Today was our first workout with the spring semester students.

Given the demands of adapting to Thailand’s climate, as well as the demands of the courses we do (backpacking, skin diving, sea kayaking), being in reasonable shape is important.  We’ve found that fitness leads directly to better academic performance — if you’re tired while hiking through the forest, it is hard to learn about forest ecology.

With the focus on functional (real world) movement and constant variance, CrossFit has proven to be perfectly suited to our needs for both staff and students.

With its emphasis on having a healthy life, good nutrition and eating real food (The Omnivore’s Dilemma is a favorite book for CrossFit), it also fits well with ISDSI’s focus on sustainability. This last year ISDSI established the first official CrossFit affiliate in Thailand (CrossFit Chiang Mai). ISDSI is a project of the Foundation for Experiential Learning, and CrossFit also gives us and our students lots of opportunities for that — learning key leadership skills, self discipline, teamwork, and other aspects of what it takes to be successful on expeditions.

It is also a lot of fun, and today was the first day of CrossFit for the spring students and they did great!  Well done! Jump over to cfcnx.com for more photos and posts of our daily workouts together.