How CrossFit helped shape the macho fitness culture of Trump’s America

The movement founded by Greg Glassman grew into an empire, helping popularize the masculinity aesthetic embraced by Pete Hegseth and RFK Jr

Comparative machismo is hardly new, but when Donald Trump publicly admired Senator Jon Husted's backside earlier this month, later telling advisers it made the since-defeated Ohio incumbent more interesting" to voters, the senator leaned into the compliment, saying it gave him extra motivation to get down to the gym".

Would that odd exchange have taken place without CrossFit, the fitness empire founded by college dropout and gymnast Greg Glassman in the 1990s that grew to 15,000 gyms across 160 countries before he was drawn into public controversy at the height of #MeToo and the social justice movement in 2020?