“I’m really stoked to have found a sport I can do, and do well.”
Photos by: Devon Rutan
Like many kids, Ethan Pinter grew up playing team sports. But after a devastating injury took him out of the game, this 17-year-old found a new life in CrossFit and is now competing for the first time in the CrossFit Games Open.
Through elementary and middle school, he was an active basketball and football player. A quick instance during a freshman year football game changed Ethan and his family’s lives forever.
During game five of the football season, Ethan, a running back, ran the ball but the other back did not block for him. A 225-pound linebacker came through the line unchecked and put a helmet-to-helmet hit on him. It was a shot he never saw coming and he sustained a severe concussion as a result; the impact caused his brain to bounce off the back of his skull then back to the front.
After the accident, Ethan missed a month of school and was unable to walk a straight line. He demonstrated many of the symptoms associated with traumatic brain injury to include: word-finding issues, severe headaches and chronic nausea. Frustration and a short-fused temper soon developed as he dealt with the sadness of no longer being able to play football since another head injury could result in permanent brain damage or death. His doctor also felt that basketball was also a risk he should not take.
“It was very disappointing,” Ethan says. “I was angry that I had to stop playing football, as that year had been my best yet. Stopping basketball was even harder. I was really upset for some time.”
Instead of spending time on the field or the court, he went to doctor’s appointments at the Children’s Hospital and underwent MRIs. He received neuro-cognitive rehabilitation and still has some challenges.
“Ethan is very intelligent, but his injury has changed the way he learns. He home schools now so he can break his day up and avoid headaches,” Ethan’s mother, Hilary, says.
Jason Pinter, Ethan’s dad and a basketball coach, found CrossFit just over a year ago while searching YouTube videos looking for lifts and exercises that would help his athletes jump higher and perform better for basketball.
“Ethan and I would look at the main page site for the WOD and do it the best we could at the Y,” he says.
Soon after that, father and son joined Go CrossFit Burien, which opened right down the street.
CrossFit not only gave Jason a new training regimen for his team, but it also gave Ethan a new physical outlet, and brought them closer together.
“I have a great relationship with my 17-year-old son — we have CrossFit together. We suffer together, succeed together, compete against each other. Not many men are lucky enough to have that with their teen son.”
Hilary has also joined CrossFit, making it a family activity.
“CrossFit appeals to our family in many ways,” she says. “We can workout together, yet all at our own skill and speed. For me, that was very important, as I was not in shape when I started. It scared me, even with Jason and Ethan encouraging me to go when they started it took me a while. CrossFit has changed our family, we have grown closer … our other kids see us working hard and are very excited to start CrossFit Kids a soon as it’s available. Even though we have different goals, different PRs, different skills, with CrossFit we can all work out together and be stoked for each other after the WOD.”
After only doing CrossFit for a year, Ethan signed up for the Open to see how he stacked up against other kids his age. Ethan’s goal for the Open is to complete every workout Rx’d. He scored 122 in 13.1 and 196 in 13.2.
“Shoulder-to-overhead movements are my weakness and 13.2 really showed that.”
Workout 13.3 proved also to be a challenge, as Ethan isn’t used to wall balls and couldn’t get through all 150.
“I was pretty upset, because I can do muscle-ups.”
In the future, Ethan wants to become a trainer, coach CrossFit Kids, open his own gym … and compete in the CrossFit Games.
After losing both football and basketball, “I’m really stoked to have found a sport I can do, and do well.”
