Many of you have already seen this video. For those of you who haven’t, it’s worth watching. Pay particular attention starting at 4:10. The back story- this is at the OC Throwdown, a recent HUGE competition. Many CrossFitters travelled from all over the country to witness this event. The athlete in question is an affiliate owner. Pay attention.
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OK, what did you see? Here’s what I saw, and what happened in case you missed it-

- The guy attempted to cheat the WOD by allowing his barbell to bounce, catching it and cleaning it with assistance from the bounce. This is clearly NOT part of a movement that by definition starts with the barbell on the ground. There was also a similar incident in the 2008 CrossFit Games, with the same result- no rep.
- The guy’s judge did NOT no rep the first three reps. Then, a head judge (woman in yellow) calls the athlete out and no reps him.
- The athlete proceeds to argue and swear at the head judge. He then pushes her out of the way, and throws the barbell in her general direction twice.

I think we can all agree this is simply reprehensible behavior. Something like this is the antithesis of sportsmanship and the opposite of what most of us want to see in a CrossFit gym. I’m sure that most of you get just as much if not more out of the camaraderie at CrossFit Elysium than the actual workouts. Can you imagine if this idiot was working out alongside you? How about COACHING you? In any professional sport this kind of behavior would instantly be dealt with by a fine, a ban, or both. I won’t even go into the fact that the judge was a woman, being pushed by a chickens**t of a man.

Unfortunately, people like this are appearing in CrossFit more and more. It may be because as we reach a larger audience it is inevitable that a certain percentage of them are going to be tools (just as a percentage of the general population is). It could be that the competitive aspect of CrossFit naturally attracts competitive people, and some of these people will adopt a “win at all costs” mentality that will cross ethical boundaries most of us have. In general, the very nature of CrossFit selects against these people. After all, CrossFit demands hard work, honesty, integrity to keep showing up day after day and the ability to play nicely with your fellow man- all attributes that in general are not found in total a**holes. I think most of us have been shielded from it and unfortunately we’re going to start seeing it more and more.

So, what are we doing about the “a**hole phenomenon” at CrossFit Elysium?

Our first and main defense is all of you, our loyal members. You comprise a community of fun and friendly people that will not tolerate a jerk in your ranks. As quick as you all are to welcome a newcomer to our gym (which you should be, and thanks), I think you would be just as quick to ostracize someone who was acting like a jerk and making others around them hate their presence. That person would probably get the message pretty quick and just find somewhere else to be.

Secondly, as most of you are probably aware the waiver that you all sign when you first come in literally contains an “a**hole clause”. What this means is Coach P and I retain the right to terminate someone’s membership if they are being a jerk. Basically, if someone is too negative a force in our community, we can ask them to leave. I would rather have ten great members than one hundred tools working out in my gym. What many of you probably don’t know is that Paul and I have actually exercised the “a**hole clause” a few times. One person was an active member who was causing a lot of discord. This person had some personal issues and just didn’t fit into our community. Paul and I gave it some thought, but quite honestly not that much. Once we knew there was an unresolvable issue, this person had to go. Notice I said “unresolvable”. We tried to find a good middle ground but ultimately there wasn’t going to be a good compromise. I’m confident we made the right decision, and the small loss in revenue pales in comparison to the gains we achieved restoring the community of our gym.

I’d like to finish this post by saying on some level you are all ambassadors of CrossFit, and CrossFit Elysium. You represent us every time you talk about your workouts, and every time you wear our shirts. Paul and I are proud that you represent our community and we wouldn’t change a thing. Together, we’ll keep people like the tool in the video at the margins and keep building a great name for our fitness program!