What Is CrossFit, Really?
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A Return to First Principles & a Call to Reignite the Movement

For the last 20 years, I've coached, competed in, studied, and owned an affiliate (since 2010) built on the methodology of CrossFit.

And I believe something important has been lost.

Not the workouts.
Not the intensity.
Not the barbells.

The methodology.

CrossFit did not begin as a sport.
It did not begin as a brand.
It did not begin as a competition circuit.

It began as a precise, measurable, evidence-based model for health.

And if we are honest, much of the world — including parts of our own community — has forgotten that.

It is time to return to first principles.

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The Original Question: “What Is Fitness?”

In the early 2000s, when CrossFit was still mostly a website publishing daily workouts, its founder, Greg Glassman asked a question almost no one in the fitness industry could answer:

“What is fitness?”

Not “What is a good workout?”
Not “What burns the most calories?”
Not “What builds muscle?”

What is fitness?

Glassman did something revolutionary: he defined it.

“Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, 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…
Bike, run, swim, row, etc., hard and fast.”
— Greg Glassman

That prescription was not random. It was built on models.

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The Three Foundational Models of CrossFit

If you want to understand CrossFit, you must understand its models.

1. The 10 General Physical Skills

CrossFit defined fitness as competency across ten domains:

• Cardiovascular endurance
• Stamina
• Strength
• Flexibility
• Power
• Speed
• Coordination
• Agility
• Balance
• Accuracy

Fitness was not defined by how much you bench.
Not by how long you can jog.
Not by body fat percentage.

Fitness was work capacity across broad time and modal domains.

That definition changed everything.

2. The Hopper Model

Glassman described fitness like pulling a random workout from a hopper:

Whatever comes out — short, long, heavy, light, odd — the fittest athlete performs best.

This rejected specialization.

CrossFit opposed the idea that health meant becoming elite at one narrow thing.

Health meant preparedness.

In a world now rediscovering “functional fitness” and “hybrid training,” CrossFit was there 25 years ago.

3. The Sickness-Wellness-Fitness Continuum

This may be the most overlooked and most important model.

Glassman described health as a continuum:

Sickness → Wellness → Fitness

He argued that measurable increases in fitness markers (strength, work capacity, metabolic health) move someone further from chronic disease.

This was not aesthetic.

This was medical.

CrossFit was positioning itself not as a gym trend but as a solution to chronic disease. 25 years ago.

Today, as our nation re-evaluates food systems, metabolic dysfunction, ultra-processed diets, and declining physical standards, CrossFit’s prescription reads like a blueprint for national reform.

Because it always was.

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Where the Message Drifted

Somewhere along the way, CrossFit became known primarily for:

• The CrossFit Games
• Elite competition
• Extreme workouts
• Highlight reels of the fittest on Earth

While inspiring, this was never the point.

The methodology was designed for:

• Grandmothers
• Firefighters
• Teenagers
• Military operators
• Busy parents

It was infinitely scalable.

The tragedy isn’t that CrossFit became competitive.

The tragedy is that the world began to think competition was CrossFit.

When Glassman would say, “CrossFit is for anyone, but not for everyone,” he meant:

It requires personal responsibility.

It demands intensity.

It rejects shortcuts.

In a culture addicted to convenience, that makes people uncomfortable.

Competitors in the fitness industry criticized it because:

• It is simple.
• It works.
• It doesn’t require machines.
• It exposes ineffective programming.

And even within our own community, we sometimes softened the message instead of clarifying it.

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The Power of Simplicity

CrossFit’s genius is not complexity.

It is elegant simplicity:

Constantly varied
Functional movements
Performed at high intensity

That is it.

Functional movements — because they move the greatest load, longest distance, quickly.
High intensity — because intensity drives adaptation.
Constant variance — because life is unpredictable.

Other systems have rebranded these ideas for decades.

CrossFit codified them.

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Nutrition: 25 Years Ahead

“Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, no sugar.”

Before macro calculators.
Before “biohacking.”
Before the current cultural shift back toward whole food.

CrossFit was sounding the alarm about sugar and processed food in the early 2000s.

Now we see:

• Rising obesity
• Metabolic syndrome
• Youth inactivity
• Chronic disease in younger populations

And suddenly the world is rediscovering strength training, metabolic conditioning, whole food nutrition.

CrossFit has been teaching this since day one.

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The Identity Crisis

After Greg Glassman’s departure from CrossFit HQ, the brand shifted.

Some of that was necessary.
Some of that was stabilizing.

But something foundational was muted:
The unapologetic insistence on defining fitness.

The early CrossFit Journal articles were dense, academic, confrontational, data-driven.

They challenged universities.
They challenged ACSM.
They challenged conventional wisdom.

CrossFit didn’t want to be accepted.
It wanted to be correct.

That fire dimmed.

And when clarity fades, momentum follows.

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The Path Forward: A Return to First Principles

If CrossFit is to experience explosive resurgence, it will not come from marketing.

It will come from:

• Education
• Coaching excellence
• Clear definitions
• Refusal to water down intensity
• Refusal to apologize for measurable results

It will come from affiliates who deeply understand the methodology, not just the workouts.

At Remedy Athletics in Marysville, we refuse to reduce CrossFit to a trend.

We coach mechanics before intensity.
We teach nutrition as foundational.
We scale intelligently.
We build community, not dependency.

And we educate relentlessly.

Because CrossFit is not a workout.

It is a framework for human performance and disease prevention.

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A Call to Coaches

If you are a longtime coach:

Re-read the early CrossFit Journal articles.
Revisit the Level 1 manual.
Study the original lectures.

Teach the models again.

Not just AMRAPs.

Not just leaderboards.

The models.

Because when people understand why it works, they never leave.

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A Call to Newcomers

If you’ve been told CrossFit is dangerous, extreme, or only for elite athletes:

You have been misinformed.

CrossFit is simply strength training, conditioning, and nutrition, applied intelligently.

It is scalable.

It is measurable.

It is effective.

And it may be the most powerful public health intervention ever created inside a gym.

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This Is the Re-Ignition

The early 2000s saw rapid adoption because the methodology was clear, bold, and uncompromising.

We can bring that back.

Not by nostalgia.

But by clarity.

By education.

By refusing to let CrossFit be defined by critics or competitors.

If CrossFit regains its voice, if affiliates return to first principles, if we teach the models, not just the movements, the resurgence will not be gradual.

It will be explosive.

And it will start in gyms like ours.

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-Ryan Swobody

Owner, Remedy Athletics/CrossFit Marysville