What is CrossFit?

We were talking about this at the gym on Monday night. This is from John Tuitele of CrossFit Summit where I train. I appreciate his perspective, because I like the idea of CrossFit, but I am simply not interested in fitness for monsters, which is what CrossFit is becoming. I already have a job, I don't need to make one out of fitness.

What is CrossFit?

Here are a couple of video answers to that question.The answer from Adidas: click here.The answer from CrossFit HQ: click here.The characterization I see (in both videos) is dominated by 20 and 30 year olds who are willing to undergo whatever it takes to forge elite fitness. This is a focused approach to training, admittedly, and that well defined sense of mission has clear advantages. The phrase "Forging Elite Fitness" is the motto of CrossFit, and I understand that.However, I've always been a fan of the CrossFit principles of scaling and modification as a means to respond to different fitness levels and even levels of interest and commitment to training. It just makes sense to me that an alternative to an "all or none" intensity commitment could find a wider audience for fitness pursuits. My interest is in helping folks move to the next level of their own fitness and health, even if they are interested in alternative to elite levels of fitness.Keep an eye out for that phrase - The Alternative - as a term that might surface again in the near future. While we will maintain CrossFit training times for those who want to breathe in fire and shed blood, our prescriptions will soon include a more deliberate scaled and modified version of training, still using constantly varied functional movements executed at high intensity, to be sure. However, as we continue to pursue broad, inclusive and general fitness, we want to extend that opportunity to as many as possible. We might even deliberately pursue those over 40 without tattoos, who even choose to keep shirts on during training. Shocking, no?