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The Support Your Local Box Fundraiser is a CrossFit event for the benefit of CrossFit affiliates affected by COVID-19 around the globe. The temporary closures and distance between us cannot keep this community apart. Affiliates around the world have demonstrated this through their actions over the past few weeks. Now, the entire CrossFit community has an opportunity to come together in support of our affiliates.

“Scientific journals exist primarily to disseminate and record science, but many medical journals ... have been about more,” writes Richard Smith, former editor of the BMJ. In this chapter of his book, The Trouble With Medical Journals, Smith describes the at-times colorful history of prominent journals such as the Lancet and BMJ. He also shares why contemporary medical journals have come to “live with a constant tension between the needs of authors and readers” and also journal owners and advertisers. “The possible functions of journals are thus informing, reforming, disseminating science, educating, providing a forum for a community to debate the issues of the day, entertaining and making money,” he explains.

This 2017 review argues insulin therapy increases cardiovascular and mortality risk in Type 2 diabetics. Given that effective alternatives exist for establishing glycemic control in this population, exogenous insulin use should be de-emphasized for most patients.

The Scaling Course reinforces the skills a CrossFit trainer will use when modifying workouts for their athletes. This course includes information on scaling for beginners, intermediate CrossFitters, advanced CrossFitters, former athletes from other disciplines, and those with injuries.

“Two years ago, following heated debate, a sports science journal banned a statistical method from its pages, and a different journal — which had published a defense of that method earlier — decided to boost its statistical chops. But as Matthew Tenan, a data scientist with a PhD in neuroscience relates in this three-part series, that doesn’t seem to have made it any easier to correct the scientific record.”

Whether the link between hyperinsulinism and disease states is causal or correlative will be debated for years. But the tide is dramatically shifting towards causality in many, many disease states. What cannot be debated is that reducing carbohydrate intake eliminates hyperinsulinemia in nearly every occurrence. By what logic would we not adopt an easy prevention, cure, or mitigation (with not only no side effect, but provable and dramatic side benefit) in regards to the litany of disease states linked to hyperinsulinism? We strongly counsel that you opt out of hyperinsulinemia while the scientific community continues slogging along.

Free radicals are reactive molecules that can damage cell membranes, organelles, and DNA. Antioxidants can neutralize free radicals before any harm is done. But should you take antioxidant supplements to improve your health? Tyler Hass surveys current research on antioxidants and explains why we should be skeptical of messaging that claims vitamin and antioxidant supplementation is always beneficial.

While many of us are forced to temporarily distance ourselves from one another, CrossFit trainers and affiliates have gone to extraordinary lengths to serve and support their members despite these challenging circumstances. They are truly the lifeblood of the CrossFit community. It’s our turn to give back to them.

A 2014 review argues traditional risk factors such as changes to lipids and blood pressure account for only half of the elevated cardiovascular risk observed in diabetics. The review authors suggest efforts to manage heart disease risk in diabetic and prediabetic subjects should focus directly on managing insulin and glucose levels and insulin resistance, not merely on improving lipid profiles and blood pressure.

The CrossFit stimulus — which is constantly varied high-intensity functional movement coupled with meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar — can give you a pass on chronic disease. It is elegant in the mathematical sense of being marked by simplicity and efficacy.

“On January 22, [personal trainer] Donna Harris received a cease-and-desist letter from the Mississippi Department of Health. Talking about healthy eating on Facebook and getting paid to do it, the department said, could trigger a $1,000 fine and up to six months in jail. In the eyes of the state, Harris was an unlicensed dietician — and apparently enough of a threat to public safety that she might need to be put behind bars. … In a lawsuit filed this week on Harris' behalf, the Mississippi Justice Institute, a nonprofit law firm, argues that Mississippi's overzealous enforcement of its dietician licensing law violated Harris' First Amendment rights. Aaron Rice, the group's director, is particularly galled by what happened when Harris asked the state what information she could legally provide without a license. She was told to stick to ‘government-approved guidelines, like the food pyramid.’”

Metabolic therapies including caloric restriction, intermittent fasting, and the ketogenic diet are receiving increasing attention as potential adjuvant treatments to improve the effectiveness of immunotherapy. Currently, preliminary but promising evidence suggests these therapies may increase the effectiveness of existing cancer therapies such as immunotherapy, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy by slowing tumor growth and increasing tumor vulnerability.

Dr. Aseem Malhotra, MD, explains which lifestyle factors can impair immunity and which are protective against respiratory illness. As more data on the coronavirus becomes available, it is becoming clearer which groups are at greater risk of developing severe complications. Obesity, Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and smoking appear to put people at greater risk, while exercise and good nutrition improve the body’s defenses.

CrossFit’s online courses are open to all individuals and trainers at any stage of development. The online courses provide flexible avenues for trainer development and exploring specific topics in more detail. New and updated offerings include the Programming, Dumbbells, Spot the Flaw, and Scaling Courses.

"The following article is a systematic overview of COVID-19 driven by data from medical professionals and academic articles. ... sources include CDC, WHO, NIH, NHS, University of Oxford, John Hopkins, Stanford, Harvard, NEJM, JAMA, and several others."

“Recent concern about the nutritional gaps in plant-based diets has led to a number of alarming headlines, including a warning that they can stunt brain development and cause irreversible damage to a person’s nervous system. Back in 2016, the German Society for Nutrition went so far as to categorically state that — for children, pregnant or nursing women, and adolescents — vegan diets are not recommended, which has been backed up by a 2018 review of the research. After the Royal Academy of Medicine in Belgium decided a vegan diet was 'unsuitable' for children, parents who force a vegan diet on their offspring in Belgium could even one day find themselves in prison.”

A 2016 letter to the editor of the BMJ argues the complete profile of metabolic changes induced by a low-carbohydrate diet — increased LDL and HDL cholesterol, a reduction in triglycerides, and a reduction in insulin resistance — indicates a reduction in cardiovascular risk. Researchers who argue the increase in LDL cholesterol is atherogenic fail to consider more recent data suggesting LDL cholesterol levels are at best inferior to alternative markers of disease and in fact may have little predictive value at all.