Some Turn to Church; Others, to CrossFit

>> The trainer is very good and there is a big focus on safety and avoiding injury.

>> I did get a shoulder injury (currently recovering from it) but it's because of my years of sedentary living my muscles are weak and things like shoulder muscles aren't held together well by atrophied muscle. That's not the fault of CrossFit.

My mother used to be in a cult and I spent a good part of my childhood living on one of the compounds. Still, I am always surprised to find how easy it is for people to believe and say things that make no logical sense.

Quite obviously, if your trainer really was very good with a big focus on safety and avoiding injury, he would've known that you had weak shoulder muscles. I would bet good money that you suffered this injury during an exercise suggested and supervised by a 'safety conscious' CrossFit instructor. This is no one's fault _except_ CrossFit and your trainer. You paid them a ton of money to help you train safely and they failed.

You are fortunate to have a good trainer at your box, but you don't have Crossfit to thank for that. The minimum requirement for opening a box is a one weekend training course to get your Level 1 certification. That's it. Considering the skill level required to properly coach some of the Olympic lifts involved in Crossfit training, a weekend hardly scratches the surface.

As for the big focus on safety and avoiding injury, a number of WODs have heavy lifts for time that invite form breakdown and injury (e.g. "Diane"). Then there is always the "Uncle Rhabdo" mascot and the strange glorification of ripping blisters off your hands doing kipping pullups, but I digress.

Glad it works for you.

> CrossFit is like group personal training, not a cult.

This is relative.

> The trainer is very good and there is a big focus on safety and avoiding injury.

This is also relative and a bigger problem. Crossfit pushes profit motives over competence.

Living in Santa Cruz, ground zero for Crossfit, the over zealousness of opening gyms, inconsistency of quality, etc. is pretty prominent.

You find the routine that works for you. For me, Crossfit reminds me of Bikram Yoga, the business/franchise aspect takes precedent over quality.

Myself, I've seen similar in yoga and martial arts. But, if you find a program that works for you, that is all that should matter.

Being active develops your body in a much better way as well. Muscles and tendons are much more complex than what is suggested by people who lift weights. Squatting heavy for 10 reps is only going to result in a very specific type of muscular development. Muscles have multiple compartments as determined by the various nerve endings. They have different types of muscle fibres and there are multiple smaller muscles all over the place.

It is pretty easy to recognise people who lift weights and don't do anything else because their bodies look strange. Many people at gyms have bigger chests than the worlds greatest fighters, bigger legs than the fastest people in the world, and wider shoulders than the fastest swimmers. Their muscles are counterproductive to being athletic as their legs rub together when they walk and so on. It is not just about size, it is about everything.

No it was the fault of crossfit. Most likely you had overdeveloped internal rotators which caused impingement due to poor posture. Any responsible trainer would get you to do facepulls and rows and maybe posterior chain exercises like deadlifts to correct your posture before you did overhead work. Injuries at the gym are extremely common because the body is more complex than some people think.

Having fun outdoors should be people's main source of exercise, not rep 1, rep 2, protein shake. Nutrition is another topic. Weight lifting is to being active as supplements, frozen meals, processed shit is to actual real food. And no you don't need 500 grams of protein per day. The whole fitness industry is garbage. It presents these bizarre bodies that nobody finds attractive as ideals and so people try to obtain them.

For some, it may be. I feel like it could be good for me, as a way to hack my mind. I hate exercising - not because of the physical effort, but because I'm too attention-deficient to experience it, or "good health", as any kind of reward. Exercising feels like a waste of time that could be spend on something else, e.g. reading a book or helping someone with some problem. I know my mind simply doesn't factor future health in day-to-day computations. I have to consciously and explicitly force* myself to care about it, and any way to push that care back from System II to System I is something I appreciate.

> and when our self image is so narrowly invested in one aspect of our lives, especially appearances, it's easy to overlook other personal growth opportunities.

True, though if your other areas are well-cultivated, then it may be worth to take that risk.

> I'd like to close with a joke: “If a Vegan does Crossfit, which one do they talk about first?”

They'll tell you how everyone from their Crossfit group loved their new fruit smoothie.

;).

Excellent joke :) But also, we all know the only sanctioned diet in Crossfit (tm) is the paleo diet! :)

I did crossfit for about a year and must say that the workout is excellent and it's nice to have "personal trainers" always running the workout.

But it sure felt like a cult. It was mandatory to "disrespect" other forms of fitness etc training, they were all seen as stupid and pointless compared to Crossfit (tm). And yes you take your kids there also etc. Once a pregnant woman did workout with another baby strapped to her back. You know training with lifting barbells over your head etc. And "to the max!". Seemed kind of stupid and over the top...

And everything seems to have to be so "extreme", you know puking during workout and working out so hard your muscles break down (rhabdo is seen as a badge of honour http://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/rhabdomyolysis-symptoms-c...).

Nice that people work out hard but any sport that takes things to this level just isn't my cup of tea.

If that doesn't deserve an upvote, nothing does.