Normative Values for Self-Reported Benchmark Workout Scores in CrossFit® Practitioners

Background CrossFit® practitioners commonly track progress by monitoring their ability to complete a variety of standardized benchmark workouts within a typical class setting. However, objective assessment of progress is challenging because normative data does not currently exist for any of these benchmark workouts. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to develop normative values for five common benchmark workouts (i.e., Fran, Grace, Helen, Filthy-50 [F50], and Fight-Gone-Bad [FGB]). Methods Performance data from 133,857 male ( M ) and female ( F ) profiles located on a publicly available website were collected and sorted by sex (i.e., male [ M ] and female [ F ]) and competitive age classification (i.e., teen [T], individual [I], or masters [M]) and screened for errors. Subsequently, 10,000 valid profiles were randomly selected for analysis. Results Means and standard deviations were calculated for each category for Fran (I M 250 ± 106 s; I F 331 ± 181 s; M M 311 ± 138 s; M F 368 ± 138 s; T M 316 ± 136 s; and T F 334 ± 120 s), Grace (I M 180 ± 90 s; I F 213 ± 96 s; M M 213 ± 93 s; M F 238 ± 100 s; T M 228 ± 63 s; and T F 223 ± 69 s), Helen (I M 9.5 ± 1.9 min; I F 11.1 ± 2.4 min; M M 10.2 ± 2.0 min; M F 11.5 ± 2.3 min; T M 9.4 ± 1.6 min; and T F 12.7 ± 1.9 min), F50 (I M 24.4 ± 5.9 min; I F 27.3 ± 6.9 min; M M 26.7 ± 6.1 min; M F 28.2 ± 6.0 min; T M 25.9 ± 7.9 min; and T F 28.3 ± 8.1 min), and FGB (I M 335 ± 65 repetitions; I F 292 ± 62 repetitions; M M 311 ± 59 repetitions; M F 280 ± 54 repetitions; T M 279 ± 44 repetitions; and T F 238 ± 35 repetitions). These values were then used to calculate normative percentile (in deciles) values for each category within each workout. Separate, one-way analyses of variance revealed significant ( p