My very first crossfit class tonight

I'm not really sure.. I felt pressured to keep up. The entire class was only dead lifting for an hour, I thought it would be more of a boot camp type thing

There are no real standards in crossfit; so as people in this thread say, you might find a "good box" or a "bad box". It's almost like open source franchising.

In any event, good for you for trying. If there's another franchise, look into it and maybe it will be one of the good ones I hear people talking about.

Personally I find it absolutely loathsome and would recommend you learn how to lift weights and find cardio you enjoy doing like swimming or running.

I've been doing crossfit for 1.5 months, 4 times/week.

What I like:

1. Scaled workouts - you can scale it to your fitness level

2. Cheap way to learn Olympic lifts - I'm not saying it's the best coaching from professional strength and olympic lifting coaches, but it's better than learning on your own. Most people that critique Crossfit Olympic lifts never had proper coaching themselves(I find). In fact, very few % of male lifters probably learned and know how to perform Olympic lifts with good form.

3. Exercise variety - Your strengths, your weaknesses, you will improve in all aspects... up to a certain point.

4. Community - I'm not a crossfit nut, but the community is generally friendly and has a positive vibe in and outside of the gym. People will push you and encourage you. Nothing negative about that.

What I don't like:

1. Pullups - Yes... the kipping pullups. I don't like them, so I don't do them. If they ask me to do 20 'pullups', I break it up into 3 strict pullups x 7. I don't care about the 'time' aspect, I can come in last for all I care.

2. Shoulders - A lot of strain on your shoulders. Your shoulders are not designed to handle heavy overweight movements. Doing a gazillian hand stand pushups? That's a lot of weight overhead

3. Improvement - Some people do crossfit for 1-2 + years and still have horrible forms in a lot of lifts... Most don't even have proper box jump forms. This is because you NEED to work on these skills outside of crossfit classes. Crossfit is an 'exercise'. You will get stronger if you haven't lifted at all before but after a certain point you will plateau fast.

None of the top crossfit athletes you see on youtube and tv just do 'box' workouts. They have a training regimen that would help them ultimately 'improve' in the timed workouts. Want to get fitter? Find a structured workout plan that would make you 'better' at crossfit workouts while doing crossfit.

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Basically, if you're using it as a fun 'exercise', crossfit is great. Remember that olympic lifts take years , decades to perfect and a lot of strength development in 'other' areas of your body. You WILL need to work with a specific program outside of crossfit if you want to improve in olympic lifts...

Injury is part of any workout - you see a lot of people getting injured just lifting weights(tearing muscles, acl, dislocation) for years with bad form in any gym. Crossfit is no different.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnjYyfkcaNI

This guy is a riot. You have to see the first video on Broscience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXO2azb3_PE

Oh yeah, Question to OP.

Did you have a training period of at least a week or more prior to your first class where they provided instruction and demonstrations with zero weight (PVC Pipe)? For your workout did the trainer demo the exercise (The right and wrong way to do the movement.) Also doing all dead lifts for the workout does not sound right was there anything else as part of the workout?

Are you going to stop going?

Here, let me help you out a bit. This is what I like to call the "crossfit mating call."

The dangers of crossfit:
https://medium.com/health-fitness-1/97bcce70356d

Check out
Is Crossfit Going to Kill Me????
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l8Y5PEjW6o

Awesome! I'm in a fun workout group on Facebook. Everyone is so positive and supportive. We would love to have you join us! Send me a Facebook friend request if you're interested! (My FB link is Facebook.com/brad.lessman.1).