Let's Chat, Myths:
CrossFit WILL Injure You + DEEP Squats = BAD Knees
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CrossFit will injure you. There have been so many links over the years in regards to doing CrossFit will injure you more than traditional training modalities. Tom even mentions that it's become a meme over the years. While we do have our thoughts on why injuries tend to occur in CrossFit we also have some studies (listed down below) that show that per 1000 hours CrossFit isn't that bad! One of the studies even shows the injury rate at a ridiculously low level. What this study did say though and it's something we all agreed on is that in that first year of training is when most of the injuries are tending to happen. Doing too much too soon. Not learning the basic movement patterns. Essentially be over-excited and not being sensible with your training. THIS is what is going to injure you.
Deep squats = bad knees. This is something that stemmed back from 50s/60s with a Dr Karl Klein. Interestingly Bill started with giving what the consensus was in terms of Dr Klein's findings (which is deep squats = injuries) BUT Tom dug deeper. We delved into the fact that this study is so old that it's only found in his book. So after further research, it appears that some of what we found may have been blown out of proportion and has turned into digital Chinese whispers. We go through some other studies and Tom brings us some information from Greg Nuckols in where he gives the argument for not deep squatting even though he identifies that deeps squats do in fact REDUCE the chance of knee injuries. Once again this will be linked down below. Studies aside we also give our thoughts on it from a realistic viewpoint but we essentially came to a similar conclusion in that doing too much too soon, going way too heavy with bad form, having the correct training cycles and not being sensible.
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Studies mentioned:
CrossFit References:
A 4-year analysis of 3049 CrossFit participants
Strength and Conditioning Study 2013
The super-duper toes to bar, pull up, muscle up movement
Deep Squat References: