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Join Ben Hollingshaus as he interviews athletes on Day 1 of the 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games. Despite a day of tough competition, the athletes are having fun.
After the beach workout, winner Josh Bridges is triumphant.
“It was a rough workout, but I’m done with it now, so I’m glad it’s over with,” he says. Second-place finisher Chris Spealler describes the event in one word: “original.”
On the women’s side, Julie Foucher took first. Her strategy was simple: “I kinda just wanted to go as fast as I could. I like chest-to-bar pull-ups, so I knew that I could make up some ground there, so that worked out well.”
Spealler dubs the next event, a set of three skills tests, a “carnival,” and it indeed captures the playful atmosphere among the competitors.
After the softball throw, Michelle Kinney shares her secret: “I’ve played softball my entire life, since age 4.”
Spealler sums up the last event, Rope/Clean, as “happy,” which characterizes the feelings of many of the athletes Hollingshaus interviews after the workout.
First-place finisher Annie Thorisdottir is exuberant: “I was really happy to get a workout that is in my comfort zone. I was thinking, ‘This is my shit, I’m gonna win it.’”
18min 01 sec
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Additional reading: Fittest on Earth, published July 31, 2011.
