James FitzGerald is the founder and president of OPEX and an all around systematic thinker and pattern matcher who has developed some pretty impressive insights into what makes people successful in mixed modal fitness. He’s applied this insight into winning the CrossFit Games himself in 2007, coaching multiple other CrossFit Games athletes through OPEX and Big Dawgs, and developing continuing education through the OPEX CCP and the more recent Mixed Modal course. In this conversation, I wanted to dig into how James systemizes his thoughts and updates his mental models based upon experiences and new information - and how he knows when his pattern matching is going off the rails and when he’s developing new insight.

Check out more from James, OPEX & Big Dawgs here:

• Instagram: @jfitzopex//@opexfitness//@opexfitness//@bigdawgsathlete
• Website: www.opexfit.com///Mixed Modal

Show Notes

• [2:03] Special Newfoundland pronunciation of vowels and consonants – and how to build and extract systems from reality and reason from first principles.
• [9:27] How James builds and updates his mental systems based upon both thoughts and experiences – and how to build the metacognition to “notice your noticings”
• [15:37] How James goes about confirming or disconfirming his beliefs. And one thing that James has changed his mind on over the years: the role of muscle endurance in mixed modal sport.
• [24:11] The role of chaos in mixed modal sport – and how to systemize mixed modal sport as a whole in terms of monads, diads, triads, etc.
• [34:03] How to pattern match in a chaotic environment like mixed modal sport – and finding the appropriate amount of variance in the skill acquisition process for mixed modal sport
• [48:13] How do you know when the patterns that you’re seeing are real? What is the application of something like peer review in fitness? What incentives would pull people out of silos as far as best practices in fitness coaching?
• [56:54] When did system building behavior start for James? And what resources have helped him in building mental models and systems?
• [01:05:38] How does James approach content consumption? How does he balance consuming content for fun vs trying to solve a specific problem?
• [01:13:24] The balance of giving people what they want vs what they need – especially in the context of fitness vs sport
• [01:19:09] What is happening in individuals who are resistant to fatigue in mixed modal sport? What would the process look like to truly do research on the various fatigue models for how people utilize fuel in a mixed modal setting?

Links and Resources Mentioned

• Ernest Shackleton
• Rusty Shackleford
• Bernie Novokowsky
• Isaac Newton
• John Forbes Nash Jr.
• International Functional Fitness Federation
• 10% Happier Podcast with Dan Harris
• Sudoku
• Sam Harris with Nick Bostrom
• Superintelligence by Nick Bostrom
• Peter Attia
• Chris Masterjohn, PhD
• Peter Forsberg
• Mathew Fraser
• No Rules Folders