Underdog
/’ʌndədɒɡ/
noun
A competitor thought to have little to no chance of winning a fight or contest.
“In 2017 I took fourth place with NorCal, that was teams of 6 so the landscape is a little different now, but, we have high aspirations and we want to go to the Games. Not just to be there, but to compete.” Raphael Durand and his Underdogs Athletics team are stepping into an arena that’s filling up with super teams brimming with Games experience and steeped in history. The definition of an underdog.
Ethan Helbig, Christine Middleton and Brittany Marella will be joining the dog pound in Vegas for the season, aiming to defy the odds.
Ethan Helbig, a 2018 Games athlete, and Durand have been planning this team for a while. “We were going to go to West Coast Classic in 2020 but COVID cancelled that,” he said. Ethan felt the team was a good fit and a fun change of pace, “The team out here is great and the atmosphere is always fun, I’m used to doing these by myself so it’s fun to have other athletes to push me” he said. He also explained that it’s not all ability when it comes to teams, “chemistry means a lot in team, so, our goal is to find our chemistry and work well together.”
Christine, or Zeoli as most people call her, reached out to Justin Cotler of Underdogs and mentioned a desire to go team again this year. “I started working with Mind Over Matter recently, I told them I was looking for a squad and a coach so they linked me up with Justin to see what was going on for the season.”
Christine Middleton’s name might sound familiar to you. She was on CrossFit Milford’s Team Conquer last year finishing 14th at the Games and also holds the heaviest in competition Clean and Jerk of 265lbs (or 120kg if you’re outside of the US…or 115kg if you were part of the Open announcement last week) which she lifted with Ocean State. “I think the team is solid and we have a variety of strengths and weaknesses that ultimately benefit us as a whole, we have a lot of experience which makes a huge difference on competition days. Personally, I’d love to take a third Games lifting record too,” she said.
Brittany Marella also has some Milford history, missing out on the Games by one spot in 2018 with Jason Leydon’s affiliate team alongside Zeoli and, more recently, was part of the ill-fated MFLH team that were disqualified having punched their ticket at Granite Games last year. Brittany is excited to team up with Zeoli, “I’m really excited, we wanted to do this for a while and this year was a great opportunity, we mesh so well together so it will be great to be on the floor again together,” she beamed.
Durand is no stranger to rivalry with the NorCal/SoCal rivalry between his NorCal team and Invictus back in 2017, “If we have other rivalries pop up between us and Mayhem or PRVN, great, I’m friends with those guys and good competition is just going to elevate us all. I want us to all push each other and make it an exciting season for the fans.”
The thing with underdogs is they have nothing to lose. Nobody expects them to do well. Nobody expects them to achieve anything or raise any eyebrows. Nobody’s watching out for them. Except them. The underdog knows the work they’ve put in, they know the hay that’s in the barn, they expect to do well, to achieve and raise eyebrows and defy the odds.
