Another competition, another victory for Rich Froning. Backing up its title from last year, Team USA showed it’s still #1 against the best from the rest of the world. While three of four athletes on Team USA changed, the team followed the lead of the 4-time Fittest on Earth Champion, Rich Froning.
From the outset, Team USA methodically paced through the workout until Chyna Cho was tagged in for the legless rope climbs. She quickly ascended the rope and completed the thrusters faster than her competitors, finished her segment in the lead and handed off the final segment to Rich Froning. As expected, Froning made quick work of the thruster/legless rope climb couplet and finished five seconds ahead of Canada’s Lucas Parker.
Heading into Event 2 and 3, the Team Speed Clean events, Team USA led Canada by two points, but with the new odd object / strongman event, there was no clear favorite. The men and women were broken into two separate heats as only two sets of stones were set up at a time. Europe and Pacific, 3rd and 4th after Event 1, went first. Both teams made quick work of the stone-to-shoulder movement until the last stone at 160 pounds. Both Sara Sigmundsdottir and Tia-Clair Toomey struggled with the last stone, which cost them valuable time against the second heat of USA and Canada.
Seeing the struggle with the last stone, both Team USA and Canada paced more in the first two sets of stone-to-shoulders. This allowed both teams to finish the heaviest stone with Canada taking 1st place and USA crossing the line 3 seconds after for 2nd place.
Event 3 started off with the same two heats, but Europe’s Guomundsson and Koski shouldered the final stone while Pacific’s Manuel and Garard were unable finish the rep. In the second heat, Canada and the USA reached the 250-pound stone at the same time. Froning effortlessly completed the rep while Alex Vigneault could not get the stone to his shoulder. As the clock neared the 5-minute time cap, Vigneault completed his rep and Canada raced to the finish line. Dan Bailey from Team USA was unable to complete the rep, leaving the USA in 3rd place for the event.
Halfway through the Invitational, USA and Canada were tied with 9 points. Europe was in 3rd with 5 points and the Pacific only had 1 point in 4th place.
After a few minutes to recover from the Team Speed Clean events, the teams began Event 4 – Push, Lift, Flip. All the teams powered through the handstand push-ups, especially Sara Sigmundsdottir who powered through 25 HSPUs in lightning speed. Europe moved onto the barbells with Canada and the USA on their heels. The Pacific team was the last to reach the barbells, but Webb and Garard’s strength propelled them into first place, well ahead of the USA. A few heavy tire flips later and the Pacific team was celebrating their first event victory. Team USA finished 25 seconds later and a full 17 seconds ahead of Canada to break the tie at the top.
Three of the four teams were still able to take home 1st place mathematically, but it would require Team USA and Canada to falter. Europe, 13 points behind 1st place, could do no better than a tie for 2nd.
The final event, Event 5, combined synchronized muscle-ups (both ring and bar), rowing and biking with static holds and the ever-present CrossFit team element, the Worm. All four teams easily cycled through the muscle-ups and headed to the conditioning/static hold stations. The heavy static holds proved too heavy as each team could not complete the 500m row before dropping the 315/225-pound deadlift holds.
Froning and Team USA finished the row and moved on to the Air Assault Bike in first with Europe and Canada following in close pursuit. After grinding out 1,000 meters on the bike, the USA moved to the Worm. It was starting to look like the USA was going to take 1st easily, but began to struggle with the 10 Worm ground-to-shoulders. However, before Canada could overtake them, the USA finished their last rep to win the 2015 Reebok CrossFit Invitational. The Pacific edged out Canada in the final event, but Canada finished 2nd place overall followed by the Pacific and Europe.
Team USA retained its hold on the Invitational and will again be the team to beat heading into 2017. Regardless of outcome, all of the athletes were proud to represent their country/region. Via social media, Camille Leblanc-Bazinet said, “Had such an amazing time with these guys [my team]. I feel so honored that I had the chance to represent Canada!!! We worked hard and we had fun!!!”
