2023 TYR Wodapalooza Individual Event Preview: “Miami Meat Market”

The Individual events for the 2023 TYR Wodapalooza are being announced in the lead-up to the competition’s January 13 start date, bringing with them some surprising movements and devastating chippers. The latest announced event sees Individual competitors face down dumbbell bench presses, the Echo bike, and chest-to-bar pull-ups in a workout called the “Miami Meat Market.”

This is actually the first part of a back-to-back finale for Individuals, with the “Dirty Isabel” workout putting a bow on the whole thing. Below is a breakdown of what these athletes will face during “Miami Meat.”

2023 TYR Wodapalooza Individual Workout — “Miami Meat Market”

Complete for Time

3 Rounds of:

• 25 Chest-to-Bar Pull Ups
• 15 Dumbbell Bench Press: 80 pounds for men | 50 pounds for women
• 30/21 Cal Echo Bike

Time Cap: 9 minutes

If you’ve been around Wodapalooza for a few years, this workout will be familiar. In 2020, there was a workout called “Pump Sesh Triplet,” which included a dumbbell bench press, dumbbell thrusters, and legless rope climbs.

This isn’t exactly the same because the Echo bike plays a critical role in 2023, but there might be some correlation between athletes who did well on that and athletes who do well on this.

Editor’s Note: This article is an op-ed. The views expressed herein and in the video are the author’s and don’t necessarily reflect the views of BarBend. Claims, assertions, opinions, and quotes have been sourced exclusively by the author.

Picks to Win | Roman Khrennikov and Sara Sigmundsdóttir

Of the athletes competing from 2020, Sara Sigmundsdóttir’s fifth-place finish on “Pump Sesh Triplet” was the best performance on the women’s side. Throw a bike into the mix and it should only be more advantageous for her.

As a whole, Sigmundsdóttir is a very large unknown in this field. Assuming everything goes well, this could be the workout she needs at the end of the competition to lock up a podium position.

[Related: Who Can Win the 2023 CrossFit Games with Tia-Clair Toomey Out?]

From a pure time perspective, the bike can help out the right athlete tremendously during this workout. Think back to “DT With a Spin” during the 2022 Rogue Invitational. During that event, Roman Khrennikov was able to hold a recovery pace on the bike that was a working effort pace for nearly everyone else.

This could very well be the case again, where Khrennikov gives a little away to the smaller athletes on the pull-up bar and reels them back in on the bike. The bench press in the middle, however, remains the unknown factor.

Dark Horses | Fabian Beneito and Andrea Nisler

Fabian Beneito Selles has been the darling of the offseason, winning both the Dubai Fitness Championship (DFC) and Wodapalooza online qualifiers. During the DFC, he went on a sprint and reeled off consecutive event finishes of first, first, and second on workouts that involved dumbbell thrusters, chest-to-bar pull-ups, and barbell cycling. In doing so, he displayed an impressive capacity for several different implements.

Beneito was also sixth (missing the final by one spot) on the “Ride or Die” event at DFC, which included fast intervals on the Echo bike. All in all, he’s likely to have a few surprise performances in Miami, and this one, in particular, could be one of them.

Andrea Nisler has been a part of the CrossFit Mayhem Freedom team, which has had a clean sweep of Quarterfinals in North America, Semifinals, and the CrossFit Games throughout the past two years. However, she also succeeded as an Individual competitor during that time.

[Related: CrossFit Performance of the Week: Kelly Shirley Hits Two PRs in Two Days]

Nisler claimed 19th worldwide in the 2021 CrossFit Open, 31st worldwide at the 2022 Open, ninth in North America during the 2021 Quarterfinals, and took sixth place in Dubai in 2021. To do so, she beat out Games athletes like Sigmundsdóttir, Emily Rolfe, Emma Lawson, and Thuri Helgadottir.

One of Nisler’s two second-place finishes in Dubai in 2021 came on Event 4, where biking, handstand walking, and overhead squats were featured. It’s not a perfect comparison, but these events are both monostructural, weightlifting, and gymnastics triplets that include a bike. Nisler will likely have some very good events in Miami. Expect this to be one of them.

Damage Control | Brent Fikowski and Emma Cary

Note: “Damage control” picks in this context are podium-contending athletes who need to mitigate losing too many points in their weaker events.

Brent Fikowski might seem like a controversial pick on the surface, but he has a poor history in CrossFit Games workouts with a higher volume of pull-ups and chest-to-bar pull-ups. Here’s a rundown:

• Murph, 2016 Games: 28th place (his 4th worst event that year)
• Bicouplet 1, 2018 Games: 18th place (his 4th worst event that year)
• Mary, 2019 Games: 28th place out of 30 (his worst event that year)
• Friendly Fran, 2020 Games Stage 1: 27th place out of 30 (his worst event that year)
• Event 15, 2021 Games: 15th out of 20 (his worst event relative to the number of athletes per event that year)
• Bike to Work, 2022 Games: 33rd (his 2nd worst event that year)

Of all of those, it’s the last one, “Bike to Work,” that is the most insightful here. That workout had the exact name number of chest-to-bar pull-ups (75) and featured a bike that took up a majority of the working time. Yet Fikowski was unable to make up for the extra time the gymnastics elements took him.

For Emma Cary, this is a bit of an unknown element for her. What we do know is that she’s on the smaller side, and she’s young. This means that no matter how strong she is, she hasn’t had the opportunity to build up 10 to 15 years of bench pressing experience and strength.

She will likely crush the gymnastics elements, but if she struggles with the bench, the bike, or both, relative to the other top women in this field, this could be a big factor in her eventual final placing.

Featured Image: @sarasigmunds / Instagram