Many forms of cheating exist in sports and CrossFit is no exception. Sadly even in the everyday CrossFit box cheating occurs. Although we aren’t going to the games we still see what we do inside these 4 walls as a sport and we take cheating seriously. While some people are working hard completing every workout to the best of their ability without taking shortcuts others are doing just the opposite. 

One of the principles we stand by in CrossFit is integrity; the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness. If you are cutting your reps to finish a workout just to get on top of the leaderboard, or to beat the person next to you that you can’t seem to keep up with then you are not understanding the purpose of CrossFit.

It takes hard work to do what we do in the box. If you put in the hard work you will be respected, you will feel accomplished and guess what?! You will succeed!!!

We take what we do at Back East seriously. Some may think what we do is simply workout, but it is so much more than that. Not only do we build fitness we build character. If you show up, and give each workout your all and are honest about it you will achieve both.  It is not easy to do this day after day especially on those days where we feel extra tired, or  sick, or depressed, or those days where you ask yourself “what’s the point?” Deep down we know we feel better when we finish a hard workout. It creates positivity and energy that may be hard to find in other aspects of our lives.

When someone cheats, they tarnish what we are trying to convey. Hard Work, and Good Character equals great results. Put in the work, in full, every day and with no question and  you will have an army of likeminded people who will respect you and stand by you when you are struggling.

Lastly there is no shame is scaling back a workout. Whether it’s because its a rough day or Rx isn’t attainable yet. Scaling is not cheating, scaling is knowing your limits and changing the workout to fit your current fitness level, scaling is honest. 

Show up to the box and get your work done. Make that work harder than you want it to be, work longer than you want to, move slower than the person next to you, get uncomfortable, and be the last one to finish a WOD and see what happens. There is no shame in suffering, there is only respect.