Edging Out a Champ

July 15, 2014

Alex Brown

"All the girls going are going because they want to win the CrossFit Games. I plan to get a good experience. I know that if I perform my best I can do pretty well—we will see."

Norway’s Kristin Holte will make her CrossFit Games debut this year after finishing third at the Europe Regional, edging out 2013 Games champ Samantha Briggs. 

But facing off with the likes of Briggs and two-time champ Annie Thorisdottir was not the biggest hurdle Holte overcame this season.

Holte’s season was almost over before it began when she suffered a punctured lung in December 2013. But the accident, caused by a stray acupuncture needle, proved to be a watershed moment for the athlete. Fortunately, she received immediate medical care. With permanent damage averted, Holte’s focus quickly returned to CrossFit.

“When I was in the hospital, I knew that this was what I really wanted to do,” she said.

Then Holte set an alarm on her phone. Every day since January 1, she woke up to see the same message appearing across a Superman logo: “You can do it—Games.”

Holte—a former national pole vault champion who was on the Norwegian Heptathlon team—did not think she would podium at the regional.

“I thought there was maybe a 50/50 chance,” she said, “but I knew there were so many good athletes there. Everything had to go my way and I had to perform better than I had ever done before.”

“I wasn’t in the top three at all until the last event,” she added. “I was feeling like the underdog. I knew Friday was my worst day with snatch and muscle-ups, but I knew Saturday was pretty good and Sunday was probably my best day.”

Holte said she knew a qualifying spot was within reach after Day 2 when she realized how close she and Briggs were on the Leaderboard.

“I was going into the last event thinking that I had nothing to lose and everything to gain,” Holte said.

But despite a win in Event 7—a couplet of pull-ups and overhead squats—a smiling Holte wasn’t sure she had done enough.

“I thought, ‘That was a great end to the weekend,’ but I was pretty sure that it was going to be fourth place,” she said. “I was very happy. I had done my best. When the guys told me afterwards that I was third, I didn’t believe them. I think it was about 20 minutes after that I believed it. And it is still surreal.”

Holte has been preparing for the heat of Carson, California, by training in Dubai and plans to be in San Diego three weeks before the Games kick off.

Ahead of the Games, Holte also spent some time at a military base to “prepare for the unknown,” she said.

There is one thing Holte hopes not to see come Games time: “I am not so happy with the rower,” she said. “I am not that tall—but I will do it.”

Holte is preparing for the Games in ways other than training, as well.

“I am trying to imagine what it will be like over there,” she said. “I watched all the movies from behind the scenes last year to try and get a picture of how it is going to be. I am going to have fun and have a great experience. And, of course, I want to do my best.”

She continued: “It is difficult to say what place I want to be in. All the girls going are going because they want to win the CrossFit Games. I plan to get a good experience. I know that if I perform my best I can do pretty well—we will see.”

Holte said she doesn’t feel any extra pressure even though she is the athlete who edged out Briggs.

“I think it is sad that (Briggs) is not going to be at the Games,” Holte said. “It would be cool to have her there—she is an amazing athlete.”

She added: “The biggest pressure on me will be the pressure I put on myself. I was thinking before the regional that the girls that had the most pressure on them were the girls who had been to the Games before. Myself and Bjork (Odinsdottir) were the underdogs.”

Success at the Games will be determined by how Holte feels when it’s over, rather than her Leaderboard position, said Holte’s coach Christian Ytterbøl.

“For Kristin, the most important aspect is the whole experience, not so much the result, because she really loves what she is doing,” Ytterbøl said. “When she calms herself down and finds her love for the sport, she performs at the top. If she feels that she has done her absolute best, she’s happy.”

A trip to the CrossFit Games was not how the 28-year-old student expected to spend her summer.

With the deadline for her master’s degree in nutrition now pushed back to November, Holte is better able to focus on her first visit to the Games.

“My plan was to write my master’s thesis this summer,” she said. “But I’m glad to spend it this way.”