Newbie strength goals and Crossfit

I am sure that a question similar to mine has been discussed before; however, I am desperate to get in shape and cannot find much information on my specific situation.

For some context, I am a novice when it comes to weightlifting. I played soccer throughout high school and the only weightlifting that I experienced was throughout one semester when I kicked for the high school football team. I am now 27, recently out of graduate school, and completely out of shape. (I would venture to classify myself as skinny-fat, or just overweight and chubby, at 5’ 7" and 175 lbs. without much muscle definition.) After taking a first job out of school recently, I decided to join my local Crossfit affiliate gym (or the local “box”) due to the emphasis on high intensity workouts, work with barbells and weightlifting, and, most of all, the community (I have several close friends that workout/coach there and I figure this will help keep me accountable). I have been to 3-5 WODs/week for the past three weeks and I can tell that I’m working large muscle groups consistently with the olympic lifts and barbell work.

With context out of the way, my question has to do with the correct strength programming and my goals. My goal is to get as strong as possible, but also improve cardiovascular/aerobic fitness in order to improve performance at Crossfit (and let’s be honest, looking and feeling better is of course a hoped-for side effect). That said, I’ve done a little research of my own and determined that most high-level Crossfitters focus greatly upon strength training as opposed to performing daily WODs with longer endurance-focused metabolic conditioning. Although my local affiliate gym programs one compound barbell lift each day prior to the metabolic conditioning, I’m beginning to get worried that attending Crossfit classes alone and completing the daily WODs will not facilitate many strength/size gains due to the lack of consistency in linear progression.

My question is this: Should I supplement Crossfit WODs with a strength training program (e.g., instead of going to WODs, attending the daily “open gym” at the Crossfit box and using the facility to follow a novice strength training program)? If so, then how should I go about meeting my goals? Or should I forego metcons (and potentially Crossfit) in order to meet my strength goals and capitalize on the potentials of “newbie gains”? Or am I fine as a newbie to continue with Crossfit WODs for the time being until I get in decent shape?

Ok, there’s a lot of nuance here. I do coach a female friend of mine that does Crossfit. She came to me because she wants to get better at Crossfit and while she’s naturally good at the conditioning aspects of Crossfit, the ceiling is very low for how much strength you can build with WOD’s. So, the first thing you need to decide is whether you really want to “get as strong as possible” or if you want to get as good at Crossfit as possible. My answer would be different depending on your response to that question.

If your goal is to get as strong as possible while improving reasonably improving conditioning then the best way to accomplish that goal would be to quit Crossfit, train for strength and include a couple of days of conditioning work. You can get The Bridge for free here from BBM, this would be a decent first program to start down that rabbit hole, it has you lifting 3 days per week and conditioning 1-2 days.

If your goal is to get as good as possible at Crossfit, then you will need to obviously improve strength on the side while still participating in Crossfit so you can train both conditioning and the specific Crossfit competition exercises. How you go about doing this is a bit nuanced, and I don’t have any blanket recommendation, it would really depend on what your work capacity is like. Since you’ve just started Crossfit I would say your ability to handle doing Crossfit regularly on top of strength training is probably not high. So I would probably start by simply doing Crossfit a minimum of 3 days per week for a month or two, until you feel like you’re recovering well from Crossfit. Then you would add in some strength training, though this may require backing down the days you do Crossfit. You would want to strength train a minimum of 2 days per week, though 3-4 would be better. You also want to make sure you get in 2-3 Crossfit days per week. It really depends on how good your work capacity is. I have my friend lifting 3 days per week and doing Crossfit 2-3 days per week. We use RPE so that fatigue is managed. I also have some auto regulation in volume as well as I never know in advance what Crossfit is going to throw at her on a day to day basis. It has worked well, she has given me feedback that it is indeed helping her in Crossfit. I also prioritize high bar squat vs low bar, and overhead press vs bench since they are more specific to Crossfit. I also periodize her programming where I give her higher volume and lower intensities over the summer and fall, and start to bring the volume down and intensity up in the winter because of the open. These things are highly individual though. If you’re fresh and new to fitness, I would probably recommend getting a strength coach to program the strength training for you around Crossfit, as you’ll likely have a hard time finding the right balance on your own (not to mention, it’s always difficult to look at ones own training objectively, I know I’m pretty good at coaching other people, but I am not so good at coaching myself because my emotions and wants distort the objective evidence in decision making).

I hope that makes sense. It’s very nuanced. Crossfit is a unique animal, and it is not easy programming around it. However, it’s definitely not sufficient for building strength in and of itself. So you really have to decide what you want. You can’t simply do all the things all the time.

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Yeah I think you need to take a hard look and define your goals a bit more. Do you really want to be as strong as possible? Also you mentioned that you joined the “box” “most of all” because of the community/accountability. Why then do you list one of your goals as “improve performance of crossfit” you don’t need to be good at crossfit to attend WOD’s and be accountable with friends. The goals of “be as strong as possible” and “be good at crossfitting” are at odds with each other. Are you sure you don’t just want to be healthy, feel good and look good? All of those can be obtained through smart programming that doesn’t kill you.

Just to be clear not trying to suggest one thing over the other, but take a hard look at what you really want. Hope this helps!

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