Workout Description

Why This Workout Is Hard

This workout combines significant rowing volume (7km total) with moderate-load wall balls and high-skill wall walks in a descending ladder format. The continuous nature prevents meaningful recovery, causing cumulative fatigue across multiple energy systems. Wall walks become increasingly challenging as shoulder fatigue accumulates from rowing and wall balls. The 25-35 minute duration creates sustained metabolic demand that will force many athletes to scale movements or slow significantly.

Benchmark Times for WOD

• Elite: <17:00
• Advanced: 19:00-21:00
• Intermediate: 23:00-25:00
• Beginner: >40:00

Training Focus

This workout develops the following fitness attributes:

• Endurance (9/10): Total of 7500m rowing plus bodyweight movements creates massive cardiovascular demand over extended duration, testing aerobic capacity limits.
• Stamina (9/10): 150 wall balls and 30 wall walks combined with rowing creates severe muscular endurance challenge, especially shoulders and legs.
• Flexibility (6/10): Wall walks demand significant shoulder and thoracic mobility, while wall balls require moderate hip and ankle flexibility.
• Strength (4/10): Wall balls require moderate leg and shoulder strength, wall walks demand upper body strength, but not maximal loads.
• Speed (4/10): Descending ladder format encourages steady pacing rather than sprint efforts, with minimal transition time between movements.
• Power (3/10): Wall balls have some explosive component from legs, but rowing and wall walks are more grind-focused movements.

Movements

• Wall Ball
• Wall Walk
• Row

Scaling Options

Reduce wall ball weight to 14/10 lbs or use a 9ft target. Scale wall walks to box wall walks or inchworms. Reduce row distances by 20% (2000m, 1600m, 1200m, 800m, 400m). Consider 4 rounds instead of 5 if athlete is new to high volume workouts.

Scaling Explanation

Scale if athlete cannot complete 20 wall balls unbroken when fresh or has never done wall walks. The goal is maintaining consistent movement for 25-35 minutes. If wall walks cause technique breakdown or excessive rest, scale to maintain stimulus. Athletes should complete each round without stopping for more than 30-60 seconds between movements.

Intended Stimulus

Long aerobic capacity workout lasting 25-35 minutes. Primary oxidative system with glycolytic bursts during wall ball sets. Tests ability to maintain consistent pace and technique while managing fatigue across multiple modalities. Mental toughness and pacing discipline are key challenges.

Coach Insight

Treat this as a steady marathon pace - aim for 70-75% effort on rows to preserve legs for wall balls and wall walks. Break wall balls early and often (sets of 5-10 max) to avoid local muscular failure. Pace wall walks deliberately - these will tax shoulders and core significantly. Plan 2-3 minutes per wall walk in later rounds. Focus on breathing rhythm during transitions. The workout gets progressively easier volume-wise, so resist going too hard early.

Benchmark Notes

This is a descending ladder workout with significant volume. Breaking down by round: Round 1 (2500m row + 50 wall balls + 10 wall walks): 2500m row takes 390-510 sec, 50 wall balls at 2-3 sec/rep = 100-150 sec, 10 wall walks at 8-12 sec/rep = 80-120 sec, plus transitions = 570-780 sec. Round 2 (2000m + 40 + 8): 2000m row = 312-408 sec, 40 wall balls = 88-132 sec (fatigue 1.1x), 8 wall walks = 70-106 sec (fatigue 1.1x), transitions = 470-646 sec. Round 3 (1500m + 30 + 6): 1500m row = 234-306 sec, 30 wall balls = 79-110 sec (fatigue 1.2x), 6 wall walks = 58-86 sec (fatigue 1.2x), transitions = 371-502 sec. Round 4 (1000m + 20 + 4): 1000m row = 156-204 sec, 20 wall balls = 50-72 sec (fatigue 1.3x), 4 wall walks = 42-62 sec (fatigue 1.3x), transitions = 248-338 sec. Round 5 (500m + 10 + 2): 500m row = 78-102 sec, 10 wall balls = 26-39 sec (fatigue 1.4x), 2 wall walks = 22-34 sec (fatigue 1.4x), transitions = 126-175 sec. Total estimated time range: 1785-2441 seconds (30-41 minutes). Elite athletes (L10) complete in ~17 minutes, recreational athletes (L1) take ~40 minutes. The high volume of wall balls and technical demand of wall walks creates significant fatigue accumulation.

Modality Profile

Three movements across all modalities: Wall Walk (Gymnastics bodyweight movement), Row (Monostructural cardio), and Wall Ball (Weightlifting with external load). Even distribution with slight weight to Weightlifting.