By now, chances are you may have seen the story of Texas native Lauren Biggers reeling in a 7-foot long Blacktip Shark off the coast of Surfide Beach, Texas. Not only was this a huge shark to catch off a heavily populated beach, but in her original Facebook post from July 7th she credited CrossFit for helping her successfully reel in the shark that she never intended to catch.
We asked her how CrossFit specifically helped with the endurance of the whole ordeal and she said, “We do a lot of weight lifting but it’s honestly a total body work out every time I go, so it helped with all aspects of pulling the shark in. It was arms to reel, legs, back and abs to pull!”
Since Biggers’ original Facebook post, multiple outlets have covered this story from local to even major mainstream media outlets like Yahoo, and there’s a video that surfaced of the event from a local bystander. And what’s ironic is that Biggers was never really intending to catch anything.
When we asked her about that day at the beach she told us, “I wasn’t actually fishing for anything! We were there for my husbands 30th birthday. He’s a big fisherman so he wanted to go.”
In Yahoo’s article covering the story, they also asked about the relationship of the fishing bout and her CrossFit training and Biggers told them,
“I do think that doing CrossFit helped me. I don’t think I could have reeled a shark that weighed more than me in without it. It was the most incredible feeling once I finally got him to shore because in my head I kept wondering if I’d be able to do it alone, but I wanted to be the one who got him there.”
[Heading to the beach this summer and want to do a no-equipment WOD? Check out this article highlighting 8 trainers favorite no-equipment workouts!]
And for those wondering about the shark’s safety — Biggers stressed that one of their main concerns through the full bout and the bringing to shore was the shark’s safety and return to the ocean. After taking a few photos, they released the shark back into the wild.
In terms of fitness itself (not the act of shark fishing), score another point for CrossFit’s ability to assist with “functional” activities.
Feature image from Ayon Dasgupta YouTube channel.
