www.beautymuscle.net

Well, now that I have everyone’s attention…

Before CrossFit, I loved to read the health and fitness magazines and find the latest and greatest to flatten my abs and “tighten” everything up. As a college student, I couldn’t get enough of the dorm room workouts I would read about. All the girls in the magazines had nice decent abs and tight, skinny bodies. Since starting CrossFit, I obviously strayed away from that kind of reading as I found the advice less useful and some of it flat out unsafe.

This week, however, I was in the check out line at Sprouts and who do I see on the cover of Oxygen magazine? Camille Leblanc-Bazinet, easily one of the hottest women in CrossFit and one of this year’s true contenders for the title of “Fittest Woman on Earth.” So naturally I picked it up and started flipping through the pages. I saw some pretty decent looking paleo summer recipes and flipped through one page to hear from Nick from over my shoulder, “dang that girl is jacked!” He was right, she was! I couldn’t believe how many strong looking women were featured in the magazine. Naturally I was curious to see if main stream fitness magazines might actually be catching on to the whole “strong is the new skinny” mantra, and purchased the magazine.

Like any magazine, there were a ton of ads, and in this case they were featuring different protein and performance powders/bars, etc. At least the ads featured women with strong arms and strong thighs. The nutrition section was titled “Primal Instincts” and featured the paleo diet. The summer grilling recipes included bacon wrapped crimini mushrooms, kale salad, spicy bison burgers and citrus and maple salmon. There were a few suggested meals that were not so paleo friendly, but I was glad to see it was mentioned. The at home workout involved a 35 lbs plate, incorporated multiple muscle groups with each movement, and gave correct tips for stabilizing the core, engaging the glutes and hamstrings and keeping your weight in your heels. The next set of tips for a strong body suggested moving away from the isolated movements to strengthen your core, and instead suggested weight training and fully body exercises. One of the training exercises did still talk about the fear that “your thighs will grow in size,” but at least the exercises involved some weight training.

There was also a great piece on obstacle races and tips for training for mud runs, without having the obstacles available to train on, on a regular basis. My favorite was the feature piece on Camille Leblanc-Bazinet. She talked about her favorite and least favorite CrossFit movements, her fitness background and gave some tips for completing some of her favorite movements. I think she became my new favorite CrossFit Games athlete when I read that a midst all of her CF training, she’s also a chemical engineering student!

The bottom line is, while the industry as a whole hasn’t completely converted, it’s great to see a women’s fitness magazine full of weight training tips, strong women, and a feature on a beautiful, smart and strong athlete like Camille. I know I’ve been on this “strong and inspirational” women kick in my posts, but it makes me happy to think that maybe some teenage girl walked through the check out line, saw the same magazine and thought, wow, I want to look like her, instead of the anorexic celebrity on the next magazine. I’m not saying go out and buy the latest fitness magazine, but it’s encouraging to see a change in the image of “fit” available to the masses. Have any of you inspired a change in those around you with your new eating and exercising habits?

WOD 06.27.13

Skills Day