January Newsletter

Make Better Choices Easier

We know that making healthy choices can help us feel better and live longer. Maybe you’ve already tried to eat better, get more exercise or sleep, quit smoking, or reduce stress. It’s not easy. But research shows how you can boost your ability to create and sustain a healthy lifestyle.

“It’s frustrating to experience setbacks when you’re trying to make healthy changes and reach a goal,” says NIH behavior change expert Dr. Susan Czajkowski. “The good news is that decades of research show that change is possible, and there are proven strategies you can use to set yourself up for success.”

Lots of things you do impact your health and quality of life, now and in the future. You can reduce your risk for the most common, costly, and preventable health problems—such as heart disease, stroke, cancer, type 2 diabetes, and obesity—by making healthy choices.

Know Your Habits

Regular things you do—from brushing your teeth to having a few drinks every night—can become habits. Repetitive behaviors that make you feel good can affect your brain in ways that create habits that may be hard to change. Habits often become automatic—they happen without much thought.

“The first step to changing your behavior is to create an awareness around what you do regularly,” explains Dr. Lisa Marsch, an expert in behavior change at Dartmouth College. “Look for patterns in your behavior and what triggers the unhealthy habits you want to change.”

Maybe you eat too much while watching TV or become too sedentary on the weekends. “You can develop ways to disrupt those patterns and create new ones,” Marsch says. For instance, eat meals with the TV off or join friends for healthy activities, like walk breaks.

Make a Plan

Make a plan that includes small, reasonable goals and specific actions you’ll take to move toward them.

“If you walk by the vending machine at work and buy junk food every afternoon, try walking a different way to eliminate that decision and bring healthy snacks from home,” Czajkowski says. “Whenever possible, make the healthy choice the easy choice.”

Consider what you think you’ll need to be successful. How can you change things around you to support your goals? You might need to stock up on healthy foods, remove temptations, or find a special spot to relax.

Get friends and loved ones involved. Research shows that people’s health behaviors tend to mirror those of their family and friends. Invite them to join you, support you, and help you stay on track.

It’s also important to plan for obstacles. Think about what might derail your best efforts to live healthier. How can you still make healthy choices during unexpected situations, in stressful times, or when tempted by old habits?

Stay on Track

Doing positive things for yourself can feel exciting and rewarding. But there will also be times when you wonder if you can stick with it.

“Identify negative thoughts and turn them into realistic, productive ones,” Marsch advises.

Keeping a record can help. You can use a paper journal, computer program, or mobile app to note things like your diet, exercise, stress levels, or sleep patterns. A study of people who lost at least 30 pounds and kept the weight off for at least a year found that they often tracked their progress closely.

“Even when you think you’re about to ‘fall off the wagon,’ hold on,” Czajkowski says. “Continue to track your behavior. Sometimes when you feel like you’re failing, you can learn the most.”

Marsch and others are working on digital technologies, like mobile apps, that could support you in a moment of weakness. Her team is also using technology to learn more about how to measure and increase the ability to monitor and control our behavior.

“The more you practice self-control, the better you become at it,” says Dr. Leonard Epstein, who studies behavior change and decision-making at the University at Buffalo. “You develop the capacity to act and react another way.”

Think About the Future

Epstein has found that some people have a harder time than others resisting their impulses. He calls this “delay discounting,” where you discount, or undervalue, the larger benefits of waiting in favor of smaller immediate rewards. This can lead to things like overeating, substance abuse, drinking or shopping too much, or risky sexual behavior.

“You can learn to postpone immediate gratification through episodic future thinking, or vividly imagining future positive experiences or rewards,” he explains. “It’s a great way to strengthen your ability to make decisions that are better for you in the long run.”

Epstein is now studying how to use this technique to help people who are at risk for type 2 diabetes prevent the disease.

Focusing on how a change might heal your body and enhance your life can help. When you stop smoking, your risk of a heart attack drops within 24 hours. Reducing stress can lead to better relationships. Even small improvements in your nutrition and physical activity can reduce your health risks and lengthen your life.

Be Patient

Sometimes when you’re trying to adopt healthier habits, other health issues can get in the way.

“When you’re really struggling with these behaviors, ask yourself if more is going on,” Czajkowski says. “For example, mental health conditions like depression and anxiety can be tied to unhealthy behaviors.”

A health professional can work with you to address any underlying issues to make change feel easier and to help you be more successful.

You’re never too out of shape, too overweight, or too old to make healthy changes. Try different strategies until you find what works best for you.

“Things may not go as planned, and that’s okay,” Czajkowski says. “Change is a process. What’s most important is to keep moving forward.”

New Year’s Resolutions – Keeping It Simple

After 10 years in this environment, we have seen many people reach the New Year with grandiose plans of how they are going to get ripped, jacked, PR all the lifts and then some. Although well intentioned, it is difficult to achieve one if not any of these goals.  The two main reasons, in my opinion, are unrealistic benchmarks followed by poor planning.  You have to keep it real. Do not fool yourself into thinking you are going to somehow squeeze in an extra 8 hours a week of training. Maybe if you quit your job?? Or neglect your family? I doubt it. Or if you are unwilling to adhere to a stricter diet that is may be a bit tough to follow at first. Be realistic. What does work is setting small benchmarks, getting to those and then regrouping to make a new plan to progress further. What does work is changing up the diet in small doses, adapting to those changes and then moving forward from there. Think about this…you want to get better at pull ups and lose some body fat. If you came in 5-10 min early and stayed 5-10 min after 2 days a week. Not every class. You do 5-10 min on the bike before class working at 80%. You burn 150 cals. You do 3 sets of 5 on pull ups after class, so 15 reps. In a week that’s 300 cals and 30 pull ups. In a month that’s 600 cals and 120 pull ups. That’s an extra workout right there. 

Let’s use intermittent fasting as an example for diet… I try to not eat any solids until after 12/1:00pm at least 3-4/Xs a week. I did not wake up one day and just not eat until 1:00pm. I like to eat. I started out waiting until 9:00am for a week or so, then 10:00am for a week or so, and so on. Now I’m at a point where I don’t realize the time and I’m like ”shoot, better eat”.  It takes time to adapt. Be patient. 

Maybe you are looking to get stronger on certain lifts. You need to have a plan. Get on a progression. Whatever your lift is, hit those sessions 2-3 times a week. Start light and build over the weeks/months in small increments. Focus on great form. The better the form the stronger the lift.  If you get stuck, back off a bit and restart at a lighter weight. Ask a coach to help. This is why we are here. We are going to really hammer down on form and technique this year. It is our goal as coaches and a gym. Listen to the coach. We are looking out for your best interests.

Discipline and consistency…I know many people just this last year have asked me on how to get that all elusive strict pull up. I have given out progressions and after that I never saw anyone practice them. We can’t do it for you. You need to own it and work on it. It is the only way. I use myself as an example of this. My HS walking skill is exactly equal to the amount of time I spend practicing. ZERO. Who can I blame for this? I should be able to do this…..my fault, my problem, my baggage only. If it is that important to me then I will figure it out….or not. Put in the time doing the correct progressions and over time the skill will get there. 

We will put weekly progressions in the accessory work for a while, then it is on you to stay on task. Ask a coach if you are not sure how to follow the plan. We can scale all movements to fit your level. No excuses. I would love nothing better than to see all BCF athletes advance their skill levels to the next level.  Remember, plan the work, work the plan.

As always our door is always open.  If you have questions or any needs please do not hesitate to ask.

- Mike

By Rich Roskopf

The problem isn’t always where the pain is. 

Happy New Year BCF Athletes! I see a lot of you working on your mobility and mechanics before, after and during classes and I want to share with you an approach that can help you be more efficient in your pursuit of fitness and performance. This approach has served me well over the years. 

It’s called the Joint-by-Joint approach. I learned about it through a conversation shared by two absolute geniuses in the movement field. Mike Boyle and Gray Cook. If you haven’t heard of them, I suggest you look them up. They really know their stuff. 

I’ll do my best here to give you a synopsis of how to systematically approach your mobility and mechanics instead of chasing pain or living with stiffness that leaves performance on the table during workouts and ease in daily life. 

According to the joint-by-joint approach some of the joints in our bodies have a need to be predominately mobile and others need to be stable. The table below outlines the basic idea. 

Joint–Primary Need 

Foot--Stability 

Ankle–Mobility (sagittal) 

Knee–Stability 

Hip–Mobility (multi-planar) Lumbar Spine–Stability Thoracic Spine–Mobility 

Lower 2/3 Cervical Spine—Stability 

Upper 1/3 Cervical Spine--Mobility 

Scapula-thoracic—Stability 

Gleno-humeral—Mobility 

Elbow—Stability 

Wrist—Mobility 

You can see that beginning with the foot, stability and mobility pretty much alternate all the way up. 

How does this relate to you and how can you apply it? Let’s say for example you experience lumbar back pain or stiffness when squatting and you want to roll it out or stretch your back to fix it. According to joint-by-joint, the low back is supposed to be stable, so rolling it out or attempting to loosen it via stretching and lacrosse balling it could very well be the wrong thing to do. A systematic approach would be to either look above the low back at the thoracic spine or below the low back at the hips to see if they are adequately mobile. Be honest with yourself. Most of us can use improved hip and thoracic mobility. The table below is a simple way to look at it: 

The Process is Simple 

Lose ankle mobility, get knee pain. Lose hip mobility, get low back pain. Lose thoracic mobility, get neck and shoulder pain, or low back pain. 

Our bodies are amazing. Solving mobility, mechanical, pain and stiffness issues can be quite complex. The main take away here is that if you are experiencing pain or stiffness in an area that innately needs stability, think before you attempt to mobilize it. Look above the area and below the area where mobility is innately needed and focus there. It’ll be time well spent. 

If you have any questions on how or whether to mobilize or stabilize, please ask me or any of the coaches and let’s come up with a strategy that works for you. 

For further reading, click HERE.

If you’re having shoulder problems I feel bad for ya, son. I got 99 problems, but shoulder mobility ain’t one!

It is no secret that most movements in CrossFit require a substantial amount of shoulder mobility. Take overhead squats and snatches, for example. When your shoulder mobility is less than ideal, you are moving less efficiently, and therefore potentially setting yourself up for overexertion and injury. The more time you dedicate to shoulder mobility, the better your range of motion and as a result, the more primed your body will be for more challenging workouts. 

In short, increased shoulder mobility = increased strength and power. 

Try the stretches above daily, as well as before and after lifting. 

- Michelle

Congrats to our December Monthly Challenge Winners

AMRAP 5 of:
Squat Clean Thrusters for Max Weight Moved Overhead

Women: 45/75/105#
Men: 95/135/165#
 

Male Winner: Robert Ball (5,130lbs)

Female Winner: Anacaren Carrizales (3,750lbs)

Grab a coach to claim your $25 BCF bucks!  

• Don't eat or excessively drink 2-3 hours beforehand 
• Don't workout beforehand 
• Use the restroom immediately before