44

we're actually doing an episode soon to salmonize

54:47

on the increased prices and the irony

54:49

is , for the first time in

54:52

five years , we're increasing our rates on

54:54

existing members in January . Yeah

54:56

, and it's the same exact

54:58

situation and it's nice

55:01

to have the perspective of being on both sides , because

55:03

I do think , if you are on

55:05

both sides of that argument , discussion

55:07

, even you

55:09

get it right , like every everyone that I know

55:11

that owns a business that comes to our gym . When

55:14

we did have discussions about raising rates . They're

55:16

like I get it , like they have both sides

55:18

of the perspective . And it's

55:21

like you said , if you want this thing to operate

55:23

, it needs to make money period and

55:25

in most cases in most cases , more

55:27

than you think that's how much it needs

55:30

, so that's that's yeah , 100%

55:32

more than you think , you trust we never

55:34

, as business owners , we never pass

55:36

on the appropriate amount of increased costs

55:38

that we're taking on Absolutely Never

55:41

do .

55:41

Never , and we're doing a disservice to our

55:44

employees , our shareholders and

55:46

the people that are requiring the service

55:48

. Yep , is this going on ? Live right now . Is

55:51

this for real ? Is that it Is this just somebody- .

55:53

I thought it was tonight that it comes out . I was a little distracted

55:56

, but I didn't want to focus on I can't

55:58

see on your TV what number four says . Is that Florida

56:00

State ? Yeah , it's blank right now there .

56:02

No , it's blank right now . Oh

56:04

I oh no , this is live . Oh , so

56:07

it's Texas .

56:08

Wow , holy sh All right , so we'll see . I

56:10

don't think we should extend the podcast

56:13

to the same number four we're

56:15

probably gonna get sued for broadcasting .

56:18

They might be like well , we'll have to crop that

56:20

out .

56:20

A little , all six viewers that we have . No

56:23

, we're not live anyway . Yeah , but

56:26

yeah , I mean that is a

56:28

task that you know . I

56:30

think most of us , especially people from my jam

56:32

, really like into it . Master's community

56:34

a lot of competitors , a lot of people that follow the

56:36

sport , a lot of people that support you guys . They

56:40

, when they think about legends in the event , it's

56:43

almost always about the programming , the

56:46

athletes that are there , but it is like 1,000%

56:49

. It's a business and if we

56:51

do truly I know you've talked about

56:53

this , I've been very strong about

56:55

this as well that if

56:57

people truly want to see something succeed

56:59

so that they can actually benefit from it , they

57:02

need to do everything they can to

57:04

contribute to it , whether it's spending money

57:06

on sponsors , whether it's showing up and

57:09

whether it's participating qualifiers , putting

57:11

messaging out on social media , like anything

57:14

is great really . But to ignore

57:16

it , but to ignore it and I

57:18

mean at some point it's gonna die down to the bottom

57:20

and it's gonna disappear if , unless

57:23

people really put themselves out in front . Because I

57:25

always say that my line on this is always everyone's

57:27

going to be a master's athlete at some point . You

57:30

know I have people that are 33 in my

57:32

gym right now that are now amping

57:34

up their training for when they turn 35 . And

57:36

I'm telling you that's not the only case . There

57:39

are people all over the world and that's gonna be a constant

57:41

feeder system into

57:44

master's sports . So we need to find a

57:46

way to make sure you guys are profitable and I've

57:48

always told you guys like you

57:50

have our word that we'll do everything we can to help you guys

57:52

out .

57:54

Yeah , thank you , and I appreciate that . You

57:57

guys have been just hugely supportive

57:59

over the years . It's been so great

58:01

. It's like Georgia got six

58:03

, by the way .

58:06

Yeah , now they're gonna dumb it down to Bama , or

58:08

or Florida State , Florida

58:10

State .

58:11

Florida State . That's gonna be Florida

58:13

State , and , yes , we get to Can you imagine ?

58:16

Wait , bama , bama's in FSU's out

58:18

man .

58:20

It undefeated FSU coming

58:22

in at number five .

58:24

That's a tough one for Matchup . I

58:26

don't know how I'm pissed at the Michigan

58:28

guy .

58:29

We gotta play Bama . Well , I put

58:31

50 bucks on Florida State when the national championship

58:33

. That's my piss .

58:35

Well , now you gotta win the legend

58:37

, so you can make money back .

58:40

Well , I also put 50 bucks on Michigan too , so it was

58:42

one of those two that I'm good . All right , bob , is there

58:44

any message you wanna get out ? Any sponsors you wanna

58:46

shout out ? Just anything that you wanna make sure you

58:48

can get out there before we call quits .

58:50

Yeah , you know , first

58:52

form barrel giant

58:55

lifting equipment sponsor

58:57

, volunteer shoe sponsor

58:59

, tier . These

59:02

guys , year in , year out

59:04

, specialty equipment sponsor , rxmart

59:07

gear . Like these

59:09

guys , have supported legends in a big

59:11

way every single year . Please

59:14

, please , please , you know , keep

59:17

showing up and making it worth

59:19

their while to put in all

59:21

the time and effort that they do to support

59:23

us . Charity

59:26

this year is underground PDX

59:28

. It's a

59:30

nonprofit CrossFit gym up in Portland

59:33

for underprivileged youth . You

59:38

know , show up right . Next

59:42

year is such a critical

59:44

year for the

59:46

sport of masters CrossFit

59:48

. You gotta show

59:50

up in the open . You gotta show

59:53

up for the quarter finals . You gotta

59:55

show up for the semis and

59:57

if you can make it in person , if you don't

1:00:00

end up qualifying for the games , come

1:00:03

out , make sure you watch the live stream . You . Just

1:00:05

the support has to be there . This is

1:00:08

your sport , right . You

1:00:11

do the community and

1:00:13

the only way that that continues

1:00:15

to grow and can

1:00:17

be serviced the way that you wanted to is

1:00:20

your sport .

1:00:21

It's awesome , bob . Thanks again

1:00:23

so much for the time . Really

1:00:25

really do appreciate it . I know you're not up in

1:00:27

the public spotlight as

1:00:30

much as you used to be and I really do appreciate

1:00:32

you giving us the time now . Thank

1:00:34

you both as

1:00:36

an athlete , as a gym owner , for everything

1:00:38

that you're doing and , like

1:00:41

I said , always have my support , buy some support

1:00:43

, and we cannot wait to see what you guys

1:00:45

have in store for us Thursday

1:00:48

through Sunday .

1:00:50

Awesome man . Thanks guys , I appreciate it , Thank

1:00:52

you .

1:00:54

Thank you everybody for taking the time out of your day to

1:00:56

listen to the Herdfit podcast . Be

1:00:59

on the lookout for next week's episode .