3 rounds for time of:
Row 500 meters
21 burpees
95-lb. thrusters, 12 reps

We are proud to introduce to you – The 2016 Benchmark Series!
The benchmark series was born in late 2014 and the first year of the series wrapped up in September of 2015.
We all know that CrossFit is constantly varied, functional movements, executed at high intensity. The goal of that training method is to increase our work capacity across broad time and modal domains. And we measure our success (measure our increase of fitness) by doing benchmark workouts that we can retest throughout a year, or over many years to make sure that our “black box” approach to fitness is moving us toward the goal. 
That last sentence struck a cord at a weekly coaches meeting in 2014. While we follow the mainsite on a two week delay and frequently test benchmark workouts, we weren’t giving athletes a solid way to test workouts over the course of a year. They might do a benchmark workout and not see if for another year. And so the Benchmark Series was born.
The series selects twelve CrossFit benchmark workouts, four lifts, and four skill tests to perform every three months for the course of one year (each workout, lift, and test is performed 4 times over a year). The workouts were carefully selected to ensure a wide variety of time domains, movement patterns, combinations of movements, complexity of movements, and loading.
A few things to note for this year’s series:

• We have selected to keep Nancy on the benchmark list for a second year. This workout will be tested over two years
• We have included a muscle-up in the skill test and will now include muscle-up skill work as part of the daily skill sessions in class
• The series will run from November 2015 through October 2016
• We will continue to follow the mainsite on a two week delay and will insert the benchmarks on mainsite rest days or, in some cases, will swap it out for a similar mainsite workout programmed for that week

We are pleased to introduce to you the workouts for 2015. We’ll be listing the entire workout for all twelve as well as the skill tests over the next few days. Here are the first four:
CHELSEA
Every minute on the minute for 30 minutes perform:
5 pull-ups
10 push-ups
15 squats
If you fall behind the clock keep going for 30 minutes and see how many rounds you can complete. Post results to comments. If you’ve finished the workout before, this time add +1 rep to each exercise, i.e., 6 pull-ups, 11 push-ups, and 16 squats each minute, and see if you can go the full 30 minutes.
ELIZABETH
21-15-9 reps of:
Clean 135 pounds (95lbs)
Ring dips
NANCY
Five rounds for time of:
400 meter run
95 pound Overhead squat, 15 reps (65lbs)
KAREN
For time:
150 Wallball shots, 20 pound ball

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