Week Three in Review: Latin America

March 13, 2012

Thomas Patton

Workout 12.3 is now history after four days of very conservative score postings in the Latin America Region. Just when our community was getting used to single exercises and short AMRAPs, CrossFit HQ released a clever triplet for Workout 12.3. 
 
The athletes must have been strategizing, watching the Leaderboard and waiting for their peers to post and set a benchmark because Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and even part of Saturday saw very few postings. Only about 30 percent posted by Saturday at 12 p.m. When Sunday rolled around though, the big numbers from both men and women started coming in and disrupting the Leaderboard.
 
However, this trend had an exception in the amazing performance of Doug Oberbeck from CrossFit Bogota, who posted his score of 447 (12 rounds plus 15 box jumps) a little less than one hour after Workout 12.3 was released. He led the region for a few days, but by Sunday dropped to 7th. His 12.3 score was never beaten in the region, not even by Orlando Trejo.
 
David Andrade Salazar rolled in to 2nd place and will most likely stay very close to there during the remaining two weeks. He was born with congenital talipes equinovarus (CTEV, also known as club foot), an obstacle that forces him to struggle a lot more with the workouts. Andrade has very small calf muscles because of his malformation and has confessed double-unders, running and box jumps are very hard to do. Once again, Salazar with his obstacle has us puzzled because he managed to do 10 complete rounds, plus 8 push presses. 
 
Juan Cruz Sartori from Argentina follows in 3rd on the Leaderboard. Trejo continues to lead with only 4 total points. In his first workout not getting the top spot, Trejo had to settle for 2nd, behind Oberbeck, with 432 points (12 complete rounds).
 
On the women’s side, Anita Pravatti from CrossFit Jundiaí solidified her lead in the region once again with a score of 387 points (10 rounds plus 12 push presses). She leads with only nine total points, but is followed closely by Krista Pell from CrossFit Cayman with 13 total points. 
 
Marylin Rojas from CrossFit Santiago has quietly been sneaking up to 3rd place with 2nd place 12.3 score of 355 points. Tarasa Barnett has also been quietly sneaking up the Leaderboard, as well. After a slow start with only 101 burpees (22nd in the region), Barnett earned 2nd place in 12.2 and 3rd in 12.3. It would not be too surprising if she starts breaking the top five by Workout 12.4. Deborah Shrem, 14, follows these experienced women at the 33rd spot.
 
It’s easy to get excited when some names are consistently at the top, and easy to dismiss the others who aren’t leading. But we know that although we are 60 percent through the Open, it is the entire top 60 that get to qualify for regionals.
 
Even others may be experienced enough to have planned their peak for the Regional competition or Games, and are consciously not going all out yet. This could easily be the case with Matthew Barnett, who follows at 19th. Others, such as Trejo, are still too complicated to analyze, and we certainly have yet to see this amazing athlete peak. Trejo just seems to be a better all-around CrossFitter every day. And that should worry not only a few Latin Americans, but all possible Games contenders.