Explainer | What is CrossFit, and who invented it? History of the Open, the Games, and former chiefs Dave Castro and Greg Glassman
- Here’s everything you need to know about, CrossFit, a sport of unpredictable fitness exercises based around functional movements
- It was invented by Greg Glassman, who later sold the company after fallout from a controversial tweet
CrossFit has been rapidly growing in popularity for years, and the sport now has thousands of athletes competing, and even more followers.
The annual CrossFit Games showpiece attracts thousands of live fans with millions watching online, while there are several high-profile CrossFit documentaries on Netflix, with top athletes garnering celebrity status.
What is CrossFit?
CrossFit is a fitness regime that relies on varied movements. The idea is to prepare participants for the many varied movements of everyday life (as opposed to a conventional body building regime that repeats specific movements like bicep curls).
To achieve this, CrossFit trains all different fitness systems – strength, power, cardiovascular, flexibility and mobility, anaerobic and aerobic systems. Therefore, the exercises can be almost anything.
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Generally, they are full-body exercises, such as burpees or the rowing machine. They are functional movements, which means they replicate real-life movements, such as squats. And they are often compound or Olympic weight movements, like dead lifts or cleans.
A common misconception is that CrossFit will make you “bulky”. It can, but that would require an incredible amount of dedication. Doing CrossFit will make you healthy, fit and injury resilient (if done properly), just like many other exercise regimes.
CrossFit has morphed from an exercise regime into a sport, and the best CrossFitters now compete against each other.
The ethos of preparing you for life through varied exercises is extended to the sport by keeping the exercises a surprise until the last second.
Athletes are given little warning as to what is coming, and can compete in anything from a maximum weight lift to a 40-minute swim. There are sprints, weights, circuits, rowing, swimming, cycling, handstand races and almost anything else you can imagine.
There are several annual competitions such as the Rogue Invitationals and Dubai Crossfit Championship, with hundreds of thousands of dollars in prize money.
The two biggest competitions are The Open and The Games, hosted by CrossFit Inc itself.
What is the CrossFit Open?
The CrossFit Open is an online competition. CrossFit release a workout and participants have a week to complete and upload their score. It is open to everyone and has hundreds of thousands of participants (415,000 in 2018, for example).
If the athletes want to compete at the top, they need to record their workout and/or have an official judge on site to verify their workout.
The first CrossFit Open was in 2011. The Open has had many iterations over the years and all have been a way to qualify for the CrossFit Games in one shape or another.
The current format is three weeks long and the top 10 per cent of athletes on each continent progress to the quarter-finals, the first step to making it to the CrossFit Games.
What are the CrossFit Games?
The Games are the annual pinnacle of the CrossFit sport, and the winners are crowned the “Fittest Man and Woman on Earth”.
They attract thousands of spectators every August to host city Madison, Wisconsin, and the prize money is over US$300,000 for the overall winner and US$3,000 per event winner.
The athletes have no idea what each workout will be until just before it starts. Over the years, they have been asked to climb ropes, swim long distances, flip huge unwieldy weights, do handstand races, complete one rep maximum weight lifts and almost anything else you can dream up.
The first CrossFit Games were in 2007 held at former director Dave Castro’s ranch in California, and were open to everyone who wanted to enter.
By 2009, organisers had introduced a qualification process, and by 2010 they had moved from the ranch to a venue in Carson, California to accommodate the growing number of participants and fans.
Who invented CrossFit?
CrossFit is the brain child of former CEO Greg Glassman and Lauren Jenai, incorporated into a company in 2000 – though there has been a variation, “Cross-Fit”, around since 1996. The number of affiliated gyms, known as “boxes”, steadily grew, and there were over 10 in just a few years.
In 2021, there were around 10,000 CrossFit boxes worldwide.
The initial concept has stayed consistent since the early days – varied functional workouts.
Castro is also synonymous with the brand. He created the CrossFit Games in 2007 and is the mastermind behind its growth and each of its workouts.
Neither Castro nor Glassman are still part of the brand.
An apology from Glassman was not enough. The tweet opened a floodgate of accusations against Glassman, and claims he fostered a culture of sexism in the workplace, as well as leaked audio of him spouting conspiracy theories.
He stood down as CEO and Castro took over. But Glassman still owned the company, so for many it was not enough.
