Safely scaling workouts for a wide range of athletes without sacrificing attention to non-scaled athletes — it’s an essential CrossFit coaching skill. Effective scaling at an affiliate demands an understanding of CrossFit programming theory, awareness of your athletes’ capabilities and limitations, and quick application of many possible scaling methods. It’s also important to understand why we scale CrossFit workouts: CrossFit workouts are scaled to preserve the intended stimuli despite athlete limitations such as experience, injury, illness or range of motion.