Week 2 began on Friday, May 25, with the West, Central and Latin America Regionals.
In the Central Regional at Music City Center in Nashville, Tennessee, two-time CrossFit Games champion Mat Fraser started his 2018 Regional competition with his worst finish since his rookie year in 2013, a year he did not qualify for the Games.
Fraser took a surprising ninth-place finish on Event 1 and was more than a minute slower than Event 1 winner Drew Wayman, who competed in the first heat.
Then Fraser got his hands on a barbell in Event 2, where he attacked the deadlifts, bench presses, and squat cleans with ruthless efficiency. Every rep, from the first to the last, looked the same, and Fraser won Event 2 for his 16th career Regional victory, putting him in second place overall at the end of Day 1. He said he had no strategy for this event except, “To give ‘er."
An athlete competing at his very first Regional competition, 22-year-old Wayman occupies the first-place spot after Day 1, ahead of four other Games veterans, including Fraser. Six-time Games athlete Scott Panchik is in 15th place overall.
For most of her CrossFit career, Brooke Wells has been known as a strength athlete. She’s spent the last year hammering her weaknesses, and the result was a second-place finish on Event 1, an event many thought would be simply damage control for the 23-year-old recent college graduate.
Wells followed up her second-place finish on Event 1 with a win on Event 2, putting her in first place overall after Day 1.
“People didn’t expect me to do well on that (Event 1), and I’m more proud of that second place than that first place,” Wells said.
WEST
Games veterans are everywhere at the West Regional.
Thirteen male Games veterans are competing for five qualifying spots in the Del Mar Arena, but at the end of Day 1, a man who has never been to the Games is at the top of the leaderboard (tied for points with Garret Fisher). Brent Fikowski, the second-place finisher at the 2017 Games, sits outside the top five.
Jonathan Gibson took 11th in Event 1 but won Event 2 by pacing the first few rounds then pushing the pace as the reps decreased. As he ran to the deadlift in the final rounds of Event 2, Gibson asked for the crowd to cheer him on by pumping his fist.
“I don’t know if it makes me go any harder. It’s fun to do,” Gibson said about asking the crowd for encouragement.
Jason Carroll won Event 1, taking an early lead and holding it throughout the grueling endurance event.
“Those movements are really good for me,” Carroll said of Event 1. Finishing just behind Carroll was Joe Scali, who had enough energy for an impromptu dance performance after crossing the finish line.
Alex Parker, the winner on the women’s side for Event 1, said the endurance event came down to mental toughness.
“I wanted to be uncomfortably comfortable and just pushed it for last quarter-mile,” Parker said.
Emily Abbott, a powerful athlete, took first in Event 2. The Canadian recently moved to San Diego, but the move hasn’t done anything to dampen her spark and way with words.
After Event 2, the classic CrossFit workout known as “Linda,” Abbott said, “When you come across a dusty old bitch, you gotta look her straight in the eye and say, ‘not today,’ and grip it and rip it.”
Abbott is in first place overall after Day 1, with a comfortable lead over Ehea Schuerch, who is competing at her first Regional as an individual.
LATIN AMERICA
A truck strike in Brazil threatened Latin America’s first Regional competition since 2014. Much of the equipment—and many of the volunteers—couldn’t make it to the venue. Undaunted, members of the Brazilian CrossFit community came to the rescue and offered their equipment and volunteers, ensuring the competition could take place as planned.
The strike did lead to some adjustments in the events on Day 1. The Triple 3 finished with a 3-mile run outside in the heat—12 laps of 400 meters—instead of on an Assault AirRunner, and Event 2 included a push press instead of a bench press.
Luis Perez from Playa del Carmen, Mexico, took the win on Event 1 by pacing the row and the double-unders, and then speeding up on the run to finish with a time of 38:16.
Simona Quintana, one of only four competitors from Chile, was the first to the run after the 300 double-unders and finished two minutes ahead of the second-place finisher. Quintana tied for 12th place on Event 2 and held onto her first-place spot at the end of the day, only four points ahead of Anita Pravatti.
André Sanches, a 30-year-old, 6-foot-2 athlete competing in his home country of Brazil, thrilled the crowd with his Event-2 win, finishing almost a minute before second-place Manuel Gallegos. The audience in the packed Arena Carioca in Rio de Janeiro counted his reps all the way from five to one, shouting him to victory.
“It was an amazing crowd, and I wouldn’t have done touch and go if it wasn’t for them,” Sanches said. His second-place finish on Event 1 gives him a 24-point lead going into Day 2.
Athletes have very little margin for error at this Regional, as only one woman, one man and one team will earn spots at the Games out of the Latin America Regional.
central - STANDINGS AFTER DAY 1
MEN
Drew Wayman (176)
Mathew Fraser (164)
Alex Anderson (156)
Nicholas Uranker (154)
Streat Hoerner (152)
WOMEN
Brooke Wells (194)
Kristi Eramo (188)
Amanda Barnhart (156)
Michele Fumagalli (144)
Jessica Griffith (140)
TEAMS
CrossFit Mayhem Freedom (194)
CrossFit Kilo (164)
CrossFit Kilo 2 (164)
OC3 Black (162)
CrossFit 417 (160)
West - STANDINGS AFTER DAY 1
MEN
Jonathan Gibson (158)
Garret Fisher (158)
Josh Bridges (152)
Cole Sager (148)
Jason Carroll (144)
WOMEN
Emily Abbott (172)
Ehea Schuerch (168)
Kelcy Ware (160)
Alex Parker (150)
Hayley Murillo (148)
TEAMS
Torrance Training Lab (178)
Invictus X (176)
CrossFit Fort Vancouver (170)
Bear Republic (156)
Invictus (156)
Latin America - STANDINGS AFTER DAY 1
MEN
André Sanches (194)
WOMEN
Simona Quintana (156)
TEAMS
Samurai Team (194)
For complete details, visit the Leaderboard.
