Semifinals Spotlight: Could Australia’s Zac Thomas Be a Dark Horse Podium Pick in Oceania?
Australia’s Zac Thomas will take on the third Semifinal of his young career this week at the Oceania Semifinal by Torian Pro.
The 22-year-old has had an impressive 2024 season so far, finishing 13th in Oceania in the Open and fifth in the region in Quarters.
Thomas lives and trains in Wollongong, Australia, home of the former CrossFit Regionals and the current location of Australia’s largest off-season competition, the Down Under Championship.
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Thomas first started at CrossFit Wollongong when he was 15 years old to improve his basketball strength. Within six months, the youngster ditched the hardwood for the barbell and found himself training with Games hopefuls Jake Sole and Luke De Jonge.
- “Luke was starting to train for the Games in 2017 (as a teen),” Thomas told the Morning Chalk Up in an interview.
- “I was a swimmer, so I had a good fitness base from that,” he continued, “Luke saw it in me that I was fit and I could keep up on some of the ergs and stuff like that. He got a push from me there, and I also did some swimming with him to get him ready for the Games.”
The Early Days in Wollongong
Thomas said that the trio trained every day, but things took a turn in 2021.
- “[Early on] we pretty much did what Luke did. We’d rock up and Luke would write something on the whiteboard,” he said.
- “Up until 2021, it was all sunshine and rainbows; no one got injured. We were teenagers. We thought we were all unbeatable, and then Luke got hurt in 2021. That was his last Semifinals (until this year).”
- “From there, it kind of went to nothing. We weren’t doing Luke’s workouts anymore because he wasn’t coming up with them, so we all went our own way,” Thomas said.
In the lead-up to the 2022 CrossFit season, Thomas coached himself and wrote his own programming.
“I was just kind of making up stuff myself,” he said. He must have been doing something right, though, as he qualified for his first Semifinal that year, where he finished 29th.
Enter: Rob Downton and Raw Strength and Conditioning
Thomas felt that he was capable of more. “I knew I needed a coach,” he said.
- “After that 2022 Semifinal, I started with Raw Strength and Conditioning with Rob Downton. It’s been almost two years, and I’ve improved heaps more mentality as an athlete.”
- “Downton used to coach Brent Fikowski; he used to coach James Newbury; he’s Jess Coughlan’s partner. He’s made people into Games athletes,” Thomas said.
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After 12 months of working with Rob Downton, Thomas finished seventh at the Oceania Semifinal in 2023. He even came home with a win in the first event — a chipper-style workout with running, skiing, biking, and sled pulls.
A Dark Horse Podium Pick in 2024?
Thomas has big goals for the 2024 CrossFit Games season: “After coming in seventh last year, the goal this year is going to be at least a podium [at Semifinals].”
Athletes have had access to the Semifinal workouts for a couple of weeks, and Thomas believes that the “classic CrossFit programming” plays to his strengths.
- “I’m pretty happy with [the Semifinals programming]. The Open and Quarters have covered everything that’s not in Semis.”
- “This year, the programming has been simpler the whole way through — the last two years prior had very high-skill Quarterfinals,” he said. “This year, the programming seems like it’s building in terms of skills and load […] It’s back to the basics, and go as hard as you can.”
“I’ve been working on everything that hasn’t shown up [yet],” he concluded.
The Bottom Line
The Oceania Semifinal by Torian Pro kicks off this weekend, May 23-26, at the Pat Rafter Arena in Brisbane, Australia. Here’s how you can watch all of the action.
Thomas is a young, exciting athlete hungry for a podium finish. Could he be a dark horse for a top-four spot and a ticket to the Games?
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