Whatever your favorite training style is, if you’re a fitness enthusiast, you’ve likely heard of or tried CrossFit. CrossFit is known for its high-intensity training workouts that combine endurance, weightlifting, and gymnastics moves. The workouts are famously hard — in addition to increasing strength, muscle, and endurance, you’ll build mental toughness as you get better.
A WOD stands for workout of the day, and one of the most brutal WODs is called the Filthy 50. The Filthy 50 workout is 500 total reps — 50 reps of 10 exercises. The movements are mostly bodyweight exercises; some use light to medium weights. You complete it with minimal rest, for time. The idea is to do it as quickly as you can.
If it sounds intense, it is. But don’t panic; it’s scalable for all levels. Whether you’re a CrossFit athlete who wants to improve your time or a newbie, we’ll break down the whole workout, give you tips for success, and customize it for your multiple experience levels. Let’s (box) jump in.
- What Is the Filthy 50 Workout?
- What Are Good Filthy 50 Times?
- Strategies for the Filthy 50 Workout
- How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Beginners
- How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Intermediates
- How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Advanced Athletes
What Is the Filthy 50 Workout?
CrossFit workouts are highly intense and vary from day to day. The idea is to use functional movements that will help you move more (and more efficiently) during your daily life.
Workouts of the day (WODs) typically have little to no rest time between intervals, exercises, reps, and rounds. You do high-volume work, typically measured by doing AMRAP (as many reps as possible) in a given time, or “for time,” meaning a set amount of reps completed as fast as possible.
Training in this style can build aerobic and anaerobic endurance and overall work capacity. (1) You’ll also build plenty of mental stamina, as you’ll need to push yourself — hard — to keep going.
The Filthy 50 was the WOD on June 19, 2005. It wasn’t named the Filthy 50 by CrossFit but later became known as such as it became popular with CrossFitters. (2)
There are three important terms to know regarding the Filthy 50: for time, benchmark, and chipper.
The Filthy 50 is done for time, meaning you must complete the whole workout as fast as possible.
Once you get your time, it becomes a benchmark workout, meaning you return to it periodically and try to beat your time.
The Filthy 50 is the quintessential classic chipper — you’re chipping away at 50 reps of 10 exercises in a row, for 500 total reps. You don’t move on to the next exercise until you complete all 50 reps of your current movement.
It’s a full-body workout with intermediate-level bodyweight movements and light weights. You keep moving and complete these large sets with minimal rest as quickly as possible to improve your score.
The Workout
The Filthy 50 is 10 exercises, each done for 50 reps. CrossFit prescribes (“Rx”) loads for men and women. (No standards for nonbinary athletes are provided by CrossFit at this time.) Here is the workout, with the Rx’ed weights to follow.
- 50 Box Jumps
- 50 Jumping Pull-Ups
- 50 Kettlebell Swings
- 50 Walking Lunge Steps
- 50 Knees-to-Elbows
- 50 Push Presses
- 50 Back Extensions
- 50 Wall Ball Shots
- 50 Burpees
- 50 Double-Unders
Women: 20-inch box, 12-kilogram kettlebell, 35-pound barbell, 14-pound ball
Men: 24-inch box, 16-kilogram kettlebell, 45-pound barbell, 20-pound ball
Some of these are famous CrossFit exercises, like jumping pull-ups, double-unders, and wall ball shots.
Jumping pull-ups allow a jump, so you use some momentum instead of a strict pull-up with no momentum. Wall ball shots refer to squatting with a medicine ball, tossing it as high up as you can to a wall or hitting a set target, and squatting again as you catch it.
Double-unders refer to jumping rope where you swing the jump rope around twice before your feet hit the ground again. This is quite a complex skill and requires a lot of practice before you hit one successfully, let alone 50 of them in the Filthy 50.
What Are Good Filthy 50 Times?
The Filthy 50 is a benchmark workout done for time, and — like so many CrossFit WODs — it’s not for the faint of heart.
CrossFitter Bobby Noyce completed the Filthy 50 in 12 minutes and 56 seconds, which may be one of the fastest recorded times for this workout. (4)
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Want to see where you measure up? Below is a range of average times to aim for, depending on your level.
- Elite: Less than 15 minutes
- Advanced: 15 to 20 minutes
- Intermediate: 20 to 25 minutes
- Beginner: 30+ minutes
Strategies for the Filthy 50
The Filthy 50 is an intense workout — 500 reps of anything is sure to tire you out. It’s best not to go in cold, so here are our top strategies before undertaking the beast.
Warm Up and Cool Down
You’ll want to do a dynamic CrossFit warm-up before starting the Filthy 50. A good dynamic warm-up consists of light cardio to get blood flowing, dynamic stretches or mobility exercises, and movement preparation. A proper dynamic warm-up before exercising can help with managing injury risk, preparing your body for exercise, and boosting your performance. (4)
Since the Filthy 50 involves explosive moves like box jumps and jumping pull-ups, do a power-specific warm-up to get your body ready for quick, strong, sudden moves.
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After the WOD, once you catch your breath, you can cool down with light static stretches. Static stretching, where you hold a stretch without moving, is best done after a workout. It may help reduce stiffness — especially after a challenging muscular endurance workout. (5)
Practice the Exercises
CrossFit beginners run the risk of experiencing injuries by jumping directly into intense workouts without knowing how to properly execute certain movements. Customize the workout as needed to meet yourself where you’re at in terms of the exercises you know how to do.
Be sure that your form remains as pristine as possible throughout this workout. If you can’t complete a solid amount of reps with a given move (or your form starts to break down in the middle of the workout), don’t be afraid to switch to a simpler version of the movement for the remainder of your chipper.
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For intermediate or advanced athletes, look through the workout and identify exercises that could use brushing up. Work on them in other sessions to nail your technique before jumping into doing 50 reps as quickly as possible.
Certain movements, like double-unders, definitely require some outside practice — so get those prior reps in to make sure your form is on lock.
Vary Your Pace
Pacing for Filthy 50 will look different for everyone. You don’t want to go as hard as possible immediately because you will burn out quicker. You’ll need to save at least some steam for those wall ball shots, burpees, and double-unders.
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But, you may not want to go at a steady pace through all your sets because it could lead to a longer overall time. One strategy is to identify which exercises are easier for you than others. You can go as fast as possible on easier exercises and let yourself go slower on more challenging movements where you need to focus on your form.
Try Sets of 10
Although the aim is to minimize resting in the Filthy 50, breaking up 50 reps into smaller chunks is a helpful strategy. Your brain may find the phrase “five sets of 10” more doable than “50 reps.” Going unbroken will also fatigue you much faster than breaking up your sets — and 500 reps is a lot to get through.
You can still keep the rest short between your mini-sets, but it could be helpful for your brain. Mental fatigue is separate from muscular fatigue. Sometimes, your body can keep going, but your brain tells you you can’t. CrossFit helps build mental toughness, and trying out this trick could help.
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As you progress, you can do sets of 12, 15, or 20 reps. They won’t be perfectly even to get to 50, but breaking them up will still help.
How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Beginners
The Filthy 50 looks intimidating to beginners. Fear not — we’ve got several options for scaling. If you’re not ready to hit a CrossFit box, you can try it on your own with these modifications.
The Dirty 30
The official CrossFit website recommends the Dirty 30 — doing each exercise for 30 reps.
The Dirty 30 is the same workout with 30 reps of each exercise; hanging knee raises instead of knees-to-elbows; and single-unders (regular jump roping) instead of double-unders. They also Rx different loads. (3)
- 30 Box Jumps
- 30 Jumping Pull-Ups
- 30 Kettlebell Swings
- 30 Walking Lunge Steps
- 30 Hanging Knee Raises
- 30 Push Presses
- 30 Back Extensions
- 30 Wall-Ball Shots
- 30 Burpees
- 30 Single-Unders
Women: 16-inch box, eight-kilogram kettlebell, 22-pound push press, eight-pound ball
Men: 20-inch box, 12-kilogram kettlebell, 35-pound push press, 10-pound ball
You can cut it down even more if this is still too much. Try doing 20 or 25 reps of each exercise to get a feel for it before increasing your reps.
Reduce the Weight
CrossFit also offers reduced weight recommendations for beginners. You can use these weight recommendations even if you’re aiming to do all 500 reps.
Women: 16-inch box, eight-kilogram kettlebell, 22 pounds push press, eight-pound ball
Men: 20-inch box, 12-kilogram kettlebell, 35 pounds push press, 10-pound ball
You could go even lower on your boxes or lighter on some of these weights. Consider using dumbbells instead of a barbell for the push press.
Modify the Exercises
Everyone is different. Let’s say you have pretty good cardiovascular endurance, and the number of reps isn’t a problem — but you’re newer to some of these exercises. Here is a list of alternatives to some of the more challenging movements.
- Box Jumps: Jump squats, TRX-assisted jump squats, or air squats
- Jumping Pull-Ups: Banded pull-ups, machine-assisted pull-ups, or lat pulldowns
- Kettlebell Swings: Kettlebell deadlifts
- Walking Lunges: Split squats, reverse lunges, forward lunges
- Knees-to-Elbows: Hanging knee raises, mountain climbers, lying knee pull-ins, lying hollow body hold and tuck
- Push Presses: Push press with dumbbells, overhead press, seated overhead press
- Back Extensions: Reduce the range of motion
- Wall-Ball Shots: Reduce the range of motion by only doing a half-squat in between
- Burpees: Take out the push-up; take out the jump; step back and forward instead of jumping back and forward
- Double-Unders: Single-unders
Cap Your Time
If you’ve reduced the reps, reduced the weight, and modified the exercises, and still haven’t finished by 35 to 40 minutes — cap it. Give yourself an amount of total workout time that your body can handle, perhaps 20 or even 15 minutes.
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Note how far you got in the workout, and set that as your first time. Next time you try it, maybe you’ll be able to get a little farther with the same time cap.
How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Intermediates
If you have some CrossFit experience under your weightlifting belt and are ready to move on, here’s how to scale it for intermediate athletes.
Get to 50
This tip may seem redundant, but if you started with the Dirty 30 (or less) — try to get to 50 reps of each exercise and finish in under 30 minutes. Simply completing the workout as Rxed is an achievement in itself.
Then, you can work on decreasing your time.
Reduce Your Rest
If you started doing five sets of ten with a little rest in between, ramp it up. Try two sets of 20 and one set of 10. Try to rest for 30 seconds or less in between.
As much as possible, take slow, deep breaths during your rest instead of gasping for air. Less rest and more efficient breathing will help decrease your overall time.
How to Scale the Filthy 50 for Advanced Athletes
The Filthy 50 is tough, even for advanced and elite athletes. But for experienced CrossFitters who need more of a challenge, here are two ideas.
Unbroken Sets
Try to do unbroken sets of 50 for at least some of the exercises — meaning you won’t break up your 50 reps into smaller sets, and you won’t rest at all. You’ll only “rest” when you transition into your next exercise.
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Mentally, you can still break up the number if it helps. Count to 10 five times. But don’t stop at all in between each 10.
Go Heavier
The intention of the Filthy 50 is light to moderate weights. Still, if you’ve nailed the WOD and are thirsty for more, you can increase the weights and the height of your box. Under normal circumstances, Filthy 50 is tough — but you’ll find that with even heavier weights and a higher box, 500 reps requires even more resilience.
More on CrossFit Training
The CrossFit Filthy 50 is a classic chipper and a benchmark WOD that will majorly challenge your muscular and cardiovascular endurance. Always do a proper warm-up, and nail down your form on the more challenging movements.
Beginners can do fewer reps, lighter weights, and alternative exercises that will keep the stimulus of the Rx’ed exercises. Intermediates can work on finishing the 500 reps, decreasing their time, and taking shorter rest breaks. Advanced and elite athletes can go for unbroken sets with no rest and increase their weight for a heavier challenge.
Now that you know how to scale the Filthy 50, check out more of BarBend’s content on CrossFit training. Each of these guides will give you what you need to know to take on a WOD on your terms.
- The Murph CrossFit Workout, Explained and Scaled for Every Experience Level
- The CrossFit Grace Workout, Explained and Scaled for Every Skill Level
- The CrossFit Nancy Workout, Explained and Scaled for Every Skill Level
References
- Toledo R, Dias MR, Toledo R, Erotides R, Pinto DS, Reis VM, Novaes JS, Vianna JM, Heinrich KM. Comparison of Physiological Responses and Training Load between Different CrossFit® Workouts with Equalized Volume in Men and Women. Life (Basel). 2021 Jun 20;11(6):586.
- WORKOUT OF THE DAY Sunday 050619. CrossFit.
- WOD DEMO: FILTHY FIFTY. CrossFit.
- Athlete: Bobby Noyce. CrossFit Games.
- Behm DG, Chaouachi A. A review of the acute effects of static and dynamic stretching on performance. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2011 Nov;111(11):2633-51.
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