CrossFit is a strength and conditioning program that incorporates constantly varied, high-intensity functional movements to improve strength, stamina, flexibility, power, speed, coordination, accuracy, balance and agility. The program is scalable for all fitness levels and draws from exercises like Olympic weightlifting, gymnastics, and other athletic movements. CrossFit aims to improve performance across broad physical domains rather than specialized training. Workouts are short and intense to elicit a potent physiological response. Progress is measured through increased work capacity, power output, and movement proficiency over time.

1. What is CrossFit?
(And why should you be doing it?)

2. What is CrossFit?
A strength and conditioning program built upon
constantly varied, functional movements
executed at high intensity.
Who uses this stuff?
• Military Special Ops units
• Firefighters
• Police
• Professional and Collegiate Athletes
• Mixed Martial Artists
• Hopefully you, your kids, and your parents.

3. It has long been our contention, our observation, that
people’s needs differ by degree, not kind.
Olympic athletes and our grandparents both need to fulfill
their potentials for cardio-respiratory endurance,
stamina, strength, flexibility, speed, power, coordination,
accuracy, balance, and agility. One is looking for
functional dominance; the other is looking for functional
competence. Competence and dominance manifest and
optimize through identical physiological mechanisms.
We scale our program by altering rest, load, intensity,
etc. while utilizing the same exercises for everyone
whenever possible.
-Greg Glassman
CrossFit Founder

4. What is Fitness?
Fitness Model 1
Identification and development of 10 general physical skills:
1. Cardio Vascular and cardio respiratory endurance –gas exchange
2. Stamina –muscular endurance
3. Strength
4. Flexibility
Each of these four skills are organic, produce changes in muscle tissue that
can be seen and measured, and are improved through training.
5. Power
6. Speed
These two are improved through both training and practice and need both for
proper development.
7. Coordination
8. Accuracy
9. Agility
10. Balance
The last four are neurological and are improved through practice. The degree
to which a training program addresses each of these physical adaptations to
training is expressive of its efficacy. 1.

5. Fitness Model 2
The second model is statistical and is a measure of an athlete
performing well at any physical test thrown his or her way. Load a
hopper with athletic tasks and the better athlete is able to do more of
them better than the inferior athlete. CrossFit is designed for this
type of general physical preparation. Life, on average, punishes the
specialist. The more specialized you are, the less cross-adapted
you are likely to be in other measures of physical prowess.
Elite endurance athletes are often looked upon as the prototypes of
elite fitness. Models 1 and 2 clearly debunk that prototype. Elite
endurance athletes exhibit few of the physical skills of the first model
and would fare poorly against the hopper. 1.

6. "CrossFit is in large part derived from several simple observations
garnered through hanging out with athletes for thirty years and
willingness, if not eagerness, to experiment coupled with a total
disregard for conventional wisdom. Let me share some of the more
formative of these observations:
1. Gymnasts learn new sports faster than other athletes.
2. Olympic lifters can apply more useful power to more activities
than other athletes.
3. Powerlifters are stronger than other athletes.
4. Sprinters can match the cardiovascular performance of
endurance athletes even at extended efforts.
5. Endurance athletes are woefully lacking in total physical capacity.
6. With high carb diets you either get fat or weak.
7. Bodybuilders can’t punch, jump, run, or throw like athletes can.
8. Segmenting training efforts delivers a segmented capacity.
9. Optimizing physical capacity requires training at unsustainable
intensities.
10. The world’s most successful athletes and coaches rely on
exercise science the way deer hunters rely on the accordion."
-Greg Glassman, CrossFit Founder

7. World Class Fitness in 100 Words
Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some
fruit, little starch and no sugar. Keep intake to
levels that will support exercise but not body fat.
Practice and train major lifts: Deadlift, clean,
squat, presses, C&J, and snatch. Similarly,
master the basics of gymnastics: pull-ups, dips,
rope climb, push-ups, sit-ups, presses to
handstand, pirouettes, flips, splits, and holds.
Bike, run, swim, row, etc, hard and fast. Five or
six days per week mix these elements in as
many combinations and patterns as creativity
will allow. Routine is the enemy. Keep workouts
short and intense. Regularly learn and play new
sports.
-From www.CrossFit.com

8. How We Do It
• Functional Movement
– Common Universal Recruitment Patterns.
– Universally Scalable.
• Constant Variation
– Routine is the enemy.
• High Intensity
– Uncomfortable
• Quantifiable Outputs
– Horsepower, Watts, etc. Why isn’t anyone else talking about
this?

9. Quantifiable Outputs
Diane: 21-15-9 reps of 225# Deadlift followed by Handstand Pushups
-Mark stands about 6 feet tall and weighs about 210 pounds. His
best time for ‘Diane’ is just over 2.5 minutes.
225# + 105# x 2 feet x 45 reps = 29,700 foot-pounds of work
210# x 1 foot x 45 reps = 9,450 foot pounds of work.
29,700 + 9,450 = 39,150 foot pounds of work.
-divide that by 2.5 minutes = 354 watts
Bench Press: 3 sets x 10 reps x 225# x 1.5 feet = 10,125 foot-pounds
- divide that by 2.5 minutes = 92 watts

10. Intensity
We can measure intensity because we can measure power. Power is a function of
Force and Distance over Time (M x D / T). It is undeniable that an increase in
power results in an increase in intensity. To increase power, you can increase mass
and/or distance, or decrease time. Manipulating any one of these factors to increase
power must result in an increase in intensity.
Intensity is all about hard and fast. Power is an issue wherever velocity is
important. Exercise success is based on intensity. INTENSITY IS WHERE THE
RESULTS ARE. Functional movements move from core to extremity and can
tolerate high loads and move them long distances in a short amount of time.
The movements are powerful in that they allow a lot of work to be done in a short
amount of time. In this discussion, power = intensity. Without power and
intensity, the neuro-endocrine response is blunted. There is a potent neuro-
endocrine response to each of the movements that we do in CrossFit. This
hormonal response is systemic and effects the entire body through a cascade of
biochemical products that are released as the result of the compound, functional
movements executed at high intensity. 1.

11. Movement Pool
• Weightlifting/Power Lifting
– Dead lifts, clean, squat, presses, jerks,
snatch.
• Gymnastics
– Pull-ups, dips, rope climb, push-ups, sit-ups,
handstands.
• Monostructural Cardio
– Run, bike, row, swim, jump rope.

12. The Magic is in the Movements!
Unlike the pec deck, leg extensions, curls, and lateral raises which you never see in the real
world, the athletic field, or combat, functional movements are not the exclusive property of the
gym. If the only place you do a particular movement is at the gym, it probably doesn’t have
particularly potent transfer to the challenges of sport and life outside the gym. Functional
movements are universal motor patterns that you find your every day life. Putting the heavy
dog food bag on the shelf over the washing machine is every bit the clean and jerk as doing
the movement with a barbell.
Proper muscle recruitment is like a symphony. Training in segmented fashion develops a
segmented capacity. You must not try to develop your muscles separately but rather in the
fashion in which they are designed to be used.
Functional movements are common, universal motor recruitment patterns, the things you
see and use all the time. Functional movements are efficient and effective. They are not
single-joint movements but rather multi-joint movements. They are safe, develop very
powerful and useful core strength, provide tremendous neuro-endocrine response, and are
the best cardio and best rehab training you can do. .

13. Progression
• Mechanical Competency
– Virtuosity. Doing the common, uncommonly well
• Consistency
• Intensity
– This is where the results are hidden! If your workouts are
producing little or no results then your dose response curve is
flat.
We fail at the margin of our experiences.
–Greg Glassman
. Adapted from Eugene Allen’s CrossFit Certification Notes from February 2006

14. Can You Keep or Gain Muscle Mass with CrossFit?
If you train the WODs hard, and eat right and get lots of sleep, you will
definitely gain lean mass, lose fat, and yes, you can build muscle mass with
the CrossFit protocol. More specifically, according to Coach,
Here is a hierarchy of training for mass from greater to lesser efficacy:
1. Bodybuilding on steroids
2. CrossFitting on steroids
3. CrossFitting without steroids
4. Bodybuilding without steroids
The bodybuilding model is designed around, requires, steroids for significant
hypertrophy. The neuro-endocrine response of bodybuilding protocols is so
blunted that without "exogenous hormonal therapy" little happens. The
CrossFit protocol is designed to elicit a substantial neuro-endocrine whollop
and hence packs an anabolic punch that puts on impressive amounts of
muscle though that is not our concern. Strength is.
Natural bodybuilders (the natural ones that are not on steroids) never
approach the mass that our athletes do. They don't come close.
Those athletes who train for function end up with better form than those who
value form over function. This is one of the beautiful ironies of training. 2.
2. From www.CrossFit.com