Jan 17 2009
Crossfit and Your Fitness
A few years ago I first heard about Crossfit. I ran across their website during a lunch hour at work and immediately was taken in by what they had to say.
CrossFit has gone on to become the preferable strength and conditioning program for military special ops groups (Navy Seals, Army Rangers, etc), as well as, police and fire departments, marital artists, MMA fighters, professional athletes and people just like you and me.
The CrossFit program is scalable so no matter what your level of fitness you can begin doing CrossFit workouts. If you are an elderly individual or a supremely conditioned MMA fighter you can benefit from a CrossFit workout.
What I fell in love with was that they had a different opinion of what real fitness was all about. Most of us have imbalanced views of what fitness is. If you have a running background, you might think that being fit means you have the ability to run 10 miles at a 5 - 6 minute pace for each mile.
If you are a weightlifter you might believe that being fit means that you can bench press in excess of 400 pounds, squat nearly 600 pounds and deadlift about 500 pounds.
If you are a bodybuilder you might believe that being fit is easy to determine. If you have large muscles and rippling abs, then you have arrived.
The point is that we have a tendency to define fitness by the standard defined by the fitness area that we gravitate towards the most. Although, all of the above things are positive and beneficial they don’t necessarily define fitness. What good is it if you can run 10 miles but struggle carrying two gallons of milk in from the store?
It is nice to be able to lift heavy weights but if you are tired after walking a couple of flights of stairs then I would venture to say that your overall fitness level is not too great.
Crossfit looked at this problem and developed a workout protocol that attempts to build proficiency in all areas of fitness. They focus on endurance, strength, and flexibility. They incorporate running, body weight exercise, olympic lifts, kettlebell training, medicine ball training, etc.
The nice thing about CrossFit is that they post WOD (workouts of the day) each day at their site. These workouts are designed to prevent your body from adapting to your exercise routine and to provide you with the avenue to increase in strength, endurance, flexibility and even confidence.
If you haven’t checked them out swing by their website and give it a once over. You will be glad you did.
