"That's a Big Calorie Burn"

Our metabolic conditioning workout yesterday was simple but brutal.

Row 500m, rest 2 minutes.
Repeat four times.

The impact of this type of work is very high.  A 500m row allows an athlete to exert 80-90% of maximal force for 90-140 seconds.  This kind of effort is the definition of "sucking wind".

The point of a workout like this is simple - let an athlete test and improve their maximal output in the glycolytic energy pathway, recover, and repeat.  It fits right into CrossFit's purpose of "improved work capacity across broad time and modal domains."  In this case, the modality is a Concept 2 rower, and the time domain is ~120s with a 120s recovery.  Competence at that output level for that duration translates well to nearly any sport or task you may wish to attempt.

After the workout, one of my clients commented on the calorie burn from the workout.  I didn't know what to say - I should have said "actually, no, the calorie burn is insignificant, and we don't design workouts for calorie burn anyway."  What I thought to myself was "didn't I already cover that?"

Burning calories in a workout is a waste of valuable time.  No workout we program is designed to burn calories - they are all designed to increase your performance!  We program to increase your performance across broad time and modal domains, which is to say we program for fitness.

The idea that working out to burn calories can lead to fat loss has a simple appeal, but when tested via science the results are anything but conclusive.  In short, the body is not a simple input/output machine, and causes of fat accumulation are multifactorial.

"But Paul, you went to Aviation Officer Candidate School, and you workout out all day, and lost fat, along with all your classmates." Yes, yes we did, but we had restricted food intake; we could eat three times per day and the amount of very limited.  Nor did we get dessert!  "In the wild", when a human gets hungry, it eats.  In the wild, when a human gets hungry it often eats whatever crap is most easily obtained.  In other words, inducing caloric deficit in everyday life is as likely to stimulate increased intake of food as it is to stimulate fat loss.

"But Paul you have lost 36 pounds over the last 7 years, and you do CrossFit 3-5 times per week, are you saying those things are not related?"

No.  Those two facts are related.  But the takeaway is simple - you cannot out train a bad diet.  When you eat like we recommend, and train, you will lose fat and feel freaking great doing it.  You will not be hungry.  That's why it is sustainable over time.

In Part II, I'll describe a model for why exercise in combination with the diet that made you fat in the first place will not make the majority of you lean.

Habits - they kill you, they save you

Habits are behaviors that are beneath consciousness - slurping coffee, putting on a seat bell, squatting with the knees caving in and the arch flattening to the floor - these bits of stored and programmed behavior save us and kill us.  And CrossFit offers a unique setting to allow athletes to undo the damage from years of habitually poor movement.

In last month's newsletter we talked about better movement and how mobility restrictions must be addressed so that athletes can get into good positions for creating force safely.  Good position is an irreducible element of running, lifting, jumping, punching, kicking, climbing, throwing, hitting a baseball or kicking a football.  Simple test - imagine someone kicking a record field goal if their hands were clasped behind their neck.  Or a golfer hitting the legendary hole-in-one while standing with one foot off of the ground.  Never going to happen.  

But what if you happen to see an athlete who is out of position, but you know that athlete has the requisite mobility to be in a good position.  In other words, imagine what it’s like for me every day! 

How then do I help athletes get into better positions?  It’s easy - you talk to them, show them pictures, get hands on to help them, or use a “blocking device” so that the only way they can move is the right way in the right position.  But all of these techniques will fail in the long run if they are not repeated enough to create new movement habits.  

Do you remember putting on your seatbelt?  Some of you may not even remember driving to work or school!  An example with movement that we see is that almost everyone has is the habit of using quad dominant movement, with knees forward and glutes/hamstrings relaxed - suffice to say that this is not good.  As a famous football coach says, "We don't practice until we can do it right, we practice until we cannot do it wrong."  Yes, and that is also the goal of CrossFit with regard to good movement habits.

In the end, our job is to do what is required, whatever is required, to create success for each of you!  Solving complex movement problems is a significant and satisfying part of our job. We want you to move well, to create power and speed and look good doing it.  Over time, we find that better movement carries over into every aspect of our clients’ lives.  

Call 207-489-8996 or email cffotg at gmail dot com to schedule your introductory session today!  Let's get to work rebuilding your movement, you strength, your work capacity.  You will start where you are, and get stronger and better every day.

"Stronger today than yesterday, stronger tomorrow than today."

An Oldie but Goldie

The implication of this basic endocrinology is that obesity is caused not by eating too much and sedentary behavior, but by a disruption of the hormonal and enzymatic regulation of fat tissue caused by the easily digestible, refined carbohydrates and sugars that we do eat. Indeed, by this logic, calorie-restricted diets – starvation and semi-starvation diets as used in the studies Ms. Parker-Pope discusses–can be thought of as particularly counterproductive ways to reduce carbohydrate consumption and so insulin levels, starving the body, as they do, of the energy required to effectively run metabolic processes.

In the past decade, clinical trials have repeatedly demonstrated that when obese and overweight individuals consciously restrict the carbohydrates they eat, but not calories, they not only lose weight, on average, but their heart disease and diabetes risk factors improve significantly. Their insulin resistance, in effect, resolves. Those of us who have lost weight ourselves and witnessed the effect of these diets on our patients can confirm that this is exactly what happens.

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/response-to-nytimes-the-fat-trap/

For more on this topic, read this:
The Scientist and the Stairmaster
http://nymag.com/news/sports/38001/

The Road to CrossFit

A person asked me last week how I came to be a CrossFit trainer and then gym owner, and I enjoyed remembering the road I travelled.

My story is all over my blog, in our pamphlet, on our Facebook page, on our web site (www.fireofthegodsfitness.com), and still it doesn't really tell the tale.  So here's a bit of self indulgence.  I found CrossFit in 2006 just after my martial arts instructor and dear friend died.  A soldier I worked with suggested that I look at cross fit.com after he heard about some of the body weight workouts I was doing.  I tracked the WODs over time and marveled at how crazy they were - deadlifts and running, in the same workout, with no rest?  That's crazy.  But after a while I began to see what they were going for - so I decided to try it.

After my first workout of the day (WOD), I was hooked.  I was training hard at that time, lifting heavy weights, running sprints and longer runs, and doing body weight work (squats and handstand pushups).  Still, CrossFit humbled me, wrecked me.  It was clear I huge holes in work capacity.

So I trained as hard as I could and I went to a Level I certificate course.  Then I was invited to come to the Level II course.  Somewhere in there, I was doing PT with the Navy, and hated it.  It hurt my knee, it was not of high enough intensity to make anyone much more fit, and it was boring stuff.  I made a comment to the instructor about how to make it better and he gave me the gift of suggesting that I take the lead role for a class (he thought he was daring me, and I was in fact being a bit rude).  He never coached again while I was there.  I had the double bonus of not having to go through his class and instead being able to practice being a coach, learning every day.

With that group, I had no barbells, no pullup bars and only the gear I could pack in my truck and bring with me.  Still, we made CrossFit style WODs with what we had and they all noted the positive impacts from the workouts.  They approached the Navy fitness test with confidence, some noted huge improvements with just a couple of months of "low tech" CrossFit.  It was satisfying.  That period of time earned me the moniker "The Punisher" from some, but I alway laughed at that.  No CrossFit workout is hard - unless you work hard enough to make it hard.  It is all "self punishment".

About that time I had my first paying clients.  That was huge fun, and the clients made rapid progress.  I had a small framed former runner, who was an incredible athlete, who went from no deadlift experience to a 315 pound deadlift (double his body weight) in just a couple of months.  I was lucky to find Chad because he was so easy to coach - anything I asked him to do, he did.  No muss, no fuss, no real work on my part.  I wish I could work with Chad now, he'd become a monster.

Along the way I began to attend more training seminars - CrossFit Kids, CrossFit Olympic Lifting, CrossFit Coach's Prep Course - and then was able to apply what I learned with clients.  I started a CrossFit group on base that ran for about 18 months.  Again, the chance to work with real folks regularly was incredibly fun and satisfying - the successes were huge - fat loss, performance gains, friends made.  That group wound down in 2009 or 2010, but I am still in contact with several of them - and to Star, Angela and the gang, thank you!

In 2010 we bought a CrossFit Affiliate and started CrossFit Fire of the Gods in our garage.  We made enough money to get more CrossFit gear for our clients and pay for more training.  Janet was able to go to (and easily passed) a Level I Certificate course, and she trained friends (and their friends) in our garage.  To Laura and Paul and Jo Anne - thank you!  We miss you but are grateful for your trust and the lessons you taught us about how to work with athletes.

All this happened as I was winding down a career as a naval officer.  I put hours and hours, week after week, into reading and blogging about nutrition and fitness, watching training videos, and of course practicing what I learned on myself and then our clients.  I spent a lot of time exploring various avenues for how to switch from employee to business owner - all seemed prohibitively expensive.  Then a few things happened in our favor and here we are - owners of a CrossFit affiliate as our full time life.

Why?  We love to learn and teach.  Teaching about health and fitness lets us create:  Impact.  Results.  Change.  Transformation.  Athletes exceeding perceived limits.  Chasing performance.

We see the impact of improved physical capacity when applied to the rest of life.  That's what we do every day, every workout, every client interaction, every SM post, most things we read, and a large part of what we talk about.  How can we help?  How can we make more impact faster?  How can we reach every client?  How can we make these painful workouts seem desirable to the uninitiated?

So, come see us and help us make our dreams come true by chasing a better you through CrossFit.  Call 207-449-8996 or email us (cffotg at gmail dot com) and let's get started today making 2014 the year you made the big change in your health and physical capacity!

Jacinto Bonilla, CrossFit and 70+ Years Old!

Have a  look at this awesome profile of Jacinto!  Jacinto and I were at the 2008 Games but somehow I did not meet him then - my loss.  He's been back to the Games many times since then at a Master's competitor in the 60+ bracket - that's right, he's in the top 20 fittest humans even when compared with those 10 or more years younger than he is!  If you could walk into a gym today and do what Jacinto does you would be very proud of yourself.

What is Strength?

Back in the day, I used to think a lot of weird stuff about strength and strength training.

I used to think bigger muscles were stronger.
I used to think strength was mostly something that happened in muscle tissue.
I used to think being better at bench pressing would make you better at - for example - punching or hitting a baseball.

In short, I thought about strength training like a body builder thinks about strength training.  At some point, it became clear that a bigger bench press didn't translate much to the athletic activities I valued.  Ten years later I found CrossFit and began to unravel why.

It turns out that the ability to generate for and the ability to generate force quickly is very complex and muscle size is a relatively small factor.  Which is why, I suppose, Louie Simmons says "Big is not strong, strong is strong."

It also turns out that while the muscle contraction has to be happen for strength to be expressed, that contraction is affected by what is happening in other parts of the body.  For example if you lie on your back and raise your legs and then turn on your core muscles, the output of those muscles will be lessened.  The first time I heard of this idea of "load sequencing" (meaning loading core muscles or for example posterior muscles first), I scoffed with the same characteristic arrogance I have always been unable to avoid.

There's also the matter of position.  If you play with yoga, they spend a lot of time focusing on postures or poses.  If you play with martial arts, the same applies - good position is very important.  Turns out that power lifters and gymnasts found the same things.  Good position is critical for high athletic output, and in particular if one wants to avoid injury.

Lastly, for athletics, stronger arm muscles are nice but they only pay off if you can apply them via powerful hip extension.  In other words, you have to know how to use your ass.  All day long I'm showing folks how to use their ass, so that they can safely generate high power - time after time.

To conclude, first you want good body position, then you want proper load sequencing, then you want  "strong muscles" and then you want bigger muscles (since the size itself can increase leverage).  But the holy grail of athleticism is force and speed together - so if you want to be an elite athlete, you have to develop, in addition to the above, the capacity to develop high force in a short amount of time.  That is to say you want a high rate of force development.  Combine them all and you get a home run hitter, a long ball golfer, a champion olympic lifter, or a world class CrossFitter.

Reader Question: How Do I Get Over My Pullup Plateau?

Hey, Paul - question on pullups. Is there a regimen you'd recommend for someone who wants to improve? I'll alternate sets of pullups with other exercises (squats,bench, etc) until I get to 50, and over months I'd say I've gone from a max of 8 to a max of 11. Would you know a simple routine I could use to shake things up and break the plateau? Let me know if something comes to mind, thanks in advance, and Roll Tide !

Hi Fletch, thanks for asking.  I prescribe more variation.  Think of a three day rotation with some of these:

1.  Add weight.  Could be just a 10# plate in a back pack

2.  Add a pause at the top

3.  Do fewer reps per set - focus on explosive contraction/fast movement

On day four, go back to doing what you normally do

Occasionally do an EMOM - every minute on the minute for 5 to 20 minutes do 3-6 reps (start w 3 and work up in subsequent sessions).

The weighted pullup thing adds a new level of accomplishment - 100# weighted pullup?  You will tell all your friends

Louie Simmons: "Once you spell your name right, you can only spell it wrong."  IOW, once you get used to doing pullups like you are doing them, they no longer provide as much adaptive stimulus - thus the prescription for variation.

If you have the elastic bands CrossFitters and weightlifters often use, you can "band yourself" to add resistance with a different force curve.  The ways to add variation are only limited by one's imagination and determination to find a better way to train.

Bodybuilder Goes CrossFit?

I've worked with a  lot of CrossFit athletes this year, helping several prepare fo the Canada East regionals.  I helped some with their Olympic lifting and others with their entire training.  I'll tell you this: I've trained figure competitors who go to extreme lengths in their dieting, cardio, and training, and quite a few of the CrossFit girls I'm working with have better physiques than the figure girls … and that’s without dieting.  Similarly, a former Canada national bodybuilding champion I know started training for CrossFit and she looks better - not just better, but also more muscular and stronger - than when she was bodybuilding! 

I always believed that CrossFit made girls look great and guys look small, in addition to making them lose strength.  I don’t' believe the latter anymore because some of the competitive CrossFit athletes are quite strong.  The average competitor in the CrossFit games can do a 245-pound snatch, 335-pound clean and jerk, 550-pound deadlift, and a 450-pound back squat. And several overhead squat in the 300s and front squat in the 400s.  Four of the guys I'm coaching can snatch over 225 pounds, which pretty darn strong!

http://www.t-nation.com/training/bodybuilder-goes-crossfit

This was an interesting read because I so rarely get a glimpse into the mind of the bodybuilder.  The focus on performance in CrossFit - no part of a WOD is build to make a body look better, the WOD is built to create performance - makes it a liberating way to train.

That said, most will not get the best results in body composition if they eat the same crappy foods that made them fat and sick in the first place.

So what I tell my folks is - train to develop the physical capacity you desire, and eat to be healthy (and more lean if you like that sort of thing).

"NERD Does CrossFit" - Changes

And sometimes they are great big GIANT leaps!!! Today was a Leap!

Fourteen years ago, I was put on my first blood sugar regulating med. I didn't think much of it at the time. I certainly didn't think I would be on it for the rest of my life. The thought just didn't occur to me. Before the year was out, I was on medication number two! Again, I didn't think much of it. Eventually, life happened, kids happened, bad food/exercise choices happened… and I found myself at the age of 41 on FOUR different daily meds. I can't really tell you how it happened, but there I was… and I wanted OFF! Thus began my search for… something different. I found Crossfit.
Three months into Crossfit, and attempting to eat better, I dropped med one. Six months into my often-failed attempts to eat better and Crossfit, med two dropped. Things were going well. Around the nine month mark, I was able to drop my daily shots. That was HUGE! I'd given myself daily shots since I was pregnant with the twins. But… there was one med left. I've been sitting on this med for over a year, waiting patiently to get rid of it. A few months ago, my doctor cut that med in half… and as of yesterday… IT'S GONE!!!!!!!
I did it! I really, really did it! I wanted OFF those meds and it took me 21 months to do it… and I did! :happycry:
My latest round of blood work was fantastic. My A1c is 5.5. I'm not even "at risk" for Diabetes anymore. My PCOS symptoms are generally under control. My fasting glucose has been consistently in the 80s. It's AMAZING!!!
I know I go on and on about Crossfit and Paleo/Primal, but it really has changed my life. 

https://bookloverlori.wordpress.com/2014/08/14/sometimes-the-steps-are-small/

For me, this has always been the CrossFit dream.  To help other find the way to do what is necessary to save their own life, to not need the medications any longer.

Awesome physical performance?  That's cool.  Looking so good you feel confident?  That's cool.  Learning new movements and enjoying them?  That's cool.  Help a young person get close to their physical potential?  That's cool.  Make a community that folks take comfort in, celebrate in, and find is their "third place"?  That's very cool.  But the best - the best is going from sick to healthy.  The best is going from declining strength to increasing strength.  The best is having a vibrant, healthy body that feels good to be in, that is useful, that is not the limiting factor in your choice of how you live.

That's why I coach CrossFit!  That's why I love the CrossFit phenomenon.

Come see us so we can ignite your transformation and create a future of vibrant and growing health.
Email: cffotg@gmail.com
Call/text: 207-449-8996
Sign up for our newsletter at www.fireofthegodsfitness.com

Elite Athletes Who Do CrossFit | THE RUSSELLS

One of the most common myths about CrossFit is that no elite athletes use it. That’s completely false.

Here are some top athletes who do CrossFit. It’s not a full list. There are 10,000 CrossFit gyms, and we can’t possibly know every elite athlete who trains at them, or who does CrossFit on their own. Also, these athletes use CrossFit as part of their training – it doesn’t replace their specific training. No strength and conditioning program could.

http://therussells.crossfit.com/2014/07/08/elite-athletes-who-do-crossfit/

Learning the Kip and Coaching the Kip

Double Under Tutorial

I like this way of teaching the double under.  The start - understand what a double under is.  Next, refine your single under technique.  Third, practice the high slow jump.  Fourth, add double under rope speed to the high slow jump.  Practice a lot.

Does Poliquin Understand What He Critiques?

It’s clear that Poliquin doesn’t understand CrossFit’s goals or methods. CrossFit’s ultimate goal is not “optimal technique” or to “activate high-threshold motor units”- it is to develop work capacity across broad time and modal domains. We do this by moving large loads, long distances, quickly, in a variety of different ways. Since life often demands it, CrossFitters train explosive movement while both fresh and fatigued, and with every possible load and rep scheme.

What happens if an athlete only trains explosive movements (power cleans) while fresh, and never after strength and/or conditioning work? How will he do this in real life if he never does it in the gym? The ability to move explosively when fatigued is necessary in both life and sport.

As a trainer with so much experience training sport specific athletes, don’t Poliquin’s fighters, football players, soccer players, etc. need to be able to make big plays late in the game or fight? The development of this capacity, to move explosively while fatigued, is something that fighters, football players, hockey players, and other sport-specific CrossFit athletes always mention as a primary benefit of CrossFit.

http://therussellsblog.com/2012/02/23/charles-poliquin-likes-crossfit/

This is a tough thing for many who come from more traditional S&C background to understand.  They've spent their careers trying to do specific things - develop discrete strength and power objectives - so when they see someone who's not trying to do that, they criticize "they are not like us! They don't value what we value!"  Right.  Because we want a different outcome than you want.  My friend Russell explains the difference nicely.

If you think in terms of "deadlifts fatigue the lower back" and "cleans are for development of explosive power" and "optimal development of capacity is developed when making maximal lifts" - all of which may be true in the context they are used by traditional S&C folks and for CrossFitters too - but isn't true in the context of a metabolic conditioning WOD (aka METCON).  For a METCON, we want to find ways to work hard, and mix them in many ways, just as life, sport and combat demands.  In other words, the clean can be many tools, not just a way to develop maximally explosive hip extension.  

At some point, all the critics will "get it."  "Oh, I see what they are going for", and 1000s of pages of criticism will immediately go up in smoke.

Causing Deaths? Yes.

Their website states “Our mission is to proactively support a sustainable exercise and fitness industry in New Zealand by growing participation in structured exercise through advocacy, information and industry standards.” As one CrossFit affiliate owner in NZ puts it, the organization does this by “milking money out of gyms and trainers so that they can call themselves ‘registered and trusted.’”

My source went on to explain that “They have strong ties to (and may even own) REPS – the Register of Exercise Professionals, which is basically the fitness industry version of the Healthy Heart tick we see on cereal boxes.  There is heavy promotion through industry related media to only train at REPS registered gyms, with REPS registered trainers. But of course, obtaining this registration only requires yearly membership payments…” 

REPs registration does require certain qualifications from a list of “registered providers”, but REPs itself appears to offer no educational offerings. At CrossFit HQ, we refer to this type of behavior as “rent-seeking,” which is the practice of trying to make money without creating value. It appears that Exercise NZ is extorting money from gyms by presenting itself as a fitness-industry authority.

http://therussellsblog.com/2014/06/18/ceo-of-exercise-new-zealand-richard-beddie-crossfit-caused-6-deaths/

CF is causing the death of BS organizations like Exercise NZ, and other pretenders to authority.

Why CrossFit?

They do it for three reasons. The first and most obvious is the physical result. High intensity exercise yields results that differ in kind from moderate-intensity efforts, not just in degree. In a peer-reviewed study in which one group exercised at moderate intensity for 45 minutes on a stationary bike and the other group did high-intensity intervals for 20 minutes and burned the same number of calories, the high-intensity group lost nine times the fat. Human growth hormone (HGH) and other compounds cascade into the blood of people who sprint as though a monster is chasing them and lift heavy objects as if earthquake survivors are trapped underneath. These hormones signal the body to burn fat and build muscle. The grim trudge-to-nowhere on a cardio machine, or miles of brisk walking, does not unlock this chemical cascade.
http://time.com/2890075/crossfits-primal-appeal/

I remember in 2007 and 2008 when I was in my first year of CrossFit, amazed at the changes I was experiencing, and wondering why there were folks who would still argue about CrossFit's efficacy.  Greg Glassman would muse about how folks speculated that it was his marketing genius or some other factor that was driving CrossFit's rabid growth, and the passion of its practitioners.  Coach would just say - "It's the results."

He was right.  If you want to be the strongest on the planet, CF may not be best for you.  If you want to be a lean, mean endurance specialist, the best in the world in your chosen endurance endeavor, CF may not be right for you.  If you are a track and field power athlete, or an NFL lineman, plain old CF may not be right for you.  CF is a core strength and conditioning program designed to make you competent across the spectrum of physical adaptations.  Specialists will need a different program.  If you want to be fit - fit for the unknown and unknowable challenge - CrossFit is the best program there is.  And if you want the most result you can get from 3-5 hours per week of training, and you are a busy mom or dad, CrossFit is outstanding.

Strangely, there's an approach to training football athletes that uses CrossFit.  There is an approach for endurance training that uses CrossFit.  MMA fighters use CrossFit and variations on the basic idea.  Boxers - even elite ones - use CrossFit.  Motorcross racers, cyclists, professional drummers and musicians, NFL players, basketball players and baseball players also have used/do use CrossFit.  In a way that doesn't make sense - they are specialists, they should be better served by a specialist's program.  And yet ....

Come see us at CrossFit Fire of the Gods, inside Coastal Performance Center (Cook's Corner).  Call 207-449-8996 (or text), or email us at cffotg at gmail dot com.  We will get your introductory lesson scheduled and launch you to elite fitness.

(Thanks to my friend Crusader for the bird dog to this article)

CrossFit Book

Sounds like it may be a good read.

Overview

The absorbing, definitive account of CrossFit's origins, its explosive grassroots growth, and its emergence as a global phenomenon.

One of the most illuminating books ever on a sports subculture, Learning to Breathe Fire combines vivid sports writing with a thoughtful meditation on what it means to be human. In the book, veteran journalist J.C. Herz explains the science of maximum effort, why the modern gym fails an obese society, and the psychic rewards of ending up on the floor feeling as though you're about to die.

The story traces CrossFit’s rise, from a single underground gym in Santa Cruz to its adoption as the workout of choice for elite special forces, firefighters and cops, to its popularity as the go-to fitness routine for regular Joes and Janes. Especially riveting is Herz’s description of The CrossFit Games, which begin as an informal throw-down on a California ranch and evolve into a televised global proving ground for the fittest men and women on Earth, as well as hundreds of thousands of lesser mortals.

In her portrayal of the sport's star athletes, its passionate coaches and its “chief armorer,” Rogue Fitness, Herz powerfully evokes the uniqueness of a fitness culture that  cultivates primal fierceness in average people. And in the shared ordeal of an all-consuming workout, she unearths the ritual intensity that's been with us since humans invented sports, showing us how, on a deep level, we're all tribal hunters and first responders, waiting for the signal to go all-out. 

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/learning-to-breathe-fire-jc-herz/1117655438?ean=9780385348874

What is Risk and Why Do You Care

What's more risky, swimming pools at the house or guns in the house?  What's more risky, driving to the gym or the most dangerous workout program known to man?  What kills more kids than guns?  What kills more folks annually than were killed in ten years of US involvement in Viet Nam?

My fellow CF professional Russell Burger takes a stab at quantifying the "risk" question in this blog post.

http://therussellsblog.com/2014/01/29/on-movement-and-risk/

"With a long enough time frame, the fatality rate for all activities is 100%. An injury rate without a time frame is meaningless.A 74% injury rate over one workout is very different from a 74% rate over years of training.
"Outside Magazine is a first-class source for bad reporting on fitness. They made this mistake recently:

"Studies have pegged the CrossFit injury rate from as low as 16 percent to as high as 74 percent." (The 16 percent figure has never been substantiated, but the Outside reporter failed to seriously investigate that fact.)

"Furthermore, the 16 percent figure comes from a 6-week study, whereas the 74 percent figure comes from a study where the average CrossFit experience was 18.6 months. In other words, the 74 percent figure came from a study with a time frame over 13 times as long as the other study. It's not a fair comparison.
"One way to address time is find the number of injuries per 1000 hours of participation. This is the incidence rate."

An interesting fact Russell cites:  "At least 52 Americans have died competing in triathlons since 2007."  Americans killed because they were doing CrossFit since 2007 - none that I know of.  But that's a meaningless comparison because we don't know how many folks are doing these things, or the causes of death.  If half the triathlon deaths were cause by auto accident, that would change the meaning of the stat, as it would if half of the triathlon/auto death accidents were caused by dehydrated athletes jumping in front of cars due to confusion.

Russell points out that "The "general fitness training" source the researchers cite found a rate of 5.92 injuries per 1000 hours of training. That's nearly twice what the researchers found for CrossFit."

In the end, you get to pick - is CrossFit too dangerous for you?  How about parachuting?  Swimming in the ocean?  Mountain climbing?  Cliff diving?  After 7 years I'm very clear about the risk/reward curve for myself.  Most folks who do CrossFit know the risks, just like they know the risks for driving to the gym, and choose to take them.

What Is A "Third Place"?

This is a big part of what made my old dojo great, and it's a big part of what makes a good CrossFit gym great.

Following the cultural move toward isolation and anonymity, the fitness industry has built gyms where people work out in parallel, sealed off from each other by headphones and personal television screens.
But CrossFit affiliates are different. Applying Oldenburg’s criteria for third places to boxes (such as a welcoming atmosphere, a diverse membership and a low-key physical space) yields a shockingly apt fit—as though affiliates were designed as gathering spaces first and gyms second.
CrossFit is not just a novel workout; its boxes offer a new community space, an alternative to the village tavern or the general store, with the power to reconnect us to our communities and to each other. 

http://library.crossfit.com/free/pdf/11_2013_Third_Brown_Everyone.pdf

Open Now in Brunswick, Maine

Many of my readers are not local, so I have not used the blog as a way to reach folks that are here and could actually walk into my gym now and train with us here at CrossFit Fire of the Gods.  That's all different now!

Today we are open for business inside Coastal Orthopedics at Cook's Corner.

I was here from 1992 to 1998, which is when I met Janet.  I thought we'd be able to come back to Maine for another tour with the Navy, but the Navy had other plans.  So we're back, just 14 or so years later than I'd hoped.

It took a strange turn of events to get here, but our business partner here is an old friend, Patrick Nelson, that I trained with at Wu Hsing Shan martial arts.  We lost our teacher, Al Gardner, in 2006, but still have the passion for movement and community that we learned at Al's dojo.  It has been exciting to join forces with Patrick and get to work.

We are scheduling 1 on 1 sessions to find out if CrossFit is right for you.  Give us call/text at 207-466-8996, or email cffotg at gmail .com so we can get you on track for a summer of rapid improvement in fitness and health!

CrossFit Bashers, Can You Be More Constructive? | Eva M. Selhub, M.D.

I remember this time last year, I spent a weekend going to watch the CrossFit Northeast Regionals competition. It was truly an amazing experience. I couldn't decide where to feast my eyes, the athletes competing, or the athletes in the spectator stands. The entire Reebok CrossFit One field was swimming with fit people. It was such a thrill for this doc to witness, especially since the night before I found myself walking amongst an ocean of obesity in the streets of Boston's North End.

In my two years of being part of CrossFit, I have witnessed more couch potatoes getting fit either because of CrossFit or because they were influenced by my or a friend's change in fitness level from participating in CrossFit. My friends and parents, for example have stopped eating high levels of grains and sugars and have started exercising regularly. Do you have any idea how many years I have been trying to get them to do so? This time around, I didn't push them to do anything.  They merely started because they saw how much healthier and fitter, not to mention happier I became.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eva-m-selhub-md/health-and-fitness_b_5412949.html?utm_hp_ref=tw

Greg Glassman has said from the first days I was exposed to what he was teaching - "It's the results that matter."

So CrossFit has a "high injury rate"?  Well, not according to the insurance company CrossFit built to protect CrossFit affiliates (http://journal.crossfit.com/2014/05/crossfit-risk-retention-group-inc-announces-premium-reduction-claim-free-discount.tpl).  But suppose it is true that some folks get injured because they do CrossFit, and of course that is true, the bigger question is "compared to what"?

You would need to know the injury rate per hour of activity, and the effectiveness of the program.  We evaluate risk in a context.  Cars are the most dangerous thing for humans.  If you had a friend who chose not to drive due to the danger of cars, you'd think they were a loony.  Why?  Because we judge the utility of cars to be worth the risk.  Likewise, if CrossFit is the most effective physical training system, folks might easily judge a high injury rate worth the risk.  Others might not see it that way.  As the man said, "you pays your money, you takes your chances."  So I like this author's perspective, and I hope as she does that we can find better critics for CrossFit.

In the mean time it is time to get my WOD on!