GRID LEAGUE

(Is Faster Really Better?)

Hello. It has been two years since my last post where I more or less totally predicted the birth of the National Pro Fitness League GRID League. You're welcome, Tony Budding.

Production-wise, what the NPGL has been able to accomplish is stunning. I was in the stands in Phoenix to cheer on my beloved Rise, and looking around I was super impressed with how slick and professional everything was. The graphics on the scoreboard, the clip packages showcasing the athletes… very admirable. No cheerleaders yet, but give them time.

Flashy graphics on large screens!

It looked and felt like a really well produced arena sporting event, but in order for the vision I had of something coming along that would eat CrossFit®'s zone-portioned lunch to fully materialize there is a major issue the NPGL needs to address.

Substitutions

The GRID League allows for limitless substitutions. The instant an athlete begins to wane, they are sat on the bench and replaced with a fresh body. I’m not talking about switching athletes in between the eleven workouts, I’m talking about right in the middle of the workout one guy will fall off just a little and he’ll be pulled out so someone else can hop in and start banging out reps.

We were told that this would add a new dimension of speed and strategy to what was previously a boring affair filled with athletes huffing, puffing and staring at the barbell.

The problem is that the current limitless substitution rule obviates all the drama inherent in reaching down deep to overcome adversity. Just when something gets hard, just when grit and determination should factor in as much as strength or skill, the athlete is replaced by someone else and we, the audience, are robbed of watching them struggle through the rest of the course. It’s a shame, because it is in that struggle that we are most able to see our own labors and thus relate to as an audience.

Simply put, watching athletes taking turns performing reps at high speed is simply not that entertaining. There is no human drama, no compelling story line. Work capacity has been removed from the equation, so races are more often decided by how the judges call the reps than by the performance of the athletes themselves.

When the sport's greatest drama and most decisive moments are provided by the referees, that sport is facing an existential dilemma.

Tony Budding has said that he loves the 400m dash, but the GRID is too much like a 100m sprint. 

Each event should feel more like a horse race, where things get truly interesting as they come into the final quarter lap. Everyone stands up and cheers because it’s still possible for their horse to reach down deep, turn it on, come from behind, and race past the exhausted leader who might have pushed himself just a little too hard.

Retooling the current substitution rule wouldn’t guarantee a scintillating storyline, but it would at least set the stage for the athletes themselves to emerge as heroes.