CrossFit Is Dangerous

Written By Charlye Hebert 

“CrossFit is dangerous and my cousin/friend/daughter/person on TV was hurt doing it.” – Every person that disagrees with my choice in fitness regimen.

I get it. CrossFit looks scary. There is a lot of negativity associated with lifting for time or from the fail videos that we see circulated on social media. However, I also understand that popular things tend to have a lot of unwarranted hate. Let’s break down some of the arguments.

Myth: CrossFit is bad for you.

Truth: One of the best things for joint health is muscle growth to support the moving parts of the body. The most efficient way to burn fat is by weight lifting. I do agree that (with any sport or fitness routine, not just CrossFit) someone with a preexisting injury should take certain precautions to not exasperate their injuries, but to say that CrossFit as a whole is bad for your body is simply not true. As we learned in the blog post last week, CrossFit is made up of functional movements. Functional movements are the best thing to promote health and wellness in your body. At Skyline CrossFit, we make mobility and recovery just as much of a priority as lifting, running, throwing, and gymnastics.  We are confident in our choices knowing that the functional movements we preform are beneficial to our athletes. This goes without saying that one movement may not provide the same value to every person, which is why we scale and modify movements to reach specific goals.  

Myth: You will be injured. 

Truth: As with any sport, the risk for injury is always there. Baseball players risk elbow injury, football players risk concussion, soccer players risk knee injury. CrossFit is a sport and it should be treated as such. There is a risk of injury every time we get into our vehicles to drive to work. To reduce this risk, we wear seatbelts, drive cars that are equipped with air bags and other advanced safety features, and take extreme caution in our own skills and abilities. The same is true for our time in the box; we have our own safety features. The amount of focus and time we as trainers spend on making sure our clients are safe is hard to describe; it is never ending. To say that we do not take the risk of injury seriously is insulting. The only thing that will cause injury is improper form, but adding a trainer to this equation substantially reduces the risk of preforming a movement incorrectly. In fact, working out without the instruction of a trained professional can be incredibly dangerous, especially if you are teaching yourself new skills. In CrossFit we wear our own seatbelts by practicing progressions and always teaching fundamentals, no matter what the skill level.

Myth: Anyone can pass the CrossFit exam and become a trainer.

Truth: I wont get too far into this subject. The course and the exam is difficult, y’all.  Trust me. I really questioned if I would pass the exam, because not everyone does. In fact, the pass rate is not very high. The handbook is over 200 pages of information that we must learn, while the course itself consists of a written exam and two days of classroom/practical training. The title of CrossFit Trainer is not one that is easily earned and those who do earn it have hours and hours of training in safety, methodology, and kinesiology. It isn’t handed to anyone.  The Level One course is just the beginning. The course opens up a world of knowledge, but the learning never stops. Trainers spend countless hours reviewing articles over movement, scaling techniques, practicing their own lifts and critiquing one another to make sure that we provide the best information to our athletes.

Summary:

I’m sure we can all agree that immobilization is the most dangerous thing in the world. Heart disease kills over 600,000 Americans per year. That is one out of four deaths every single year.  For me, it is a no brainer. I would rather CrossFit than suffer from disease. It is my medicine and my prevention. CrossFit, along with any fitness routine, has the potential to be dangerous and that is not something that will ever be hidden or wrapped in a pretty package. However, under proper instruction, the benefits of healthy nutrition, metabolic conditioning, gymnastics, lifting and throwing, and sports far outweigh the risks of not having a comprehensive fitness routine. 

Coach Crystal helping an athlete modify movements for class. This leads to completing movements safely and effectively.