Comments on: We’re not in a cult!!! … are we?

By: Bruce

Bruce — Wed, 19 May 2010 15:04:42 +0000

Parker,
I recall your posts on the board and I don’t think that anyone will argue that you were polite – except perhaps that politeness goes out the window with persistent insistence. However, you would be foolish to deny that the comments section of the WOD was a poor place to discuss the matter. The purpose of that section of the site is to archive results of a WOD so that it can be referenced at a later time. If you are being censored, its because of your misuse.

Longevity in fitness is really quite an elusive thing. If you run marathons, you will have bad knees when you get older. You don’t see people that coach boxing in a boxing match, frequently because they were injured at some point in their career – or because the goals that they were setting out to meet in their training faded away with time.

You keep on pointing to Glassman as the poster child for doing CrossFit long term and using this one statistical outlier as the basis of your entire argument. I disagree with your rationale. Glassman is what – 53 years old? You can’t exactly expect him to be the worlds pinnacle of fitness – despite the success of his program.

The big problem with your rationale is that it takes almost no factors into consideration except that Glassman has been practicing CrossFit principles for longer than anyone else.

Let’s take a track athlete for instance. Most people who compete in the same event on a high school track team are going to participate in roughly the same training regimen. However, you are going to have some athletes that are more successful than others. Your success in fitness is not 100% determined by the training regimen you follow. There are other considerations to factor in:
1) Genetics
2) How frequently does the athlete follow the program?
3) To what intensity does the athlete train?

In the Army, we use the FITT approach to fitness: Frequency, Intensity, Type, Time. Each of these 4 factors are components of the end result. It’s not as simple as “Who has been in the Army the longest?” to determine the most fit person in the room – as you will likely find that the two questions produce very different answers.

And also, to what standard do you judge fitness? Are you calling Glassman unfit based on comparison to other (younger) CrossFit athletes? Are you comparing him to olympians? Average people? Average people his age? You have not quantified what you consider to be fit and neither have you quantified his level of fitness. You have simply made claims that he is unfit.

Beyond that, I have been to a CrossFit gym twice – once to check it out and again to actually work out. While speaking with the owner of the gym, we talked about how he is drastically fallen out of shape since starting the gym – because it is much harder to stay on a strict regimen when you are running a business. I think this pertains to Glassman on much larger scale. So back to my factors of fitness –
I think we can agree that his age plays a factor into the role his genetics play. Sure, he may have been a great athlete at one point in time – but people deteriorate as they age – so his fitness is going to deteriorate with age.
I think we can also agree that being a trainer does not necessarily mean you are fit. In fact, I think it should be easy for a trainer to make their students more fit than they themselves are. Half of the reason for this is competition. Glassman no longer competes. Competition is one of the elements of any elite athlete – it makes you better.
This leads me into my next factor – intensity, which has undoubtedly decreased for Glassman as he is no longer competing which is where the most intense physical activity occurs.

Now, personally I am not an avid CrossFitter. I do follow the WOD from time to time and I do recommend elements of the fitness technique to anyone who is trying to improve their fitness – it is built on sound principles, combining the the best principles of every successful training regimen. I myself like to think of CrossFit.com as kind of a Fight Club organization. It’s interesting that so many people will simply “do as told” on such a large scale. Kind of interesting to see the discipline in my opinon – and really not scary like some other cults such as the Church (the world’s religious organizations are the largest of the slave nations) as the goal is basically of self improvement.

Anyway, I’m wandering now – I guess I would like to see you clean up your argument before continuing:
To what degree is Glassman “unfit”?
How exactly is his state of unfit relevant.

Rather than posting a largely irrelevant post, please organize your argument in such a manner that someone can intelligently respond – I’d be happy to do so as a more or less neutral party.

By: Billy

Billy — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 19:42:18 +0000

It isn’t Greg Glassman himself that gets people bothered, it is his bullshit claims that he makes, often.

For example, he talks about infinite scalability, we see Kyle Maynard working out, No Excuses CrossFit, etc., yet Glassman apparently does not work out. A little contradictory.

Oh, Greg Glassman also said Dan John has no squat. This is Dan John we’re talking about. Does Greg Glassman have ANY squat?

By: Thor Holt

Thor Holt — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 13:39:47 +0000

Wow, This Mr Glassman certainly gets people hot and angry…

As a Personal Trainer of 15 years who’s looked into and tried many methods and paths… I feel a little sympathy for Glassman as he could be injured + demotivated or just has an eating and drink problem for all we know… we all have our own demons don’t we?

As to the $1000 which seems to piss you guys off, well that’s about £650 in my money and for that you would only get about fifteen 45 minute sessions with me

However, I do admit to being more than a little sad to find footage of a non adonis like Glassman, when researching Cross fit ( Because someone has challenged me to their How Fit Are You test in June)

Think I will go and start a cult of my own now… at least when people find my footage my belly ain’t hanging over my belt (YET

By: Billy

Billy — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:48:14 +0000

He apparently was a gymnast before precise sports record keeping was invented, because there is apparently no record of his awesome accomplishments anywhere.

By: Parker

Parker — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 05:37:26 +0000

I’m disappointed Nathan didn’t respond to my post. Although, I will point out that Nathan seems to be more familiar and involved with CF than he lets on. For example, he said that the WOD comments section was for stating times only. That may be true to an extent, but plenty of posts aren’t related to the WOD, and besides my post was made on a rest day, so there goes that argument. I wasn’t misusing anything.
Longevity isn’t elusive, actually. Although it is in high injury activities like boxing. Longevity is elusive in CF, sure. But if one trains intelligently, you can get all of the health benefits of sports training without any problems (like, say, getting your head bashed in by another human). I again point to Jack LaLanne, Art DeVany.
Again, I do not agree that it is ok for a trainer to be out of shape. A coach, sure, but not a trainer whose purpose in life is to make people healthier. As opposed to a coach, whose purpose in life is to make people win a particular competition-and doesnt give a damn about longevity and health. Boxing is a good example.
I believe fitness deteriorates with age, but the rate and speed of that deterioration can be drastically different. I think CF, because it can be so injurious, speeds up fitness deterioration via incapacitation. There are superior programs out there, again, Art Devany, Jack LaLanne, etc.
As far as Glassman not competing, his own words contradict that. he said in his flaming of Josh Hillis that he was the original crossfitter, and at 49 he could still beat the majority of CF’ers. Sounds like fightin words to me.
When all is said and done, I can’t convince anyone of anything, but I can attempt to show the inner contradictions of CF logic. When you add up the outrageous price of CF, the high injury rate, the silly cult mindset, the slowing and weakening of the body as I experienced it, and Greg Glassman’s awful personality and treatment of his own clients, I’d recommend that people just do sprints on their own, learn the olympic lifts somewhere much cheaper, and stick with what really works long term.
Also, meatgrinder, you said you were gonna post the emails CF’ers sent you. Post them!

By: buck

buck — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:59:36 +0000

With regard to #2, a long time ago on the @fit forum, someone asked about Coach’s injury, (knee?), and that person was shouted down for trying to cause trouble. IIRC, that person was subsequently banned for violating various and sundry rules.

I think the @fit founder had a background in gymnastics, and the injury might have happened from that.

By: Parker

Parker — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:58:08 +0000

Will someone please explain what @fit means? I’ve never seen that. Also, regarding the physics, my point was that CF (or apparently @fit) claims empericism but does not publish numbers. If you are increasing work capacity through your workouts, then publish that work capacity increase. Also, I would like to point out that my original 4 questions have yet to be responded to intelligently. Those are:
1. Why my post was deleted (a link to the cultfit article)
2. Why Greg Glassman is unfit (IT MATTERS)
3. The Multi-Level Marketing nature of CrossFit
4. The lack of “super-wellness” aka fitness hard data (i.e. biological markers-cholesterol, etc.) to support Greg’s claims, despite constantly harping on empiricism.

By: MEATGRINDER

MEATGRINDER — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:55:47 +0000

Ouch! Sharp points… wish I had made them.

-M

By: MEATGRINDER

MEATGRINDER — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:52:16 +0000

Don’t apologize to me for a damn thing. I put these articles up here to inspire discourse not minimize it. If I wanted a mindlessly controlled and marginalized point of view I’d just lurk on the crossfit boards all day or talk to a fucking parrot. Talk about this stuff, speak your mind, write about whatever the fuck else comes into your head. I just read some comments here where people are arguing physics for christ’s sake!? Bottom line, every blank comment field possesses unlimited potential for expression. Use it.

-M

By: Parker

Parker — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:06:37 +0000

Hey Nathan
Thanks for commenting. This is really what I am looking for; a civil discussion on health, fitness, and longevity without any of the emotion surrounding CrossFit. I don’t know where else to go: I tried to post a comment on the message board, twice, but it never showed up. I asked everyone for a link, no one did. But a huge problem with the message board is that you need an account, so not everyone can chime in. That is why I chose the comments section-there are reasons, but in the end it was the only place to pose the questions. I will not deny, now, that it is a terrible place to ask a legit question and expect an intelligent response. Not to mention, I wanted someone representing CF to answer, I didn’t really care to hear xyz’s input. And it would have been great because it would be there for everyone to see, and comment. I was told it was an open forum.
The “greg is a statistical outlier” position is a little much, in my opinion. Greg is the only full bit of “data” to come back on CrossFit’s long-term potential. Its simply the logical conclusion you come to when CF is presented as scientific. He is the only bit of data, so he can’t be an outlier. He is it. The term outlier implies that there are massive amounts of other “data” taken–and there are not. There are alot of people who have CF’d for a few years, sure, but that is not 20+ years. If he is an outlier and I am wrong to base my conclusions based on one person, then CF can’t say that their program is healthy, long term.
You’re exactly right about marathons killing your body. Long distance running is hard on your body, and of course the original marathoner died after completing it, as many others do each year. That is an acute, versus chronic, injury, i suppose. but marathons, as you point out, pose a chronic injury threat to your knees.
Greg being too busy and thus out of shape is a massive problem, as it flies in the face of the CF doctrine of scalability. No, most certainly, he does not have to be “elite.” But his schedule should not inhibit his fitness as CF is “infinitely scalable.” He should simply scale it to meet his needs. Do you see what I mean? Jack LaLanne travels way more than GG, i assume, and is killin it in his 90′s. Also, what good is a fitness program that isn’t practical for successful people?
As far as to what degree is Greg Glassman unfit, that is a great question. I can only go off of what my eyes, from viewing the CF journal, can tell me. CF claims empiricism etc., the whole “super-wellness” idea from the “what is fitness” article, but does not provide any of those empirical markers. So I don’t know to what degree Greg glassman is unfit because he won’t publish his blood panel (cholesterol, tryg., insulin sensitivity, etc.) My eyes don’t deceive me, however, and I can tell you that he is not fit.
It does matter that he is not fit, and it does matter that a trainer be fit. First, it’s hypocritical to preach elite fitness and be out of shape. A child would recognize that. His lack of fitness is a serious problem. It makes me question the durability of CF. I have actually written at great length on this subject on the comments at cf and here, I’ll dig around to find it. But look at Jack Lalanne-he followed his program and is still working out at 94 or thereabouts. The fact that Greg is injured doesn’t disqualify him from the data, he is the data. That, in my opinion, is where CF leads – incapacitation. And that is based on the only relevant data. Who can deny that?