My goal at the onset of the Off The Carbs / Off The Couch challenge was to explore ways of introducing nutrition to our members as a component of our regular programming. This is tricky because I don’t want to use up whiteboard time during class when we only have an hour to workout. However nutrition is paramount to ANY health or fitness program, so we can’t just skip it. Persistence – stick with it, even if you stray from the plan every now and thenAwareness – be aware of EVERYTHING you eat (and drink)Clarity – we know what works and we can help you navigate the sea of things that don’t I believe these three things are the key to success in nutrition at CrossFit Spur. We aren’t just going to let nutrition fall by the wayside, taking a backseat to exercise. It will be brought up in class...Read more

When asked, people often have a difficult time explaining what exactly The Open is. On its face it’s a competition. The first stage of the CrossFit Games season. In reality those who use the open as a means to participate in the games only make up an extremely small portion of what The Open is all about. Each year approximately 0.26% of the participants in The Open will move on to the games. An average of 300,000 participants signed up each year, with only the top 40 men and 40 women earning a place at the games. So why would so many people sign up if they know their chances of making it are so slim? They don’t care, that’s why. The remaining 299,920 people sign up to have fun. To test their fitness much in the way they get their annual check up at the doctor. They do it...Read more

Notes and References From All OTC Classes So Far (updated after each class) Reactive Hypoglycemia – AKA: “Hangry” Consume something high in sugar or carbohydrates (high glycemic index) Blood sugar rises rapidly The body overcompensates by releasing excessive insulin to get the sugar out of the blood Sugar (glucose) is removed from the blood and put into cells – Extra glucose is stored as FAT Blood sugar rapidly decreases to a level below normal resting glucose This causes hunger and the craving of more carbs If this cycle is repeated on a regular basis the body eventually becomes resistant to insulin, resulting in type 2 diabetes Pink = meal high in sugar or refined carbohydrates (hyperglycemia) Dark Purple = meal consisting of whole foods: meat, vegetables, dairy, nuts, seeds, some fruit / starchLight Purple = hangry – feelings of hunger, frustration, irritability, etc (hypoglycemia) “The 5 Buckets of Death” In...Read more

New Year, Same You – But Better! We know how much our members love a little friendly competition, so we’re offering a challenge to kick off the new year. The Off The Carbs, Off The Couch Challenge starts Friday, January 3rd. You’ll start by getting an InBody scan to set your baseline metrics (muscle mass, body fat mass, and body fat percentage) so we can compare at the end of the challenge. Think of it like your favorite (or least favorite) benchmark WOD. Your first score sets the bar and every subsequent score reflects the hard work you’ve put in to get better. But, the hard work for this challenge consists of more than just working out. This isn’t your typical crash diet, shed weight and gain it back health challenge. This challenge is based on creating habits over the course of three months. How Do I Win? Easy –...Read more

One of the reasons I chose “back to our roots” as the title for this blog is because I wanted to highlight the origins of CrossFit Spur and the methodology that inspired me to get started. It also hints at the root cause of our current metabolic health crisis. It’s within this root cause we find solution to our problems. However, somewhere we lost our way and have been conditioned to believe that managing our symptoms through pharmaceutical intervention is the only answer. This management of individual symptoms flies in the face of physiology. The human body is an amazingly intricate and efficient organism consisting of many systems working synergistically. The thought that each system operates independently and manipulating it through “symptom management” will have no impact on other systems is absurd. Yet, this is the basis of our current healthcare system. The “management” of a single symptom is often...Read more