
Outside the Box: Best Crossover Activities for CrossFit
Outside the Box: Best Crossover Activities for CrossFit
What is a crossover?
A crossover is when two different fitness programs are combined into one program. For example, if you have been doing cardio on your own and want to start working out with weights, then you would do a crossover. If you were already training for strength but wanted to add some weight training into it, then you might consider a superset or circuit workout instead.
If you’re looking for a way to get stronger without getting injured, then you might consider starting with a bodyweight routine. Bodyweight routines are great because they don’t require any equipment other than your hands and feet.
You can perform them anywhere, even while driving around town! However, if you’d like to really put yourself through the paces of bodyweight training, then you’ll need some sort of resistance. That’s where dumbbells come in handy. Dumbbells allow you to train your muscles using less weight. They’re also easier to use than free weights.
The key here is to pick a combination of exercises that will target all major muscle groups in your body. Some of these combinations include:
Cardio Workout – Cardio workouts are great for building endurance and burning calories, which helps you lose fat faster! But they aren’t always enough to build true strength and size.
This is where free weights come in handy.
HIIT – The high-intensity interval training method is one of the best ways to burn fat, build endurance, and gain strength. However, it’s not enough for building size.
For that, you need to incorporate heavy lifting into your routine.
If you want to know more about how to use these natural bodybuilding techniques to your advantage, then be sure to read on.
Bodybuilding Routine For Beginners
One of the best ways to build strong, muscular, and lean body with natural bodybuilding exercises is to plan your routine around a simple 6-day split. This routine consists of two upper body days, two lower body days, and two rest days.
Ideally, you would perform this routine 3-4 times each week. Try to keep your workout times to 60-90 minutes and take a day of rest in between each workout. This is the perfect routine for anyone who wants to lose fat and gain muscle. It provides a great balance of muscular endurance, strength, and size. Keep in mind that this routine should only be used by those who are in good health and are not prone to high blood pressure or any other major medical conditions.

Workout 1: Upper Body
Exercise Sets X Reps Bench Press 4 6-8 Barbell Row 4 6-8 Overhead Press 4 6-8 Lat Pulldowns or Chins 4 6-8
Workout 2: Lower Body
Exercise Sets X Reps Deadlifts 4 6-8 Leg Press 4 6-8 Squats 4 6-8 Lunges 2 6-8 each leg Straight Leg Deadlifts 2 6-8 Calf Raises 2 15-20
Workout 3: Rest
Workout 4: Upper Body
Exercise Sets X Reps Chest Exercises 4 6-8 Incline Bench or Dumbbell Press 4 6-8 Flyes with Dumbbells or Barbell 4 6-8 Pullovers 2 6-8 Tricep Extensions (with Bar or Dumbbells) 2 6-8 Overhead Rope Extensions 2 10-12
Workout 5: Lower Body
Exercise Sets X Reps Leg Extensions 3 10-12 Lying Leg Curls 3 10-12 Squats 4 6-8 Lunges 2 6-8 each leg Straight Leg Deadlifts 2 6-8 Calf Raises 2 15-20
Workout 6: Rest
Workout 7: Repeat Workout 1
Workout 8: Repeat Workout 2
Workout 9: Rest

Workout 10: Repeat Workout 3
Workout 11: Repeat Workout 4
Workout 12: Rest
Stretching & Recovery
While it’s important to give your muscles a rest, you should always be sure to stretch and do a little bit of cardio in between your workouts. Also, make sure you’re eating enough food and getting enough sleep every night.
Your body needs these things to repair itself after all the exercise you put it through!
You can perform the same split more than once (I.E do a four week cycle twice), but make sure you have at least one week of rest in between cycles.
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Sources & references used in this article:
- Rx’d and shirtless: An examination of gender in a CrossFit box (BA Knapp – Women in Sport and Physical Activity …, 2015 – journals.humankinetics.com)
https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/wspaj/23/1/article-p42.xml - Garage Gym II: the revolution (G Glassman – CrossFit journal, 2015 – library.crossfit.com)
http://library.crossfit.com/free/pdf/35_05_Garage_Gym_II-The_Revolution.pdf - Effects of Six Days of Dietary Nitrate Supplementation on Strength, Power, and Endurance in Crossfit Athletes (SJ Kramer – 2015 – fsu.digital.flvc.org)
https://fsu.digital.flvc.org/islandora/object/fsu%3A291310 - The effect of chronic progressive-dose sodium bicarbonate ingestion on CrossFit-like performance: A double-blind, randomized cross-over trial (K Durkalec-Michalski, EE Zawieja, T Podgórski… – PloS one, 2018 – journals.plos.org)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0197480 - Temporal localization of fine-grained actions in videos by domain transfer from web images (C Sun, S Shetty, R Sukthankar, R Nevatia – Proceedings of the 23rd ACM …, 2015 – dl.acm.org)
https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/2733373.2806226 - Exercise and Physical Activity for Older Adults (D Avers – Guccione’s Geriatric Physical Therapy E-Book, 2019 – books.google.com)
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Aiy7DwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA166&dq=Outside+the+Box:+Best+Crossover+Activities+for+CrossFit&ots=0bPTtWMDZq&sig=coZU7iZMeUE-PLaTBbiJRNkFUPM - Future-thinking through technological nature (G Calogiuri, S Litleskare… – … Activity in Natural Settings …, 2019 – books.google.com)
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=wPqzDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PT272&dq=Outside+the+Box:+Best+Crossover+Activities+for+CrossFit&ots=L2WbPTofoV&sig=zqvTxNoU7BqHz2HD03VJQ4VFw7M - Effect of a four-week ketogenic diet on exercise metabolism in CrossFit-trained athletes (K Durkalec-Michalski, PM Nowaczyk… – Journal of the International …, 2019 – Springer)
https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1186/s12970-019-0284-9.pdf