After a string of injuries that have hampered Sara Sigmundsdottir over the past several seasons, the Icelandic CrossFit Games veteran and fan favorite will be heading down to Miami this January to compete at the 2023 TYR Wodapalooza Fitness Festival. For Sigmundsdottir, it will be the first time at an in-person competition since she finished 6th at the 2022 CrossFit Lowlands Throwdown.
Sigmundsdottir will compete in the Individual Elite division, making it her fourth time to throw down in Bayfront Park. Sigmundsdottir received an invite to compete this year because of her 3rd place finish at the 2016 CrossFit Games. Wodapalooza invites all CrossFit Games podium finishers from 2016 to 2022 as one of its automatic qualifiers.
History at Wodapalooza
Sigmundsdottir has had good success in her previous appearances at Wodapalooza. In 2019, she finished 3rd overall and followed that up with a 2nd place in 2020. Then, after Wodapalooza returned in 2022, Sigmundsdottir withdrew from the event after three workouts. Sigmundsdottir would later share that she had a “big scare” during Event 3 where she injured her knee.
Luckily, the injury did not take her out of the 2022 CrossFit Games season, although she was unable to qualify to Games this past season.
Wave of Injuries
Sigmundsdottir’s last few years have been plagued by injury. In 2020, Sigmundsdottir competed in the online portion of the 2020 CrossFit Games where she finished 21st. Sigmundsdottir said that a shin injury incurred before the 2020 Rogue Invitational attributed to her lower than expected performance.
Then in 2021, Sigmundsdottir was forced to sit out the 2021 CrossFit Open after rupturing her ACL while working on split jerks.
 And then last year, the knee injury at Wodapalooza forced her to withdraw.
The Comeback?
But with Sigmundsdottir slated to compete this January, it appears that she is healthy and ready to make another run at the CrossFit Games. With the changes to the upcoming CrossFit Games season, Sigmundsdottir will need to show she is back to her former self prior to the string of injuries to compete with the strong women’s field coming out of Europe.
While we still don’t know how many athletes will qualify to Games out of the European Semifinal, we do know that it will be battle in the women’s division. This January, we will get to a preview into how how Sigmundsdottir looks compared to the rest of the women’s Elite field.
