CrossFit is Great, But Competitive Exercise Is Flawed
If you have 10 min. to burn, watch this entire video.
Actually, you only need about 90 seconds to get an idea what the hell is going on here. For a higher level of entertainment, watch John Travolta and Jaime Lee Curtis get down in a scene from movie called Perfect, which also highlights this phenomenon.
Through the cocaine-fueled 80’s, competitive aerobic competition was a big deal. Essentially, “Aerobics” as a fitness system comprised of a mix of psuedo-dance and exercise to beat heavy synth music. The outfits were…bright.
A product of it’s time, 100%.
When Crystal Light entered the world of Aerobics and decided to sponsor a competition to find the “World’s Fittest Aerobic Athlete,” people were heavily incentivized to become great at Aerobics-as-sport, rather than using it as a tool to improve their quality of life or achieve some greater aspiration.
See a similarity here?
Scratch out Crystal Light (I guess sugar-free flavored drinks were a real big thing in the 80’s), and replace it with Reebok. Change Fittest Aerobic Athlete to Fittest on Earth and voilá.
Then, look down the road 30 years, and you have the same easy-to-spoof, self-serious-hilarity with the CrossFit Games as you do now, 30 years on, with The Aerobic Championship.
Training is at its best when it is a means to an end. When exercise becomes the end, the path of its usefulness narrows. Training primarily breaks down fundamental movements of athleticism into component parts, not just to get better at the exercises themselves, but rather to learn to piece together those component parts creatively and spontaneously outdoors, in a game, or playing with your kids on a leisurely Sunday afternoon.
Separately, training is great as a release from the grind and rat race of a competitive work environment. When done as competition only as well, exercise becomes just another stressor on your overtaxed endocrine system. Rather than functioning as a release, it piles on more stress. Insidiously, and over time, injury creeps in and obstructs your ability to benefit from the health and physical benefits of exercise.
We’d rather avoid these traps for you – our athlete – and focus on the function of exercise outside the gym. Don’t have an outside activity? Keep your ear to the ground, the world is full of leagues, clubs, and activities. Find something you love and train for it.
I’m not sure who re-mixed this version but the video quality is much higher than the other ones with the real music. Enjoy.
– Coach
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