Woo Jin-yong: The CrossFit athlete on Physical 100

Woo Jin-yong was the winner of season 1 Physical 100. He is a CrossFit athlete and his age is 37 years

Early life: After graduating from Yangmung High School, Woo went on to study physical education for a master’s degree at Chung Ang University, a private research institution in Seoul

Professional background

• Jin-Yong primarily credits his accomplishments to his experience as a snowboarder, his CrossFit training, and the “Murph” workout
• Jin-Yong is a CrossFit instructor and believes that functional strength training is more important for the body than the aesthetics
• His favorite exercise is the deadlift

Stage Eliminated in Physical 100

He is the winner of Season 1

Performance in Physical 100 (Season 1)

Woo Jin-yong defeated 99 competitors in the competition and won USD 250,000. 

Although there was controversy around the close outcome involving competitor Jung Hae-min in the final round, Woo performed extremely well throughout the competition. The controversy was that there were reruns due to technical issues in the last game

Strengths:

• As a snowboarder, Woo has excellent fitness (anaerobic as well as aerobic) and good balance

Interesting facts

• While visiting Canada in 2007, Woo Jin-yong was introduced to snowboard cross racing. Later Woo left his job as a PE teacher to pursue a professional snowboard cross-racing career, competing on behalf of South Korea

• Choo Sung-hoon, an MMA fighter who also participated in the show, is someone Woo looks up to. Fans of the show admired Choo Sung-hoon for his upbeat and friendly attitude

• Woo has also served as a sergeant as a Korean Marine during his mandatory duty

• He wants to coach the national team for the upcoming Olympics

• He has quit the professional snowboarding scene and now works as a CrossFit instructor and continues to coach promising snowboarders

• He occasionally shares his workout videos on his Instagram

Social Media Presence: Woo Jin-Yong is on Instagram and his handle is @jdsbx

What is CrossFit’s “Murph” WOD?

The Murph exercise is a core CrossFit exercise and is one of its workouts of the day.  The workout consists of: 

• A one-mile run

• 100 pull-ups

• 200 push-ups

• 300 squats

• Another one-mile run

The Murph workout is performed with a 9kg weighted vest (a standard for this workout in competition). However, CrossFit boxes allow people to work without a weighted vest in training and to gradually scale up

Most people will take more than an hour to complete this workout

Every year on Memorial Day, people compete & complete the Murph challenge as a tribute to the fallen service members