Getting fit for the rest of life

It started with a fairly typical warmup — jogging and stretches.

Then 12 men and six women grabbed weighted medicine balls and formed a circle. Ricky Frausto Jr. demonstrated a ball hang, a squat-like lift traditionally done with a barbell. Frausto and Joe Westerlin circled, making sure everyone was dropping under the ball correctly and squatting low enough.

Next the group perfected burpees, a throwback to grade school that involves dropping to a crouch, kicking the legs back, pulling back into a crouch, then jumping upright and clapping overhead.

Then they cranked up heavy metal music and began the workout of the day — five rounds of 10 ball hangs and 10 burpees each in under 12 minutes.

A lean, fit-looking man finished first and sat, breathing hard, against a wall. Frausto's 5-year-old son wandered through giving high fives to people as they finished. Then everyone cheered the last two women and clapped when they tallied their last burpee.

It's called CrossFit, and it's a strength and conditioning program based on the concept of cross-training, or combining exercises to work various parts of the body.

But instead of simply alternating cardiovascular exercise with a weightlifting routine that works one muscle group at a time, CrossFit emphasizes exercises based on functional or everyday movements —such as squatting or lifting. These multiple movements are done quickly and without breaks. Classes run an hour each, but workouts are capped at 20 minutes.

CrossFit also is a network of 1,150 affiliates worldwide, including the CrossFit Omaha affiliate Frausto and Westerlin launched in June 2007 while working as strength coaches at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. A club affiliate, the nonprofit BU CrossFit, operates out of Bellevue University.

And it's competitive. In May, 24 athletes from CrossFit Omaha competed at a regional qualifier in Denver that drew participants from a dozen states. Frausto finished second. He and three others — another man and two women — advanced to the CrossFit Games, a world competition in mid-July in California. Six also will participate in a team competition.

Sound hard-core? It can be. CrossFit has proved popular among firefighters, law enforcement and military personnel.

Yet it can be scaled to anyone, from kids to senior citizens, by adjusting variables such as weight, repetitions, range of motion and time, say Frausto and Westerlin, both former UNO athletes.

The CrossFit Omaha affiliate, headquartered in a storage warehouse-turned-fitness-facility near 89th and L Streets, has about 130 members, split about 50-50 between men and women. Most are in their 20s and 30s, but a growing number are in their 40s and 50s, and they've trained a man in his 70s. Only a few are athletes in training.

“Great-grandmas and Navy SEALS can do this,” Westerlin said.

In fact, keeping people fit enough to go about their everyday activities is one aim, whether that's dragging someone out of a burning building or hefting a grandchild, Westerlin said.

“It does me no good to squat 1,000 pounds if I can't touch my toes,” he said. “Or to run 26 miles and not (be able to) lift a 50-pound box of nails.”

Local fans say they like the program's variety. Workouts are rarely the same. The sense of community and camaraderie keeps them coming back. People cheer one another during workouts, and Frausto and Westerlin recently held a barbecue outside the business. The competition, as they try to improve personal bests and square off against one another, helps keep them going.

And if you work at it, you get results.

Greg O'Kief, 42, tried CrossFit last summer. He played multiple sports in high school and has worked out ever since.

“I thought I was in pretty good shape,” he said. But for CrossFit, “they had me do some exercises I thought shouldn't be too bad. After seven minutes, I'm on the floor in a puddle.”

He kept at it. This spring, the Omaha attorney noticed he felt better than in past years after helping out with branding on his family's cattle ranch near Valentine. He got back on his bike recently for the first time in a while and felt good afterward.

“I'm fitter than I've been, maybe since I was in high school,” he said.

Greg Glassman, a Californian who started experimenting with the movements and exercises as a teen, founded the program. He started the Web site Crossfit.com in 2001, said Tony Budding, CrossFit Inc.'s media director.

The number of affiliates, which are independent and license use of the CrossFit name, has grown rapidly from 13 in 2005. Four are listed in Iowa: Ames, Des Moines, Iowa City and Coralville.

Frausto and Westerlin heard about CrossFit from a friend. Frausto, 31, is a former UNO wrestler with a degree in exercise science. Westerlin, 26, played football at UNO and has a degree in physical education.

Frausto tried it.

“You think you're at a certain level, you think your religion is right,” he said. “It was like a slap in the face.”

They got certified to teach the program and started seeing clients privately at UNO in June 2007. They moved to their Spartan but spotless facility with its garage bay doors and black rubber floor in August 2008.

Unlike most gyms, their center has no machines other than rowers. People do many of the exercises by utilizing their own body weight, so instead of more machines there are pull-up bars, barbells and gymnastic rings.

Frausto said the program draws from a handful of disciplines, including Olympic lifting, power lifting and gymnastics. It follows a three days on, one day of rest schedule.

They aim, said Westerlin, for balance among physical skills such as strength, speed and power and for the ability to tap all of the body's energy-producing systems.

“The more things I can do, the more fit I am,” Westerlin said.

Jeff Rudy, director of physical education training at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, said he wasn't familiar with CrossFit.

But he said cross-training generally is a good idea. It avoids the kind of repetitive stress that some traditional strength and conditioning programs can place on joints.

Cross-training done in high intensity bursts with little rest in between is known to produce cardiovascular benefits, Rudy said.

Budding acknowledged that some have raised questions about the safety of the program, particularly because of its competitive nature. Participants can post their workout times on Web sites.

But he said the program is no more dangerous than any other fitness program.

“Our official recommendation is, ‘Go only as hard as you can safely and sustainably,'” Budding said. “There are injuries, but they're few.”

Frausto and Westerlin, in fact, require new clients to go through four one-on-one sessions with a coach before starting group classes.

Mike Messerole, assistant director of UNO's School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation, said both Frausto and Westerlin have the educational background to make good decisions for their clients.

“On top of that, they stress form and proper technique before anything,” he said, noting that both are former students of his.

Messerole himself has done CrossFit, and so has his 16-year-old daughter, a volleyball player. He's seen improvements in her vertical jump, strength and confidence.

His 13-year-old son, a basketball player, wants to try CrossFit Kids, another program under the CrossFit umbrella that also includes options such as CrossFit Football and CrossFit Endurance. Westerlin is certified to teach CrossFit Kids and hopes to start it in the future.

The head athletic trainer at Bellevue University said he believes the program may help prevent injuries, as long as workouts are scaled.

Mike Livergood, a certified strength and conditioning specialist, heard about CrossFit from a nephew in the Marine Corps who'd done it as part of his training. Livergood tried it last January. He threw out his old weightlifting routine, got certified to teach it and began offering it free at a Bellevue University gym.

He has a group of up to 20 people, some athletes, some former athletes, some faculty and staff and a few military personnel from Offutt Air Force Base. He's also worked some of the functional movements into his rehabilitation programs for injured athletes.

He and others even call it fun.

“I'm pretty passionate about this,” said O'Kief. “It's something I really enjoy. … And it has been real beneficial for me, healthwise.”

Contact the writer:

444-1223, julie.anderson@owh.com

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