Following the announcement that the format for the CrossFit Games will take place in two stages, it has been confirmed the competition will get underway on the 18th of September.
The first stage, which will see athletes compete remotely via a live-stream service, will last two or three days over the weekend.
From that competition, the best five athletes from each of the male and female divisions will go head-to-head in California from the 19th to the 25th of October at the CrossFit Ranch to decide who will be crowned the Fittest Man and Woman on Earth respectively.
In total, 60 of the highest-ranking athletes in the sport - 30 men and 30 women - will take part in the first phase.
The change in format came after it became clear that international athletes would struggle to fly into the USA due to travel restrictions.
Given the challenging circumstances that organisers were faced with and the number of high-profile international sporting events that have already been cancelled or postponed this year, it’s somewhat remarkable that the Games are set to go ahead at all.
It’s certainly going to be an abnormal competition to the one we’re used to at Madison and it remains to be seen how smoothly the competition will be able to run, but fans of the sport throughout the world will still be overjoyed to see elite CrossFit athletes competing in person for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak was declared a pandemic.
It was back in early March that we last saw face-to-face competition at the Australian CrossFit Championship and the Brazil CrossFit Championship.
