Let me set the story up.
There is a lot of buzz in the fitness world about Crossfit recently. Crossfit work outs include intervals of high intensity plyometrics, olympic weight lifting, powerlifting, gymnastics, calisthenics, and girevoy sport. It is commonly associated with people who are very muscular and athletic, but is becoming more and more "average person" friendly. Crossfit truly is it's own culture. People who stick with Crossfit and join a Crossfit gym become like a close proud family almost.
As someone who studies athletics and fitness as a major in school (I am a Kinesiology major) I have shied away from the topic of Crossfit because many fitness professionals are skeptical of it. Many are against it because the high intensity can lead to a much higher risk of injury. If you are not properly trained on the equipment you have an even higher risk of injury. Some say Crossfit does not promote a healthy mindset to apply to long-term physical activity, especially later in life. But there are some fitness professionals out there that do condone Crossfit as a great way to get in shape if you do it under the right conditions. Crossfit is very popular among college aged people. I hear about it on campus quite frequently. I was excited to try it for myself and apply what I am learning about fitness to the experience!
It was a friday afternoon and a group of my friends and I were excited to try a free womens only crossfit class offered by my school's recreation facility. None of us are "athletes" but we all are normal active young people in our 20s.
The room was a large dark windowless gym in the basement of an old building on campus. Full of weights, dumbbells, and many other weightlifting and gymnastic equipment pieces. This atmosphere heightened my fear I had and built the anticipation I had been feeling leading up to the work out. We did high intensity intervals of burpees, crunches, dead lifts, and kettle bell swings. Honestly, I walked out of that gym feeling good, feeling the burn of a good work out. It was a hard work out, but like any exercise, I could see it getting easier if you stuck with it for a long time. I walked out of there just fine. Maybe Crossfit wasn't so bad after all…
It was the next 48 hours after that changed my mind. We were all sore after that, as anyone is after performing tasks their muscles aren't used to doing. But my lower back was in pain. It has been for the last 4 days since doing Crossfit. My friends's legs can barely move 4 days out from the work out. In retrospect it seems to me we were not properly trained on the form and techniques of dead-lifts or kettle bell raises. And when lifting weights are involved you need to be very well prepped and monitored on form so that you don't injure yourself. So it's no wonder I'm experiencing a minor back injury! We were very much thrown into the intense exercises with little training.
In my opinion doing those intense intervals for years would result in toned muscles, yes. But would also result in irreversible wear and tear on the body and probably injuries to numerous places. I believe I could tone the same muscles in a traditional gym setting if I wanted to, save myself hundreds of dollars, and prevent overuse injuries while I was at it. There truly were no exercises we did there that I couldn't have done on my own (after I was PROPERLY trained on technique). Seems like you would have to be into Crossfit more for the atmosphere, the prestige that comes with it, and the community aspect than the work out itself.
