One of the most commonly asked questions I receive is, “When can I expect to see results?” Of all the questions I receive, this is one of the most reasonable questions. Unfortunately, there is no real answer to it. I say this because I have had people lose 30-40 pounds in a couple of months and then I have had people lose 10 pounds in a year. There are things like diet and genetics that play a role outside of exercise that affect how much or when you will start to lose the weight. But here are a few things that everyone should focus on to speed up those results!

The first suggestion is YOUR DIET. Following the CrossFit’s suggested diet of: “Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, and no sugar. Keep intake to levels that will support exercise but not body fat,” will help you speed up those results right away. If we were to look at those two sentences the first says to avoid processed foods and stick to whole foods. Limit your fruit and avoid refined sugars and EAT YOUR VEGGIES! If you just stuck to this, results would happen. You would lose weight, tone up and improve your workouts.

If you wanted to take this to the next level, sentence two is even more critical. This sentence is telling you that you need to eat enough calories that your body repairs itself after your workouts rather than break down further. The goal is to be lean and not look like a smaller version of a fatter you. To do this, you have to weigh and measure your foods and also time certain meals. These are all things we do FOR FREE with any membership. Like anything else in exercise, some people may start this diet and lose 20 pounds in a month and others may take 2-3 months, but this is the most essential step to getting on the fast track to results.

The second suggestion that I would make is to “enjoy the process.” This is something I have talked about in a couple of posts and videos, but it is something I genuinely believe to be vital to everyone’s success. In this particular example, what I am trying to say is that there is a lot to learn when you start our program. We have more movements that we implement into workouts than any other exercise program and learning those movements take time. Learning is the fun part, and it is what keeps people coming back. There are so many movements in CrossFit that you could learn something new a couple times each week and never get bored with the monotony of routine.

You have to learn these movements before you can see real results. I would even venture to say that you will need some mastery of these movements before the ultimate rewards are gained. Although, that being said, I do not think you need to have an understanding of exercise or lifting weights to see results quickly because I would say about 90% of our members either did not exercise or had never lifted weights before they started. What I am saying may be easier explained with an example. When your kid wants to play baseball, you do not take them to the batting cages and put them in the cage with the machine that throws the hardest. You start them with a tee and teach them the fundamentals. Then you move up to some soft toss and then to some slow pitches, and eventually, they will step up to the big dog machine. This process takes time (a lot longer than learning exercises) but by the time they get to the big dog machine, they will be able to smoke each pitch, and then translate that to a live pitcher where they will have success (hopefully).

The point is that as you learn and master these movements, the intensity that you can apply to each one will be much higher. Meaning that your workouts will result in higher reps or faster times. When you are finishing workouts faster or finishing workouts with more rounds and reps than you were a month ago, you are doing more work, and more work means better workouts, and better workouts mean better results!

So the point here is taking the time to learn and master these new movements and DO NOT RUSH IT! I know our society has us conditioned to, “Give me my results and give them to me now!” But we have to understand that working on eating better and making our workouts better is the only way that you will see results! For some, this could take a month, and for some, this could take 6 months or longer, but enjoy your time learning and exercising and love the results that are sure to come with this!

 

Richard Andrews

CF-L2