‘Progress every week’

CEDAR RAPIDS - CrossFit boasts that it is a strength and conditioning program executed at 'high intensity” with 'constantly varied functional movements” that are scalable to anyone.

Stephen Jones, a Xavier senior, is a second-team all-state soccer player who excels at CrossFit.

Jones started lifting at a Cedar Rapids CrossFit location in the summer of 2013 after seeing Olympic weight lifting videos and wanting to do different workouts not offered at Xavier.

Jones' first CrossFit competition was hosted by his club as a members-only competition.

'I remember how much I thought the workouts sucked and how tired I was, but in the end, I'm pretty sure I won the scaled division,” Jones said.

Jones won the competition.

He recently competed in another CrossFit challenge in the teens division and won this competition by capturing the final power-based event. The first two events were based on conditioning.

'After each workout, during the competition, I thought to myself that I should have done the Men's Rx division instead,” Jones said.

Each of Jones' competitions are composed of different events, so he never enters the day knowing what to expect. At the beginning of each competition day, instructors give each athlete a brief explanation of the events and what they are looking for in movement standards. Before each participant competes, the instructor will call out to the division for a quick warm up. Then, the division will compete in one to three required events.

To Jones, CrossFit is a very important part of his every day routine.

'I enjoy CrossFit so much because, if you bust your butt, you can see progress happen every week,” said Jones, who has set a personal record for each of his movements every week since the first week of November.