CrossFit: More money, more problems...more solutions?

More money, more problems?

CrossFit, it seems, has a target on its back. The world of fitness can be polarizing. When you’ve got a movement with a founder who proclaims to have revolutionized the industry, you can bet people will take shots. When that founder is actually right, you can bet those taking shots will number in the hundreds. When he’s both right and builds a global behemoth that grows geometrically, the numbers of detractors will increase correspondingly. 

Sometimes CrossFit provides the target, sometimes it is the target.

Erin Simmons ignited an internet firestorm when she posted her piece, Why I don’t CrossFit. Here’s my rejoinder. 

Erin Simmons Doesn't do CrossFit

Perhaps the biggest complaint lodged against Crossfit—and, frankly, the most important—is that it’s dangerous. This blog is interested in two guys’ ideas: Greg Glassman and Charlie Munger. I think their respective notions of general physical and intellectual preparedness are amazing. And very similar. But Glassman’s do run a risk that Munger’s don’t: physical harm. (Glassman might rejoin that sitting on one’s ass for hours on end doing nothing more than reading is likely to produce a lot more physical harm than his program ever would…and he’d probably be right!)

CrossFit can be dangerous. Poor coaching is always bad; coaching that ignores movement that is inherently dangerous is worse than bad. No doubt, there are some CrossFit coaches who fail to protect their clients. But there are a lot more CrossFit gyms and CrossFit trainers who never fail their clients that way. Scroll down to the Hackenbruck stuff for a wonderful counterexample to Simmons’s rant happening at Ute CrossFit.

Lift Big Eat Big’s Brandon Morrison, though makes a wonderful point, any physical activity comes with risks. When people are ambitious in their physical goals and training, then there’s inherently more risk. Anyone familiar with the story of Icarus—the guy who borrowed his dad’s chariot to try to fly to the sun—is aware that doing stuff that others can’t or won’t do necessarily runs risks that those others aren’t exposed to. (Of course, poet William Blake’s point, “No bird soars too high / if he flies with his own wings” is a helpful corrective).

Let he without stiffness or injury cast the first stone

Morrison, who doesn't do CrossFit, but is fed up with those who would criticize the program, notes that, “it is very easy to call something dangerous, when you are on the outside looking in.” Of course CrossFitters get hurt and they get sore. Morrison offers some perspective, “but think about it this way: a race car sitting in the garage may require no maintenance, but it also isn't going anywhere. Wear and tear is normal across all strength sports, and let he who is without stiffness or injury cast the first stone.” 

What a great line.  

Brandon Morrison Doesn't do CrossFit...but likes it anyway.

Of course, no one who walks in a gym for the first time after 20 years of doing nothing more strenuous than sitting on a coach should not be doing Olympic lifts or heavy loads on their first visit. While I doubt very much that has ever happened in any CrossFit box, I’m sure some questionable stuff does in some gyms on occasion.

I follow Morrison in not holding, “the entirety of Crossfit responsible for the irresponsibility of the minority of new Crossfit coaches.”

CrossFit is hugely popular. It will continue to grow in popularity so long as it continues to produce results for people, and as long as it keeps producing facilities, athletes, and coaches like those found at Ute CrossFit. I love CrossFit. I think Greg Glassman’s definition of fitness is amazing and has produces truly incredible results. The notion of developing general physical preparedness in response to life’s unpredictable demands is as good a fitness idea as I’ve ever come across.

CrossFit on magnanimity

Because of CrossFit’s status and profile, it is in a position to be generous, even magnanimous. CrossFit’s and CrossFitters magnanimity is on display in activities like fighting for a cure for children’s cancer, providing clean water for Kenya, supporting the families of fallen firefighters, and making sure kids are safe around water, just to scratch the surface. It can even (especially?) be seen in supporting athletes injured while participating in CrossFit, like Kevin Ogar.

As great as their work in fitness is, it’s this kind of altruistic work that makes CrossFitters, including founder Greg Glassman, live up to an even higher ideal than the libertarian dream of non-interference.

Morrison points to another way CrossFit is generous, writing, “I challenge all non-Crossfit strength athletes to think of another fitness movement with thousands of gyms around the world, where we can bring in our Strongman equipment, have a big open floor to do whatever we want, and most importantly, not be surrounded by treadmills, mirrors, and ‘no deadlifting’ signs. LBEB lifters are eternally grateful to all the Crossfit gyms that have let us use their space in the past, because without them, we would be screwed.”

How am I grateful to CrossFit? Let me count the ways…

How are you grateful for CrossFit?