35 results for "TuffWraps Guest Writer"
Now well into the month of December, it seems as though the holidays are in full swing. Perhaps you’ve been to a holiday party or two and maybe skipped a workout or two, and as you’ve gotten busier and busier and as you get busier and busier, you relish in the idea that in just a few weeks, you’ll be jetting off to a relaxing vacation away from the your everyday stressors.
It’s that time of year again! No, it’s not Christmas…it’s time for the CrossFit Opens! The annual five-week long competition that draws together athletes from around the world to compete and support each other and set a benchmark for the year to come. But what is the CrossFit Open exactly? Who is it for? And why should you sign up? Hopefully we’ll be able to answer all those questions today.
In this third and final part we will take a look at some rehydration strategies and methods to keep athletes hydrated and performing effectively. As it was previously discussed a decrease in just 2% total body water can have a negative impact on physical performance, and if we think about exercising and how much we sweat, it's not hard to imagine how quickly we can lose 2% through respiration and perspiration. So how do we offset that and how do we keep our salts and electrolytes from being t...
Since its founding in 2000 and the inaugural CrossFit Games of 2007, the “Sport of Fitness” has taken the world by storm like no other fitness program has ever done before. From desk jockey to at-home mom to professional athlete, CrossFit has enabled its members to become dramatically more capable in physical feats and athletic prowess through what it preaches as “constantly varied and functional movement.” Executed, of course, at “high intensity” which every CrossFitter has found to be profo...
In order to function properly, our body needs Omega 3 fatty acids, but since it’s unable to produce required quantities by itself we have to take it through food. Omega 3 fatty acids can be primarily found in fish oil, some plant-based sources (walnuts etc.), and krill oil. However, krill oil is usually overlooked even though it has numerous health benefits. In order to find out why krill oil should be your source of much-needed Omega 3 fatty acids keep reading.
FOMO, or the Fear of Missing Out, is a term usually used to describe interactions within social media networks like Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. The feeling can come from missing actual activities with friends (and constantly “checking” social media), or it can come from a broader source, like feeling as if you are missing out on a potential type of life. Social media outlets are great ways to keep in touch with people from your past, but they can cause feelings of jealousy (I want his/he...
This week at CrossFit we were working on finding our one rep max for cleans. I was pretty excited when I successfully completed a rep at 155—a ten pound PR for me—and added five more pounds on for another attempt. I stood at the bar, bent over and ready to go. Then I stood back up. I did this approximately a million more times before finally lifting the bar off the ground. I made it to my waist, and that's as far as it went. It had nothing to do with my physical ability, as I knew I had more ...
Living in an East coast beach town, my box gets quite a few drop-ins, especially during the summer months. Just as gyms have their own rules, commonly known as “box etiquette,” guidelines for drop-ins are just as important. Here are the ten most important things to remember when dropping-in to another box.
More and more athletes are cross training to improve overall performance in their main sport. Some runners may be concerned that heavy strength training can produce too much muscle mass and hinder their speed. However, most studies show no adverse effects on aerobic power from heavy resistance exercise. Kraemer and colleagues reported that women who performed both resistance and aerobic endurance training had greater aerobic development than those who performed aerobic endurance training alon...
The Human body is made up of approximately 60% water* (by weight); water is involved in numerous functions within the body, which are vital for proper physiological functioning. Therefore it should come as no surprise that losses in body water - aka dehydration - can have significant negative effects on our performance (both physical and mental).
Last time I talked (briefly) about the importance of water for proper physiological functioning, how and why we lose water, and what happens when we enter a dehydrated state. This post will pick up where we left off and take a more in depth look at dehydration in athletes, what can happen when it becomes serious and some preventative steps we can take.
In the beginning, CrossFit was fairly simple. Simply show up, do the work and see the results. The mere factor of walking half-heartedly through the door on a Friday evening only to lace up your nanos and put in even a minimal effort would bring about results. You probably PR’d at least once a week in some area or another and the mere completion of a workout was an achievement in itself. Fast forward 6-12 months and the results have started to slow. PR’s have become more spread out and less f...
We’ve all heard of the “seven year itch.” This issue of the “honeymoon phase” being over can happen to our relationship with CrossFit as well. The first year or so is filled with PRs, learning new skills, and discovering an inner athleticism that you never knew you had. Around the eighteen month mark, however, things begin to shift. PRs become less and less frequent (or non-existent). You begin feeling run down, and workouts that used to relieve the stresses of the day actually make it worse....
How many days a week do you RX the wod? Every day? None? Somewhere in between? According to an article on mensfitness.com, to RX a wod "means the athlete performs all modalities using the prescribed weight and reps." My number is typically 4. Four out of 5 wods I do in a week, I can RX. Should I be satisfied with that?
What do Talayna Fortunato, Emily Bridgers, and Camille Leblanc-Bazinet have in common? Aside from the fact that they are incredible CrossFit athletes, all three of them also have a background in competitive gymnastics. Even Greg Glassman, the founder of CrossFit, tumbled his way through his teenage years. As a retired gymnast myself, and someone who has been doing CrossFit for just over a year, I can say without a doubt that my experience with CrossFit would be completely different if I didn’...
Competing is not just for the top most elite athletes. Competing is something anyone who CrossFits can do. They are designed to push people beyond their comfort zone and come in all shapes and sizes. Athletes can compete as individuals, pairs and even teams at various skill levels. There are so many of them that happen throughout the year so really, there is no good reason not to try at least one.
Creatine just might be the worlds most popular supplement, but is it worth its weight? Scientific research and practical results say so. For the performance athlete, creatine is almost unparalleled in efficacy when it comes to short-range bursts of high energy for the power athlete.
You need a day off. Yes, I’m looking at you, person who runs, lifts, does CrossFit twice a day, and then goes to hot yoga 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Rest and recovery is a critical part of training.
A part of the family of gymnastics movements in crossfit, stringing toes to bar are an important benchmark for most crossfitters. While the action of completing one toe to bar can be relatively simple, simply swing your feet up until they hit the bar, stringing multiple toes to bars is when it becomes a real challenge. Luckily, with hard work and persistence, toes to bars can become easy!
Everyone has their own reasons for skipping a workout. Whether you changed careers, got injured, or your personal life went through major changes, you may have missed a WOD or two (or ten) because of it. Though life may get in the way, do your best not to fall into the trap of avoiding the gym because you "can't make it."
Benchmark workouts have been around for what seems like forever. “Girls” like Annie (5040302010 reps of doubleunders and situps), Grace (30 clean and jerks for time), and everyone’s favorite, Fran (21159 of thrusters and pullups) show up on whiteboards all over the CrossFit world and even make their way into competitions like the CrossFit games. These workouts are the truest test of one’s fitness, according to the CrossFit community. They can range from all bodyweight movements, like ...
Although testosterone is generally associated with masculinity, the benefits of this naturally produced hormone are critical for both men and women in a number of ways. Playing a key role in the building of lean muscle mass and strong bones, healthy testosterone levels can guard against osteoporosis, boost athletic performance, increase sexual desire, improve mood, decrease risk of cardiovascular diseases, and much more. Specific to the fitness athlete, however, how can we continue to natural...
CrossFitters are always looking to improve performance by working on weaknesses. (At least that’s what they should be doing.) Rowing is most likely one of them.
Why is rowing a part of CrossFit anyway? The best answer is taken from The CrossFit Journal Articles: “Rowing engages all the major muscles of the body and works multiple joints through a large range of motion in a natural, powerful sequence in a no-impact manner”. That’s what CrossFit is all about – using functional movements to work...
Often times, we become so wrapped up in the score on the board, that we forget that sometimes our scores and weights come not just from what we’ve done in the moment, but also what we’ve done in the hours and days leading up to the workout. But, post workout recovery can get complicated. If you’re not careful, you can quickly become entangled in a complicated web of protein shakes and mobility.
It’s pretty obvious that CrossFitters love a good barbell workout. We love the clanging of the weights as they hit the floor and that feeling you get when you have the perfect hook grip set-up. As athletes, however, we must remember that there is a world outside of the gym! It may be hard to believe, but all of that fitness can prove to be quite beneficial out in the “real world.” We need to do our best to find a balance, for both our mental and physical well-being, of activities both inside ...
Our hips and shoulders get a lot of use in CrossFit, like those of many other people so passionately involved in functional fitness. But due to the greater complexity of the shoulder, they often times get put into overdrive and overuse and as a result, it is not entirely uncommon to hear complaints of shoulder pain or discomfort in the CrossFit community…maybe you have even experienced these frustrations yourself. But it doesn’t have to be this way! These 3 simple tips can help you not only b...
Carbs are the most bullied group on the food pyramid, no thanks to popular diets such as the Atkins and Paleo. Although these regiments have their respective merits, they've also helped construe a dark image of carbohydrates in which dieters have increasingly become fearful of carbohydrates and erroneously come to believe that carbs are what make them fat.
’Tis the season…to get busy and go on vacation, skip workouts and eat unhealthily until you’ve nearly completely undone nearly everything that you’ve done over the past year. But it doesn’t have to be this way. The next several weeks will constitute a 3 part series detailing how to keep up on your workouts and healthy habits over the holiday season. We’ll cover everything from working out away from home to working out at home, as well as keeping your eating in check over this upcoming holiday...
In today’s world, it seems as though everything and anything can be done successfully at home. Computers and the Internet have allowed us to bring our work to our beds, education to our living rooms and now, fitness to our garage.
Somewhere in the back of your gym, behind the jump ropes you love and the rowers you hate and way beyond your beloved steel, chrome, custom Rogue Olympic lifting bar lies a miscellany of odd (and sometimes not so odd) objects, rarely touched by the calloused hand of even the most experienced crossfitter.
So something went awry at the gym today. Maybe you deterred ever so slightly from your form on your deadlift and felt something tweak. Or maybe you woke up this morning and something is feeling just a little more than “sore” from yesterday’s squat session.
It's summer, which means a lot of people are traveling and taking vacations. For a lot of people, vacation doesn't always mean taking time off from the gym—especially when it often DOES mean indulging in foods and drinks outside of their normal diets. It can be difficult to find the time to make it to an actual gym or to find a gym to go to. Here are some suggestions for making your workouts happen, even when you're on the road.
So it’s that time of year again, I call it “Comp” season, it’s the time of year when the sun shines, ok sometimes that part fails to deliver, but in any case it's summer and there are an infinite amount of competitions to enter.
As a CrossFitter who enters competitions, my transition to a more structured approach has been somewhat of interesting journey.
All CrossFitters are innately competitive. Whether you thrive on the feeling of competition at a local, regional, or national level, or you just like to be the first to finish a workout in your class, we all have the competitive “gene.” I believe that it one of the things we all have in common as people who love fitness as a sport, and even though sometimes we do not like to admit it, we all get that urge inside of us to excel when the WOD is posted. What we are reluctant to admit, however, i...
Although the fundamental principles of it have been a part of the bodybuilding community for some time, the unorthodox diet plan known as Carb Back-Loading (CBL) has made a sweeping trend in the fitness community since John Kiefer’s publication of his “Manual for Total Body Fat Control.” CBL has exploded in popularity in recent years and leaves many wondering if CBL is just another fad and more importantly, if it actually works in transforming body composition and increasing performance. This...
