Crossfit is the best program for Bodybuilding

[Matt Thomas]

I think it would be fair to ask the FAQ to clarify that Crossfit is better than the popular bodybuilding split for putting on mass if that's what it meant. It's not right to lump all bodybuilders together anyway. There's bodybuilders out there (maybe not the big stars that are on all the magazines) that do try to do it right and use compound heavy lifts with the right diet to achieve their goals and I deffinately don't thing anyone should demean their efforts.

[Tim Donahey]

Originally Posted by Derek Maffett

Coach said "mass," not "how ripped you look." He must be referring to split routines because there is no way on this planet that Coach puts CF above SS here.

As a newcomer to CF, never having heard of CF or SS before, I'm sure exactly zero readers would make that assumption...

That would be either very ignorant or very much in need of a great deal of explanation. If this was an ignorant statement Coach made in the long ago past, then I'm sure he would be in a hurry to correct the FAQ.

Yeah, I'd have thought so too.

Seeing that he has not done so, I'd say that he was talking about what most people consider bodybuilding to be - split routines.

This begs the question.



Why wouldn't he just say "split routines" and not "bodybuilding?" A credible FAQ should answer the question, not leave it to the reader to make assumptions and fill in the blanks.

It also confounds me that "Crossfit specializes in not specializing" and then purports itself to be more specialized in bb than actually bb.

If long time cf'ers can't even agree on this, what will a newcomer think?

[Jacob Vohs]

I've never seen a crossfitter in the videos on this site bigger than the top natural bodybuilders. Both training styles have completely different goals and over time natural bodybuilders have been getting better and better at putting on mass without steroids. In the past this might have been true but not currently.

[Matt Thomas]

Yes, but to compare how big a specific bodybuilder is compared to a specific crossfiter you would have to take diet into account. I would assume (perhaps i'm wrong) that the bigger natural body builder is eating a significantly greater amount of food since the main goal of someone who does crossfit is usually not to gain mass. So I could ask the question if you took that same bodybuilder and kept his diet and put him on crossfit would he get even bigger than he is on his current program? Or if you took the crossfiter and made him eat more like a bodybuilder would he get bigger than a natural bodybuilder not doing crossfit or something similar?

[Tim Donahey]

Originally Posted by Matt Thomas

Yes, but to compare how big a specific bodybuilder is compared to a specific crossfiter you would have to take diet into account. I would assume (perhaps i'm wrong) that the bigger natural body builder is eating a significantly greater amount of food since the main goal of someone who does crossfit is usually not to gain mass. So I could ask the question if you took that same bodybuilder and kept his diet and put him on crossfit would he get even bigger than he is on his current program? Or if you took the crossfiter and made him eat more like a bodybuilder would he get bigger than a natural bodybuilder not doing crossfit or something similar?

And that's something else that is relevant to the equation besides simply comparing crossfit/bbing and steroids/no-steroids. Diet, training, rest, and individual proximity to genetic potential are all important factors in mass gain that are glossed over or ignored entirely in Coach's oversimplified explanation. Honestly you could write a whole nother FAQ on mass gain (oh yeah, they have) and what is offered in the CF FAQ just doesn't even come close.

SS + Whole Milk is how a beginner is going to gain the most natural mass in the shortest amount of time and that is very, very different from pure CF. Rip has said as much before.

For an intermediate trainee, CF might be the best option, but this is something that needs to be posed and investigated.

For an advanced trainee, CF is not going to be the way to go, b/c they would need more specific programming.

[Tim Donahey]

One more question; whom are those "CrossFitting on steroids?" Isn't his "hierarchy of mass" tantamount to saying that our most massive Crossfitters are all on steroids? Obviously there are some or Coach wouldn't have used them as an example in the FAQ. Or is his hierarchy pure speculation?

[Derek Maffett]

His statement about CF with/without steroids is probably based on science than anecdotal evidence.

You make a good point about what a newbie would think upon reading the FAQ - he wouldn't know the in's and out's of mass gain. On the other hand, though, he probably considers bodybuilding to be traditional split routines, so Coach's statement shouldn't confuse him too much. It's when someone with some knowledge about the subject (who knows about split vs. full body, etc...) reads it that there is trouble, but he need only realize that Coach Glassman was only issuing a general statement, not an in-depth CFJ article.

I do think this might merit some better explanation, if only because so many people get caught up on it.

[Tim Donahey]

Originally Posted by Derek Maffett

You make a good point about what a newbie would think upon reading the FAQ - he wouldn't know the in's and out's of mass gain. On the other hand, though, he probably considers bodybuilding to be traditional split routines.

Even so, reinforcing the notion that bodybuilding = traditional split routines is fallacious and needs correcting. Or for that matter that mass gain = bodybuilding.

[Derek Maffett]

I don't think he said mass gain = bodybuilding, but I agree.

[Steven Low]

Basically as I have been saying (for probably more than a year now) that portion of the FAQ should be clarified. Not necessarily eliminated... but clarified.

That's really the only 'major' problem I have with the FAQ though. (good job with the rest of it Lynne).