beyond the whiteboard

As I mentioned in my last article, the holidays are fast approaching. This time I’ll give you a list of things that won’t be a waste of your money — things every Crossfitter should have.

A Pull-up Bar

Even if you don’t have your own garage gym, you can do pull-ups at home. There are many different types of door-mounted pull-up bars you can buy, from a simple bar for about $20 to the more complex models which allow for different, wider grips which can range up to about $80. You can kip with these if they’re mounted securely enough, but read the reviews to make sure you’re getting a good one!

Stopwatch

This one’s a no-brainer: Every Crossfitter needs a stopwatch! Wristwatches have gone out of style recently because most people will just look at their cell phone for the time, but nobody works out with their phone at hand. A good wristwatch with a stopwatch function, lap timer, and countdown timer is a necessity for Crossfitting.

Abmat

As if you’d do sit-ups without one.

A Zone Cookbook

Healthy eating is just as important as exercise, whether you’re trying to lose fat, gain muscle, or both. There are at least a dozen books on the subject on Amazon alone.

Weights (Kettlebells, Dumbbells, Olympic bar and weights)

Weights are absolutely necessary for Crossfit. If you’re short on space, a set of adjustable dumbbells is the bare minimum. You can do kettlebell swings with a dumbbell, and you can do a variation on most barbell lifts with dumbbells; in fact it generally requires better balance since each weight is completely independent.

Video Camera

I do Crossfit in a converted warehouse gym, and I have the luxury of having a trainer there to yell at me about my form all the time. If you’re lifting by yourself, a video camera with a tripod is very useful. Set it up, do a few reps, and play it back to see where you’re falling short. Digital video cameras are much more accessible than they used to — the Flip cameras are as low as about $150 for an hour of recording time which should be more than enough to record any single Crossfit workout; just copy the clips you want to keep to your computer when it’s full.

Medicine Ball

If you’re just starting out, these are good for practicing your squats; wallballs are also a component of a lot of Crossfit workouts.

C2 rower

This is on the more pricey side but it’s well worth it. For $900 (a bit less if you’re getting a used one) you get the one machine I have ever seen a Crossfitter use. These rowers are ergometers; that is, they measure exactly how much work you are doing and your power output while you row. It’s also a great alternative to running if you tweak an ankle or the weather’s bad for running.

We have created a new feature, Sync, which lets users sync their other web accounts to their beyond the whiteboard account. We have supported Sync with facebook for a while, and just added twitter integration. We plan to add more options in the future, and hope Sync will benefit both gyms and members.

Member Benefits

Social feeds seem to be filled with addicting games, time-wasting status messages, and other non-active forms of living. We want to encourage our users to post their real productive activity into their social feeds. Simply sync your account once and we’ll handle the rest. As you post workout results, you’ll instantly get encouragement from your friends and family via your social accounts. This will help you complete any and all fitness goals. If you are part of an affiliate, you can represent them because every workout post will show your affiliate’s logo. As with all our features, there are privacy controls. You can find sync in the settings option on the beyond the whiteboard top navigation.

Gym Benefits

Gyms have told us how our facebook sync feature is helping them grow. As many affiliates know, one of the best types of marketing is word of mouth. Word of mouth advertisement is effective because people hear it from a reliable source and trust their opinion. Sync will let you take advantage of word of mouth advertisement through your member’s social sites. As your members post their workout results on beyond the whiteboard, Sync will push them into their social feeds where their friends will see them. Some of these friends will end up clicking on the links and end up on your beyond the whiteboard gym page. Eventually, they will approach their friend, who keeps posting results, about coming down and checking out Crossfit at your gym. Let’s assume that you have 30 members using beyond the whiteboard who have elected to also use Sync. Let’s also assume that they have an average of 200 friends each(case studies show more). That is a total of 6,000 people who will be available to find out about your gym via social feeds. Even if only 1% of these 6,000 people end up being interested in your gym, you will still produce 60 leads. We are in the process of building case studies and analytical reports now. If any gym owners have stories to share, feel free.

It’s that time of year again: We’re still trying to find things to make with leftover turkey and looking to the next month full of more holidays. Of course, the most important one to the fitness industry is New Year’s Day. We’re all going to promise to lose fat, gain muscle, and generally be more fit, which is a great idea if you can stick with it. If you think you can do it with one of the following products though, think again.

The Hawaii Chair

Well, at first glance this seems pretty cool. Work out while you sit in your depressing grey cubicle, all right. I can write some code for beyond the whiteboard while I burn off the stuffing. Here goes nothing.

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So what can you use instead? A hula hoop. Yes, they still make them, in a plethora of sizes and weights. None of them will set you back $300. You will still look ridiculous if you try to use it at work, though.

JumpSnap: The ropeless jump rope

It’s a jumprope… without the rope. You can do everything with it you can do with a jumprope, except for learning to be coordinated enough to actually do double-unders. The list price is $60 but you can get it for only $35 at Amazon right now. Of course, you could also get a jump rope for about $8; batteries not included and not necessary.

Shake Weight

Comes in two types, one for women

And one for men

240 reps per minute! WHOO! I am going to get RIPPED!

Wait. What’s the range of motion on those “reps”, about an inch? How much work can you possibly be doing? You would be much better off with a good set of dumbbells — Sure, they’re more expensive than a $30 Shake Weight, but think of all the money you just saved by not buying a Hawaii Chair! Plus, you won’t look like a massive tool.

Carb Blockers / Fat Blockers

Eat all the carbs you want, and don’t get fat, as long as you don’t mind a little “leakage”. Think about it for a minute: If you’re not allowing your body to digest this stuff, it’s going to head for the nearest exit as fast as possible. Instead of spending $70 a month on these pills, you could try NOT eating 500 Calories worth of carbs in a single meal. Do Zone, do Paleo, or at least skip the soda. You don’t need 36 grams of carbs from caffeinated carbonated sugar water.

Wii Fit

I have a Wii. I’ve had good times with it, some of the games are awesome, and maybe this one is even fun, but Wii Fit is not going to do much for you fitness-wise unless your entire life has been spent in front of the TV. If this came with Wii Dumbbells and a Wii pullup bar I might have more respect for it, but Nintendo probably decided that people flinging their remotes at the TV was bad enough. Instead of Wii Fit, I highly recommend New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Sure, you don’t use the balance board and it doesn’t claim to make you fitter, but just try playing it for an hour with your friends without at least one fight breaking out. That’ll burn off some of the pumpkin pie.

Globo Gym Memberships

Gym membership agreement

Yes, I am really claiming that (most) gym memberships will not help you get fit. I’m talking about big chain gyms with lengthy contracts here. They lure you in with their free first months and other deals during this time of the year, and get you to sign up for a year-long contract. What happens for most people from then is you’ll use the gym once or twice a week for a month and then stop going (but keep paying) when the drive to complete your New Year’s resolution dies down. They make a good deal of money off of people who don’t go to the gym, so there’s no incentive for them to call you when you stop showing up.

I know I’m preaching to the choir here, but if you join a Crossfit gym, you will see results because their business model is predicated on you showing up and working out.