Saxon Panchik is heading back to the CrossFit Games. While he came close, Panchik failed to qualify for the Games in any CrossFit Sanctionals™ or the CrossFit Open this year. (He finished in 32nd place in the Open, and recently earned fifth place at the CrossFit Granite Games.)
Panchik instead earned his invite after CrossFit HQ announced that Henrik Inri Oskarsson tested positive for a banned substance last week. Oskarsson was banned from CrossFit competition for four years, and his invite was passed down to Panchik.
An extraordinarily complicated series of events led to Panchik’s invite.
Oskarsson actually earned his ticket to the Games by his second place finish at the Reykjavik CrossFit Championship. Bjorgvin Gudmundsson came in first at the competition, but because he had previously qualified for the Games his invite was handed down to Oskarsson.
Will Moorad of the United States earned third place at the Reykjavik CrossFit Championship, but he too had previously qualified for the Games. So there you have it, Panchik’s fourth place finish at Reykjavik CrossFit Championship has earned him the official invite to the Games this August.
Saxon Panchik made his first Games appearance last year where he placed 19th overall. Before that he competed as a Regional athlete from 2015 through 2018. His best placement at Regionals was last year, where he finished fifth at Central Regionals.
CrossFit runs in the Panchik family. You’ve probably heard of his brother Scott Panchik, a veteran CrossFit Games athlete. Scott has been to the Games five times and will be competing at this summer’s Games. There’s another Panchik brother too, Spencer Panchik, who’s a two-time Regional CrossFit athlete, but he won’t be competing.
Expect to see some quality family competition and plenty of action come August 1st in Madison, Wisconsin.
Featured image from @saxon_panchik Instagram page.
