A Rough Watch: CrossFit Deserves Better than What the Legends Championship Served
Cringe.
It’s the best way I can describe what kept happening to my face while watching the Legends Championship livestream behind the FloElite paywall last weekend.
Not the athletes themselves: There were plenty of impressive performances, as four of the undoubtedly fittest athletes in the world earned their invites to the 2026 CrossFit Games. But watching the live feed felt like a time warp that sent me back 15 years. Maybe longer.
What I got for $30: A glitchy production that consistently left me staring at a “we’re experiencing technical difficulties” screen, while at other times it was the wheel of death buffering away. And what about watching the event again if you missed it live? Don’t even think about it.
- When the feed was actually showing fitness, the low-definition quality made it challenging to even see what was going on, failing at sports production 101 – the viewer needs to know who’s in the lead.
Sometimes the announcers tried to help, but all was for naught when, all of a sudden, someone they hadn’t even mentioned during the event crossed the finish line. Did she really come out of nowhere, or had she always been right behind the leader?
I will say, I grew to find a certain amount of, dare I say, charm in Taylor Self’s uncharacteristic questions during his on-floor post-event interviews — What’s your favorite movie? What did you eat for breakfast this morning? — but another cringe hit me when he asked one athlete whether this was their first Semifinal. (And another each time it became apparent that the color commentators had zero regard for pronouncing names correctly).
Maybe the in-person fan experience would have been better, but at least from the livestream, it appeared that there was next to no one in the stands.
As for the events themselves, I enjoyed the programming.
Were five events maybe too few for a CrossFit Games qualifier? Maybe.
Was the competition lacking a complete test because there was no running? Perhaps.
But a case can probably be made for either side, as programming is a topic where consensus is rare.
From my understanding, the bigger event issues weren’t about programming but about equipment, judging, and logistical problems: broken skiers who had to be taken off the competition floor, a waterfall event in the masters competition that turned into a clusterfuck, and accusations of inconsistent judging.
The Big Picture
As someone who started CrossFit in 2008 — who competed at the Games twice with a team in the early days and once as an individual in 2014, and who has been a fan of the sport for 18 years—the Legends Championship reminded me of what the sport was like in 2009 and 2010 (even CrossFit’s livestream that first year at the Home Depot Center in Carson, CA, was more watchable than what I experienced over the weekend).
At the time, though, the sport was young and growing. We didn’t expect more.
We do now. And it has become obvious that CrossFit as a sport has regressed, and calling it a legitimate, professional sport is comical.
Ultimately, it’s a good thing the live feed was behind a firewall: Only the most diehard fans likely tuned in. And maybe our deep-rooted love for the sport will make us a bit more forgiving.
