CrossFit Hackney – A goal-based approach

Nobody likes to be told what he or she cannot do.  Nobody likes to be told they’re doing something wrong, but at some point in time we need to start paying attention to ourselves as individuals and stop being sheep…

Some athletes are simply built to squat and others are built to deadlifting, due to their biomechanics and leaver length.  Some athletes are powerful and explosive and good at Olympic lifting, while others have an amazing level of endurance and can go all day.

CrossFit offers a unique form of camaraderie that can be very powerful and motivating.  It brings together people from different backgrounds with individual skills, strengths and weaknesses.  CrossFit has the ability to help everyone achieve their goals and to keep exercise fun.

As you can imagine it’s hard work designing a group exercise program that is suited to the experience, goals and needs of each athlete.  Everyone that walks into Momentum Training has a vast range of personal abilities and training goals.  Over the past couple of years we have tried to implement a levels system at CrossFit Hackney with the best intentions of helping our members follow a training protocol suited to their strength and skill.

Hand a child a musical instrument, persuade them to repeat a passage a few times each week and one morning they will wake up and know it instinctively.   CrossFit is the musical instrument and each individual need countless repetitions to learn and master many of the complex movements.  The athletes who break down the movements into the simplest scales and repeat them a few times each week will quickly build the required strength and skill needed to move onto the more complex movements.

Everyone wants to be able to do “CrossFit the sport” and many try to rush the process without building the required strength and skill.  Most of us need to focus on “Crosfit for health anf fitness” and appreciate that we are not high level CrossFit athletes. Just because these althletes are performing hundereds of kipping movements does not mean we should be following suit. Inefficient repetitions with poor form lead to injury and zero rewards, it take time and patience to master a new skill to a high levels.  Just like learning to play a musical instrument.  With this in mind we have made the decision to move away from the levels, as we don’t feel they can be implemented without dividing the classes and assessing each individual athlete.

“You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.”

In the next phase we will be introducing new training protocols that are designed to meet the needs of our large and varied community.  Each training protocol has a goal-based approach that is designed to improve our members’ health and performance in a way that is most meaningful to them. While not as targeted as an individual program we believe that these protocols will offer everyone the best benefits of CrossFit.

A goal-based training approach

Fitness (70% of our membership):

The fitness protocol is designed for athletes who are using CrossFit to promote and enhance their health and fitness goals.  These athletes are not here to win medals; they are here to improve their strength, body composition, cardiovascular fitness and overall health markers.  Fitness athletes will be exposed to a wide variety of movements with a focus on correct mechanics, movement quality, and muscle strength and endurance.

The fitness protocol will be designed to follow the best training principles to:

• Loose weight
• Build lean muscle mass
• Burn body fat and get lean
• Improve flexibility to restore joint mobility and function
• Improve muscle endurance and overall strength levels
• Improve aerobic fitness

Athletes with these goals will get the best results following this protocol over the performance or competition protocol.

Recommended Fitness Classes: CrossFit, CrossFit Engineering, Met-Con, Barbell Club, Movement

Performance (25% of our membership):

The performance protocol is designed for athletes who are using CrossFit to improve their sports performance.  These athletes are training to complete in local CrossFit competitions or other sports (football, running, triathlon, rugby, martial arts, etc….).  The performance protocol will include a greater degree of intensity and complexity with increased exposure to strength and conditioning principles.  Athletes taking part in the performance protocol will be required to record their training numbers, know their percentages and be wanting to take their fitness to the next level.

The performance protocol will be designed to follow training principles to:

• Improve relative strength
• Increase explosive power and speed
• Improve resilience / injury prevention / structural balance
• Build and maintain lean muscle mass
• Improve aerobic fitness
• Improve anaerobic fitness

Recommended Performance Classes: CrossFit, Met-Con, Barbell Club, Movement, Heavy Met-con

Competition (5% of our membership):

The competition protocol is designed for athletes who are using CrossFit to compete in CrossFit competitions. The sport of fitness is one of the fastest growing competitive sports in the world.  As a sport, CrossFit demands high levels of strength, skill, coordination, speed, power and endurance.  The competition protocol is designed to help athletes prepare for elements likely to be contested in the sport of CrossFit.  These athletes must record all their training information, know their strength and weaknesses and be willing to focus on improvements in all aspect of fitness.

The competitors program will be designed to follow training principles to:

• Continued development of absolute strength and relative strength needed to compete in high level CrossFit competitions
• Continued development of explosive power for competitive sports
• Build athlete resilience and structural balance to meet the demands of CrossFit
• CrossFit gymnastic elements for competition preperation
• Building a high level of aerobic fitness for the sport of CrossFit
• Building a high level of anaerobic fitness both lactic and alactic specifically for the sport of CrossFit

Recommended Competitor Classes: CrossFit, CrossFit Weapons, Heavy Met-con