Sanctionals, Start Your Engines

As the saying goes, time feels like it speeds up the further along we get. It’s hard to believe then, that given all the change brought about within the sport in the last year, we’re already at the starting line for the second season of Sanctionals competition. A freshman year filled with question marks and growing pains is already being replaced with a bigger, bolder sophomore campaign poised to bring CrossFit competition to more corners of the globe than ever before.

Let’s run it back: A year ago, the CrossFit world waited anxiously for Dubai to kick off a string of 15 sanctioned events, and now here we are ready for round two, with nearly double the amount of events, and Ireland batting lead off just 11 days after the close of the Open.

• 18 different countries will place host to the 27 events for the 2020 Games season, and if the Fittest in Cape Town issue gets resolved the numbers bump to 19 and 28 respectively.
• The full slate of Sanctionals will run for 32 weeks in total, which is longer than the full seasons of the NFL, MLB, and NBA.
• Starting March 5, and ending July 5, 2020 there will be a CrossFit competition taking place every single weekend except for one. For anyone counting that’s 19 out of 20 weekends.

Now we’re cooking with gas: And that means from a numbers standpoint, there are ton of opportunities out there for athletes and fans of the sports to get their fitness fix over the next eight months before the Games.

• In total, there will be 81 days of live competition, meaning roughly 500 hours of competitive CrossFit streamed live from six continents, most of it completely free to consumers.
• As of this morning, the Morning Chalk Up will have boots on the ground at 10 Sanctionals in 9 different countries bringing comprehensive coverage each day.
• Translation: more exposure, for more athletes, on more platforms.

More doesn’t always equal better, but the media efforts across the board are continuing to improve, and many of the major players responsible for covering the sport since the beginning are doubling down on coverage and content this year.

Fully operational: Even though this is the second season of this new system, 2019 was more of a transitional year, and this will be the first full year of the new system as intended. With the Open at the front of the year, the rulebook being released prior to the season start, and expanded media efforts across the board, we’ll have a better feel for what this new system is really about, and what the future holds.

It all starts today, and before we know it we’ll be wrapping up the Sanctional season down in Mexico, so buckle up and hold on, because it should be one helluva ride.