CrossFit Makes You Athletic? Here’s Why That’s a Lie (And Why It Still Matters)

CrossFit is beautiful in the simplicity of its application. People all over the world, at some point in their busy days, head to their affiliate, garage, or park to do the Workout of the Day. On their own, with a group, coached or not, they spend an hour going through a warm-up, the workout, and a cool-down. They may lie down on the ground to recover, but then they go on with their days. Very few post videos of their workout or comment about it on social media. Most CrossFit athletes just quietly go about their business of toiling to be the fittest version of themselves. All this to say, CrossFit gyms and garages are not places of raging controversy, arguing, and posturing.

That is reserved for the internet, where CrossFit squabbles are a great way to garner clicks. Want to boost your clicks and views? Make a video called “The Top 10 Things I Hate About CrossFit” or “CrossFit Lied About (insert here).” While the best strategy is to ignore the clickbait and evaluate CrossFit objectively by the results we get from it, the constant barrage of nonsense puts us on the defensive when our friends and peers challenge us with the latest fake news. 

Currently, there is a debate about whether CrossFit has claimed that work capacity and athleticism are the same thing, so we can claim we build the best athletes. You might not even realize a storm is raging just outside your affiliate doors. It’s entirely possible if you have been going to work, taking your kids to their sports, doing extra mobility work, prepping your meals for the week, helping your neighbor move furniture, mowing the lawn, reading, grabbing a coffee with a friend, or spending 20 minutes in the sauna to relax, that you have missed the big event: fitness vs. athleticism.

At the risk of losing views and clicks while at the same time fanning the flames of the debate and enraging a whole cadre of keyboard warriors, I’ll insert my simple take on this subject. 

CrossFit Forges Elite Fitness

From the beginning, CrossFit has claimed to be nothing more than a general physical preparation (GPP) strength and conditioning program designed to develop a broad, general, and inclusive fitness to prepare us for the known and unknowable. To successfully implement CrossFit means we’ll see an improvement across the 10 General Physical Skills — cardiorespiratory endurance, stamina, flexibility, strength, power, speed, coordination, accuracy, agility, and balance — and our health markers, and we’ll develop the capacity to attack any physical endeavor we choose or life chooses for us. That’s it. Our mission is to produce in our athletes a physically ready state to handle whatever comes their way and make them generally harder to kill. 

What is Athleticism?

CrossFit has very clearly defined fitness. We have not defined athleticism because that’s not our game (pun intended). Borrowing liberally from Google AI, let’s set the parameters that athleticism refers to someone who participates in sports, where there is an emphasis on specific skills and the performance of specific competition elements. To be clear, we’re talking about a golfer driving, chipping, and putting; a tennis player serving, hitting forehands, and placing drop shots; and a basketball player shooting, dribbling, and passing. 

This should not come as a shock to anyone, but just doing CrossFit workouts, or any type of well-structured strength and conditioning program, is not sufficient for developing a high level of skill or athleticism in any sport. 

While a part of athleticism can be considered genetic — some people just move better than others — most of what we consider athleticism comes from hours of skills practice. Michael Jordan’s fade-away jumper, Wayne Gretzky’s slap shot, Tom Brady’s passing, and Tiger Woods’ golf swing were ingrained and refined into examples of athleticism through thousands of hours and repetitions. We must practice our sport to get good at it and demonstrate athleticism.

Why the Debate?

Here’s where things get a little murky. In addition to being a comprehensive general physical preparation strength and conditioning program, CrossFit also produces adaptations that support the development of athleticism and the acquisition of sports skills. This is equivalent to a very positive side effect. For example:

• Back squats develop great leg and hip strength, and midline stability. 
• Cleans and snatches develop powerful hip extension and all of our neurological skills. 
• CrossFit workouts develop capacity across every metabolic pathway in which sports are played. 
• There is a direct link between the relative strength we build with gymnastics movements and performance in sprinting and jumping. 

Am I reversing course here and saying CrossFit does develop sports skills and athleticism? 

No.

CrossFit and strength and conditioning programs, in general, develop and enhance the raw material an athlete needs to mold into the athleticism that displays a sports skill. 

As a young volleyball or basketball player learns their sport, a sound strength and conditioning program allows them to jump a little higher, cut a little sharper, stay balanced in thousands of different positions a little better, and more readily absorb and deliver contact. With these raw ingredients, our basketball player, through thousands of hours of practice, can develop the crossover dribble into the two-foot jump stop, explosive elevation, and quick release from behind the three-point line for a game-winning shot that has people exclaiming, “What an athlete!” 

This player may have been born with some genetic predisposition to moving well on the basketball court, and his work in the weight room enhanced those gifts and improved areas of weakness. However, the ability for any athlete to execute seamless, smooth play on the court or field — athleticism — requires years of toil mastering their sport’s craft. It’s really that simple. 

At CrossFit, we know our wheelhouse. We develop incredible fitness results across a broad range of adaptations. We hold no illusion that we’ll make you better at the specific skills your sport requires other than enhancing the physical tools you bring to practice and giving you the conditioning to practice well and longer. Nevertheless, we are very proud that athletes worldwide use and adapt CrossFit to lay the physical foundation they need to become the best athletes they can be.

About the Author

Stephane Rochet is a Senior Content Writer for CrossFit. He has worked as a Flowmaster on the CrossFit Seminar Staff and has over 15 years of experience as a collegiate/tactical strength and conditioning coach. He is a Certified CrossFit Trainer (CF-L3) and enjoys training athletes in his garage gym.