Learn about the changes to regionals, as well as new additions to the sport.
Over the eight-year history of the sport, the CrossFit Games season has consistently evolved. This year is no exception.
CrossFit Games Director Dave Castro released the basic outline on the Cool Down Show moments after USA won the CrossFit Invitational. We’re here now to fill in the gaps.
Eight Regional Competitions
As in previous years, there will be 17 regions in the Open, and your placement within your region will determine whether you advance to the next stage of competition.
New for 2015, top athletes in each region will face top athletes from at least one other region in the new regional format.
- Canada West and North West Regions → West Regional
- Canada East and North East Regions → East Regional
- NorCal and SoCal Regions → California Regional
- North Central and Central East Regions → Central Regional
- South West, South Central and Latin America Regions → South Regional
- Mid Atlantic and South East Regions → Atlantic Regional
- Europe and Africa Regions → Meridian Regional
- Australia and Asia Regions → Pacific Regional
The number of athletes and teams to advance from the Open to regionals varies from region to region.
- 20 men, 20 women and 15 teams will advance from regions in the U.S. and Canada.
- 30 men, 30 women and 20 teams will advance from Europe and Australia.
- 10 men, 10 women and 10 teams will advance from Latin America, Asia and Africa.
The region combinations result in a total of 40 men, 40 women and 30 teams at all regionals except the South Regional, which will have 50 men, 50 women and 40 teams.
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 2015 Reebok CrossFit Games.
Region Boundary Changes
- Russia will be split along the Ural Mountains into its Western and Eastern halves. The Western half will be included in the Europe Region, and the Eastern half will be included in the Asia Region.
- The Middle East will now be included in the Africa Region. This includes Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
Scaled Open Workouts
The Open takes place in garages and affiliates around the world, with athletes of all levels. For the first time, scaled versions of the week's Open workout will be available so athletes can choose the programming that best matches their abilities.
Each Thursday, when the Open workout is released, athletes will be able to go onto the Games site to see their division's prescribed version of the workout and their division's scaled version of the workout.
As in the CrossFit Team Series, scaled workout will have specified standards for each movement. Athletes who opt for the scaled version will need to meet our movement standards and other requirements, and cannot scale or modify further.
The intent of the scaled workouts is to allow everyone who wants to compete, to compete at an appropriate level. Choosing the scaled version of the workout one week will not prevent an athlete from doing the next workout as prescribed. Those athletes who choose to do all five Open workouts scaled will be visible on the Scaled Leaderboard, where they can compete with their peers.
The scaled workouts are not for anyone who’s fighting to advance to the next stage of the CrossFit Games season. One rep of the prescribed version of the workout will be ranked ahead of the best score of the scaled version of the workout—we want to celebrate and reward the hard-earned first-ever chest-to-bar pull-ups, double-unders and snatch PRs. If you cannot get one rep of the prescribed version of the workout, or simply find the scaled workout more appropriate for you, you’ll be able to opt for scaled. You’ll stay on the overall Leaderboard, but pick up more points.
Athletes who scale a workout will be removed from contention from regionals and the Masters Qualifier. Since team scores are calculated based on total reps and total time for the best six scores from the team, scaled workouts will not count toward the team division.
We hope the new scaled workouts will allow more CrossFit athletes to participate in one of the largest community events of the year, and post an official record of their fitness they can return to over time and try to beat.
New Teenage Division
We are adding a teenage division for athletes who are between 14 and 17 years old as of the close of score submissions for Open Workout 15.1.
The teenage division will have an overall Leaderboard showing all athletes between 14 and 17 years old who have not elected to compete with adult men and women. The teens will perform a different version of the Open workout than the adult male and female competitors. The winners of the teenage division will be crowned after the fifth and final week of the Open.
All athletes between 14 and 17 will automatically be entered into the teenage division. Teens who want to be in the running for regionals—as a team or individual competitor—must change their division by emailing support@crossfitgames.com before the end of score submissions for Open Workout 15.1.
An athlete must be at least 14 years old in order to register for the Open. See the Rulebook for complete information.
New State and Country Champions
While the Open is accessible to anyone, it is also the first step to finding the Fittest on Earth. The 4-year-old online competition has been remarkably good at finding CrossFit Games champions. Since 2011, seven of the eight winners of the Open have also been either past or future CrossFit Games champions.
This year, we’re going to use the Open to find the fittest in each country and U.S., Australian, and Canadian state or province.
Think you may be the fittest in your state or country? The Open will be your chance to prove it.
Updated January 5, 2015: The cutoff date for the Teenage Division has been changed. See the Rulebook for full details.
Updated February 6, 2015: A new version of the regional map has been added which includes the regional dates and venues.