As the we careen toward the CrossFit Open, which starts tomorrow in Montreal and Paris, CrossFit HQ has released one and a half hours of never before seen footage of athletes preparing for the 2016 Reebok CrossFit Games… and it’s one of six behind the scenes documentaries that just became available.
It’s probably fair to say that most CrossFit Games documentaries are constructed so as to satisfy the hardcore fans of the sport while also highlighting the aspects that can help it appeal to strangers: the struggles, the personalities, the grit, the drama.
This footage won’t do that. It’s absolutely not for anyone who is unfamiliar with CrossFit athletes, but for diehard fans this footage is addictive. This film of the competition’s aftermath defines “nitty gritty,” as athletes talk about the extreme specifics of winning (or trying to) at the elite level: form minutiae, pacing, and the tiny alterations that they used to crawl as close as possible to first place. There’s also drama as the athletes learn that their final rankings have been changing throughout the day as the judges review the competition footage.
CrossFit’s YouTube channel summarized the content thusly:
Executive Producer Sevan Matossian gives us behind-the-scenes access to the 2016 Reebok CrossFit Games. For the athletes who have dedicated their lives to training, the stacked competition leaves little margin for error. Watch as Matossian captures the most riveting, comical and saddening moments of the quest to find the Fittest on Earth. In Part 6, the competition concludes and it’s time to find out who is the Fittest on Earth. After a more-than-dominant weekend, Mat Fraser improves on last year’s second-place finish. The race between reigning champion Katrin Davidsdottir and 2015 second-place finisher Tia-Clair Toomey is closer than ever, but Davidsdottir retains her crown.
Sure, it’s a little unusual to only release part 6, but the idea appears to be promoting subscriptions to the CrossFit Journal: if you sign up, you get access to parts 1 through 5.
Here’s a preview of the first part, if your appetite needs whetting.
If you want to see more, you can head over to The CrossFit Journal.
Featured image via CrossFit® on YouTube
