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[man] It's cliché, but in regards to the things I create
that are not workouts,
the process and the journey
to get to the end state, the creativity,
the ability to make your own decisions,
to go a different direction, to decide this looks good,
this feels good, this doesn't look good,
this doesn't feel good,
the only person held accountable
to the end state is myself.
But in regard to the workouts, that's a whole other level,
'cause the people I'm held accountable to
is the community.
At the end of the day, it's my 15-year-old kid,
and I look across even these open workouts,
and I look at 2011, 2012, '13,
all the way up to the current years,
and every one of those means something to me.
I knew what was going on in the background.
I knew what our team was talking about,
our CEO at the time,
and they really wanted to disrupt what we did.
I think the 2018 Games were some of the most creative
visually and programmatically
in terms of CrossFit events that we've ever had,
and that was really driven by the notion
that this might be the last Games ever.
I put my all into that event,
so therefore I wanted to just blow it out the water
and make it an incredible show.
[indistinct sports commentary]
[man 2] In March of 2018,
on the way to an open announcement in Houston,
we got a call and it said that our leadership
wanted to change the structure of the Games next year.
And that meant anybody who was a national champion from the Open
was going directly to the Games.
They wanted to expand the amount of licensed competitions.
They wanted to replace the regional stage of competition
and wanted to dramatically overhaul
the finances of the whole sport.
From that point forward, we knew that 2018
was gonna be a dogfight,
to preserve the things that were essential
for our sport to grow and thrive...
and for the athletes, for our events, for our fans
that wanted to see this thing continue forward,
and it was a race against the clock to produce some plan
that we thought was going to carry the sport forward.
The CrossFit Games are known as the ultimate proving grounds
for the fittest athletes on Earth.
So the CrossFit Games is a test.
And it starts with a worldwide online competition
where anybody can register and compete,
and it advances through a series of stages
until only the top 40 men and 40 women
are in the field at the finals.
[Sean] It is just a bunch of different stuff.
It's part Olympics, it's part Super Bowl,
it's part decathlon, weightlifting meets Strongman.
It's got a bit of something for everybody
and it is unlike any other event out there.
[man] When you go to the CrossFit Games,
you can expect a spectacle.
You're gonna see some of the fittest people on this planet
put down amazing performances.
That's not just true for the individual divisions,
it's true for a variety of age groups,
because they have a teenage division,
they have masters divisions extending upwards of 60 plus.
And not just that, you're gonna get to enjoy that spectacle
with an amazing group of like-minded individuals
who are there to celebrate a once-a-year festival scenario
that is kind of like a fitness Super Bowl.
[man] The modern CrossFit Games athletes, it's a full-time job.
You cannot casually mistake your way into the CrossFit Games.
It's not possible at this point. Those guys are animals.
What does it take? It takes an insane well-roundedness.
It takes talent and then the discipline and hard work
layered on top of that talent.
It's no easy feat.
[labored breathing]
Why do you put yourself in this pain?
Because I wanna win the CrossFit Games.
[grunts]
Is this good product placement?
It's all about product placement.
Do you think it's bothering Mat that you got a bigger cooler?
- Nah. - Wait till tomorrow.
Yeah, right. He's gonna walk out with a tumbler.
- Come out with my YETI 160. - Yeah, that thing right there.
How are you feeling this morning?
Good.
Why are you the only athlete that brought your own bike pump?
I don't know. At the Airbnb they had one.
And I thought might as well, yeah.
It was fine yesterday, we didn't need it,
but I'd rather have it and not need it.
Of course I do.
I'm just impressed that you brought one too.
I got two. I got one like that and then I got a pocket one.
- Trumps. - Yeah, right? There you go.
I think everybody woke up this morning
and the reality of today sunk in a little bit.
We got a lot of work to do.
I think this morning's gonna be a little more fun.
The cycle's a little different.
People are excited to go do it and try not to crash.
The afternoon's just some fun, easy stuff on the field,
and then tonight's when shit gets real.
They want the CrossFit Games,
and that's the bottom line,
people are a little less friendly.
Ride with consideration
for preserving yourself for the rest of the weekend,
and also, more importantly, consider the people around you.
If you go down, people might go down because of you.
If you get too aggressive, you might make other people go down.
So think about your actions,
you can hurt yourself or put yourself down,
but, worse yet, you can put your other competitors down.
[Tommy] The Crit is basically a play on a criterium race,
which is a type of cycling race
that exists outside of the sport of fitness.
It was basically the entire field
of the CrossFit Games for the men,
and then also the women, thrown onto road bikes.
First of all, good morning, welcome.
It's gonna be a great event.
We've got a couple of minor things...
[Adrian] Dave loves having things
that are a little bit unconventional
as far as what you're gonna see in a CrossFit gym.
Everybody rides Assault Bikes,
everybody rides C2 bikes, stuff like that,
but sometimes people forget
that we're really trying to make this apply to the real world.
They should be ready to roll out at 8:20 easy.
All right. 8:20, you wanna pull 'em out, set 'em up.
- Do a rolling start. - Two laps.
Two laps, stopping, slowing them down back there.
Yeah, stopping, getting into position. Then it's game on.
[Sean] It's the final stop on the road to the finish,
Madison, Wisconsin, and the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games.
- [cheering] - Goosebumps.
[commentator] There just is no limits anymore
when you talk about the CrossFit Games,
of what kind of tests are gonna be thrown at these guys,
starting off with a very specific road race.
Last year we saw the mountain bike.
We see a very technical race this year with the road bike.
It's gonna be fun.
- Liverpool, England. - Who'd you come to see?
Camille Leblanc-Bazinet.
- Who'd you come to see? - Sara Sigmundsdóttir.
- Tia. - Tia-Clair?
Tia and Mat.
And Josh.
[Sean] Athletes starting to build up speed
as they approach the beginning of the opening event
of the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games, the criterium,
10 laps around a 1200-metre course, and we are underway.
[Tommy] Honestly, I think the Crit was probably
one of the more dangerous events
that the CrossFit Games has had,
not because of the physical toll that it took on the athletes,
but the skill set required to tackle a road bike race
in close quarters with 39 other individuals besides yourself
speaks to the athleticism and the adaptability
of the athletes in tackling that.
I think the line was that unpredictable riding
is what causes crashes.
[laughs]
[woman] I feel like, actually, the male side
was a little bit more like considerate.
The girls just go for it.
They're, like, I don't care who I'm hurting.
We're going for it.
It's like Mad Max.It was just get to the finish line.
[Adrian] It's funny because from my perspective,
outside of the ropes, so to speak,
watching them on the track going round,
it didn't look quite that chaotic to me.
[Sean] Oh. Patrick Vellner has dropped a chain.
But Vellner gets himself a new bike. He is back on.
[Patrick] I basically got a new bike
that was not fitted for me.
The seat was way too low.
I was basically riding on a clown bike
for the next nine laps.
So tough hit on lap one.
[commentator] Being in the lead doesn't guarantee you the win.
All that does is mean you're setting the pace for everyone.
[Sean] We've had a change at the front of the pack.
Sara Sigmundsdóttir, in all black, has moved to the front.
I don't even wanna talk about it. I'm so embarrassed.
In the event announcement,
Boz had said that we would hear bells before the last round.
So I heard bells from some people
that were just in the crowd, and I went up.
And I was like, why is nobody going faster?
Then I knew there was another round left,
and I had just hit a wall.
[bell rings]
[Tommy] Noah grounded his pedal onto the cement
and it eventually popped off.
He had to get that swapped out.
And then Mat Fraser, who was actually doing really well,
nearly had disaster strike on the final turn of the event.
[Mat] I thought I was upright enough to start pedaling out
and caught my pedal.
So both wheels came off the ground,
my back wheel kicked out to the side,
and I just, like, oh...
Landed on both wheels, eyes were like grapefruits,
and it was just like put the hammer down,
but, yeah, that got the heart racing.
[Sean] It looks like Adrian Mundwiler on the final stretch
is gonna lock up his first career win
at the CrossFit Games.
100 points for Adrian Mundwiler.
[commentator] Wow.
[Sean] And now the sprint to the finish,
but Holte has overtaken Laura Horvath,
and Kristin Holte will win event number one.
[woman] That was super fun.
So it was Katrín, me and Laura on the last stretch.
I had to sprint as hard as I could and made it. It's cool.
Was there a camera on that corner? I almost...
Someone fell. So, I was always...
Oh.
- How's your elbow? - Busted up.
Her front tire. I was in front.
And she cuts in closer, and I bounced off my bike.
I thought I was on the ground.
And then I just heard someone fall behind me.
[Adrian] It is an individual sport, at the end of the day.
If you have an athlete
that is knowingly impeding another athlete,
of course that's not fair and we're gonna look into it,
so we did, and there was no foul play.
I always try to put myself in the mindset
of being in the competition, in the intensity of the moment,
and I'm sure that if you get
a little bit of friction from another rider,
it very much can feel like somebody wants to take you out,
but the reality doesn't always import to that.
Tell me about that. How'd it go?
Good. Mat came over at the beginning.
And so we had a strategy, me, Mat and Rasmus.
It didn't work that well.
I knew I was gonna win that one. I had to.
It's Swiss National Day today,
so I had to keep my country proud.
And, yeah, it's good. Looking forward, it was a good start.
I was leading for too long in the beginning,
so I shouldn't have done that, but...
It was so much easier in the back. I knew it would be easier.
But it was way more easier than I thought.
Everyone was messing around in the back,
so I was maybe more careful than I should have been, but...
And then in the last lap I just pulled out
and then Kristin came in the last turn
and she passed me in the last stretch,
but I'm happy with that.
There were some scary moments out there.
Some of the girls pushing back and forth against each other.
Please don't fall. Please don't push each other off.
All the rules were out the window by the start,
but by round seven, eight, they were out the window.
Little bit of lacking race etiquette out there.
In the first corners when the pack was pretty tight,
some guys swiped across and wiped out six riders.
Not the first time I've started in a big hole, unfortunately.
- How's she doing? - Good. Good.
- She warmed up? - Well, warming up now.
So we'll find out how good.
Has she done a Muscle-Up yet?
2018? 2017? She did one last year at regionals.
That was the last time we've done them.
How do you think this is gonna go down, buddy?
- The Muscle-Ups or the Total? - The Muscle-Ups.
Think you're gonna see some guys go for it and crash and burn.
And then I think you'll see maybe one...
I think we'll see one guy go unbroken.
[Sean] The toughest day
in CrossFit Games history rolls on.
It's event number two, and it's pretty simple.
30 muscle-ups four times.
[commentator] It's classic CrossFit.
This was the gold standard event.
30 ring muscle-ups. It's pure gymnastics.
[Tommy] It's a classic CrossFit benchmark type test.
It's been around in the community for ages.
I think a lot of people were excited
to see the Games athletes tested,
because the standard has always been whether or not
someone can go unbroken on that.
[commentator] Sean, a number of athletes are having trouble
locking out at the top of the muscle-up
because of the length of the strap.
The rings are eight feet above the ground.
There's 10 feet from the rings
to where the straps are affixed.
[Tia] Typically with longer straps,
they do require you to keep the rings in a little bit closer,
so you're actually going to be fatiguing your upper body
because you're fighting with the straps
wanting to just constantly keep going out.
[Patrick] Everybody knew the length of the straps
and things like that would impact the muscle-ups,
so you might have to be a bit more conservative
than maybe in training.
[Katrín] I've never worked as hard in my life
on muscle-ups as we did this year.
[Adrian] It's funny, the athletes talk about
longer straps and different details like this,
and maybe this is my lack of competitive experience talking,
but I think that's nerves.
I really don't think it makes as much difference
as a lot of them claim.
[Sean] Fighting for first place,
Fraser back up on the rings after a break.
[Adrian] What stood out most about that event
was seeing Fraser miss a rep.
[Sean] Mat Fraser fails a rep.
That might open the door for Cole Sager.
But Fraser is trying to minimize his rest.
He has one rep to go.
[Adrian] I don't know, I've long felt
that his mentality of do or die and attack
is what it takes to be a champion.
And I see a lot of athletes on the other end of that
that actively strategize themselves out of a win.
His willingness, even that early in the competition,
to take a risk, to blow it out and fail,
even if it means he might have lost some placements,
that speaks to the mentality that it takes to be on top.
You can't hold anything back.
[whoops]
[Sean] Tia Toomey looking to lock up an event win.
She will lock it out, and the 2017 fittest woman on Earth
will get beat now by Kristi Eramo
on the far side of the field.
[Patrick] I think that Dave probably programmed that
expecting people to go unbroken,
at least a couple of people.
And it just didn't happen, like, it's, I don't know.
Sorry, like, it's hard. We tried.
[Sean] Two tests are down.
Two more remain here on the opening day
of the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games.
The CrossFit Total is up next.
CrossFit Total's awesome.
Everyone loves heavyweights. It's like the Home Run Derby.
But it's a significant event because you go from that
to another benchmark workout, CrossFit Total,
that has been around forever.
It is one of the first events that was ever performed
at the CrossFit Games back in 2007.
[commentator] In event number two, we went back to 2002
Mainsite programming.
In event number three it's time to lift heavy
and have a flashback to the very first Games back in 2007.
It's time for CrossFit Total.
Another athlete that needs a good event here.
Patrick Vellner.
Rough start with that bike race.
Tried to get himself back in there with the Muscle-Ups.
He needs to finish off this day well
going into that last event.
Ever since I started CrossFit,
I've never been one of the stronger guys.
Coming from a gymnastics background,
I'm much more interested in doing high-skill movements
than heavy, heavy movements.
[Mat] Dead lift is a lift that just favors
a certain body type so much.
You see Vellner over there with his ape arms.
He was talking after the event, he was, like,
dude, the weight didn't even come off the ground
until it's at my knees.
[Patrick] I was not planning on dead-lifting that heavy,
so I had no idea.
I didn't even know how to load the bar.
I was asking my judge, what do six blues weigh?
I don't even know. I've never loaded that on a bar before.
And the fives were sitting right beside the clips,
so I just threw the fives on.
[commentator] Vellner needs a big lift.
[Sean] And Vellner is lining up for a huge lift.
At 595 pounds, less than 30 to go,
so plenty of time for Pat Vellner.
- Pat Vellner at 595! - [commentator] Wow. Man!
Then by the time I processed that that was ridiculous,
like who dead-lifts 595?
That's basically 600 pounds. You might as well dead-lift...
Next time. Now I know. Next time.
[Sara] I was pretty angry going into the Total.
I had tried one lifting belt one time before,
a thick powerlifter's belt.
I just put it as tight as I could
because I thought the tighter it would be,
the more weight I could handle.
My first dead lift in the warm-up,
I just felt something,
and I didn't wanna think about it more.
I knew what happened, but I wasn't gonna let it stop me.
So I was just in denial that something had happened
and went out to the floor
and did the worst dead lift of my entire life.
[Sean] Here's Sara Sigmundsdóttir at 365,
and Sara Sigmundsdóttir is off to a surprising start
here at the CrossFit Games.
[Sara] PR'ed with a broken rib.
[Laura] I didn't exactly know the number that I was lifting
in kilos because it was in pounds.
I PR'ed my back squat. I PR'ed my press.
I PR'ed my dead lift.
I thought I would win the dead lift by a lot.
Clearly people had been working on their dead lift
because everyone was super close to me.
[Sean] It was hard to tell who was gonna win.
You knew who was gonna do well.
A lot of people were watching Tia Toomey
'cause of her recent foray into the Olympics
and her proficiency in anything you throw at her.
[Shane] I'm very conscious of what the field are capable of.
Based off a lot of the data that I received,
I thought she'd be very competitive in it.
[Sean] Remember, she competed for Australia
at the 2016 Rio Summer Olympics in weightlifting.
[Katrín] She was next to me
and she was getting really loud roars.
So I didn't even wanna know what number she was putting up.
But they were pretty big numbers.
- Let's ....... go, yeah? - [woman] Come on, Tia!
[Sean] Now Toomey will be making a run at 410 pounds.
[Tia] I had my mom, dad, Shane,
just standing right there in front of me.
And there my dad was, shirtless, with a hat on,
and he was screaming at me.
I just thought that that was the best thing.
It didn't matter what was on that barbell, I was lifting it.
- Come on! - Let's go! Let's go! Come on!
[shouting continues]
[cheering]
[Tommy] We got to see Tia make a statement
with that final dead lift.
Last year it was a close competition, the closest ever.
But it probably wasn't gonna be that way this year.
The hair thing, don't worry about it. It's too late now.
- What? - You dropped the thing.
So just be smart, find comfort in this movement,
and then just breathe, follow through.
Just be very conscious to keep breathing.
That's what we're after. It's an endurance test.
You're an endurance athlete. Period.
- I love you so much. Have fun. - Thanks.
- Have fun? You have fun. - You'll have fun.
I will. I'll be eating burgers and drinking beers.
Where are we going?
We're walking to our doom.
We're gonna go row a marathon.
Nice finisher. Nice finisher for your day.
I wish they gave us a last supper or something, though.
But it's gonna be... it's gonna be good.
Do you like being a part of the history of the Games?
Yeah, I mean, like, I know when I first started, it was just...
I was in... I am still, but I was in so much awe
of the athletes that had done it from the very beginning.
I think that this is so special.
The CrossFit Games is more than just determining
who the fittest on Earth is.
It's more than just people working out and everything.
We're a huge community and just growing every single year,
and it's pretty spectacular, yeah.
[Justin] The first time Dave talked about
doing a marathon row, in my mind I said that's long,
but I was only thinking half-marathon long.
So in my mind it's an hour and a half workout.
I remember him saying
how long it took him to do a marathon row
and then going they'll probably be a lot faster.
And then I remember being in the arena
while they were doing the row,
leaving after 45 minutes, eating dinner,
coming back, and they still had over an hour to go on the event.
[Sean] There are some infamous numbers
in CrossFit Games history.
42,195 is going to join them after today.
That is the number of meters that these athletes must row
in event number four.
It is a marathon row.
It is the longest event in CrossFit Games history.
The time cap: four hours.
This is a grueling physical and mental challenge.
[commentator] This is gonna be mentally draining,
so who's gonna be able to deal with that?
[Justin] I don't think anybody looks at a marathon row
and says "That sounds like fun."
That's hard, it's long, it's outside your comfort zone.
But at the CrossFit Games, people look at that and say,
"Does everybody have to do it? All right. Who's gonna win?"
I think that's exactly what you get with CrossFit training,
a daily dose of "This is outside my comfort zone."
"It's hard. Is everybody else doing it?"
"All right, let's go. Start the clock."
That builds tough, durable people
that have a performance mindset,
and it takes them and their mentality outside of a workout
and it applies to other parts of their life.
[Adrian] Mental toughness is huge.
I think it's one of the things we train for.
You're not always gonna get the event that you want.
You're not always gonna have the movement that you like.
And yet you're gonna show up and do it anyway.
That's a huge aspect
that's baked into the culture of CrossFit.
You take a challenge, you embrace it
and you do the best you can with it.
That's true for everybody.
[Tommy] There's an inherent mental training
that goes along with CrossFit
as a training methodology as well as a sport.
In practice, every single day,
you're redefining and pushing the limits
of what you're capable of
and actively trying to tiptoe to the edge
and see where that line is for you physically.
And when you're constantly pushing those limits,
that is an opportunity for you
to reframe your mindset personally
about what you see in the mirror is capable for yourself.
[cheering]
Can you help us?
We can't really bend down right now.
So... I'll do the camera,
and can you put our stuff into the basket?
- Seriously, I can't bend over. - I can't bend over.
- It was good. - Was it the hardest yet?
- Yes. - Yes.
[announcer] ...with a time of three hours,
13 minutes and 24 seconds...
Heber wouldn't pick up my stuff for me.
[laughs]
- You OK? - No. I feel ....ing shit.
I feel like I have to throw up, crap and everything.
So I literally just wanna dip my ass in.
- This is unbelievable. - I got it.
You got it?
- Oh, God. - [man groans]
Cramp? Dude, as soon as... Mmm.
As soon as I stood up, dude,
quads, hamstring, ass, calves, everything cramped.
That was brutal.
Hitting the hour 40 mark
and realizing I still have over an hour to go.
[groans]
I would like to do triple marathon instead of that.
I'm never doing that again, not a ....ing chance.
How do you feel after that row?
I feel really good, actually.
Are you sore? Like your boots are sore? Your hands are sore?
- No. - You feel fine?
Yeah, I feel really good.
Like, I was wondering,
I thought between my shoulder blades was a little bit sore,
but the more I move around,
the more I don't feel it anymore.
When I very first got up, but...
Yeah. I'm ready for day two.
What's your confidence levels like this morning?
- How are you feeling? - It feels good.
I'm trying not to think too much about it.
I'm in second place right now,
and that makes me a little bit nervous.
But it's three more days, so it's just started.
Anything can happen.
But I'm gonna for sure do my very best.
I wanna do really good this year, so I'm excited, yeah.
I'm Lukas Hogberg from Stockholm, Sweden.
I have an apartment here in Stockholm.
I live there with my girlfriend and my dog.
My dog's name in Swedish is Walter.
- How old is he? - Seven months. Just a kid.
He's a Rhodesian Ridgeback, an amazing dog.
He's seven months old, but he's big as ..... Can you say ....?
- New sweater? You just got it? - Yeah, yesterday.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg is just like a big, goofy dog.
He's always happy and he's a little bit goofy.
You can't help but really like Lukas Hogberg.
He's just a good guy.
[whines]
[man] Where are we going right now, Lukas?
We're going for a run in the spooky forest.
We have a place just out in the woods.
We have a lot of tracks and we run around.
The session can be from 45 minutes
up to two and a half hours.
[Adrian] I remember the words of my friend Martin Altmark,
Swedish CrossFit affiliate owner.
Swedes know how to run. It's in our culture.
We run a lot. People don't realize it.
And I think Hogberg showed that a few times over the 2018 Games.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg, what changed?
This athlete wasn't even in the Games last year.
[commentator] In the last qualifying spot,
fifth place, Frederik Aegidius!
[cheering]
[Sean] Frederik Aegidius did just enough
to hold off Lukas Hogberg.
Two points and two seconds,
all that separates fifth from sixth.
[Lukas] So what I learned about not qualifying in 2017
was to focus more on myself
and not think too much about what others think about me
or how they expect me to perform.
I really had to think back,
I'm doing this 'cause I love the sport,
and I love competing and I enjoy it and it's fun.
That's why I'm doing it.
I started when I was a kid, 10 years old. I did kung fu.
I thought Bruce Lee was super awesome.
And then I started boxing instead.
I always enjoyed
the physical training more.
I loved the boxing, but it's more fun to do all the push-ups
and the stuff that everyone hates.
And then when I saw CrossFit,
I was like, shit, this is my sport.
OK, listen up. Make smart decisions out there, OK?
Do the right thing on these obstacles.
The event's not gonna be won
on shaving off time from dropping from obstacles.
Someone just hurt themselves on a low wall.
I'm thinking they rolled their knee. I don't know yet.
But think about self-preservation, OK?
Win this on the stuff in here and on the run.
Don't win it on the O-Course. Be efficient on the O-Course.
Promise me you're gonna be safe? All right, thank you. Good luck.
[Laura] When they announced the Battleground, I was very happy.
I was stoked. I was like, that's my event.
It's awesome, it's great.
[Sean] It's the Battleground, presented by
the United States Marine Corps,
one of the most unique challenges
these athletes will face all weekend.
[commentator] I absolutely love it.
It is true, real-time, real-world fitness.
With that Rescue Randy Drag and O-Course, it is fun to watch.
I'm actually kind of jealous they get to do it.
[Adrian] The Battleground was a good test of GPP.
General physical preparation is a big part
of what CrossFit is all about.
[Tia] It showcased how diverse CrossFit can really be,
and it showcased that we really, truly are preparing
for anything and everything.
[commentator] Rescue Randy is 185 pounds of dead weight.
The dummy is 165, plus 20 pounds of body armor.
We've seen different techniques.
It's called Randy or Bob or Pukey.
What did it say? I don't know.
Yeah, I get to drag my doppelganger around.
It was great. Good time.
[man] What is the fastest way to move Randy?
How can you get an edge on the rest of the field?
Literally, as I walked out on the field,
I looked down at Randy, and I kind of saw his strap
sticking up on one side.
I was like, the fastest way to move Randy
is to run up to him and be the first one to move him.
[commentator] It looks like Cole Sager
single-handed running forward.
We haven't seen that yet.
There's been a lot of monkey see, monkey do.
But all the way out to the front. Great first move.
I took the lead, I think, from the beginning,
and then I kept it almost throughout the whole event.
[commentator] I love her confidence
at only 21 years of age.
Look at the way she just ripped right up that rope
like she doesn't even have a weight vest on.
One of the biggest cues in that workout was to run hard.
There was no assigned lane at the obstacle course,
so getting to the obstacle course first
meant that no one's in your way.
[Mat] We saw Lukas and Cole hitting elbows.
They were getting aggressive. I thought they were joking.
[commentator] Oh! We got a little jostling on the field.
Yeah, he got so pissed, and I tried to be a bit annoying
and just go pretty close and block his way.
I just tried to tire him out by ....ing with him.
He started to crowd me, and he was leaning into me
and I was leaning into him.
He gave me a shoulder check,
and instantly, I didn't even think about it,
I grab his hip, swim over the top of this shoulder
and throw him back behind me.
Right when it happened, I was like, 14 years of football
all just came together in one moment right there.
That's fine, 'cause I ....ed with him,
so I guess he's ....ing me back.
[commentator] If they can get to those obstacles,
they can make each one count.
They have to be very specific and exact
when they hit those obstacles.
[Patrick] So I had to pick lines and avoid some people,
but it was fine, it was all pretty smooth.
I got through the jump hurdles
without crashing again this year, which was great.
I've had to live down that video for a whole year.
[Sean] Brent Fikowski is right next to Cole Sager.
He's climbing the cargo net as well.
Mat Fraser is there, as is Patrick Vellner.
[Patrick] There was somebody coming up behind me,
so I went close on one side.
I was reaching right towards those black lines,
so I had to really choke out
and try to avoid that cargo net no rep.
So I came over really awkward.
I should have climbed down more under control.
[Mat] I got to the top of the net, I went over sideways,
got two solid handholds and then just flipped my feet over,
and my first thought,
as soon as I realized I was falling, was... "Good."
"I'm gonna get down so much faster than these other guys."
[Sean] Sager's up and over. Hogberg hits the ground.
And Mat Fraser takes a nasty spill off of that thing.
But he is OK.
And Vellner's off it as well.
[Patrick] I knew it as soon as I let go,
and I was pushing back,
and my whole body's coming back, and my one foot snags,
and then you're just like "pew!"...
And I was like, all right, shit.
[Mat] In that one second of falling,
you have so many thoughts going through your head.
It went from, "Good, I'm gonna get down
so much faster than everyone else," to,
"No, you idiot, that's not good. You're gonna die."
[Sean] But the two of them look to be all right.
Fraser gets over the hop logs in a hurry.
Vellner looks like he's OK.
[Patrick] Really knocked the wind out of myself pretty good,
and did one of those like... [wheezes, laughs]
And I was like, just move,
'cause otherwise someone's gonna try to help you
and you don't wanna get saved.
Two or three obstacles were the swinging and catching
and a lot of highly technical things,
and then you did monkey bars, and then you're running again.
[Sean] Now Laura Horvath is done.
650 meters back to the North Park.
[Laura] Got in the stadium, did my two rope climbs,
and then saw Cole Sager pulling it with one arm,
so I was like, why not give it a go?
And I pulled it all the way.
[Sean] Somebody get out there
and tell this woman she's a rookie!
Laura Horvath takes event five!
[Patrick] But, yeah, I hit the white finish line
and took a knee real quick,
and I just spat a loogie, like when you're done working out,
you're just all phlegmy and gross,
and it was just pure red, right on the white finish line too.
I was like, "Uh-oh."
[clears throat] It's like if I do that...
- Are you having pain? - I don't have any pain, really.
It feels like you lie on your back,
you've got a little bit of wind knocked out of you.
And I thought I got sand in my mouth.
- Which way did you land? - A bit more on my shoulder.
I saw him hit, on TV, right here.
[Patrick] I had to go through due process
and everybody got involved,
and they basically have their policy
and wouldn't let me compete until they had investigated that
and I got a CT scan and had been cleared by some doctors.
So a couple of the events staff just drove us to the hospital.
I had to get a scan done.
The CT came back
and there was clearly bruising in my left lung,
but they kind of said it's not gonna get any worse,
it just might be uncomfortable.
- How do you feel right now? - Pretty good. A little sore.
I fell from pretty high, but not too bad.
I don't feel bad. I just feel like... I feel dumb.
I shouldn't have done that,
but that's what happens when you're racing.
[shouting and cheering]
Tia, how was it?
That was harder than the row.
What was that battle with Laura like?
Yeah, that was fun. Very, very fun.
[cheering]
[rap music]
Guys, you're running 10 rounds! 60 seconds! Go!
Right now we are in Boston. I was in Tennessee before.
I was at Chris Hinshaw's place.
He is doing a seminar here and I'm helping out a little bit.
The goal here is to count your reps, count your lunges.
I like helping people to get better in anything.
And go. Fast, fast, fast, fast, fast.
It's awesome, and they just want to learn from you.
When they wanna reach their goal,
you just help to make it happen.
Faster, faster, faster. And time.
- So how do you like Boston? - It's nice. Great city.
The weather was perfect.
Everything was fun. We ate ice cream. We had a smoothie.
Sightseeing on a bike is so much more fun than walking.
[Chris] We want Laura to reach into a lobster pot, grab it,
throw it into hot water and eat it with her bare hands.
- Tell me, how do I do? - Pull the tail off.
- I can't eat the head. - Just talk to it.
- Just go "Hi!" - Hi!
Now, the problem is, you got the poop chute here.
- There you go. - That was easy. It's empty now.
It's like you grew up in Boston.
[Laura] I was a rock climber.
I still do climb sometimes for fun.
So I was very athletic as a kid,
because my parents are PE teachers.
I had always to win. I had to beat the guys.
So I was very competitive. I like to win, I guess.
[Patrick] Knowing her from just this last year,
training with her at a couple of camps,
I expected that she would crush it.
I thought Laura would have a great weekend.
She was very stoic throughout the whole weekend.
She surprised me with how well she kept her composure
for just being new in the game.
[Laura] My goal was to be top five or podium.
I would be very happy with that.
But of course I was there to win.
All 40 women are there to win.
If you are not there to win, then why are you there?
Do you have any big goals? Clean ladder?
Other than not have your aorta explode?
That's plan A, every event from now on.
No, I think you have to power the whole first round
if you wanna advance, and then... and not miss any.
So do that, and then the second round,
I don't think I'm top five.
'Cause I can't power all the bars.
I think you need to power all the bars in the second round.
Then you advance.
How you feeling?
I'm not the strongest guy here,
so if I make it to the top 20, I'm happy, for sure.
[commentator] Welcome in to the electrifying Coliseum
at the Alliant Energy Center in Madison, Wisconsin,
as we're ready for women's event number six
of the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games,
the Speed Clean and Jerk Ladder.
The interesting thing about the Clean and Jerk Speed Ladder
is the format, basically rounds.
And you're trying to get a time
that will advance you to the next round.
That unique format
really adds some excitement to the competition
because there is that pressure to make the final cut
and make the final round
and be one of those final few athletes to secure a top spot.
[commentator] Vellner here getting some medical attention.
They're trying to make sure that he's fit to compete.
He has been cleared to continue.
Patrick Vellner has made his way back to the arena
to complete this event.
The question is, is he 100%? How will he handle this one?
[Tia] So the Speed Clean and Jerk Ladder, it's like,
OK, you can't think, you just have to go.
[Adrian] When you have to do near max efforts
back to back to back,
that expression of strength
is much different than having a lot of time
to get the perfect rep.
[Mat] Everyone's gonna be sprinting.
No one's gonna be setting up on their lift.
[Tia] The Coliseum is so electric.
[Adrian] At least once a year the hairs
on the back of my neck'll stand up in the Coliseum.
I'm thinking literally of the movie Gladiator.
They're out there showcasing their best.
[commentator] Toomey trying to hold off Thorisdottir.
Thorisdottir trips.
I do my final lift, put it down
and I slam down on my face.
[commentator] But Mat Fraser might be taking the top time
here in the quarter final round.
Why not? Mat Fraser, fastest time in round one.
[Patrick] I think the second round,
I wasn't really trying to race that much.
Get through all of them, don't miss any bars,
try to fall inside that top 15 or something like that.
[Sean] Mat Fraser, whether it's fair or not,
gets held to a much higher standard.
Everyone expects him to demolish every event.
Don't make Mat Fraser angry.
You would not like him when he's angry.
And he only leads by eight points.
Looking to put some distance
between himself and Lukas Hogberg.
[Mat] And I was so nervous
about not qualifying for that final heat.
I know I need to give everything I have.
I'm so amped up when I go out on the floor,
I don't take time to notice where a clock is.
[Sean] Fraser hits that lift and he continues to lead.
Fraser's going through it and then gets to that final weight.
[Mat] Never saw where a clock was.
So I'm just in full panic mode
going into the last bar, just grip it and go.
[Sean] Paulson behind him.
Fraser drops the bar. He'll get right back on it.
And he missed once, and people went, "What?"
[Adrian] He made a tactical mistake and he got back on it,
'cause he thought he could beat the person next to him.
If I took five seconds to regroup, do it again,
it would have been too late.
I just said, .... it, grab it, try it again.
[Sean] Fraser has it stood up, as does Tim Paulson.
Fraser will miss the jerk. Paulson is through.
This could be huge for Lukas Hogberg.
Shit's not good. I attacked this incorrectly.
[Sean] The top five times advance.
Mat Fraser may not be one of them.
[Tommy] It was like this kind of shock and all moment,
not getting to see the Michael Jordans
or the Kobe Bryants of your sport
not be in the finals in this very spotlighted,
highlighted type final heat.
But it also provided an opportunity
for some other athletes to shine.
[Sean] Nick Urankar can throw some weight around.
[commentator] Look at the bowling ball shoulders.
We talked about that during the CrossFit Total as well.
He likes these kind of events.
He likes to go big. He likes to go heavy.
When it was announced, I was excited/scared,
because everybody anticipated I'd have a shot at winning it.
[Sean] Urankar sticks to jerks, and he is way out in front
as he moves to the 340-pound barbell.
Opening up a lead with Amanda Barnhart.
The rookie is hanging tough.
220 pounds. Amanda Barnhart hits the jerk.
Amanda Barnhart, her first career event win!
And he's calling on the crowd to get him through this lift.
[Nick] The final bar, thinking,
"What am I gonna do? This is heavy."
All I told myself was, "You've hit this a million times."
- [cheering] - [commentator] Oh, yeah.
[Sean] Nick Urankar wins the Speed Clean and Jerk Ladder.
[Nick] Probably one of the most unbelievable moments
of my athletic career ever.
That was... That was awesome.
That was so loud. So loud. And they just kept getting louder.
And I was like, I don't wanna not go.
I started telling 'em to get loud a little early.
I wasn't quite ready.
And, yeah, that was... that was sick.
The energy out there is un... unbelievable.
Hopefully it stays like that.
I'm sure it's gonna stay like that all weekend.
What are we fixing to see? What's gonna happen?
Well, best strategy in this workout, like all workouts,
is fast and unbroken.
So whoever does that wins.
[Sean] The top 10 men in the overall standings
in this final heat.
Pat Vellner in lane four has been
the living embodiment of Murphy's Law
so far in this competition,
but he is still in third place overall.
[commentator] Katrín Davídsdóttir right now
is sitting 46 points outside a podium position.
She also has had some struggles along the way.
38th in the CrossFit Total.
She would definitely love 100 points at this point.
[Mat] When he announced Fibonacci,
I was pretty excited about that.
Even last year I did well in the event,
while still pacing it to the point
that it was almost comical.
I was like, OK, time to see
what I'm actually capable of with this event.
[Laura] So when they announced the Fibonacci, I wasn't happy.
I didn't like that workout. It's not good for me.
[Sean] Laura Horvath is in lane number six,
and she is falling well off the lead pace.
My handstand push-ups have got better,
but they are still my weakest.
I'm gonna say this a couple of times.
That was my favorite event.
[commentator] Look how fast Katrín Davídsdóttir
transitioned right to the dead lifts.
[Katrín] I like it when you get to use your fitness,
there was gymnastics, there was dead lifts.
I'm very good with those kettlebell dead lifts.
I never know where they come from.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg is the man
who is closest to Mat Fraser in the overall standings.
He trails him by 20 points.
[Mat] I'm in a lane next to Vellner.
That dude is standing upright
by the time the kettlebells come off the floor.
His arms are so long and the kettlebells are sitting so high.
[commentator] We saw him falter on the cleans earlier,
so we wanted to see if he could actually handle
the pressure of being chased.
I was like, I know I'm gonna have to push
to keep a good race on this.
I noticed that every time Mat would come down and move on,
and I would come down 10 seconds after and advance,
the crowd would really react.
[commentator] He needs to hold on to that position.
He has to keep fighting.
[Patrick] I so far had had
a bit of a rough shake, but I keep coming.
I wasn't gonna sit down.
[Sean] Davídsdóttir, one rep to go, she's done.
It's time to grab the 35-pound kettlebells
and take off on that march down the floor.
And that's when your arms are so fried, and they feel like jelly.
And the only thing I'm thinking about is just lunge faster.
[Sean] Mat Fraser will be the first man
on the overhead walking lunge.
[Mat] When you pick up the kettlebells to lunge,
you can deal with the pain in your legs and ass later.
It's go time.
[Sean] A good race developing now in the middle.
Katrín Davídsdóttir on the left,
Annie Thorisdottir on the right.
I love the overhead walking lunges with the kettlebells.
I really wanted to get to that final line,
I have one gap left,
and I could just feel my right shoulder getting wobbly.
[Katrín] My shoulder mobility is really good,
so I was able to just set my shoulders back
and just keep 'em there, and I was like, keep 'em straight.
[Sean] Katrín Davídsdóttir is across,
and Katrín Davídsdóttir takes the Fibonacci!
Fraser continuing to march towards the finish line.
He's gonna take a break and has to retreat to the nearest line,
and here comes Patrick Vellner.
[Patrick] I think that was a turning point in the weekend.
I had had a lot of things go wrong,
and it was like, I can turn this around.
[Sean] Mat Fraser wins the Fibonacci.
Vellner is in, but Vellner's gonna take fourth.
There's still lots of weekend left, and I'm in a good spot.
[Mat] That sucked having that be my first event win.
Waiting that long in competition to finally get one?
I was like, "Oh, man, what's going on here?"
It was concerning, but it was a relief to finally get one.
It was good. I was very clear-minded.
Um, I did good.
Good, fair judge, he was making me
open up my hips on the handstand push-ups,
which was good, it was fair.
So it just slowed me down just a little bit,
but I'm still super happy with how I paced it.
Everything felt great. I got a good score.
Yeah, no complaints. Good workout. Great workout.
Heber! The Coliseum is magical this year.
- You like the magic? - It's all magic.
Is that what you've been missing?
I thought of that as the end of my workout.
I knew I could put those kettlebells up
and lunge 'em all the way, and then halfway and I was like,
- "Oh, shit." - Annie was right there.
He told me to stop if you need to when you got over a line.
And I was like... I didn't know where Annie was,
but the crowd was roaring and Annie's judge was here,
so I was like, "Lunge faster, lunge faster."
Then you don't have to hold them up for as long.
- Yeah. - [laughs]
Let's go back to fact that some days you don't know it's Friday.
[laughter]
Do you know what day it is right now?
- [man] It's Saturday. - Obviously did you know?
[woman] Everyone's just walking around knowing what day it is.
But do you just know, or do you have to think about it?
- [man] I know. - It was really good yesterday.
And I'm really excited about this one,
especially the 500 swim.
It's just so pretty out
that I think it'll be a fun event to do.
Right, so I'm not gonna be there.
We know what we need to do. Back to square one, OK?
Your day. Love you.
- Love you too. - Bye.
Let's focus on the course.
Swim starts here and ends here. You're gonna go that way.
You'll see the buoy when we get out there.
Boat launches from here and lands over here.
What do you think about Katrín?
- On this? - In general.
- Is she gonna climb back up? - I think she can climb back up.
It'll be a battle between her and Annie
on the second and third.
- Mmm. - What do you think?
I think yesterday was good for her. She needed that.
Otherwise she was .......
[Sean] For two days, the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games
have been contested on dry land.
That changes on day three.
Thanks for joining us as we kick off action on Saturday
with event number eight, the Madison Triplus,
and this is the latest in CrossFit Games history
that we've actually put athletes in the water.
[Tommy] Madison Triplus was a mash-up
of a few different off-site events,
and any time there's a swim involved,
the Australian contingent
automatically jumps to the forefront
as some of the favorites.
[Tia] As soon as there's a run, a swim, anything outside,
I'm like, yes, these are my points.
And in 2015 we had this event,
I think it was actually the first swim event.
I was so nervous, I was so young, and I came fourth,
but I knew that I could have done so much better.
So for the CrossFit Games team to bring the board back,
I was like, yes, let's do this.
When that event got announced, oh, God, this is gonna be bad.
'Cause every other year that there's been a swim and a run,
it's been survival mode for me.
I'm kind of like stroking in and out of consciousness.
I'm getting light-headed and tipping over.
And then they're doing a mass start on the swim in the water.
It's just a recipe for chaos.
[starter buzzer rings]
[Sean] Event eight, the Madison Triplus, is underway.
500-metre swim to open things up here.
It was hard swimming next to 39 other women. I got some kicks.
I think I gave some kicks to some girls next to me.
[commentator] That's legs and feet on top of heads,
on top of other legs.
Three pulls into the swim, knocks my goggles,
lens fills up with water.
I'm like, "Shit."
And with a compromised lung, I don't wanna blow it in a swim
when there's two other sections of that workout.
[Sean] This is more like a street fight than a swim,
but there are some really competent swimmers
who can do very well in this portion of the event.
I can't tell you how much I've worked on my swimming this year.
I've done more distance in the water this year
than the last three years combined.
I was excited to see how much I could improve,
but at the same time I still hate swimming.
[Brent] My goal was to start swimming fast
and hold the lead there and hold off the Aussies
as long as I could on the paddleboard.
I got out of the water first,
and I could hear and see that they weren't far behind.
[Sean] Brent Fikowski is done with the swim.
The women, the leaders got out of the water
faster than Brent Fikowski did.
I knew, though, you didn't wanna go out,
and I wasn't one in the swim,
so I came out of the swim in third place,
and then it was about picking up the board,
having a fast transition.
[Sean] Now, Kristi Eramo and Amanda Barnhart
are dead even on that paddle.
[commentator] So far both women are laying down on the board.
Toomey is able to use a lot more of her hips
and get more pull through the water.
And I ended up catching up to them and I was on my knees,
so I was able to actually gain some momentum from them.
[Laura] I fell a couple of times.
I tried to get on my knees.
It was impossible for me.
I just fell over.
It's so hard for me to know how to control it and how to do it.
When I gain speed, I get so tired in the shoulders,
and I think more than 10 people passed me.
[commentator] He just doesn't look real confident to me.
[commentator 2] He's really struggling,
but if you can't balance, then it's really hard
to even get yourself to move.
[Brent] It was not as fast as Dean Linder-Leighton,
who had these big double-hand strokes.
[Sean] Three Australians out front, Dean Linder-Leighton,
followed by now Khan Porter
and James Newbury, your top three.
And near the end, Sean Sweeney, yelling,
"You Australian dingo, I'm coming for you!"
[Sweeney] I'm coming for you, Khan!
You better paddle that sweet ass!
Yelling at me, "How you doing over there, Brent?"
And I just had my chin down.
I'm not gonna give him the satisfaction of response.
And when we get out of the water, I'm gonna dust him.
[Sean] Now Toomey is off,
and now the race really starts.
The two lead women faster
than the two lead men.
[Mat] For me, coming out of the swim
and not being in a panic survival mode,
and feel comfortable, was just a huge win for me.
[Sean] Brent Fikowski right now looking to pick up some points.
Fikowski could find himself in the top three after this event.
[Brent] Pretty quickly I caught Khan Porter,
and then I caught up to James.
We've shared a coach. We're good friends.
Dean Linder-Leighton had a sizeable lead.
[Sean] And he will be 100 points richer.
Dean Linder-Leighton takes event eight,
the Madison Triplus.
[Brent] We talked a little bit
and made sure no one behind us was gonna catch us,
and we said, "Hold this pace, get into the stadium,
sprint to the finish for second, OK."
[Sean] Brent Fikowski opening it up.
James Newbury right behind him.
And it's Fikowski just ahead of Newbury.
The final stretch for Tia Toomey.
100 points for the defending fittest woman on Earth.
- High five. - Good job. There you go.
[cheering]
Fourth place on the swim. How you like them apples?
I might have finished just outside the top 20
in the swim, so...
- I'm so happy you did bad too. - I know. It's a swim, man.
- For me it's the paddle. - Always like that.
So, we are all getting checked in
to go and get our workout announced.
So we don't really know what's going on,
but we have a feeling it's gonna be some sort of pulling workout,
which is gonna be good.
All 40 women are gonna walk out onto the field.
You're actually gonna jog out onto the field.
You're gonna get in position,
and there's gonna be a judge in front of you
and the entire field.
On three, two, one, go, you're gonna run to your judge
and whatever happens to be right there,
and they're gonna tell you go,
and it's gonna be obvious what you need to do.
They are not gonna tell you how much you need to do
until you finish that.
Then you're going to advance
to another thing you might need to do.
They're not gonna tell you how much of that
you need to do either until you're done.
Then they're gonna repeat that
and repeat that and repeat that through the whole field,
until the end there will be a point
where they tell you what you need to do,
therefore you have the ability to turn it on
and you can kind of pace at the end to finish this off.
Everything will be unknown,
and it'll be very clear once you get there.
But don't ask again, don't say, where do I have to go to,
how many reps do I have to do,
how many whatever you need to do.
They'll tell you when you're done. Just work.
[Sean] It is time to embrace the Chaos.
It's the ninth event of the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games.
That's one of my all-time favorite events
at the CrossFit Games, the Chaos event.
[Adrian] Dave had been saying for a while
that he wanted to do an event
where the athletes would take the field
and they didn't know what the event was gonna look like,
how many reps they had to do or how long it was gonna be.
We knew that the athletes would know nothing
about what they were doing, that the judge would say,
"You're gonna do this. Go until I tell you to stop."
[Tommy] It is the most insane concept,
and I think it is quintessential CrossFit,
in terms of sometimes, even at the Games,
you gotta lay down the track
right in front of the train as it's going.
[Cole] Everything being kept secret before we went out there,
it toyed with people's minds.
Everyone was kind of worried.
[Katrín] What can Chaos be? Who gets to something first?
40 athletes on the field, I was like, "That's gonna be chaotic."
[Lukas] No one told us and no one in the audience
when we walked in said anything.
They were just quiet.
[Laura] You don't know how to warm up, what to expect,
what to bring out to the field.
It's not good.
- [starter buzzer rings] - [Sean] We are underway.
The athletes are being told right now,
"Work until I tell you to stop" by their judges.
They don't know the movements that are ahead of them.
Their judges will inform them at every station.
[Patrick] Something that I do maybe more than I should
is watch everybody else.
As soon as the announcer is like,
so-and-so's hand is in the air,
you're like, cool, where are they?
As soon as they move, I see what the next movement is.
OK, what's he doing? What's he doing? Burpees. Got it.
Instead of waiting for instruction,
I started doing burpees.
My transition's twice as fast.
I had 28 calories when Annie's judge goes, "Go!"
Kind of figured gonna be 30.
I was gonna run past and I see Annie drop to the floor.
Oh, like, burpees.
Every time I'd get to a movement,
I would just go pretty hard but not redline.
[Kara] It's this constant back and forth
of trying to figure out what's too much, what's not enough.
[Sean] Pat Vellner has had
all kinds of bad breaks throughout this competition,
but he is still in contention for a spot on the podium,
fourth place overall.
[Patrick] I started doing overhead squats.
Switch your arms as often as you want
to make sure that you're not gonna wreck your shoulders.
[commentator] You saw him make that switch.
He is a smart competitor, not just resilient,
as we've seen with all those bumps and bruises, but smart.
[Patrick] I'm pretty good at pistols, and once you're there,
it's clear, what else are you gonna do on that box
other than jump over it?
The other thing's a sled drag.
It was obvious what you had to do after pistols.
It was just the first four movements that were mysterious.
[Katrín] When you hear Pat Vellner's strategy,
it was the opposite to mine.
I didn't mind where I was
as long as I wasn't redlining.
[Sean] Davídsdóttir, the first woman on
to do the box jump-overs.
They are telling them
how many repetitions they have to do here.
The reason is, director of the CrossFit Games said,
"I wanna tell the athletes
so if they want to turn on the gas, they can right here."
It doesn't hurt to be a little bit taller.
I saw Mat wipe out on the box.
It brought me a little bit of enjoyment.
It showcased, hey, we don't need to know what we're doing.
We're so fit and we're so strong
that you can throw anything at us and we got it.
[Adrian] The Chaos event really does replicate
a lot of people's day-to-day affiliate experience.
No matter what's gonna be thrown at me,
I'm gonna show up and train.
That mentality is so important because, at the heart of it,
CrossFit is about capacity.
What can I do when I haven't had the chance
to train specifically for this thing?
How prepared am I really?
[Sean] Now it is on to the implement known as the Slug,
her judge telling her,
"You gotta pull that thing to the finish line."
Vellner is way out in front
and has that finish line within reach.
She says she's a sled dog, and she proves it here.
Davídsdóttir wins Chaos.
And Pat Vellner conquers the Chaos and wins event nine.
[Patrick] That's also a cool event to win
because it's quintessentially CrossFit,
unknown and unknowable.
It was like a true test of that.
It was like a marquee CrossFit event.
I feel like I'm good to win one a year.
So I got it done. Pressure's off.
But it feels good. The swim's never gonna be my best finish.
I did better this year.
So it's nice to rebound with a strong finish
to balance that stuff out.
[cheering]
[Sara] Saturday I woke up
and I've never felt this bad in my entire life.
I was just stuck with my hand like this.
So Phil can read me really well,
and he could just see how much pain I was in.
That's where I told Phil that I thought my rib was broken.
[Sean] The big news is not who is here but who is not.
Sara Sigmundsdóttir was supposed to be in lane five.
She has withdrawn from competition
due to a medical issue.
We do not know what it is,
but we do know that Sara Sigmundsdóttir,
who was 11th overall coming into this event, has withdrawn.
[Sara] So I talked to the medical team, got an MRI,
and I could see the broken rib on black and white paper.
I had worked the whole year to get to the Games,
and I was in the best shape of my life,
and it's the hardest thing that I've ever done in my life.
I just felt like, I don't know, like a... a weak person
that I stopped competing because of pain.
Why couldn't I push through it?
[Sean] The people get what the people want.
Back-to-back events to close out day three of competition
here at the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games.
There are 200 points up for grabs
for potentially only six minutes of work,
here on Saturday night in the Coliseum.
[Tommy] The Bicouplets were effectively a two-part workout
but each graded separately
and featured some gymnastics work
and then some barbell work as well.
[Adrian] Both events are pedal to the metal.
There's not a lot of room for error.
And then it's who can be ready to go
immediately after emptying the tank?
I think that's really at the top of the heap where you see
the biggest difference between CrossFit athletes.
Everybody can go hard, but who can go hard again?
[Tia] I just sent it.
Whether that was the smartest option, I didn't really care.
[commentator] Toomey is so strong on the barbell,
but I was really impressed how she held on
for that set of bar muscle-ups.
Go to the point right before failure.
[commentator] Mat is extremely smart.
He knows exactly where everyone is.
He knows how far along he is and how fast he needs to go.
[Mat] Take a quick glance side to side to see who's there.
And it was Willy Georges. Like, damn. Good for you, kid.
[Sean] Willy Georges on the left,
Noah Ohlsen is in the middle,
and it's Mat Fraser on the right.
[man] I watched Camille go unbroken all the way through.
Unbroken snatches, unbroken muscle-ups.
Somebody can do it, I can do it too.
[Sean] As Noah Ohlsen moves out for his final set,
here comes Mat Fraser.
Credit to Noah in that scenario. He really sold the farm.
You could see him just absolutely
throw himself over that bar because he was that redlined.
If you wanna beat the best, you gotta be willing to do that.
[Noah] If I would have taken an extra second
to breathe and shake out my arms,
I could have hopped up and done all six unbroken.
[Sean] The crowd comes to its feet to watch this showdown.
Who will break first?
[Noah] So I jump up, one, two, three.
So on four I was pulling like this from my fingertips,
and I chicken-wing over for four.
[commentator] Look at the way that Noah's doing that.
He's actually pushing himself... Oh!
Just thought, please, please, let me get this next one.
- [commentator] Oh! - [Sean] Fraser's off.
Willy Georges! Vive la France!
[commentator] Wow!
[Noah] It was a fourth place finish.
Normally I would be happy. That gets you a lot of points.
But what could have been once again.
[Sean] Kara Saunders is in.
And here comes Cassidy Lance-McWherter.
Kara Saunders, 26 points behind Davídsdóttir for third.
Davídsdóttir could fall out of the top three.
[commentator] I'm a little nervous for her
going into the next event.
[Katrín] We underestimated that workout a little bit.
We thought it was gonna be way faster and easier
than it actually was.
I think that's always dangerous.
You never underestimate a workout.
And I was really bummed after that one,
but I turned around and I was like, let's kill this one.
[Sean] Final heat of the final event
of day three is underway.
The second one, my grip was falling apart.
I was having trouble putting together big sets of pull-ups.
[Lukas] When I came to the chest bar
and lightweight snatch,
my grip was just way gone.
[Laura] Chest bar pull-ups, I just couldn't hang on,
so I had to break up a couple of times.
[Adrian] With events like that where you've got
these really short events, a really short break
and then another really short event,
the tension you feel, there's a difference to it.
The athletes sense that there's something
really on the line here, and that's palpable.
[Sean] The time to beat is 3.44.90.
Davídsdóttir is taking a break. She has four reps left.
I was just trying to hold out and I was falling off the bar.
I have no clue where anyone else is.
I sprint across and my judge goes screaming after me.
He's like, "No, you're not done." I was sure I was done.
[Sean] Katrín got hit with a no rep and had to go back.
We had Chaos in the event earlier,
and we get chaos tonight.
[Katrín] I was absolutely sure I was done,
and so I come back and I finish that one,
and by that time a couple more girls had finished.
They actually went back, reviewed the videos.
I did get that no rep in the beginning,
but I did that extra rep, so I did finish my nine reps.
I needed to do well in that one
'cause I'd done so poorly in the bar muscle-up one.
It ruined my vibe a little bit. It's OK.
I just wanted to do... I didn't do well on the first one,
so I really wanted to do well in the second one,
and I thought I did, and then I just felt stupid
if I had gone and not done nine, you know.
But I never count wrong.
I'm actually very good at keeping count.
So I was surprised.
What happened, buddy?
I went just too hard on the first one, I guess.
I'm pretty happy with that one. But my grip just blew up.
I'm still hanging in there, trying to do my best.
One more day tomorrow, so have to be prepared.
And I'm pretty excited, man.
It's been a crazy journey this week for me,
so I'm gonna try to keep the spirit up.
Hopefully I didn't drop too much. We'll see.
How did that leader board check out tonight?
It was huge. 200 points in one event there was a massive swing.
So I jumped to second. Brent's down to fourth.
Lukas is in third.
Willy jumped from ninth to fifth.
- [woman] Sixth. - Sixth. Bjorgvin's fifth.
It made a big difference. It's a big shake-out, so...
It's gonna be a big day tomorrow, another one.
Final day at the CrossFit Games. What else could you ask for?
Dave Castro just posted that there's pegboards.
From a coaching point of view,
you would think that there would be pegboards,
just given that they did chest bars,
they got a sled pull, so more lat work,
a lot of forearm activation, so compounding fatigue,
you'd think the likelihood of having that would be there.
So I guess it sort of goes to show
that I've never picked a workout yet
and he's still got me 100% of that.
How many pegboards have I done?
You would say, like, between 50 and 60, and I did one.
Yeah, not because we didn't try. We were able to complete one.
We tried 'em. We could only do one.
- Now we can do 'em. - Now we can do 'em.
Oh, man, this event, this is a Fikowski event.
This is a... This is a Toomey event.
And everything is easy enough that there's no strategy.
You just have to be fast.
[indistinct]
You're fine.
[Sean] Fourth and final day of competition
at the 2018 Reebok CrossFit Games,
and we are about to find out
who has some gas left in the tank.
[commentator] It is all about engine. It's not technical.
It's just about how much pain are you willing to endure
for all five of those rounds?
[Tommy] Two-Stroke Pull was the opening event on Sunday.
That first event is a big turning point
because it can make or break some athletes.
A lot of people were thinking, sled dog, Katrín Davídsdóttir,
this is custom-built for her.
[Sean] Laura Horvath had been hanging around,
but I think a lot of people expected,
OK, she's a rookie, this is not gonna last.
We were all proven wrong.
Laura Horvath went toe-to-toe
with Katrín Davídsdóttir.
[Mat] Super nervous about that one.
I knew the possibility
of me finishing in the middle of the pack was very high.
The Assault Bike, just the way it favors the power athletes,
it favors the big guys.
From the start, I felt like, oh, shit,
I can maybe push this one and get an event win.
[commentator] Katrín Davídsdóttir here in blue.
These women have the pressure on them.
They're the ones sitting in fourth and fifth place,
just outside the podium,
so they need every possible point that they can get.
Laura Horvath, who's sitting in second,
Kara Saunders, who's sitting in third,
they have to do better than them.
[Katrín] I go out pretty hot, and I was OK with it.
I was like, I'm gonna go hot.
I thought I'd be able to hang on,
and then the pull was really hard for me.
I couldn't even just use my arms
'cause I was going so slow.
[Lukas] Everyone was standing awkward
when they were doing the pull,
and I tried to stay pretty straight up
and just lean back and do big pulls,
and I was much faster than a lot of the other guys.
[commentator] This kid can drive.
He keeps that confidence, he's gonna do amazing.
[Sean] And Hogberg, currently sitting in third place overall,
looking to stay on the podium for the first time here.
Laura Horvath now off the bike, as she looks to gain ground
and solidify her hold on second place overall.
[Laura] The first round I was biking,
and everyone got off so early from the bike.
They went too fast on the first round
and I could catch them on the second and third round.
[Sean] And now Laura Horvath has taken the lead
from Katrín Davídsdóttir
as we head into the fifth and final round.
[Katrín] Still don't regret this,
but the only way to catch her is on the bike.
She was so much stronger on the pull.
Every round she'd catch me.
I was like, if I can make it to the pull before her,
maybe I can win this event.
[Tommy] That event is what really kick-started the battle
that we would see play out through the end for third place
between Lukas Hogberg and Brent Fikowski.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg is trying to hold off Brent Fikowski,
who's the man right behind him in the overall standings.
Hogberg can earn 100 points if he stays in front.
[Brent] Keep within range
and try and chase him down at the end.
Before I knew it, on the third round,
Lukas was out in front by a lot.
I was like, I don't know what he's done to get that lead,
but I don't think I can cover that ground.
[Sean] All that remains is a final 44-foot sled pull
for Lukas Hogberg as he is staring 100 points in the face.
[Lukas] Round one and two was pretty easy,
and then three was hard, four was like, oh, shit,
and five was like, I wanna die, you know.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg blew the doors off that event
and saved one of his best performances
for when he absolutely had to have it,
and that event win proved to be huge for him.
Davídsdóttir looking to win for the second consecutive time
here in the North Park.
But here comes the rookie, Laura Horvath.
I just knew if I can get to the bike
in the same time as she does, she will catch me,
but then I will catch her on the sled pull
because I just pull faster and harder.
[Sean] Laura Horvath, one pull to go.
And the new kid on the block is here to stay!
Laura Horvath wins event 12.
Lukas, what are you feeling right now, buddy?
Amazed. I know this was a really good workout for me.
I tried to just, like,
keep a steady pace and then just hold it,
like in the head think that you're pushing it in the end,
but you probably don't 'cause you're so tired,
so you can't keep the same speed.
Last round was really hard. It was fun, though.
Maybe I'm gonna get a post on Instagram
for CrossFit Games this times.
I don't know.
- Come down every single time? - From the obstacle.
And then try and push for that tiebreaker there.
Then you just rest, and then have a go at it.
- Handstand. - How is that obstacle course?
Different. A lot of people predicted that.
- Didn't they, Tia? - Yeah.
- They thought it would come. - What's your game plan?
Go out hot, try and go unbroken on the whole obstacle.
If she comes down, that's not the plan.
You said earlier, dream scenario, handstand course.
- Mmm! - Uh...
- What do you think? - And a fatigued one.
I'm excited. I think it's gonna be really fun.
I'm a little nervous for other people on the traverse,
but maybe everyone will just put their hands on the thing.
Interesting way to finish. It's gonna make for some good photos.
Yeah, I mean, going into the last day,
I know it was really close between Hogberg and Fikowski,
and I know that Hogberg was up.
And I think it came down to the last two events,
the Handstand Walk event with the obstacles,
and then the final.
Yeah, we'll see. I'm just gonna try to stay really focused.
[commentator] We last used this heavy jump rope
at the 2016 Reebok CrossFit Games on Sunday afternoon.
It's five times heavier than normal rope,
and each handle is around one to two pounds.
The new element for this is the low parallel bars.
Demo member Travis Mayer will show us how it's done.
He said the most disorientating part
is approaching the bars and seeing nothing there.
These athletes weren't able to test this
before coming on the competition floor.
First time they tested it was in 2011,
and Rich Froning walked 50 yards on his hands.
That blew everybody's minds.
You had athletes who couldn't even do it.
Fast-forward now to 2018 and we're throwing obstacles in.
They're walking up and down steps,
down ramps, over parallettes.
[Adrian] How hard should we make it?
How technical do you wanna get on your hands?
We didn't know if the athletes would rise to that challenge
or if they would get tripped up by it.
When they announced the Handstand Walk, I was nervous.
I never tried the parallels. I was terrified of that event.
[Tia] When I first started CrossFit,
doing a handstand hold or even handstand walking
for even three foot was not possible.
[Brent] I made a little mistake and I caught my finger
under my hand and fell off.
I said, OK, relax, it's OK.
And then I went up a little too slow.
So I said you gotta go up a little faster.
The list kept going on. I'd change something, reset, focus.
Before I knew it, 20 seconds left. My God, what happened?
[Mat] With that event, with how short it is,
half a second can be two places, three places.
[Katrín] You had to be really smart with your approach.
You have to just make every obstacle.
It's not about being fast. It was about being smooth.
[commentator] You are trying to push for the top,
and you overextend yourself, and you get overextended
and you fail, you fail, you fail.
You're not fifth place. Now you're 35th place.
I was right between Brent and Lukas, I think.
I was like, it's the three of us
racing for the podium right now.
We all were very sloppy in that workout.
I stumbled on my finger on the line with my left hand,
and I fell down, and I was like, .....
[Brent] Me, Vellner and Hogberg,
I could see us all look at each other,
we were like, this is really important.
I could really use these points like you guys.
[Adrian] Currently on track to potentially be
the second fittest man on Earth,
with one event remaining,
what's going through your mind right now,
considering all the hardships
you've had to go through this week?
Do you know how heavy that yoke was again?
[laughter]
It's gonna be a hard event in the final,
and so I think it's gonna come down to that.
Like you said, there is still one event to go.
Nothing's sealed. I got a lot of work to do.
- [cheering] - Try to regroup and recover.
- Thank you. - Thank you.
At that point, based on what Brent and Lukas were doing,
I was like, I think I've locked up second place,
so that was a cool moment.
I high-fived Mat and he knew it too,
and we gave a good chest bump.
I think he's happy for me to be successful,
just as long as it means he's in first.
You know what I mean? So...
It's one of those... he wants me to be as successful as possible
just as long as he's a little bit more.
Thank you.
You did so good. I'm so proud of you. You did so good.
Oh, my gosh, we're gonna get you back there. Oh, man.
- Did you have fun? - Yeah, a lot.
That's good. Well, how was the parallettes?
Easy. I rested before, like, 10 seconds or so.
You just went through. You did everything you had to do.
That was fantastic. You caught up so much on the... the stairs.
Yeah, I know.
A little stumble and then... Crazy, crazy, crazy.
You should be proud of yourself.
[Brent] The whole weekend, I don't look at the leader board,
'cause I know so much can change from Thursday to Friday to...
There are so many points up for grabs.
Usually on the last day I look at the guys in the top eight,
and I just make sure when I'm doing events
I know where they're at
and I try to beat those guys if I can.
And then on the final event my coach said
we should probably look at the leader board.
[Tommy] Fikowski is 34 points back of Lukas Hogberg,
which is interesting because Fikowski typically
comes out of the West Regional,
and that is the one regional where 30-plus point deficits
going into the final event
have evaporated yearly with these amazing comebacks,
with Cole Sager multiple years.
And so Fikowski is probably the one athlete
that has repeatedly seen that type of comeback play out
on the competition floor around him.
And he's probably one of the few athletes that mindset-wise
can approach that with, hey, I can go out there
and still have a shot at this.
Don't go half-hearted. All in. Feels good?
[indistinct]
[Adrian] The Aeneas workout was really cool.
Dave reads a lot, and his whole deal
was that he wanted to recreate the myth of Aeneas,
who, after the Siege of Troy, escaped.
It's kind of the story of that, so you gotta scale the walls,
and then you gotta carry whatever it is
out of the wreckage of the burning city of Troy.
[commentator] Aeneas was a demigod
who carried his mortal father
out from the ruins of the burning city of Troy.
Mat Fraser is a full human on the precipice
of his third consecutive CrossFit Games title.
The final event was cool, first of all,
because they brought back the pegboard
that had first shown up I think in 2015.
It was one of those things that stopped athletes
dead in their tracks.
A lot of them just could not do it.
So fast-forward now three years and they can all do it.
And Mat Fraser shows up
and, again, he has clinched the victory.
All he has to do is just finish.
One event stands between Tia Toomey
and a second straight CrossFit Games championship.
[Tia] I couldn't have programmed
an even better workout to finish on.
It is 99% that Tia is going to win.
[Sean] Who will join Mat Fraser on the podium?
Right now it's Pat Vellner and Lukas Hogberg.
But Brent Fikowski has a chance
to work himself back into a top three spot.
[Mat] I'm gonna go like a bat out of hell and just send it
and just see what I'm capable of.
Worst-case scenario, you crash and burn.
Who cares? You still won.
[commentator] Mat Fraser has been nonstop unbroken so far.
[Sean] Fraser is done, and for the third straight year,
the final event is just a victory lap for Mat Fraser.
[Adrian] That event was really dramatic
because at that point Mat was pretty much a lock.
Vellner was already up there.
He wasn't in any real danger of losing his second place.
But Lukas and Brent were battling that out.
[Sean] Lukas Hogberg needs to just reel in Brent Fikowski
to do some damage control and keep Fikowski
from leapfrogging him onto the podium.
Vellner was in second, then 34 points back was Lukas,
then 34 points back was myself.
Risk it and try and get those 34 points on Lukas Hogberg.
[Lukas] And I didn't know how good Fikowski was,
but I didn't wanna think about him when I'm doing the workout,
'cause that's gonna .... me up.
So the plan was to try and do five pegboards unbroken,
40 thrusters unbroken,
and carry the yoke fast to the finish line and win the event.
[Kara] I knew I needed a bit of separation
with Katrín and I to be on the podium,
but Matty had said, "You can't drop below fourth."
[Sean] Kara Saunders is trying
to work her way back on the podium.
She is only six points back
of Katrín Davídsdóttir for third.
[Katrín] I knew going into the last one
that I was fighting for the podium.
[Laura] We got to the barbell, me and Tia
and almost Katrín at the same time.
She was ahead of me, so she kept going.
I was like, hell, yeah, I'm not gonna take the barbell down.
I can do this all day.
[Sean] And here goes Mat Fraser
on his first yoke carry.
Lukas Hogberg is onto the thrusters.
He's gotta try and reel in Brent Fikowski
if he wants to guarantee himself a spot on the podium.
Vellner and I were really close on the yoke,
and he fell off pace, and I didn't know why.
Mr Magoo Patrick Vellner style.
His plate apparently was rolling across the stadium.
You see this yellow 35-pound plate
go rolling across the floor
and Pat Vellner frantically scrambling to go and get it.
[Patrick] I could see it flip up. "You gotta be kidding me."
I just ran it down, and I could see Boz was looking at it.
He's looking at me and he's like, "Stop it"
and I'm like, "I can't get involved."
[Patrick] It got right to his feet when I grabbed it.
I grabbed this plate and looked up.
And he's looking at me like, "What are you doing?"
I'm like, "Sorry."
[Sean] Once again, Mat Town is Mat's town.
For the third straight year, he is the fittest man on Earth.
That's Fikowski trying to jump Hogberg
for the final spot on the podium.
Fikowski ahead of Vellner.
Vellner also ahead of Hogberg.
And Fikowski is in.
As long as Tia Toomey stays right here with Laura Horvath,
it is all over.
First she finished second two times.
Then she won by two points.
Now two for Toomey! She is the fittest woman on Earth!
Davídsdóttir is in. This could be your women's podium.
Kara Saunders needs to do damage control right now.
Unofficially, Brent Fikowski has scored 84 points.
Lukas Hogberg was only up by 34.
- Thanks so much, Pat. - What a weekend.
Love you, buddy. Good job.
[indistinct]
[Tommy] Lukas finishes towards the back half of the heat,
and it's not exactly clear where he finished overall.
So immediately everyone becomes
an amateur calculator, leader boarder,
just trying to figure out times from the previous heat.
[Sean] We didn't wanna say
that it was officially gonna go to a tiebreak,
but it was very clear that that was what was gonna happen.
And then we knew that because of Hogberg's win,
he was gonna wind up on the podium for the first time,
and once again it's another near miss for Brent Fikowski.
- Congratulations, man. - Oh, God.
[Brent] You compete long enough,
I've been playing sports my whole life,
and you learn more from the losses than the wins,
even though I'd prefer to win all the time.
There's ups and downs, and there's 40 men there,
and only one guy gets the gold medal,
and the other 39 men get to choose
how they perceive their performance.
And obviously they might not be as happy as the guy in gold,
but happiness is also a choice.
[Dave] For the third consecutive year,
your CrossFit Games champion is Mat Fraser!
[cheering]
[Sean] It was really cool to see Katrín Davídsdóttir
pull off that comeback
and make that steady march up the leader board
that we have been accustomed to seeing from her.
She's never out of it.
But you had to feel for Kara Saunders
because here she is again
suffering another just heartbreaking near miss.
[indistinct]
I love you so much.
- Next year. - Next year.
You're talking about next year? 2019? What part?
- What we're doing for training. - How we're gonna show up.
[Katrín] Now it's done, you can't change it.
There's no hope, there's no keeping the mindset good,
there's no working harder.
It's just like it's done and I didn't win.
But at the same time, I've never worked harder
in my entire life than I did this year.
And third place is still third place,
and we're back on the podium, and there's a lot of wins
and there's a lot of good in it,
and I can't forget to celebrate that.
I felt like I ....ing won the CrossFit Games
taking third place.
This has been my dream for eight years,
make it to the podium.
It was just amazing,
and I was so proud to be representing Sweden,
and all this hard work I've been doing for so many years
has really paid out and I'm standing here on the podium
at the CrossFit Games.
I've been thinking about it a lot,
how it feels to stand up there,
and it's ....ing amazing.
[Laura] It's awesome. It's so great.
Standing on the podium next to these girls, it was incredible.
It was amazing, it was the best experience ever,
like, representing my country.
I was the only Hungarian at the Games this year,
which was huge for me and also for my country, I guess.
It was awesome. It was so great.
[Patrick] I put myself in some sticky situations,
but I'm happy that I'm able to just rally and figure it out.
I think that's part of what
people liked about me this year,
was that terminator mentality
where it didn't matter what happened to me.
I was gonna figure it out and ride the ship
and we were gonna get back on track.
I'm proud of my ability to do that
and I think that's something I have as a competitor
that maybe some others don't
that gives me a little bit more of an edge, so it's cool.
It's nice to see that sort of thing pay off.
[Dave] I've said before that there will be people
fitter than Rich Froning in the future
but never more dominant.
I'm on the verge of being proved wrong.
He's now won three times in a row, Rich won four,
and arguably a much harder time period in our sport.
So... I might have to tip my hat to Mat. He might have it.
I remember I finished the event
and I'm just scanning the crowd, like, where is my sweetheart?
I wanna go get a hug from my sweetheart.
And then someone finally pointed her out to me
and it was just a mess of tears and hugs and...
It hasn't been all roses.
So it means a lot.
[Tia] This year it was so different to the previous year.
It was more relief that I won in 2017,
and then to be able to back it up in 2018,
I actually felt like my job wasn't done.
There's still room for improvement.
I have a long way to do.
I'm just ready to start the next season,
because I'm not satisfied.
- You're the back-to-back champ. - What did you say?
You're the back-to-back CrossFit Games fittest woman on Earth.
I heard you the first time. I just wanted to hear it again.
[laughs]
Her goal in 2018 was exactly this, to leave no doubt.
She wanted to make that a clear goal
throughout the weekend,
the CrossFit Games, the entire season,
that she was gonna turn every stone possible.
And to see her get the finish she deserves,
for me it just makes everything worth it,
for that particular moment where I'm like,
I'm happy for you completely 'cause you deserve this.
That's it.
[Justin] In March of 2018,
on the way to an open announcement in Houston,
we got a call and it said that our leadership
wanted to change the structure of the Games next year.
So on Monday morning, the day after the CrossFit Games,
I got a phone call that those changes
are happening right now.
And normally that following week
is a time for me and my family to detox,
we go away, we turn off cell phones,
and it was, you need to start scheduling time to be in town
because we're gonna make dramatic changes to the team.
Leading into it, I didn't know the teams were gonna be let go.
We actually thought, I thought, maybe I was too hopeful,
that we had solved the problem.
It was a surprise and a huge contrast,
because that was coming right on the heels
of an amazingly good event.
It was the best viewership we'd ever had,
the best international pickup we had ever had,
largest crowds that we've ever had.
And it was a cold-water bath on Monday,
knowing that everything was gonna change that fast.
[Tia] I think it was quite distressing,
not just for the athletes
but the whole CrossFit community.
It actually affected a lot of friends
that I'd met through CrossFit, you know, the media team.
I had people who would come to Australia and film me
and actually get to see and meet my friends and family.
It just really sunk a lot of people's hearts
back in 2018 when everything happened.
From the outside looking in, very much it could have seemed
like there was this "we don't care" kind of attitude,
we're not really interested in what the athletes
or what the community thinks.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
These are people that have put their life into this event.
[Justin] It's our life's work. It is for Dave, it is for me.
It is for a lot of people on this team.
It's the same way when you look behind the scenes,
whether it's the way the teams are led,
the way we treat people on the floor,
the way judges respond to athletes,
the way we interact with fans,
the way this entire team tries to bring this event to life.
It's not a selfish pursuit.
It's something that we do feel we have a duty for,
but it's also deeply satisfying
to produce something that adds value back to our community.
It's a job that we wanna do really well
and to the best of our abilities,
and it's in service of athletes,
it's in service of our community,
it's in service of affiliates.
And when we do our job well, it changes people's lives.
CrossFit is a sport, but more importantly it's a community.
It was a community first before it was a sport.
And long after the sport is done each year,
the community is what continually
keeps things moving within the space.
It's the affiliates, it's the people that you train with.
Those are the people
that are the constant throughout the year.
When the athletes are done, the season's done,
they walk back to their affiliates
and they train with those people, in that community.
Long after their sporting careers are done,
it's that community that's gonna surround them
and it's gonna support them,
whether they're an athlete or not,
in pursuit of something much bigger than sport,
which is your lifestyle, your health
and your fitness over the course of your lifetime
that will make you a better human
and allow you to live a happy and fulfilling life.
I think that's the beauty
of what the CrossFit Games represent,
is everything changes.
When I look back at 2018,
the challenges that we went through that year,
and in 2019 and 2020,
the direction we were going wasn't wrong.
It was difficult to make
those dramatic changes that quickly,
but the motivations were good,
to be more geographically diverse,
to welcome more events into the fold,
to create more opportunities for people to participate
in our sport around the world.
We will and we have grown faster
because we've brought more people in,
and I think it was a necessary change in our evolution.
And to know where we're going in the future,
we're taking some of the best elements from 2018,
and we're taking some of the challenges and the learnings
from 2019 and '20 and correcting them,
and then we're building something
that's got the best of both of those systems.
And that's what gets me really excited
about the future of the CrossFit Games.
I think sometimes to know where you're going...
you have to know where you've been.