Did the cast of 300 train with CrossFit?

The short answer is yes and no, mostly yes. Watch the 300 Training Video

We’ve had a few folks call or come by CrossFit Atlanta who have somehow discovered a connection between CrossFit and the training of the 300 cast by Mark Twight of Gym Jones in Salt Lake City, Utah. Like everyone exposed to it, Mark Twight has put his own special spin on CrossFit, but the main ideas and the essence of his current training method remain CrossFit.
Mark Twight is an extremely accomplished endurance alpinist, and author of several books on training for mountaineering events. He was an advocate of long, slow endurance training and high carb, low fat diets until he discovered CrossFit, attended a few CrossFit seminars, and become (temporarily) a CrossFit affiliate. CrossFit turned his world upside down, and he became an advocate of short duration, higher intensity workouts, and low carb, higher fat diets.

Here’s what Twight has said about CrossFit in issue 19 of the CrossFit Journal, "What Is CrossFit?" (Free Download)

"You can talk all you want about being in good shape until you do a few CrossFit workouts. And then you
will realize -- like I did -- that what you have been doing is likely training strong points, rarely working on weak points, and training efficiency to such a degree that the workouts you do are less effective than they might be if you mixed energy modes, duration, and types of work.
You probably know something about climbing-specific training because of books like Ex Alp, Clyde’s book, Dale’s book, and maybe Will’s. But none of this will prepare you for what is to come if you make even the slightest effort to follow CrossFit. Coach invited me to CrossFit HQ for an instructor seminar. I was the weakest guy in attendance, by at least 50% during every workout we did over the three days. Those days changed my life. I could “what if?” my old training program and all the years I missed when I thought I was fit but I was nowhere near my potential but the key is to move on when you know that something better is out there, without second-guessing. I don’t believe I will find anything better than CrossFit for developing power, endurance, lactate tolerance, stamina (local area endurance), balanced muscle groups, efficient neurological pathways (in the context of movement), etc. The bottom line: I started toying with the CF protocol last April without truly understanding it. I improved in some diverse areas of fitness but had not seen the light or my own potential yet. I went to CFHQ 1 December. Since then I have lost 12lbs, leaned out, and I am approximately 25% stronger across the board without significant negative effect on endurance despite the short duration of our workouts (nothing longer than 25 minutes, with the norm being half that or less)."

Here’s what Twight has said about CrossFit on his own website:
“In December of 2003 I attended an Instructor Certification course at CrossFit headquarters to learn more about what I had been dabbling with during the previous six months. I went there fit, secretly confident but I was destroyed by each and every fitness challenge presented. Humbled, ego thought we should have a “soloing on loose rock” contest but pragmatism held sway and I poured ego from my cup, which meant it could be filled with the knowledge and experience that hid in every nook and cranny of that small gym in Santa Cruz.”

Update: Evidently there are some bozos out there who think that the 300 crew could not have gotten the results they did without chemical aids. Twight responds to the knuckleheads here. At CrossFit we know different, these results are real, and come from hard work & proper nutrition.

Comments

[dan colson]

Heres another of my favorite quotes from CFJ #19

"Now, with several months of CrossFit under my skin, and many conversations with Coach
I recognize that, while fitness might never have caused me to fail, I could certainly have
achieved higher and broader levels of fitness by following a protocol

other than the one I developed on my own

or with equally narrow-minded coaches who thought
there was one right way to get there."

[MissTress]

I am new to both CrossFit and Mark Twights Alpine system but not new to athletic types of training. I have talked to many Crossfit fundamentalists and I appreciate the Atlanta Crossfit stance. Not being like many complaining of Mark Twight stealing something while he is more paying homage to Crossfit he truly by technicality and physiologically does have a different system.

I feel it is almost the duty of him and Crossfit's to recognize and appriciate both of the systems since they have the same fundamentals, they do train a bit different though it appears very much alike.

I applaud Atlanta Crossfit for being able to say it is alike yet different and look to Mark Twight system as a brother.

Both systems are outstanding and feel they are ahead of a standard. I very much hope many systems like Crossfit and MT Alpine system will be more imbibed by society and earn rightful places in the health industry.

-Ballistic stress is the only stress!