CrossFit

My Story: How I Started Paleo and CrossFit

My initiation into CrossFit was probably not a typical one. My husband, nephew, and several of our friends had been crossfitting at a powerlifting gym for a couple of years. Every evening I was inundated with lingo that I didn’t understand: WODs, AMRAPs, PRs, toes-to-bar, double-unders…many of you can relate, I’m sure. One day, my nephew Alex, who was living with us at the time, suggested that we try this “paleo diet” he had been reading about. As the family chef, I was game. After doing my own crash course on paleo and primal lifestyles and their health benefits, we went all in.

Almost immediately, I experienced:

Increased energy level
Elimination of osteoarthritis pain in my fingers and knees
Elimination of plantar fasciitis symptoms
Better, sounder sleep

Now remember, I wasn’t yet CrossFitting. I was a regular at the barbell classes at my local globo gym, but it was getting a little boring. Soon, not one, but TWO CrossFit gyms opened close to home. CrossFit Carbon opened first—and Dave and Alex quickly joined. I heard them talk about their WODs each day, and it totally freaked me out. But not long after, CrossFit Freedom opened about a half mile from home. I could WALK to my workouts AND cut at least an hour in commute time by switching from my globo gym. How could I say no?

So now I proudly go to both CrossFit Freedom and CrossFit Carbon. My brother-in-law Greg Major owns Bulldog CrossFit—and my sister, Michelle, CrossFits, too! You should just sit at our dinner table sometimes and hear our conversations. They are pretty hysterical—all paleo and CrossFit. But as they say, “A family that CrossFits together stays together.”

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World-Class Fitness In 100 Words

Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and NO sugar. Keep intake to levels that will support exercise but not body fat. Practice and train major lifts: deadlift, clean, squat, presses, C&J, and snatch. Similarly, master the basics of gymnastics:pull-ups, dips, rope climb, push-ups, sit-ups, presses to handstands, pirouettes, flips, splits, and holds. Bike, run, swim, row, etc, hard and fast. Five or six days per week mix these elements in as many combinations and patterns as creativity will allow. ROUTINE IS THE ENEMY. Keep workouts short and intense. Regularly learn and play new sports.
—Greg Glassman, Coach