In last year’s CrossFit Invitational, Team World stunned Team USA by compensating their lack of star power with teamwork and strategy. This year, Team USA looked to exact revenge on teams Canada, Europe, and Australia. And they did in exhilarating fashion.
Watch the recap below to relive how a team of champions became a championship team. This is Team of Champions: The Story of the CrossFit Invitational.
Mark your calendars. Open registration will begin on Jan. 15.
As per the CrossFit Games website:
The first Open workout will be released on Thursday, Feb. 26. As in previous years, the Open will be a five-week competition with one new workout per week. The week’s workout will be released each Thursday at 5 p.m. PT, and competitors will have four days to complete the workout and log their score on the Games site. Score submissions will be due before 5 p.m. PT on the Monday following the workout’s release.
The Open
Feb. 26-March 30, 2015
15.1: Feb. 26 -March 2
15.2: March 5-9
15.3: March 12-16
15.4: March 19-23
15.5: March 26-30
The Masters Qualifier will begin on Thursday, April 23. The world’s top 200 masters athletes in each age division in the Open will be automatically entered into the Masters Qualifier. Like last year, the qualifier will be a four-day online competition. The workouts will be released at 5 p.m. PT on Thursday, April 23, and the competitors will have until 5 p.m. PT on Monday, April 27, to submit their scores. The top 20 athletes in each age division at the end of the qualifier will be invited to compete in the Masters Competition at the CrossFit Games.
The Masters Qualifier
April 23-27, 2015
The Regional competitions will be held over three weekends in May. The 17 regions in the Open will feed into eight Regional competitions. The top athletes in each region will face top athletes from at least one other region in the new format. (Read more.) Each Regional will take place over three days, and the top five men, five women, and five teams at the end of the weekend will qualify for the CrossFit Games.
Regional Weekend 1: May 15-17
South Regional | South Central, South West and Latin America | Dallas, Texas
Atlantic Regional | Mid Atlantic and South East | Atlanta, Georgia
Regional Weekend 2: May 22-24
California Regional | NorCal and SoCal | San Diego, California
East Regional | North East and Canada East | Hartford, Connecticut
Pacific Regional | Australia and Asia | Wollongong, Australia
Regional Weekend 3: May 29-31
West Regional | North West and Canada West | Seattle, Washington
Central Regional | North Central and Central East | Minneapolis, Minnesota
Meridian Regional | Europe and Africa | Copenhagen, Denmark
Tickets to the Regionals will go on sale on March 30, 2015.
If you would like to get a head start on Regional travel, click here to find hotels.
The 2015 Reebok CrossFit Games will be held on July 21-26. The final stage of the search for the Fittest on Earth will return to the StubHub Center in Carson, California. The Team and Individual Competitions will begin on Wednesday, July 22, and continue through the weekend. The Masters Competition will be held earlier in the week (Tues.-Thurs., July 21-23).
Tickets to the Games will go on sale April 29, 2015.
If you haven’t heard yet, one of the main highlights of the recently-concluded 2014 CrossFit Invitational was Rich Froning’s 305-lb snatch in Event 2. Take note: that was just 55 seconds after he did a successful 300-lb snatch.
His team would go on to win Event 2 and the 2014 CrossFit Invitational over teams Canada, Europe, and Australia. Watch his glorious snatch in slow motion, accompanied by action-packed music, below.
Team USA is once again on top of the CrossFit world after scoring a come-from-behind win at the 2014 Invitational in San Jose, California.
Entering the competition as the favorite, Team USA encountered early problems with their neighbors from up north. The Canadians won event 1 – wherein all athletes had to do 45 pull-ups and 45 thrusters. Australia followed in second place, leaving USA and Europe to finish in 3rd and 4th, respectively.
In the second event, Team USA dominated, thanks to Rich Froning’s massive 1-rep max snatch of 305 lb. Canada kept its lead, however, by finishing second – just 25 lb. behind USA’s 482 lb. total.
In event 3 (1-rep max clean and jerk), Canada pulled away once again, beating USA’s 560 lb. total with 603 lb. of their own. The score after 3 events: Canada 11, USA 6, Australia 5, and Europe 2.
Event 4 called for synchronized muscle-ups, rowing, heavy deadlift holds, and snatches. Team Europe finally got things going – after finishing dead last in events 1 and 2 – by claiming first place. Team USA, meanwhile, chased down Team Canada – courtesy of Froning and Khalipa – to finish second.
The final event of the competition would become the battleground to determine the eventual champions. And the team full of champions proved that it was their war to win. Team USA finished their handstand walks, tire flips, legless rope climbs, and the notorious worm lunges way ahead of the competition. They capped the event in 6:12.84, while the next-fastest team was Europe at 7:43.17. Their closest competition for overall first place, Canada didn’t finish the event.
Last year, Dave Castro notes, Team USA was cocky. That led them to their eventual downfall to Team World. This year, “They had better attitude, better spirit,” he says. With this win, Team USA has now won two of the three CrossFit Invitationals. You can now begin chanting: U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
You can watch the replay of the entire competition below.
Photos via: games.crossfit.com
They’re probably the most polite competitors you’ll ever see, but don’t expect them to take their opponents lightly! Representing Team Canada will be 2014 CrossFit Games champion Camille Leblanc-Bazinet, along with Michele Letendre, Paul Tremblay, and the most gorgeous facial hair in the competition, Lucas Parker.
Expect them to give teams USA, Europe, and Australia, a run for their money on Saturday, Nov. 9 at the SAP Center in San Jose, California.
Kara Webb, Denae Brown, Khan Porter, and Rob Forte will be representing Australia at the upcoming 2014 CrossFit Invitational. Considered as one of the competition’s underdogs, Team Australia hopes to pull the rug out from under teams USA, Canada, and Europe on Saturday, Nov. 9 at the SAP Center in San Jose, California.
The (quasi) underdogs have emerged victorious. After three weeks of grueling workouts, Team Reebok East came up on top of favorites Rogue Fitness Black and Rogue Fitness Red, becoming the first ever CrossFit Team Series champions.
Team Reebok East, composed of athletes Scott Panchik, Ben Smith, Stacie Tovar, and Emily Bridgers, were able to overcome the Rogue teams stacked with CrossFit Games champions and podium finishers like Rich Froning, Jason Khalipa, Julie Foucher, and Camille Leblanc-Bazinet.
Throughout the competition, all three teams proved dominant, taking up the top three places from start to finish. However, it was Team Reebok East’s model of consistency and teamwork – rather than individual star power – that steered them to no lower than 2nd place in the three weekends of competition. Congratulations, Team Reebok East!
Here are the top five teams of the 2014 CrossFit Team Series:
From the looks of it, we’ve already been seeing Team USA perform the past few weeks as most of the members come from Rogue Fitness Black! Only difference being they switched out Team Europe’s Sam Briggs for Emily Bridgers.
Rich Froning
You already know this guy. Four-time CrossFit Games champion. Only thing he needs to prove left is how he can bring that winning tradition into team play. Out of the four team competitions he’s competed in, his team has only won once.
Currently, Rogue Fitness Black has performed below expectations and is trailing two other teams in the CrossFit Team Series. Miranda Oldroyd explains why Rogue Fitness Black might be struggling:
“When I see these athletes (Khalipa, Froning, Briggs and Foucher of Rogue Fitness Black) I think of athletes that win at the CrossFit Games because they’re slow and steady, they know how to pick a pace, stick with it, and just continue to move,” Oldroyd said on the Update Show. “When you see Rich Froning moving, he never looks like he’s going super fast. And I think slow and steady doesn’t win this race. On a team … you’ve got to go 100 percent all out for two to three minutes, then get out of the way.”
Can Froning and company change their style of play to win both the CrossFit Team Series and Inviational? Or will they stick to their strategy of going slow and steady?
Jason Khalipa
Khalipa is another athlete who’s had an illustrious CrossFit Games record. Finished first in his rookie year, finished top 3 the last two years, only one of three seven-time CrossFit Games competitors. Like Froning, only thing he has left to prove is his ability to win in team competition.
Julie Foucher
After taking a year off to focus on med school, Foucher came back to the CrossFit Games and placed 3rd overall. In the 4 years she’s competed in the Games, Foucher never finished outside of the top five. As for team competition, she was part of the 2012 Team USA that beat Team Europe 20-6.
Emily Bridgers
2014 has been Emily Bridgers’ year. After spending three years at the regional level, she finally won 1st place at the South East Regional, before finally placing 6th at the CrossFit Games. Bridgers also knows a thing or two about team competition, as she’s a member of second-ranked Team Reebok East (ahead of Rogue Fitness Black) in the CrossFit Team Series.
Becca Voigt: Coach
Mentoring this all-star crew will be seven-time CrossFit Games competitor, 2014 Spirit of the Games recipient, and 2012 Team USA member, Becca Voigt.
All Invitational teams have now been announced. Who’s your pick to win this year?
H/t: games.crossfit.com
We’ve introduced Team Australia and Team Canada. Now it’s time to meet Team Europe!
Annie Thorisdottir
Was there ever any doubt? Coming off of her back injury, the two-time CrossFit Games champion returned to competition, winning the Europe Regional before finishing second at the Games. It’s also been a busy year for Thorisdottir as she signed with the New York Rhinos in the National Pro Grid League, commandeering them to a 2-2 record before finally getting an upset defeat early in the playoffs.
Expect Thorisdottir to bring lots of muscle, finesse, and cheer to this year’s Invitational.
Sam Briggs
After winning it all at the 2013 CrossFit Games, Sam Briggs shocked the world by placing 4th at Regionals and failing to qualify the following year. Since then she’s been actively training and competing in various competitions, including the CrossFit Team Series with Rogue Fitness Black. To say that Briggs will be look to avenge herself at the Invitational is pretty much an understatement.
Lukas Hogberg
Swedish rookie Lukas Hogberg made his countrymen proud by finishing 23rd at this year’s Games. More than Garret Fisher’s rival for the best head of hair at the Games, Hogberg proved himself a worthy competitor with some pretty good finishes: Triple 3 (7th, 34:23), Sprint Sled 2 (8th, 1:32), 21-15-9 Complex (11th, 4:55). And Double Grace (9th, 5:51.2).
Bjorgvin Guomundsson
His name may be a biiiiit hard to remember and pronounce, but we’re pretty sure everyone will get the hang of it in coming years. Starting CrossFit only in 2012, this 21-year-old athlete progressed quickly, able to finish second at the Europe Regional – just after Hogberg – and then finishing 26th at the Games. I guess those training sessions with Annie Thorisdottir, Frederik Aegidius, Katrin Davidsottir, and Thuridur Helgadottir paid off?
Mads Jacobsen: Coach
Coaching Team Europe will be L1 Seminar Staff member, CrossFit Nordic owner, and 2013 CrossFit Invitational Team World coach Mads Jacobsen. Last year, he led Team World in a victory over Team USA. Can he do it again this year?
H/t: games.crossfit.com
Or what we otherwise like to call: Team STRAYA! Here are the 5 men and women who will be representing Australia in the upcoming 2014 CrossFit Invitational on November 9 at the SAP Center in San Jose, California.
Kara Webb
Two-time Regional champion and three-time CrossFit Games competitor Kara Webb had a great bid to win the 2014 CrossFit Games. That is until she got injured during the Midline March and had to pull out of the competition.
Previously, she helped Team World defeat Team USA 24-19 last October at the 2013 CrossFit Invitational. Expect her to find redemption as she leads Team Australia for an upset victory at this year’s event.
Denae Brown
Back in 2012, Brown qualified for the Games but didn’t compete after finding out she was having a baby. She came back in 2014, beating Webb to become Regional champ. She later on finished 17th at the Games.
Rob Forte
Judging by his constantly-improving CrossFit Games record, Rob Forte is about to make this Invitational a very competitive one. In 2012, he finished 35th, then improved to 33rd in 2013, before finally reaching 12th in this year’s Games.
He’s also dominated Regionals in the past few years, rising from third in 2011, to second in 2012, to taking 1st place the last two years.
Khan Porter
Former lifeguard Khan Porter showed his swimming chops at The Beach by finishing fourth, just behind equally-great swimmers like Jordan Troyan, Jonne Koski, and Josh Bridges. He placed 27th overall, ahead of athletes like Chris Spealler and Brandon Swan.
Chad Mackay: Coach
Team Australia’s mentor will be three-time CrossFit Games competitor Chad Mackay. One of the most popular personalities in Australia’s CrossFit scene, Mackay competed for Team World last year and served as coach for Lynne Knapman of the Masters 50-54 Division.
