Glad to see a lot of folks still lurking? What do you want to talk about. While I generally find myself on the side of crossfit hate, I've been paying a bit of attention to it this week given its the games. I have a buddy competing in them for the first time. He crushed the competition during the first event this afternoon. Granted, the deck was stacked in his favor seeing as how it was the first time the games took it to a pool and he was a dominant swimmer. Still exciting to see him rock some well known superstars in the xfit community.

Last I saw, he was getting absolutely smoked in his second event through, which was a half marathon of rowing.

Yeah, it's a win. I'm glad to hear you have access to quality stuff. And I know plenty of people who've had their lives, as they pertain to fitness, transformed by crossfit. Generally I find myself on the side of xfit hate though simply because...

1. They've essentially created an extreme sport and mass marketed to the masses. The extreme sport aspect is fine... I'm not going to knock that just like I won't knock downhill mountain biking, extreme skiing , etc. But I'm not going to take someone who's never ridden a bike before and put them on my full suspension downhill bike at the top of a mountain and say, "have at it." Unfortunately that's what I see happen more often than not in xfit circles.

2. So-called professionals can get xfit certified as a trainer in the matter of a weekend as long as they're willing to fork over big money. Which makes sense since xfit is a marketing monster rather than a fitness movement really. Yeah, it's become a movement for some simply because of the marketing... but that's not the point. I'm not okay with putting really questionable authorities at the helm of what boils down to, essentially, an extreme sport.

3. It seems that many of the xfitters I encounter have a superiority complex, which is no reflection on you obviously. But they believe that they're part of something that's unique and novel. When in reality, xfit is just a hodge podge of a lot of training methodologies that've been around forever. And some times hodge podging everything together isn't the best road to a given goal. It's certainly not how I'd go about developing the world's "fittest athlete," which is self proclaimed beyond believe. And you should listen to me, because I'm the world's fittest and smartest trainer.

These are my major rubs.

However, I have some things I like, not the least of which is it got people using foundational, important equipment. It got them off bull**** gimmicks and using real weights, which I have to respect. The camaraderie is through the roof in many boxes, which establishes a fantastic support network to keep people interested. Retention rates are likely much higher in xfit boxes than they are in LA Fitness clubs, for example. Lastly, I know some box owners who are actually legit coaches. They understand specificity, individual programming, etc and they simply use xfit as their horse to hitch their cart to in order to teach their methods. But when you really look at what they're doing then, it's not REALLY crossfit. It's intelligent training done under the xfit wrapper.

I've to run, client coming in as we speak.... but I'd be happy to talk about this more if you're interested.

Hi Steve, am pleased you're back. I joined this group just yesterday, after wandering into your website and reading two of your articles that I found hugely interesting and insightful - the ones on The Walk and on Self Identity. I know that this group is about nutrition and exercise, but I must say I liked the philosophical bent in those two pieces, they cut to the core of why we want to get fitter.

Hey there, thanks for the interest and kind words. The philosophical and psychological side of things is definitely where my interest lies nowadays. I mean don't get me wrong, I love training and nutrition... but there's just not really anything worth reading on those fronts from my perspective. But I do love reading about things like mindfulness, cognitive behavioral therapy, rational emotive therapy, etc. I think that this is where there's the most to uncover as far as research goes in the context of weight control.