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🏋️♀️ Months After Her Accident, Alex Gazan Shines at Rogue
Good morning and welcome to the Morning Chalk Up.
In today’s edition:
💪 Just months after a car accident fractured her fibula, Gazan stormed back to take second place at the 2025 Rogue Invitational.
🧠 The real test of discipline isn’t your PR — it’s your patience, presence, and how you show up when no one’s keeping score.
🔥 Lucy Campbell does it again. The 2025 TYR Wodapalooza champ’s super Sunday resulted in a third-place finish at the Rogue Invitational.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
I’m just excited and I know it can be taken away in the blink of an eye, so when I get to step on the floor, it’s a privilege.”
COMPETITIONS
Less Than Six Months After Devastating Car Accident, Alex Gazan Finishes Second at Rogue Invitational
A triumphant return hardly captures what Alex Gazan achieved at the 2025 Rogue Invitational, just months after a car accident that could have ended her career.
The Rogue Invitational wrapped up yesterday after three grueling days of competition for top CrossFit athletes. Gazan finished the weekend in second place, which is an incredible achievement considering that the last five months of her life involved rehab and a slow rebuild after fracturing her fibula in an accident.
“We train to win, so it feels good,” said Gazan, in a post-event interview on Friday after winning Event 2.
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SPEED READS
🏃♂️💥 Why VO₂ Max Might Be the Ultimate Health Metric: VO₂ max — your body’s capacity to use oxygen — may be the strongest predictor of lifespan. Dr. Peter Attia told 60 Minutes that improving cardio fitness through endurance and interval training is “the closest thing we have to a longevity drug.”
🔥💪 The Kip Swing, Explained: Rebecca Fuselier breaks down the most controversial move in fitness — the kip swing. She shows how mastering the kip builds upper body strength, midline control, and thoracic mobility (without wrecking your shoulders).
💉📈 GLP-1 Use Doubles Across America: A new Gallup poll shows use of weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy has jumped to 12.4% of U.S. adults, with the biggest increases among women and people aged 40–64. Obesity rates are finally dipping — but experts warn meds alone won’t fix America’s health habits.
🥞🔥 The Buttery Bros Turn Up the Heat…Literally: From CrossFit’s early media days to building a global YouTube empire, Heber Cannon and Marston Sawyers share how Buttery Bros was born — all inside a 230° sauna.
🗓️⚔️ Why the Off-Season Isn’t “Off”: Training Think Tank coaches break down why September–December should be goal-driven, not FOMO-driven: define your North Star, set micro-benchmarks, build habits (fuel/sleep/mobility), and periodize real weakness work.
ICYMI: 🥇 Laura Horvath and Jeff Adler clinch the 2025 Rogue Invitational titles.
MEMBER EXCLUSIVE
Your Hardest Workout Isn't on the Whiteboard – It's Waiting for You at Home
You can deadlift 400 pounds, but can you put your phone down at dinner?
You show up at 5 a.m. for workouts, but are you fully present in a conversation with your spouse? You push through Murph every Memorial Day, but do you lose your patience with your kids over spilled juice?
Here's the uncomfortable truth we discussed on a recent episode of the Chasing Excellence podcast: the discipline you've developed in the gym might not be carrying over to the areas that truly matter.
Training Hard, Eating Poorly
Every CrossFitter knows this truth – you can work hard in the gym five or six days a week, but if you go home and eat pizza, pretzels, donuts, and drink beer every night, you're canceling out the effort you put in. You're not getting as much benefit as you could.
The same thing occurs with real-life challenges.
TRIVIA
🇨🇦 🏴 In five trips to the Rogue Invitational, what is 2025 champ, Jeffrey Adler’s worst finish? | 
Last week, we asked: 🪵🏴 Event 1 at the 2025 Rogue Invitational brings back log bar muscle-ups, first seen in 2022’s “Ski Bar.” Who was the only woman to finish all 40 reps that year?
Emma Lawson ✅
Annie Thorisdottir
Arielle Loewen
Kara Saunders
Laura Horvath
Laura Horvath received 32.8% of the vote, but the correct answer was Emma Lawson (she received the second-most votes at 30.4%).
PROFILE
Lucy Campbell’s Sunday Surge – From Ninth to Podium at Rogue Invitational
We are used to seeing Lucy Campbell on the podium in 2025, but it didn’t seem likely for her on Friday and Saturday at the 2025 Rogue Invitational in Aberdeen, Scotland.
Campbell, the 2025 TYR Wodapalooza champion and second Fittest Woman on Earth from last summer’s CrossFit Games, was ninth overall on Sunday morning, 100 points behind third.
But in classic gritty Campbell style, she kept pushing on Sunday, eventually clawing her way to the podium. Yet again.
She finished third behind the winner, Laura Horvath, and second-place finisher Alex Gazan.
How Campbell Got It Done
Campbell started the competition with a 15th-place finish in Event 1. Although it was her lowest finish of the weekend, the event was a big success because Campbell was able to complete all 16 log muscle-ups.
“Learning log bar muscle-ups has been rough,” she posted on Instagram, adding that she had “many fails in the last 48 hours” as she tried to learn them. “But I guess I found a way,” she added.
HIGHLIGHTS
Celebrating a PR, hosting a fundraiser, this, that, or otherwise? Send us a tip.
🎂Happy birthday to Katie Hammer.
Happy belated birthday to Nic Johnson.
Congratulations to Allison McKail on this (barefoot), squat snatch PR of 77 kilos/170 pounds.
👏Well done to all these athletes who PRed their snatch at CrossFit Bil Athletic in Australia last week.
Well done to 54-year-old CrossFit Games veteran Cheryl Brost on this 21 unbroken bar muscle-up PR.




