The CrossFit Hero WODs are about as far from a vanity project as you can get. They’re deliberately tougher, meaner workouts, created and dedicated to servicemen and women who have given their lives in the line of duty. They’re intentionally harder than usual CrossFit fare in order to give you pause to reflect, usually pushing your entire body with heavy lifts, calisthenics and running – often while wearing a weighted vest.
All of that being said, one of my personal favourite Hero WODs takes a different tack entirely. It’s a bodyweight piece that hits you in a much more concentrated fashion, drilling into the pushing muscles of your shoulders, chest and triceps with burning intensity.
As a finisher, or even a quick-fire standalone workout, performed regularly, ‘JT’ – dedicated to Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Jeff Taylor, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2005 – is a surefire way to increase the size, strength and durability of your delts, pecs and triceps without touching a single weight.
That’s if you can complete it…
CrossFit Hero WOD JT
Deceptively simple and following the classic CrossFit 21-15-9 format, you’ll perform:
Complete 21 reps of each movement, followed by 15 reps of each and, finally, 9 reps of each.
What to read next
Complete the entire workout as quickly as possible while maintaining good form.
CrossFitters will often use ‘kipping’ handstand push-ups to work through the reps more efficiently, but perform these as strict reps and you’ll get a better shoulder workout using just your bodyweight than most people manage in a fully kitted-out gym.
Next up, the dips target your chest. With your shoulders already fatigued, your pecs and triceps are forced to work even harder – especially your tris, which were already pushing hard during the previous movement.
Finally, the push-ups. This workout is technically a mechanical drop set, which means you shift angles to make the movements slightly easier, allowing you to keep working. That being said, the push-ups in JT always feel like the hardest push-ups I’ve ever done, and I often have to break them up into short sets of 10 or even 5.
How to Scale JT
If you don’t yet have handstand push-ups in the locker, you can substitute them for pike push-ups or simply bump all of the movements down one notch:
- Dips
- Push-ups
- Hands-elevated push-ups
Keep the 21-15-9 formula, as well as the mechanical drop-set format – just regress each movement by one step.
More CrossFit Hero WODs
- This Hero WOD Builds Old-School, Full-Body Strength with Squats, Bench Press and Pull-Ups
- I Tried This 12-Minute CrossFit Hero WOD – and it Might be the Most Efficient Full-Body Workout Around
- This 650-rep CrossFit Hero WOD Delivers a Brutal Bodyweight Workout
- Tackling The CrossFit Hero Workout 'Chad' This Weekend? Here's Everything You Need To Know
- 7 Celebrities Who Have Completed the Murph Workout – and What Counts as a 'Good' Time
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With almost 18 years in the health and fitness space as a personal trainer, nutritionist, breath coach and writer, Andrew has spent nearly half of his life exploring how to help people improve their bodies and minds.
As our fitness editor he prides himself on keeping Men’s Health at the forefront of reliable, relatable and credible fitness information, whether that’s through writing and testing thousands of workouts each year, taking deep dives into the science behind muscle building and fat loss or exploring the psychology of performance and recovery.
Whilst constantly updating his knowledge base with seminars and courses, Andrew is a lover of the practical as much as the theory and regularly puts his training to the test tackling everything from Crossfit and strongman competitions, to ultra marathons, to multiple 24 hour workout stints and (extremely unofficial) world record attempts.
You can find Andrew on Instagram at @theandrew.tracey, or simply hold up a sign for ‘free pizza’ and wait for him to appear.
