The second day of events of the CrossFit Games took place this Friday. After 3 workouts, Tia-Clair Toomey and James Sprague are now ahead on the leaderboard before Saturday events begin. See how it all happened in the paragraphs below.
Until Thursday night it was unsure if we would still have a CrossFit Games to watch after the tragic passing of athlete Lazar Dukic. However, at the down of night, athletes received an e-mail confirming that Friday would continue with events for competitors, however with a short tribute to Lazar to kick off the day.
There was much speculation about whether all athletes would be back to compete. As the tribute was happening at 10am, Karin Freyova and members of team CrossFit Walleye decided to pull out of competition out of respect for Lazar Dukic and claiming the way CrossFit handled the situation was not in accordance with their views.
Minutes later, another athlete decided to withdraw from competition: current champion of the CrossFit Games Laura Horvath.
Chronological Facts: All We Know About Lazar’s Death and the Future of the CrossFit Games
Individual Event 2
At 12:20 pm (local time) individuals went to the competition floor for the first time since the tragic event. First we saw the women take on the arena, then the men.
Midline Climb
For Time:
- 50 deadlifts (155/225 lb)
- 3 rope climbs
- 30/50 ski-erg calories
- 3 rope climbs
- 50 GHD sit-ups
- 3 rope climbs
- 50 GHD sit-ups
- 3 rope climbs
- 30/50 ski-erg calories
- 3 rope climbs
- 50 deadlifts
A couple of athletes decided to take the first minute off of the workout for Lazar Dukic and his family.
Many athletes were visibly shaken as they began the workout, some holding back tears as they began deadlifting the barbell.
Without Laura Horvath, one of the strongest athletes competing and current champion, all eyes were on Tia-Clair Toomey attempting to regain her throne. And so she has done it by winning event 2 with time to spare.
On a different heat, another Australian athlete got the spotlight: Madeline Sturt. Maddie finished second in the event followed by Haley Adams.
With the event over, the overall top athletes were, in this order, Tia-Clair Toomey, Emily Rolfe and Emily Tall (tied in points with 179), Haley Adams and Bethany Flores.
On the men’s side, Pat Vellner got a much-needed win. During the first event, he won only 14 points with a mountain to climb – which he did, jumping from 33th to 14th overall.
Following Pat Vellner very closely was Jayson Hopper – only two seconds behind in the end. Dallin Pepper, Justin Medeiros and Kalyan Souza finished in the top 5.
After the event, the overall leaderboard had Jelle Hoste still in first place, followed by Brent Fikowski, Roman Khrennikov and James Sprague (all three with 164 points) and Justin Medeiros finishing the top 5.
Individual Event 3
The third individual event of the 2024 CrossFit Games was:
Firestorm:
3 rounds for time of:
- Echo-bike calories (11/15)
- 11 burpees over barricade
As the name suggested, Firestorm brought the heat up and quick. Jayson Hopper got the quickest mark with only 2 minutes and 32 seconds, followed closely by Dallin Pepper, Pat Vellner, James Sprague and Samuel Kwant.
The women’s division was the first test that put Tia-Clair Toomey outside the top five. The winner, in just 3 minutes and 3 seconds, was Australian Grace Walton, then Bethany Flores, Alex Gazan, Danielle Brandon, and Emily Rolfe.
Individual Event 4
The last event of the day for individual athletes consisted of a run and sprint with carrying the star-shaped bag. This was supposed to be event 6, initially, but the events for day 1 were cancelled and this became event 4 overall.
Track and Field:
For time:
- 1,600-meter run
Then, at the 12-minute mark:
- 50-yard sprint
- 50-yard bag carry (70/100 lb)
- 75-yard sprint
- 75-yard bag carry
- 100-yard sprint
The last event of the evening had a different way to rank the athletes, so the best strategy was put forward.
In the men’s category, Ricky Garard took his first event win of the Games to continue his pursue for the podium. Luke Parker, Roman Khrennikov were close behind and James Sprague finished fourth to take over the race ahead of Dallin Pepper and Jayson Hopper.
At the end of the night, the top 5 athletes in the men’s division are:
- James Sprague – 255 points
- Dalin Pepper – 249
- Jayson Hopper – 243
- Roman Khrennikov – 243
- Brent Fikowski – 240
In the women’s division, the fastest time was recorded by Tia-Clair Toomey once again. After failing to grab a top 5 finish in the previous event, she got down and did the work. After her came Haley Adams to solidy her presence among the best on the day, Aimee Cringle, Gabriela Migala and Paige Semenza.
Before the lights turned off inside the Dickies Arena, the leaderboard showed these athletes were the top 5:
- Tia-Clair Toomey – 382 points
- Haley Adams – 352
- Emily Rolfe – 352
- Bethany Flores – 340
- Gabriela Migala – 334
Teams
It wasn’t only individual athletes who withdrew from competition during the day. CrossFit Walleye and C23 CrossFit The Progrm Motion have both said they would not continue before the first event began.
Today we saw teams competing during 3 events, one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and a last one in the evening.
CrossFit Torian Mayhem won the last event (Farrington Five), finished the first one in second and the other one in 4th, taking over the race on what is technically day 1 for the teams.
CrossFit Mayhem, from United States, is currently second after winning the first event, coming in close 2nd and ending the night with a 6th placement on event 3. The third place was the only other team who finished all events within the top 5 ever time: Raw Iron CrossFit Mayhem Thunder.
Here is the final table with the top 5 teams.
GoFundMe Donations for Dukic Family Surpasses 1st Place Prize Purse of the CrossFit Games
