Trying out Crossfit!

I have been doing crossfit for a few months now, I think maybe 3 or 4? So I thought it was about time I got around to talking about it!

For those of you who haven’t heard of Crossfit, it’s one of the big things in the fitness world at the moment, the main talking point of Crossfit is the WOD, workout of the day. The WOD is always varied and uses a combination of weights, body weight and a bit of cardio and the WOD can be for as many reps as possible in a set time, or you have to complete a sequence of moves and complete it as quick as possible. I’m not sure I’m explaining this very well so I’ll just give you an example of a workout we had to do last week:

As many toes to bar as possible in a minute (using a pull up bar you raise your feet to the bar, great ab workout)
As many burpees as possible in a minute
As many kettlebell snataches as possible in a minute
Rest for 1 minute
Repeat three times.

The WOD is always different though, they can last anywhere from 10-30 minutes and are always challenging.

Crossfit London is where I have been taking my classes and I definitely recommend them. They have boxes (the name of a Crossfit gym) in Bethnal Green and Vauxhall and the coaches are lovely, they are very encouraging and patient which has definitely helped me because I am by far the weakest and they don’t ever make me feel like I’m useless, which has happened in other gym classes.

Another thing that is great about Crossfit London is that when you join you have to do all the level 1 classes which is where you learn the basic lifting moves and how to do them with good form so you don’t injure yourself before you are let on to level 2, which is the general class.

In a class we will normally do a brief warm up of either squats or burpees, then we will work on one move for strength such as deadlifts or squats, adding weight each time we complete a set until we reach our maximum, followed by working on a skill such as pull ups or even muscle ups and we end with the WOD.

Crossfit is definitely challenging and I am normally sore for a couple of days afterwards, my shoulders are very sore from Tuesdays WOD as I’m typing this! I think Crossfit is a great way of building strength, and a lot of these workouts you can do at home if you have the basic equipment but the coaches and encouragement from other Crossfitters encourages me to go a little heavier with my weights and to try and squeeze in a extra rep where as if I was at home I may have given up a little sooner. Everything in the workout is completely scalable too, from making the weights lighter or heavier to modifying the move slightly to make it easier or harder which is great because it means everyone can do the WOD and still find it challenging.

You find a lot of people will go to Crossfit five days a week, but unfortunately I can only go once a week because of pole dancing and running, which also means I’m slow to see progress. It’s also quite expensive at around £13 a class, but that is the average sort of price you pay for fitness classes in London.

So what do you think, is Crossfit for you or do you prefer doing your own thing when it comes to strength training?