More strange things to do on Camac Street in the name of sick nasty performance!
This is a re-post of Liz’s excellent write-up! If you are coming to running classes or even interested in coming to running classes please read!
What is CrossFit Endurance?
CrossFit Endurance (CFE) is first and foremost CROSSFIT. CrossFit is primary for the endurance athlete and the bulk of the programming for an endurance athlete will be CrossFit wods. As you all know, CrossFit is constantly varied, functional movement, done at high intensity. CrossFit is broad and challenges all domains of fitness. CFE, working from the base of CrossFit, allows an athlete to focus on cardio respiratory endurance, or one’s ability to maintain a certain aerobic output for a desired period of time.
You all know what endurance is: 5ks, 10ks, half marathons, marathons, triathlons, ultra-marathons, and so on. Many of us, myself included, got into fitness through this kind of activity. Running has always been a passion of mine. I ran track in high school, 5ks in college, and completed 3 marathons in my 20s. I loved running and training for marathons, but both started to wear me down physically. I trained for marathons the way that most people train for marathons, with a focus on quantity, not quality. The common way to train for most endurance events is to train a lot. Indeed, the gold standard for most marathon training is the 20 mile run two weeks before the marathon itself. Endurance athletes program for time and miles, not results. My training group programmed “junk miles” workouts twice a week, runs where we would just get out and run 5 miles for “time on our legs” without regard to performance or form.
Sound familiar? Sound like oh too many session spinning away on the elliptical without a clue if you are improving or what improvement really is?
CrossFit Endurance is about quality not quanity. REST makes you better, NOT more work! CFE focuses on smart programming and performance. You will not be doing more work poorly when you start CFE. You will train smarter and be a better athlete for it. You will spend less time training and more time with your family and friends!
CFE can be applied to lots of endurance sports, including running, rowing, swimming, and biking. For now, CFCC is focusing on running (but let’s talk if you want do a tri!). The first thing that we are going to look at is your running form. Remember, it’s about quality, not quantity, and quality will obviously suffer if your form is bad (bad form also leads to injuries). During the classes, we will break apart the way you run now and put it back together again so that you are a more efficient runner. Drills will be key to reinforcing proper movement patterns.
Warning: this is not just people who want to run marathons! This class is for everyone! This class, and CrossFit Endurance in general, benefits more than just the endurance athlete. It also helps athletes who want to work on their running form or athletes who want to work on their met-con. Athletes who want to work on form only are welcome to come and just do the drills with us.
At CFCC, endurance athletes should hit the major lift days: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. Go to the morning class on Tuesdays if you are coming to the running class in the afternoon. It would be great to rest on Wednesday. Remember that rest makes you better!
We will talk more about programming for endurance events that you want to race when appropriate.
You can read more about CrossFit Endurance here!
