As a Masters swimmer, I have the flexibility to change-up my training and essentially do whatever I want whenever I want, which makes swimming a joy most of the time. To supplement what I’m doing in the pool, I often hit the gym.
Just over a year ago I entered the CrossFit world to spice things up and I learned several important things along the last 12 months.
Throughout the chronicling of my CrossFit experience, I was hit with all kinds of reader comments, from the rational feedback to the ‘I hate CrossFit no matter what’-type hysterics.
Here is what I gleaned from my swimmer-goes-CrossFitting experience as I now step away from ‘the box’.
As a refresher, here are my previous swimmer-does-CrossFit posts to give you background:
#1 – Gym Fatigue Carried into the Pool
Reader Comment: “This new fangled Crossfit thing has hurt a bunch of kids. My daughter hurt her shoulder. I say just be careful and protect your body!!!”
In CrossFit‘s defense, I am solidly on the swammer end of the ‘in-swimmer-shape’ spectrum. My age dictates I take recovery seriously and adhere to the signs my body relays to me when I push things too far.
As such, my usual week of hitting CrossFit at least 4 times followed by swimming workouts took its toll, where I wound up not being able to give my full effort in either and both wound up suffering.
#2 – Non-Specific Strength Got Old
Reader Comment: “But I eventually realized that doing random stuff for time doesn’t train you for anything specific.”
Although I saw a direct translation of certain CrossFit moves or elements to improved mechanics in the pool, we simply didn’t perform those particular exercises often enough to maximize that translation.
CrossFit prides itself on being varied and avoiding muscle memory, which I found prevented me from building on the specific movements I found were most helpful to my training in the pool.
#3 – Increase in Strength Comprised Mobility
Reader Comment: “Matt Fraser [American professional CrossFit athlete] is not similar to any elite swimmer.”
I’ve lifted weights in some form or fashion my entire adult life, but I’d never performed Olympic lifts before I joined CrossFit. Also, I’d never lifted as heavy as I did when in the CrossFit gym. Over the course of my CrossFit year my overall strength improved in leaps and bounds, to the point where I had to shop for new clothes since my body was changing, especially in the shoulders and arms.
However, I found my new ‘big guns’ more restrictive in the pool. My mobility in the water definitely took a hit. I wound up feeling that my blending in aesthetically with the other members of the CrossFit gym wasn’t worth not being able to maintain swimming staples, such as a high elbow recovery in freestyle.
#4 – Reduction in Quality of Pool Training
Reader Comment: “CrossFit is good and all, but my shoulders hated it. Had to give it up.”
I didn’t suffer any performance-impacting injuries, but my body was indeed sore and tired literally all the time. I would wake up stiff and achy and go to bed the same way.
I wound up using my swimming workouts as a form of recovery from CrossFit WODs instead of using the pool as my primary form of exercise. I didn’t like that feeling that I was shortchanging what I loved to do the most.
#5 – Overwhelming Lifestyle
Reader Comment: “CrossFit: The Scientology of Fitness”
What I had heard about CrossFit wound up being very true at my particular box. Gym-goers form a very close community that can both be welcoming, but also extremely CrossFit-centric. I wound up living and breathing CrossFit and began to realize that every conversation or communication I had with my workout buddies revolved solely around CrossFit.
My experience confirmed I need to have more of a well-rounded mentality when approaching working out. When I meet fellow swimmers at the pool, the last thing we talk about is swimming. Yes, we happen to be swimming, but we chat on family life, we gripe about work and we trade weekend plans.
Do I miss CrossFit since I’ve stepped away? Honestly, not really. I still get my weight-lifting fix in on my own terms, on my own time, with the ability to do the gym stuff that best benefits what I’m doing in the pool. My body doesn’t miss feeling fatigued all the time and the quality of my swimming workouts is getting back to where it was pre-CrossFit.
The experience simply reinforced the fact that I’m a swimmer, first and foremost and that’s how I want it to be.
I have to tell you I think I found the perfect compromise! I take a CrossFit class at our local community college. Sets and specific exercises are similar (if not exactly the same) to CrossFit. However, the big difference is that nothing is timed. We don’t record it, we just do it. You can rest as much as you want whenever you want to. Doing things quickly lead to shortcuts and poor technique. Doing it slowly I feel like I’m getting all the strength with minimal risk. My instructor has a Masters in Kinesiology, and is not just someone who’s lived in the CrossFit gym for years.
This article is an opinion of a “swammer” (former swimmer) not based on any studies and a small sample size. One size doesn’t fit all. As a DI athlete and Olympic trial qualifier I did CrossFit and it gave me an edge in preparation for college.
I heard Eddie does cartwheels and handstands exclusively for weight and dryland training
It seems that if we could somehow combine the benefits that many have admitted a CrossFit type methodology could bring with the discernment that most swim coaches have with regard to safe practices we could actually come up with a pretty effective program for training athletes of all ages and abilities.
I wish swim coaches weren’t so close minded.
Any exercise regime that looks at rhabdomyolosis almost as a badge of honor (and even has an unofficial mascot named Uncle Rhabdo) doesn’t sound like a healthy place to improve your fitness. Additionally, my friends who are orthopedic surgeons have warned me against it and say that Crossfit is in large part why their business is booming.
I haven’t seen “Uncle Rhabdo” used in years – and never in an CF gym I’ve been to.
>Crossfit is in large part why their business is booming.
Don’t forget trampolines – orthopedic surgeons love them.
And Mudruns are good for a couple tib-fib fractures
Never seen it at my box in 6 years and that condition is one that some authors just regurgitate because they saw it somewhere else. Actually, rhabdo can happen in any intense training or sport.
How do you know someone does Crossfit? They’ll tell you.
Drawing from my firsthand experience with both groups, I’d say adult/Masters swimmers are at least as likely to bring up their hobby as CrossFitters.
As a Masters swimmer, I disagree with you.
Touche!
People like talking about their hobbies, that’s okay. Just as long as they aren’t trying to sell me anything
This is just one persons take. I hadn’t swim in twenty years before I recently decided to give it a try again. I had been doing CrossFit for two and a half years before I went back to swimming. When I joined this team, they saw that I was already fit and fast and I went into the fast training lane by the second practice. I find I’m not in swimming condition anymore, but I’m also much stronger than I was in high school, and CrossFit helped give me a good strength base to return to swimming. I’m in Amsterdam and not the USA, so the culture is different. Yes, there are groups of crossfires whose lives revolve around fitness… Read more »
This is basically my experience, though I took six years out of the water. Actually, my body changed enough in terms of where and how much muscle I have that I went from a 400 IM/200 backstroker to breaststroker/sprinter and have gone some pretty decent times in those. And I’ve done a good job of avoiding injuries.
I feel like a lot of commentors on here are building their judgements of CrossFit around caricatures of it.
This☝️
CrossFit is a caricature.
*Some* CrossFit is a caricature.
Masters swimming is a caricature, to be honest.
People act like a CrossFit gym is the only place where people perform lifts with bad technique. For every “CrossFitter” with bad technique/going too heavy there are 10 “power lifters” or “body builders” or “insert programming allegiance here” doing the same thing. I think everyone here would agree technique should come before volume/weight in any discipline including swimming. While we all know this, every single one of us has let technique slip before in order to push a little harder/further/heavier/faster. Any halfway decent CrossFit coach/personal trainer/power lifting coach/swim coach/etc. is going to hold you accountable for technique before allowing you to increase volume. There are tons of bad swim coaches out there that push kids too hard too early with… Read more »
If you want to see bad technique, tune into the Dark Horse/Tusop farce.
I go to crossfit and my instructor is great. When I first started I did very little late and worked on technique for months. I still don’t do the RX workout for some lifts.