Chasing Excellence
A Novel that Changed America
Introduction and Thesis
Over the past two decades the sport of fitness, otherwise known as CrossFit has been a hot topic. When it was founded in California in 2000, it started off with the sole purpose of creating workouts with functional movements and high intensity. These workouts incorporating military drills, lifting, and a multitude of conditioning movements to provide a good workout and improve the health of those who participated. Once it started to grow, the CrossFit Games were introduced. This is a competition where athletes engage in various challenging workouts to determine who is the fittest. This quickly became very competitive and top athletes as well as their coaches became well known. One of these is Katrin Davidsdottir, who was deemed “fittest on Earth” in the 2015 and 2016 CrossFit Games. Her coach, Ben Bergeron wrote “Chasing Excellence”, a book about what it takes to get to the games from both the perspective of the athlete and the coach. This is all about the hardwork, dedication, effort, and mindset that it takes to be a top level coach and athlete. This book is very influential and can be a useful tool in guiding not only athletes but any goal driven individual to achieving their highest potential.
About the Author
Ben Bergeron was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1977. He started coaching at the age of thirteen and competed as in athlete in events all throughout his life. He started his own baseball camp in the 1990’s and competed in triathlons and Iron Man competitions before he decided to open up CrossFit New England in 2007. After multiple trips to the Games as a coach and an athlete, Bergeron has put himself in the position of one of the most successful coaches in the sport of CrossFit.
Now, he coaches some of the world’s fittest athletes. His website talks about the method to his madness and quotes “Ben’s approach to building the world’s fittest athletes starts with building better people”. One of his core focuses in coaching is the character of the athlete. He famously says “better people make better athletes”. He centers in on building the mental toughness of his athletes, which is one of the main secrets to his and their success. Aside from coaching elite athletes, he also has a passion for helping regular people improve their health and fitness. He has a training program called Comptrain that is available to anyone who would like to participate. This as well as “Chasing Excellence” are resources from Bergeron directly are both mediums that have helped spread Ben’s knowledge of the sport and have helped coaches and athletes reach their full potential.
About the Book
Ben Bergeron released “Chasing Excellence: A Story About Building the World’s Fittest Athletes” in 2017. One of his top athletes Katrin Davidsdottir, the CrossFit Games champion from the year prior, wrote the foreword for this book. In the book, Bergeron provides specific examples from his perspective as a coach on how we handled unpredictable situations. He also includes the athletes’ perspectives on how they incorporated his strategies, which ultimately led them to taking a win. The article “Chasing Excellence Summary and Review” talks about Ben’s approaches. They include “building mental toughness, having grit to push past limitations, knowing what is in your control, building good habits, being humble, having a positive outlook, and going through intense training”. Ben explores a much wider range of factors that go into molding an elite athlete. This is part of what makes his methods different, as well as why he is considered to be so successful. His methods have made a significant impact on the way Games athletes are coached as well as the approaches to their training.
The Legacy
In the CrossFit world, Ben Bergeron’s ways have moved him up the leaderboard to be one of the top coaches. His methods are proven to build champions. Part of the reason that his book “Chasing excellence” is so influential is due to the fact that he has developed a method to build anyone into an elite athlete. According to his ways there is no talent required, just hard work and grit. He is very committed to sharing his ways, since his goal is to help everyone reach their fitness goals, not just his athletes. Bergeron is a prime example of an exemplary coach in CrossFit and is a role model for other coaches and athletes.
Furthermore, he is a very humble coach that teaches humble athletes. In the fitness world, it is extremely common to come across athletes with high egos that have not built themselves up in a sustainable way. Often times, people will take shortcuts and do whatever it takes whether it is legal within the sport or not to get to the top. Ben’s methods that he talks about in his book say the opposite. He is a coach that builds character and aims to have his athletes be the best they can be in the right ways.
The article “Reflections from Our Bookshelf: Chasing Excellence” includes the viewpoint of someone who read the book and what they took from it. They talked about “people tend to go through their careers hoping to be excellent at a job when in reality they are working to be competent. The difference is the willingness to grind everyday and refusing to quit until the job is done”. This is a perfect example of how Bergeron puts what it takes to win into perspective and initiates a “wow” moment. Critics who read this book also said they ended up changing their daily habits and developed a more positive mindset with taking on challenges. Both of these are just two example of how influential “Chasing Excellence” is on athletes, coaches, and the general public.
Works Cited
“ABOUT BEN BERGERON.” Ben Bergeron, benbergeron.com/about/.
“Chasing Excellence Summary and Review.” Chasing Excellence Summary, Review PDF, lifeclub.org/books/chasing-excellence-a-story-about-building-the-worlds-fittest-athletes-review-summary.
“Reflections from Our Bookshelf: Chasing Excellence.” Foster Victor Wealth Advisors, 2 Oct. 2020, fostervictorwa.com/reflections-from-our-bookshelf-chasing-excellence/.
