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CrossFit Held a Post-Open Press Conference, Here’s What You Need to Know

March 17, 2022 by
Photo Credit: Athlete's Eye Photography
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On the eve of the finalization of the 2022 CrossFit Open Leaderboard, Home Office hosted a press conference for select media.

The details: On the panel were Justin Bergh, GM of Sport; Adrian Bozman, Director of Competition; and Mal O’Brien and Saxon Panchik, who were announced as the winner’s of the 2022 CrossFit Open

Bergh tackled a question focused on the fact that the Open grew 11.5% from 2021 to 2022, however is still 122,000 registrants down from its high water mark of 416,000 in 2018. Bergh said they are moving away from specific numbers, when asked about how they plan on getting back to Eric Roza’s declarative statement that he wants half a million people competing in the Open. He said:

  • “Our goals for the Open are kind of steady growth and sustainable growth. I think that what’s important for us, we grow the sport at all levels and continue to grow at all levels and professional opportunities for the athletes and also do this in the future in a way that really supports the affiliates and the training methodology broadly.”
  • “In my mind I don’t have a certain number set where I would say, ‘If I made it back to 417 thousand, then you’ve made it. Our goal is to continuously progress over the next decade so there is steady, continuous growth around the world. And while we had some terrific years that lead to that number (416 thousand) we’re actually really pleased that we added 30,000 (this year).”

What else we learned: While the 2022 Open Leaderboard is not yet official, we were able to gather a lot of information as we head into the next stage of the Games season.

  • The 2022 CrossFit Games Open
    • The 2022 Open Leaderboard will become official at 5 PM PT on March 18, 2022
    • There may still be penalties assessed
  • The 2022 CrossFit Games Quarterfinals
    • Similar to last year’s cadence, Quarterfinal information, including workout details and score sheets will be released on Thursday leading into the competition on March 24.
  • Future Press Conferences
    • Bergh said that the Games team plan is to hold more press conferences going forward.
    • He confirmed that there would be a press conference for the media after the last Semifinal and at least one at the Games.

The bottom line: The press conference today revealed some useful information related to the season and in addition, athletes Saxon Panchik and Mallory O’Brien were able to answer some questions about their experience the past three weeks.  

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