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Photo by St Paul's Collegiate School

Students qualify for CrossFit Nationals

St Paul's Collegiate School —

For 60-90 minutes, five times per week, Drake Walther, Mitchell Clark and Joe Harcourt were training to qualify for the CrossFit Nationals.

Their preparation was alongside other sporting commitments and added pressure to their already busy schedules. However, the young men stepped up to the challenge of having less preparation time than the other dedicated CrossFit athletes in their divisions. 

"Often the boys would come to train straight from another training, or even a game. They were extremely dedicated, and never made excuses. It was impressive considering a lot of the other competitors do CrossFit as their dedicated sport" says coach Ryan McCarthy.

The qualifiers consisted of six separate workouts being sent to each competitor. Three were delivered on 6, 7 and 8 July, to be completed on film to the best of their ability by 15 July and sent to the judges at CrossFit NZ. 

After completing the first three, the same amount was sent on 20, 21 and 22 July to be sent back to judges by 29 July.

Only nine athletes were taken from the competitive 16-17 years age group which Drake and Mitchell competed in and both boys qualified, Drake as the 3rd ranked qualifier and Mitchell 7th.

Joe competed in the 14-15 years age group and finished as the 6th ranked competitor, meaning he too qualified for the nationals.

Workouts varied between being judged on most completed repetitions or completing the set amount of repetitions within a certain time frame. Competitors were then given rankings across each discipline which when combined made up their overall ranking in their division.

Mr McCarthy himself also qualified for the nationals in the masters category, finishing as the top qualifier within the group.

Preparations now begin for the nationals, which are to be held at the Cambridge Velodrome on 5 and 6 September. They are New Zealand's premier CrossFit competition. They will be aired on Sky TV. We wish all these competitors the best of luck going into the competition.