CrossFit Kids is a strength-and-conditioning program that is specially designed for kids (ages 3-12) and teenagers (13-18) and their specific developmental needs and helps them to develop a lifelong love of fitness. In a group setting, children and teens participate in fun and engaging workouts that deliver measurable results and prepare them to be well-rounded athletes. Unlike the adult version,
fun—not intensity—is the focus of CrossFit kids, the idea being that if you can get a kid to have fun while he or she works out the health benefits will follow. CrossFit Kids workouts consist of constantly varied, functional movements that deliver a fitness that is broad, inclusive and general (B.I.G.) and are scalable for any participant at any level. What Does This Mean? Constantly varied means that, for the most part, no two workouts are the same, so kids and teens never get bored and the novelty of each workout keeps them excited about participating. The functional movements involve exercises that are fundamental to all things that kids need to do when they play—- pull, push, run, throw, climb, lift and jump. All of the movements are taught safely and effectively under the close supervision of thoroughly trained CrossFit Kids trainers. When fitness is defined as broad, inclusive, and general (B.I.G.) it means that participants will become well-rounded athletes who will be better at any and every sport that they play because CrossFit Kids doesn’t coach them to be good at just one thing. Our workouts will increase physical competence in 10 fitness domains: Cardiovascular and Respiratory Endurance, Stamina, Strength, Flexibility, Power, Speed, Coordination, Agility, Balance, and Accuracy. With workouts that are scalable, CrossFit Kids can equally benefit a person who is less active or an accomplished athlete by tailoring workouts so that each participant is challenged just enough to deliver measurable results and personal athletic progress. CrossFit Kids aims to avert childhood obesity by creating an excitement about exercising and providing the foundation for a lifetime of healthy eating by focusing on the importance of good nutrition that complements physical activity. While workouts are fun, they also increasingly demand strength, stamina and perseverance. The physical and mental demands of CrossFit Kids foster self-confidence, discipline, persistence, problem solving, and integrity that can be applied in all areas of children’s lives. Important Safety Note: Start slow. Yes, we want the kids to work hard, but we never demand children to work harder or faster during a workout. This is a critically important point: With children, we always privilege good movement over speed. (1) We do not want them so sore the next day that they are hurting. (2) It is our long-standing experience that when children move well consistently over time, they will eventually move faster safely. General Age-Appropriate Guidelines:
Preschool (Ages 3-5): Able to focus enough to engage in supervised play that involves fundamental movement skills and the simplest foundational movements, e.g., the squat. All movements are done without weights. To make this clear: We NEVER load preschool-age kids during a workout. Elementary (Ages 5-12): Able to focus and take instruction on the foundational CrossFit movements. Introduction to gymnastics-style resistance training with very light external objects, e.g., starting with a PVC pipe and moving toward 10-pound dumbbells contingent on capacity. Novice (Ages 12-14): Approaching proficiency in body weight movements and seeing an increase in volume. Familiar with light dumbbell movements and beginning to use barbells with light loads. Junior Varsity (Ages 13-16): Proficient in body weight movements. Starting to explore heavier loads with weighted movements and higher volumes and intensity more generally. Varsity (Ages 13-18): Comfortable with high-volume, high-intensity body weight movements. Capable of executing some complex gymnastic movements, eg, the muscle-up, handstand walking, and the handstand push-up, and is starting to explore, under experienced supervision, more advanced gymnastics movements, eg, levers, ring handstand push-ups. Comfortable with powerlifting and Olympic weight lifting movements. It should be noted that Varsity-level kids ages 13-14 are exceptional and would likely have many years of training at a registered CrossFit Kids program. Is CrossFit Kids safe? This is a pretty broad question, but it does serve as a starting point to discuss the many levels of safety that CrossFit Kids takes into account. The primary way in which CrossFit Kids ensures the safety of participants is to require that ALL trainers attend the two-day CrossFit Kids Trainer Course. This course also requires previous attendance at the two-day CrossFit Level One Trainer Certificate Course as well as passing the associated written exam. Therefore, CrossFit Kids trainers not only have a working knowledge of CrossFit but also how CrossFit Kids differs from the adult program. Further, all CrossFit Kids trainers in the United States must submit to a yearly background check regardless of whether this is required for their occupation (internationally, laws vary and many require governmental background checks for those individuals who work with children). Perhaps most significantly, Crossfit Kids is an exercise program that views good movement as a key factor in maintaining health for children from preschool to high school. CrossFit Kids stresses proper movement mechanics at all ages, and consistency of good movement is a necessity before loads are added or intensity is increased. What about kids who are severely overweight or out of shape? One of the hallmarks of CrossFit Kids is inclusion. Training in a group of peers can have a profound positive effect, increasing daily compliance with the program, pushing mental and physical limits, and maintaining a positive sense of self (Beets et al. and Vorhees et al.). Children that are deconditioned will also benefit from exercising in a group. The key to incorporating children with various physical abilities is in modulating the planned workout of the day (WOD), often referred to as scaling. During the CrossFit Kids Trainer Course many scaling scenarios and solutions are discussed with the intention of showing how deconditioned children can be integrated into a class simply by modifying the WOD or its component movements to accommodate differing abilities and capacities. The CrossFit Kids website also provides scaling options for each day’s WOD, from the varsity to pre-school ability level. The immediate goal is inclusion and maintenance of the general movement patterns, the long-term goal is to have each individual continue to improve and require a decreasing amount of scaling.
