Last week, we looked at the trainable Health related components of fitness. This week, we’ll defined the Skill related components as well as the last health related component. This last  component is not trainable, and, as such, wasn’t included in last week’s post.

Here are the Skill related components of fitness:

1. Agility — This is the ability of someone to quickly (and efficiently) change direction. It can be thought of as a combination of power, balance and flexibility. Sports like football, hockey and lawn tennis all rely on a high level of agility.
2. Speed — This is the ability to move from point A to point B (whole or part of the body) in a short space of time (high speed = shorter time). This requires power, muscular endurance and flexibility. Sports like sprinting, cycling and swimming all require speed.
3. Balance — This is the ability of a person to maintain equilibrium (stay upright or in whatever position he/she chooses). This requires strength, stamina and flexibility. Tightrope walking, handstand or even standing on one foot (in fact, even standing on 2 feet or regular walking) all require different levels of balance.
4. Coordination — This is the ability to move the body in accordance with one’s senses. The more body parts that one can move in different ways at the same time, the more coordinated one is. Swimming, drumming and basketball all need a practitioner to be highly coordinated.
5. Reaction Time — This is a measure of one’s ability to respond to a given stimulus (anything that happens) quickly. It can be thought of as trained reflexes. One requires coordination, speed and strength (as well as an ability to interpret what happens around you) to react in a short space of time. Table Tennis, badminton and the start of any race all utilise fast reaction times.

Now, we will talk about the one untrainable component of fitness: Body Composition. This refers to the amount of fat and muscle one has. This can be affected by a combination of any of the above components as well as one’s dietary habits (and sleep).

CrossFit is the only sport that is specifically designed to train all 10 trainable components of fitness (even though other sports may utilise all 10, they aren’t designed to do so, but rather do so as a result of the nature of the sport). Powerlifters and Bodybuilders tend to argue with CrossFitters because CrossFit is not specific to any 1 (or small number of) components, but that doesn’t make any discipline more valid than another. I, myself, don’t do CrossFit, but I cross train and, as such, also have the same approach (lack of specificity) to my training. You, as an individual, can determine what fitness is to you and engage in activities that focus on the components of fitness that will help you to attain your goal. There is no one definition of fitness and no one is necessarily wrong for going after his/her idea of fitness.