Hey Roots! Exciting news! We’re adding an Endurance class to the regular group class schedule! In addition to the many specialty classes offered – including Olympic Weightlifting, Strength, and Erg – now you can also take an Endurance class once a week. Please help us figure out a great time to launch this class by voting here! Thank you for the input. Loading…Read more

Newcomers to CrossFit often ask if it ever gets easier. No, it doesn’t, you just get stronger and better able to stay moving while fatigued. They typically aren’t too relieved by the answer but it’s the truth. The idea of something getting easier is also a sign that at some point you reach the “end”, and if you haven’t realized it yet, there is no end to CrossFit or fitness. Times get faster, loads get heavier, movements become higher-skilled, but there’s no finish line where we can sit back and say, “there, I finished.” CrossFit is a journey, cliche I know, but true nonetheless. There is no finish-line, there is no blackbelt. Similar to life, it’s a series of undulating waves of progress and regress, peaks and troughs. So why does this matter? If we get too caught up in our goals and achieving them then we quickly lose sight...Read more

There are some things that we do every single day at Roots – like meeting at the whiteboard to talk through the workout or going through a proper warm-up. While in some ways mundane, it lays the foundation for the environment in which we train and is an integral part of our class vibe. The same could be said for our list of Shop Etiquette – this list makes expectations clear, holds us each accountable to our community, and aides in the daily operations of the shop. We wanted to take a moment to review our etiquette list. Now, I know what some of you are thinking, “Oh shit, was it me? Did I not do one of the things on this list? Is this post about me?!?!” The answer is simple – no. We share this list periodically because it reflects our culture here at Roots and rereading it helps...Read more

I’ve been trying out the ketogenic diet since February. For those not familiar with the ketogenic diet it is a very low carbohydrate diet with moderate protein and lots of fat. I’ve known of it in the past but never gave it a real effort, and as of lately was hearing a lot about it being involved in cancer treatments. No, I don’t have cancer, but think about that – reversing cancer through dietary changes! CrossFit did a great writeup of it in Cancer, Carbs and Controversy. The idea is to limit carbohydrate intake to the point that insulin and blood sugar levels are very low thereby allowing the body to create and burn ketones for energy. It turns out that unlike other cells in our bodies, cancerous cells cannot use ketones for energy but need glucose, so a ketogenic diet starves the cancer cells into remission. I was very...Read more

The conversation is all too familiar to the coaching staff. An athlete returns to the shop after a period away, say 1-2 weeks, and a coach asks them, “where have you been?” The athlete replies that they haven’t been in because they suffered a tweak – inside or outside the shop – and they didn’t want to be a burden by coming to class. We’ve heard a lot of variations to the athlete’s why I didn’t come to class statement – not knowing how to modify for injury, not wanting to take a disproportionate amount of the coach’s time, not wanting to scale or modify around the injury, or not wanting to stand out to the rest of the class, to name a few. We wanted to take this opportunity to set a few things straight. First of all, it’s 100% encouraged for you to come to class when you...Read more