There is no doubt that a CrossFit work out is intense. This intensity is the very thing that can accelerate you to higher levels of fitness by increasing your output. However, we need to manage that output with adequate amounts of recovery in order to find an effect dose of training. Sleep, diet, stress, and the frequency of your training will all have an impact on the quality of your recovery. Ultimately it is the recovery that allows you to most effectively adapt to your training. If your recovery isn’t matching your output, you may be running the risk of overtraining.

Overtraining is a condition that manifests in a number of symptoms. The following is a list of things to watch for as signs of overtraining.

1- Joint pain

Joint pain is related to inflammation within or around any particular joint. This can be caused by factors including poor diet, poor technique and over use. While training can be a great way to help rehabilitate joint pain, too much training can worsen the problem. If you are experiencing joint pain during your CrossFit work outs, please consult with a coach. The pain may be remedied with an analysis of particular techniques or perhaps a referral to a professional who can direct your recovery more specifically. A nagging pain is your body letting you know that something needs to be adjusted with your training. Don’t dismiss joint pain and fight through it. Talk to your coach and we can help direct you towards better recovery.

2- Loss of motivation

If you’ve felt like your work outs have been lack lustre, or your finding it hard to get yourself to the gym, this may be a sigh of overtraining. When your stress-recovery ratio is out of whack your body does a good job giving you signs. The tough part is listening to those signs. In this case you may decide to take a couple extra days off during the week to soak up some more recovery. Heck you may even need to take the whole week off. If your in a sate of overtraining and your worried about losing fitness by taking a week off, think again.  Remember the recovery from the stress that makes you stronger and fitter.

3-Sleep disturbance

When you train intensely, all the systems of your body are demanded to kick into overdrive. In recovery, these systems relax and other systems activate to rebuild and prepare for the next bout. If your recovery systems aren’t completing their job this can leave you feeling restless and excitable during sleep. Poor sleep amplifies poor recovery and this too can lead to overtraining.

4- Performance decrease

Tracking your daily performance can tell you a lot about your progress. The whole point of training is to see an improvement in your performance markers. If these things take a general dip and continue to worsen, it could be a sign of overtraining.

The remedy to overtraining is simple, get better recovery. Better recovery comes from better diet, better sleep and sometimes taking a break. Taking a break might just be the best thing to accelerate your fitness to the next level. Be aware of the signs o overtraining and make sure to take appropriate action. Overtraining isn’t something you can just grit your teeth and train through. Ask a coach if you think you are feeling symptoms of overtraining. If you’ve experienced any of this personally, please share in comments. Often times people can connect much better with a personal story from a peer than from our ramblings on the website.

People who misunderstand CrossFit commonly view pictures like these as Overtraining. Those who have experienced an effectively coached CrossFit program, and therefore properly understand CrossFit, easily recognize pictures like these as Recovery, a key component to avoid Overtraining.

Over the past couple of weeks you may have noticed a percentage prescription attached to our strength workouts. We’ve tried to give everyone a quick run down on the reasoning for this, but i feel like a more detailed description will allow you to appreciate it and plan  in accordance to maximizing your strength results.

The particular template we have adopted was developed by Micheal Rutherford out of Shawnee Mission, Kansas where he runs a successful gym and CrossFit affilate. Coach Rutherford has been in the strength and conditioning industry for many years and is highly accredited by his peers including Robb Wolf (NorCal Strength and conditioning) and Greg Evert (Catalyst Athletics). Coach Rut (as he is referred too) along with some of the other mentioned coaches also spoke at the first “Black Box Summit” recently which was a CrossFit affiliate-run event that Chad got a chance to attend and spoke very highly of on his return.

The reasoning for adopting his strength template was to give our clients a more focused and planned approach to strength training.  For each workout there is a specific amount of weight assigned by way of a percentage of your 1Rep Max to each set. This allows you to map out a targeted plan for that session. It gives you a training goal and removes the subjective tinkering we’ve all done to the ladder approach “just lift as heavy as you can, every time”. A successfully executed workout is one that lets you know your heading towards your goals and a unsuccessful execution allows you to dial in more closely a goal that is appropriate for you.

Now this is all fine and dandy for someone who has a solid idea of what their 1 Rep Max is for the various lifts, but what about the beginner, someone who doesn’t know their 1 rep max value? The beginner will approach the work out similar to how we used to, in that, over the assigned amount of sets the individual will lift up to a weight that feels close to a max in 1, 3 or 5 reps . Then a coach will help estimate a 1 rep value for you.  For example if the work out was a Back Squat with 5 sets of 3 reps prescribed to it, a beginner will lift their first set based on what a coach may suggest and then increase the weight each set until the weight feels substantial. With the help of a coach you will be lifting a weight that is appropriate for your level as your heaviest set.  If this all seems complicated, don’t worry, the details of the design is not important to you coming in and doing the work out, as always a coach will be there to guide you through each step.

With the benefits and the logistics laid out loosely we can now discuss how to maximise your strength gains. The percentage based strength program is threaded into our monthly planning in a particular way. To maximize the results of this method, it is important that you attend the specific classes in which the strength thread is prescribed. The following is an example of a 3 week cycle in which the target is to lift a previous 1 Rep max or set a new 1 Rep max.

Percentage based strength program- 3 week cycle

Percentages for 5,3 and 1 rep work outs are:

If your still with me at his point, the importance of knowing this is to allow you to see forward what days will be strength days and allow you to plan your attendance accordingly. This is important because to best obtain your strength goals you must complete the 5 and 3 rep workouts leading up to the 1 rep test day. But don’t worry, you will still see great results in your fitness by attending the classes that you can when you can. This system is for the individual who hasn’t seen the types of gains they once did and is interested in dialling in the strength training a little more. If this is you then feel free to ask Auty, Chad or Suzanne any questions.

Seems like certain coaches do ALL the work around here…

Did you know that you can sign up for all of our classes online!

Starting on March 1st we will be requesting everyone to pre-register for every class. This is to prepare for the eventual class caps that may be implemented as class sizes continue to grow.

As an added incentive to learn and use our registration system, we are proposing a Class Registration Challenge. For 3 months; March, April and May, we will be tracking everyone’s pre-registration for classes. Every time you pre-register for a class online, you receive one point. If, however, you don’t show up for that class, you lose a point. You can avoid the point loss by early cancelling your registration up to 60 minutes before the class. You can register for classes up to 14 days in advance.

1st Place will receive a free WOD Log Book.
2nd Place will receive a $25 credit towards services or product.
3rd Place will receive a $10 credit towards services or product.

**Sign up by clicking the “Online Scheduler” link at the top right of our website**

4 people, 1 workout and a whole lotta weights!!!

There’s always a lot going on at CrossFit Edmonton so here is the latest:

New Schedule Changes
A reminder that our new schedule changes start today. Check out Schedule Page for class times.

Paleo Challenge Almost Done!
A reminder to all of our Paleo challenge participants that this is the last week of the challenge. Congratulations to everyone who has made it this far! Your “After” photos will be due by Tuesday next week at the absolute latest to be able to qualify for the prizes.

Central Canada Sectionals
There are only 5 weeks left until the sectionals! There are only 4 Male Athlete spaces and 17 Female Athletes spaces remaining. Also, volunteers and sponsors will be needed. Please email us for more information.

New Faces
We have 3 new faces that recently started and a bunch more as our fundamentals course will be finishing up. I just thought I’d take this opportunity to remind everyone of our New Faces Rule: If you see a face you don’t know, go up and introduce yourself. I know it may seem simple but it helps to strengthen our fitness community.

Some WOD's get a little sweaty!

There is no secret as to why CrossFit training is effective for developing fitness: Athletic, full body exercises combined into a multi-modal format ramped with high intensity. The equation is flawless for improving work capacity. But how do these work outs fair against the needs of individuals. For the able-bodied folks our scaling and modifying systems work great for matching individual strength to weight suggestions and offering modifications to exercises difficult in strength or technique. But what about for those with sore elbows, shoulders or knees?

Chronic inflammation is a common thing amongst our society. Many factors contribute to these types of injuries including poor diet, repetitive stress in the work place or home, sedentary lifestyle, poor technique in the gym and lack of recovery. A lot of the time an individual may not even have noticed these sore spots until endeavouring in some kind of fitness program. Thankfully with some adherence to solid technique and light ramp up these things are rectified with ease. However if these nagging pains go un-checked a far greater inconvenience could be looming. While exercise can be a fantastic fix for chronic inflammation injuries it can also exacerbate the issue. An injury that is repedativley stressed and not given sufficient recovery will worsen. This is an important point in your training where using your coaches becomes crucial. You have to speak up!

At CrossFit Edmonton we employ competent coaches with ample experience. We are there to instruct and help individuals set up for their workout to ensure everyone is able to safely and effectively execute the WOD. However, if you neglect to inform us of a pain or issue, you may be setting yourself up for problems in the future. As coaches we understand these issues and we know how to modify your workout so you can continue to forge towards elite fitness while working on proper recovery from inflammation. We may have suggestions for speeding up recovery or recommend you make alterations to your training schedule. The quest for ultimate fitness is a valiant one, but in our experience, it is unique to each person. Speak up if something bothers you whether it’s at the beginning of the work out or half way through. There is no bad time for us to help you, but you have to speak up. Your coaches are there for you.

Have you experienced working through an injury in CrossFit? Are you currently experiencing any issues? If you’ve felt like a CrossFit Edmonton coach has helped you by making modifications, please share in comments.

To bring back the excitement for next day WOD postings, we will be adding a post entitled: “Benchmark Advisory”. This post will get published at 6pm on the night before a benchmark workout. It will not give details of what the benchmark will be, but it will let you know that there is a performance WOD the next day so you can better prepare yourself.

The post will be easily recognized by it’s simple content of a Benchmark Advisory sign:

This Monday February 15th is Family Day.

We will run holiday hours AND evening class and Fundamentals as usual.

Classes at: 9am, 10am and 6pm
Fundamentals: As usual at 7pm.

Last weekend  CrossFit Edmonton hosted the 3rd “Inner City Challenge” and once again the event was a great success! I want to send big thanks out to all who participated.  We had members from other affiliates as well as a handful of Crossfitters not associated to a particular gym. In the spirit of competition we all gathered to sweat, bleed and burn through what can be argued as the most intense physical sport on the planet.  In the end we had many outstanding performances and a close race for the podium spots.

CrossFit Edmonton members Lisa Dika(1st) and Aaron Chetek (3rd) both finished with podium placements. Congratulations to them and great job representing our club. We also had great performances from a number of other members, both seasoned veterans of our program along with new recruits battled through the vigorous work out and all finished! Congratulations to all of you!

In the spirit of competition many things can happen, but what is assured, is a strengthening of community. Whether you’re a competitor in the ring or a volunteer helping out you equally contribute to this. If you’ve been involved lately with a competition as a competitor or a volunteer what are your thoughts? What things did you find exciting? Are there things that can be improved?

Starting Monday February 22nd, we will be making a couple of changes to our class schedule.

1) There will be no more 10am classes. However, we will be introducing a new Mamas class on Friday’s at 10am. All are welcome but registration online is mandatory and parents will get priority.

2) There will be no more 7pm group classes on Tuesday’s and Thursday’s.

Please see the calendar below for a details.

**UPDATE**

The event pictures are now online in our gallery. You can see them here. You may download them if want them and you can even upload to the gallery if you took some of your own.

Details:

WOD

5 Rounds for time of:

5 Ground to overhead 135/95 lbs
10 Pull ups
15 Box jumps

Movement standards:

Ground to over head

- You must grip the bar with a clean grip (Not a snatch grip).
- The bar must touch the floor each rep.
- The bar must be locked out overhead with some or all of the ear visible from the profile.

Pull ups

- Arms must be at full extension in the bottom.
- Chin must clear the vertical plane of the bar at the top.

Box jump

-You must achieve full knee and hip extension at the top of the box.

We look forward to seeing you there!!

-CrossFit Edmonton Staff

Reminder: New Fundamentals course starting Feb. 8th @ 7 pm. Sign up today here

Making changes can be tough in any situation. Its far easier to sit back and coast in the comfort of the norm, the known and the practiced. But when making a decision to change, for better health, nothing compares to the return on investment. It’s not something that is obvious immediately, but over time the benefits become astounding. Better sleep, leaner looks, better performance, a more positive outlook, the list goes on. So be courageous as we forge forward into week 3. Leave behind any stumbles or hiccups’ you may have had and renew your commitment today. Remember your only 1 meal away from re-claiming your caveman self.  Plan your groceries and meals for a week and pick up a new recipe from our food logs thread. Use each other to help motivate and encourage others as a team. We will concur the temptations of Neolithic foods and bask it what it feels like to thrive. Grok on!!

Share your challenges and triumphs up to this point in comments:

Crossfit Edmonton offers strength and conditioning programs directed to everyone who values fitness and enjoys being part of a like minded community. Our work outs are athletic and challenging and as a coach I am committed to bringing you the latest in fitness prescriptions from around the world.

Crossfit Edmonton understands the importance of seeing results weather its to improve a particular area of strength like doing a pull up, or to change your body composition. Seeing the results will ultimately play a part in keeping you committed and working towards levels of fitness you never imagined. But are there better methods of measuring results? Many fitness programs advertise great results in little time but don’t have any methods to back their claims. Sure, with high energy instructors, blazing music and a workout leaving you sweaty and breathless, this certainly appears to be an effective formula. But what if the initial excitement dwindles and you are left wondering if the program is really giving you what you what?

At CrossFit Edmonton we employ a method of measuring your success by strategically placing “benchmark” days into the program allowing you to compare back and see an improvement in performance. We also have log books for sale which can be an excellent tool to track daily workouts, sleep and fatigue levels. Keeping a log book can keep you in tune with daily successes, benchmark improvements and help in goal setting witch are all things CrossFit Edmonton and their coaches can help you with. Our daily score  and achievements boards  allows you  to celebrate successes, keep in touch with other members and, for the competitive folks, generate some friendly rivalries. These tactics are all tried and true methods for measuring your success and keeping you committed to ultimate fitness.

What has been valuable for your measurements of success? Post thoughts to comments.

As a crossfitter you engage in a multitude of different work outs all designed to develop your fitness across a broad scope. Crossfit methodology utilizes a list of fitness components to help outline the aim of the program as well as give fitness itself a more workable definition. Those components are; Cardio respiratory endurance, stamina, strength, flexibility,power,speed, coordination, agility, balance and accuracy.

STRENGTH

Strength defined is: The ability of a muscular unit or combination of units to apply force.

We live on a planet where things and their mass are given weight by way of  gravity. Our very being on earth demands a physical capacity to generate force. This being said strength obviously plays an imperative role in our ever day functioning. Lifting, pushing, pulling and moving from A to B all require strength.

To develop strength we have to understand the types of exercises that are truly cultural of getting stronger. The greater fitness community uses strength as a term loosely, describing everything from various weightlifting regimes to spin classes, but at closer inspection some activities are far better suited for inducing the desired result. What we know is that the body adapts specifically to the demands placed on it, so to develop strength we need to place ourselves in situations requiring us to produce muscular force. Nothing does this better than lifting weights, and not just any weights but HEAVY weights. Exercises like the deadlift, squat and press are by comparison far more effective than others in their ability to generate force. One has only to look to the worlds strongest athletes to see this empirically proven, Power lifters, Strong men and Olympic lifters are all by definition strong.  And it is for this reason that CrossFit utilizes these movements as their foundation for strength training.

Reminder: ICC # 3

Date: February 6, 2010
Time: Registration available online through our Online Scheduler. 
Heats: 12 pm- 2pm
Awards: Approximately 2:15
Registration fee: $10

Competition WOD details and movement standards will follow prior to event.

All Edmonton CrossFitters welcome!

With the commencement of the January Paleo Challenge, I’m already seeing some interesting posts about ‘Paleo’ foods. The people who have been doing it a while are suggesting ideas and all the newbies are looking for help. It’s a fantastic process but we may be getting into some grey area. There’s a lot of websites out there with Paleo Recipies that leave me wondering, are we any better off?

Not many people would argue against the idea that diet soda is better for you than regular soda. Or 25% less salt chips are better for you than regular salted chips. Or how about whole grain cheerios are better for you than regular cheerios? Does any of this mean that the said food is actually Good For You? Where this hits in Paleo land is in things like Almond Flour, Agave Nectar or Gluten Free Bread!! Are these things actually taking us on a path to superior health?

I know I have my opinion on this issues, but what’s yours? Please post thoughts to comments.

Low Fat! and part of a Heart-Healthy diet!!!

Today is the first official day of our Paleo Challenge. If you haven’t registered yet, DO IT TODAY! Once you’ve paid your deposit you will be emailed the password for the food logs post.

If you are already registered or will be today, you MUST have your pictures in by TOMORROW at midnight at the absolute latest or you will be ineligible to win.

CrossFit Edmonton’s Inner City challenge
A competitive CrossFit event

Date: February 6, 2010
Time: Registration @ 11:30 am at the door. Online registration available through our Online Scheduler. 
Heats 12 pm- 2pm
Awards: Approximately 2:15

Competition WOD details and movement standards will follow prior to event.

All Edmonton CrossFitters welcome!

ICC #2 Power Cleans and Push Ups.

Happy New Year to all of our clients and all of our readers! Hopefully all of your holidays we happily spent with loved ones enjoying life and enjoying FOOD! Since we all know it’s true, what better way to start the year than with a Paleo Challenge!

The Challenge:

This month’s Challenge will begin on January 18th and run for 6 WEEKS until February 28th. The challenge is to see who can change their body the most from Paleo eating. The buy-in for this Challenge is $30 (serious participants only).

The Details:

• The Challenge is 6 weeks long.
• You must take 3 ‘before’ pictures: Front, Back and Side Views. Men in shorts only and Women in shorts and sports bra or bikini top. (we can do this at the facility for you if you’d like)
• You must submit a weekly food log here.
• You must take 3 ‘after’ pictures within 2 days of the challenge finishing. (same 3 profiles)
• Coaches will pick the final 5 men and 5 women who’s body composition changed the most based on pictures only.
• All challenge participants then vote on the top 10 to determine the winners.
• The pot from the buy-ins will be divided for the 2 winners (50% to male winner, 50% to female winner)
• The runner-up for men and women will receive a free WOD Log book from CrossFit Edmonton

All those who participate in the Paleo Challenge will be given a password for the Paleo Challenge Food Logs post. The Password will be given once the buy-in is paid. Full details of Paleo eating are provided on that post.

CrossFit Edmonton would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

As a Reminder, the holiday hours this season are:

Christmas Hours:
Thursday Dec. 24th – 9am, and 10am classes only.
Friday Dec. 25th – Closed.
Saturday Dec. 26th – Closed.

New Years Hours:
Thursday Dec. 31st – 9am, and 10am classes only.
Friday Jan. 1st – Closed.

All other days around those listed above are running regularly scheduled classes.  You can also find the Holiday Schedule on our Schedule Page.

We will resume posting on on the website Monday January 4th ready for some exciting progress in the New Year!

A few highlights from the CrossFit Edmonton Christmas Party…

I’ve had a few comments from some of our members and think it’s time to officially establish a new courtesy rule at CrossFit Edmonton. It comes in regard to putting your weights away after the workouts.

We have an amazing community of people who are very courteous and ALWAYS put their weights away after their workout is finished. So courteous in fact that they’ll start to put the weights away IMMEDIATELY after they finishing the WOD. I’d like to change the focus of courtesy away from the facilities cleanliness and put it towards your fellow Crossfitter.

If you’ve ever been one of the lucky souls to be finishing last in a workout, you know what it feels like when everyone is cleaning up around you and you’re still struggling to workout. It just straight sucks! If you haven’t had this luck, then please take my word and know that it’s not only annoying but deflating of your intensity to finish.

So, from this date forward I’d like to establish a rule of WAITING to put your weights away until EVERYONE IS FINISHED. If you’re so fast a feel you need something to do, take that opportunity to provide encouragement for your fellow Crossfitter and help them finish rather than trying to clean up around them.

This is our official rule enforcer!

If you’re the type of person who’s interested in the CrossFit Community that extends around the world, then you probably know that each year CrossFit  holds it’s own Games to find the fittest man and fittest woman on earth. July of 2009 was the 3rd year of this event, and each year it has grown exponentially. The CrossFit Journal is releasing full video of each of the 8 events these athletes competed in online. You can easily download these videos and watch the games unfold. The first event was a 7K run and is free for anyone to view. If you’d like to see the rest of the events you can subscribe for only $25 per year. Well worth it in our minds.

You can download the first event here in HD, Windows Media and Quicktime versions.

Deadlift (event 2) at the 2009 CrossFit Games.
(photo courtesy of CrossFit.com)

Sorry for the delayed post today…

But just wanted to send out  a big thank you to all of our members who came out for the 2009 CrossFit Christmas party. It definitely lived up to tradition as the ‘party of the year’ with copious amounts of food, fun and photos! I now have to sort through 232 photos to see what might possibly be website worthy… I wouldn’t hold your breath for many though

Just a friendly reminder of the high-jinx from last years Christmas party.

Our CrossFit Edmonton Log books are now in. We only ordered 50 and over half were gone within the first day. Make sure you get yours soon! The benefits of using the log book include:

1) Monthly outline for summary of workouts and quick comparisons (6 months)
2) 2 Days per page for plenty of room for WOD/food logging
3) Ability to track sleep, fatigue and stress levels each day
4) Collected results for easy logging of all strength lifts and benchmarks
5) Percentage break downs for quick calculations on percentage based lifts

These are just a few of the advantages but as the people who already have theirs have noticed, they will be a great tool for all your fitness logging.

**A reminder that our CrossFit Christmas party is tonight starting around 7pm. All members are welcome. It’s a great opportunity to meet and socialize with many of the members you may not normally see in your classes. Directions are available at the facility or by emailing us.

Lisa and Karen rockin out some kipping pull ups

The following excerpt is from CrossFit Coastal.

If you don’t check your ego when you first come through our doors, one of two things will happen.

1. Your ego will go.

2. You will go.

In order to be successful at CrossFit Coastal, you need to develop a balance of confidence, strength and humility.

You must approach each class with the attitude that you are on a mission to achieve your goals. Sometimes, however, you might fall short of that goal for the day and that is when you will be faced with a choice…

You can point fingers at some external factor that caused a poor performance, beat yourselves up for not being good enough, or you might go as far as cheating (reps or range of motion).

… or we can accept our performance for what it is, evaluate it, readjust if necessary and continue on our journey to elite fitness.

If we check our ego at the door when we walk into the gym, the latter is much easier to do. We understand that letting go of that ego is a hard thing to do sometimes, especially when you have an established perception or identity of who you are or how strong you think you are. Our advice – approach each class as a sponge eager to learn – not to impress.

You know…sometimes you might not get that personal record you’ve been trying to achieve, sometimes you won’t come in first place, sometimes you’ll have to scale down the workout, sometimes you’ll have to sit out in the middle of a workout, and one day you might even be tempted to miscount a rep. when that day comes…Take a deep breath and remind yourself to “Check your ego at the door and take the time to achieve mastery.”

Sincerely,
Ezekiel

I know we’ve all had an ‘ego moment’ at some point in our CrossFitting career. Are you humble enough to share yours? Post thoughts to comments.

Yoga

Our last yoga class of the year is this Thursday night. If you haven’t tried it yet, drop ins are welcome. Yoga will be resuming in mid January so stay tuned for details on that.

Christmas Party

This Saturday the 19th is our annual CrossFit Edmonton Christmas party. It starts around 7pm and is potluck themed so bring a treat. Directions are available at the gym or you can email us if you won’t be in before then.

Log Books

We apologies for the delay in receiving our log books but they have been shipped and should be here any day. I’m hoping by the end of the week. Approximately half have been spoken for already so if you want one please let us know.

December 50/50 challenge

If you measured for the challenge this month, please make sure you pay your $10 buy in. We want to make sure we have all the cash ready by months end for our winner.

6pm class enjoying some man-makers.

In case you didn’t already know, and based off some questions from yesterdays post, CrossFit Edmonton also offers personal training. It also comes in two separate forms:

1) General 0ne-on-one personal training for all fitness levels who want the benefits of CrossFit and a Coach with an individualized focus. Whether beginner or advanced we can fast track your progress based on your personal needs.

2) Technique sessions. These are more for the seasoned Crossfitter. You’ve been doing CrossFit for some time but still have those one or two movements that you just can’t get yet. Maybe you even have more but you just want to shorten the list! Cleans, Jerks, Muscle Ups, Handstands, Snatch… All things that many have already taken advantage of this session for.

If you or someone you know would be interested in either of these options, please email us to set up your personalized appointment.

Ooops… the proper order of these pictures.

CrossFit Edmonton is now offering a new service called Program Design. These are individualized programs for 4 or 6 week periods. The ideal candidates for a Program Design are those who follow CrossFit already at home or at another facility but are looking to take it to a new level. They need something that will focus on their specific needs and give them an opportunity for some one-on-one coaching that they wouldn’t receive otherwise.

Another ideal client is someone looking to get into CrossFit because they need something different. They’ve been working out on their own for years, manage quite well on their own, but need something new to get them back on track. They already have a gym membership and you know they’re just going through the motions still doing bicep curls and tricep kick backs! A Program Design can get them introduced to CrossFit with an individualized approach without being intimidated by our classes full of amazing athletes.

Do you know anyone that fits these categories or can benefit from a Program Desing? If so, get them to call or email us for a free 30 minute fitness assessment.

Aaron digging out of a 170lb ring dip! (click image to enlarge)

This years Holiday Hours are as follows:

Christmas Hours:
Thursday Dec. 24th – 9am, and 10am classes only.
Friday Dec. 25th – Closed.
Saturday Dec. 26th – Closed.

New Years Hours:
Thursday Dec. 31st – 9am, and 10am classes only.
Friday Jan. 1st – Closed.

All other days around those listed above are running regularly scheduled classes.  You can also find the Holiday Schedule on our Schedule Page.

**A note to anyone coming in for training these next couple days. With this incredible cold snap, the gym isn’t holding heat very well. Please bring decent clothing as it is only 10-15C in the facility when it’s -30 out.

Apparently Mamas class is forming a Band!

Since we are nearing the half way point of December I thought I’d send out a reminder to our participants of this months 50/50 fitness challenge. We have approximately 28 people who have signed up and have their starting numbers. That means that the winner (most improved flexibility) will get approximately $140. Not bad just for getting more flexible! With that being said, keep stretching! It’s very important to take the time after every workout while the muscles are warm if you really want to see improvement. If you need help with figuring out what to do, please ask any of your coaches.

Can any one spot the ‘hissing cobra’…? NOT a recommended technique by the way.

In the spirit of working on weakness and upcoming challenges, qualifiers, regionals and games we’d like to know what your weakness (aka. Goat) is. It’s an important part of an athletes training that all coaches try and help them to overcome. When it comes to putting in your own effort to strengthen your goats, where do you stand? Do you run from it or attack it head on? What’s been your experiences with your goats and maybe offer some insight to help others pass that hurdle.

Post thoughts to comments.

Is this one of your goats like it is mine???