» Sport: Always Picked Last
Andrea Fox gets a bit hot and bothered but not very cross at CrossFit
America. It’s given us so much. Oreos for a start! And now a tough new way to burn them off called CrossFit. If getting fit is literally making you cross then you might like the fact that during an hour at CrossFit you will probably only be working your butt off for 20 minutes. I was hard at it for a mere seven minutes. But it left my legs so tired I couldn’t jump off the ground.
The idea is that just running or weight training isn’t going to give you overall fitness and that the best thing to do is act like a triathlete and mix up your sessions. Gymnastics, weight training and cardio are all involved in the nine different moves used in the session, to really work the body with tough tasks that constantly change.
Originating in the US, there are now 35 CrossFit centres in the UK. Miles at the Hove branch is one of many in the country now. He began by running a gym upstairs at his family’s pub, two very different activities that should never be mixed. He’s a man who believes in Cross Fit so much, he and his wife even went to a CrossFit conference on their honeymoon. Must be good then!
My first one-to-one session started with squats. Not just any old squat, the CrossFit kind, which Miles said I was very good at. In hindsight, I think he was just giving me a confidence boost for the next task: more squats, which led into standing up and throwing a football weighted with sand, eight foot up a wall. Oh yeah, I could do it alright, but then I had to do 10 more, then 10 box jumps. I must have been tired already as I had to ask what a box jump was? “Jumping on a box.” Two minutes of rowing followed. It felt tough, but achievable.
“I felt like a Dalek, stairs were my enemy”
According to Miles, CrossFit can adapt to any level of fitness. You adjust the weights and sets until you’re strong enough to step it up. There are CrossFit sessions that are open to kids as young as 3 years old but I imagine they have more bright colours and games involved, and I doubt they use weights.
I felt okay after trying out the sequence. It was the next two days that really killed. The CrossFit squat takes it out on your thighs during the session, and then reminds you of the pain tenfold the next day. I felt like a Dalek, stairs were my enemy.
Be warned, though, Miles also offers nutritional advice and will try and get you to give up cheese. I’m just not ready to put the Cheddar down yet.
