The Open is Over, How’s the Verification Process Going to Work?
After five weeks and five events, the 2019 CrossFit Open has officially ended.
What’s happening: Now that the Open has concluded, CrossFit HQ is undergoing a thorough verification process to vet scores, crown national champions and certify the top 20 worldwide. Here’s what the process looks like:
- Letting the leaderboard settle: Affiliate owners had until last night to validate scores. By now, the leaderboard should be pretty well firmed up.
- Verifying citizenship: Each national champion will be required to submit proof of citizenship (See rulebook 1.32) through passport or other verification means.
- Requesting videos: CrossFit HQ will begin requesting videos starting today at 5:00 PM PT and conducting a thorough review of submitted scores. According to the rulebook (1.30) “The top five men and women from each eligible country may be required to submit videos for review.” Also, “The top 40 men and women on the overall worldwide CrossFit Games Leaderboard.” HQ indicated at least the top 40 will be asked to submit 19.1 and 19.3 videos for review, perhaps more depending on what they see. Given that the qualification line is already at 28th for men and 31st for women this isn’t surprising.
- Assessing penalties: If you haven’t already noticed, HQ has been assessing penalties at the top of the leaderboard. They’ve docked athletes during 19.1, 19.2 and 19.3 — the only week’s we have official scores for so far. We’d expect that pattern to continue.
The dates to pay attention to:
- Today: When HQ will begin requesting videos.
- April 1: The deadline for athletes to submit their videos.
- April 12 – 14: Mid-Atlantic CrossFit Challenge
- April 26 – 28: CrossFit Italian Showdown
- April 27 – 29: Asia CrossFit Championship
- April 29: HQ’s deadline for completing the video review process for all athletes.
- May 1: When HQ will email all individual athletes notifying them that they’ve qualified for the 2019 CrossFit Games.
- May 3 – 5: Reykjavik CrossFit Championship
Yes, that means that athletes’ qualification status will be pending during three Sanctionals (MACC, CFIT, and ACC). In reality, as Reykjavik takes place only a couple days after the final notification date, athletes probably should keep their flight and hotel reservations for that Sanctional too.
Bottom line: It’s going to be about a month before we know who has officially qualified for the 2019 CrossFit Games.
But what about the five teams who have already qualified?
- From section 4.05: “For the 2019 season, any teams that have been invited prior to the conclusion of the 2019 Open will be required to declare a roster after the completion of the Open competition.”
- Check your inbox: Team invites are going out on Monday.
- Clock is ticking: “Teams will have seven days after receiving an invitation to declare their roster. The team roster will be frozen after the seven days.”