Taking a Look at the 2024 PRVN Fitness Roster as 24.3 Goes to Nashville

POWERED BY:

Good morning and welcome to the Morning Chalk Up.

In today’s edition:

• CrossFit Open 24.3 heads to PRVN Fitness HQ. Learn more about the 2024 PRVN athlete roster

• Pool season is coming! Learn some quick tips for adding hypertrophy work to your CrossFit training

• At 350 pounds, Caitlin Stevenson elected to have bariatric surgery, but the weight came back. Now she’s at CrossFit Ground Up, 85 pounds down, and a major advocate for CrossFit training versus surgery

• And, how to watch CrossFit Open announcement 24.3

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“I wake up and I go, ‘What time am I going to the gym today?’ I can’t imagine my life without it.” - Caitlin Stevenson on her CrossFit journey

CROSSFIT GAMES

Get to Know the 2024 PRVN Fitness Athlete Roster

One of CrossFit’s top training camps, PRVN Fitness, announced their roster of 2024 athletes in advance of the CrossFit Open 24.3 live announcement at PRVN Fitness HQ in Nashville, TN, this week. 

The camp looks to have one of their best lineups ever.

Their 15-person roster consists of CrossFit Games veterans, potential 2024 Games rookies, and, of course, six-time champion Tia-Clair Toomey-Orr.

• This lineup doesn’t include the many other up-and-coming athletes following PRVN programming but instead gives us the best idea of which of their athletes are most likely to be competitive during the later stages of the season.

With that being said, let’s take a brief look at each of these 15 top PRVN athletes:

Tia-Clair Toomey-Orr

The champ is back and she will be leading the charge at PRVN along with her husband and PRVN Fitness co-founder, Shane Orr.

Last year was wild for the women’s Individual division with Tia absent, but after a tough second-place finish at the 2023 Rogue Invitational just months after giving birth, Toomey-Orr is back to reclaim her spot at the top.

Jay Crouch

Six-time Games athlete Jay Crouch is coming off of his best finish ever, breaking into the top 10 with an eighth-place overall finish.

He made some massive improvements throughout the season last year, surprising many in the community, seemingly coming out of nowhere.

Crouch will be looking to earn a second straight top-10 finish at the Games and show that it wasn’t a fluke.

Elevate Your Athleticism with Personalized Care

Don’t let your DNA be your Achilles heel. Wild Health helps you harness the insights from your genetics to optimize your health and performance.

This genetics-based personalized health care service analyzes your genetics, biometrics, and lifestyle data to personalize a health plan to help you achieve optimal wellbeing. Find your edge by tailoring and optimizing your nutrition, exercise, recovery, and supplementation routines.

Get started with a dedicated doctor and health coach today. Use code MCU20 to save 20% on a Wild Health Standard Membership.

JOIN TODAY.

SPEED READS

🚨 Tia-Clair Toomey-Orr Out: The six-time champ announced yesterday in an Instagram reel that, due to a wrist injury, she would not be able to compete in the 24.3 announcement.

New CMO at CrossFit HQ: As first reported by Barbell Spin, CrossFit announced earlier this week, in an email to affiliate owners, that Jenna Hauca has been hired as the company’s new Chief Marketing Officer.

• From the email: “Jenna joins CrossFit after spending five-plus years at Barry’s, where she led global marketing. Prior to Barry’s, Jenna oversaw digital, innovation, analytics, and business development at Generator Media + Analytics, a marketing agency based out of New York City.”

• “She was also a volunteer firefighter and nationally registered EMT and played NCAA D1 ice hockey at Princeton University, where she studied neuroscience and was published in the Journal of Physiology & Behavior. Originally from Canada, Jenna currently resides in Santa Monica with her rescue pit bull, Storm, and is enjoying her first CrossFit Open.”

😎👟🏊‍♀️ TYR Sport Europe: The title sponsor of TYR Wodapalooza, TYR Sport, has launched its European site. Check it out now. 

👟👟 Shelby Neal x INOV8: 2023 CrossFit Games rookie, Shelby Neal is the newest member of Team INOV8 for the 2024 season.

🎥 🍿 Tim Paulson Doc: “IDENTITY: A Live Free Film,” a documentary film following CrossFitter Tim Paulson during his final competitive season is out! Catch it on YouTube now.

💪🔥 Coaches Congress London x HWPO: The Coaches Congress, one of the largest, independent, educational events for gym owners and coaches in Europe within the CrossFit and functional fitness space, is celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2024 and announced that HWPO will be the title sponsor of its inaugural London event, October 5-6. Additional events will be held in Stockholm, Berlin, and Brisbane.

• Coaches Congress CEO Henrik Almers: “I am thrilled to have HWPO as a partner of our upcoming London event. It is a great pleasure to welcome such highly talented, hardworking, and knowledgeable people.”

ICYMI: In an exclusive interview, Games veteran Kelly Baker opens up about her fertility struggle and elite CrossFit training.

MEMBER EXCLUSIVE

Adding Hypertrophy Training to CrossFit: A Quick Primer

Every week on the Chasing Excellence podcast, we answer listener questions across the Five Factors of Health–Movement, Nutrition, Connection, Recovery, and Mindset. We recently got one about how best to introduce hypertrophy training to CrossFit.

Our answer is below, edited for clarity and brevity.

COMMUNITY

From 350 Pounds on the Scale and Bariatric Surgery to the CrossFit Open 

Being overweight is all Caitlin Stevenson ever knew. It had been that way her whole life.

Then, in 2015, at 350 pounds, Stevenson went to her doctor because she had been having back pain, and her doctor recommended weight loss surgery.

• “So I went to this meeting at the hospital and they convinced me it was the only thing that was going to work for me,” Stevenson told the Morning Chalk Up.

Feeling she had no other choice, Stevenson, now 32, underwent bariatric surgery that year.

• The surgery worked to some degree. She lost a bunch of weight, but when COVID-19 hit, she promptly gained most of it back.

Enter CrossFit: Last April, Stevenson’s friend convinced her to at least give CrossFit a try.

• “OK, I’ll try it once,” agreed Stevenson, who weighed 276 pounds at the time.

She walked into CrossFit Ground Up in Hastings, NE, and what happened next surprised her. “I had never enjoyed working out before. I never felt good working out because it wasn't a good atmosphere…The gym always felt so judgy,” she said.

This wasn’t the case at CrossFit Ground Up, and that was immediately apparent. Everyone was so supportive, and she found herself enjoying the experience of being in a gym.

• “[The support] is one of the main reasons I have continued to come back, basically every day,” she said.

CROSSFIT GAMES

How to Watch CrossFit Open Announcement 24.3

The final week of the 2024 CrossFit Open kicks off with the live announcement of workout 24.3 on Thursday, March 14, on the official CrossFit YouTube channel. And we’ve got all the details you need to know heading into the event.

The details: The final live Open announcement represents the conclusion of the 2024 CrossFit Open and, for many people, the conclusion of their Games season. For the talented top 25 percent, the Quarterfinals lies in wait. The live announcements started during the 2013 season and grew in size and popularity through 2018. CrossFit elected not to host live Open announcements during the 2019 and 2020 seasons but returned to host them in 2021.

• 24.3 will be presented by Jocko Go, the Official Energy Drink of the CrossFit Games, and will take place in Nashville, TN, at PRVN Fitness HQ.

• The Six-Time Fittest Woman on Earth, Tia-Clair Toomey-Orr, who was scheduled to compete, made a last-minute announcement that a wrist injury would keep her from throwing down on Thursday. Instead, fan-favorite Games veteran, and the current Third Fittest Woman in the World, Arielle Loewen (Toomey-Orr’s original opponent) will now be featured in a four-way match-up that includes PRVN athletes Sydney Wells and Jay Crouch, along Mayhem athlete and fellow Third Fittest, Roman Khrennikov.

How to Watch the 2024 CrossFit Open Workout 24.2

Tune in to the CrossFit Games website or CrossFit YouTube channel for the live 24.3 announcement on Thursday, March 14, at 12 p.m. PT. 

Quarterfinals, for the top 25% of each division, will take place April 17-22, registration begins on April 1.

As always, the Morning Chalk Up will provide workout strategy guides and full leaderboard coverage and analysis.

THINGS TO…

…CONSIDER

Open Workouts: To Re-do or Not?

Read through these slides from HWPO Training’s Jake Marconi, who gives some advice regarding re-doing Open workouts. He offers some great food for thought as we are in our final week.

BIG DECISIONS.

Turn Client Attendance Dips to PRs

Did you know that, on average, clients tend to drop their attendance by 47% in the month leading up to cancellation? Don't let your members lose their gains! Check out our latest blog for all the tools you need to ensure accountability and keep your athletes on the path to success!

READ NOW.

…PREP

Chocolate PB Protein Cups

Try this quick and easy recipe for a make-ahead, protein-packed sweet treat. You’re going to want to stock your freezer with these cuties so you can grab and go whenever the craving hits.

DELISH.

…GRAB

Natural Fitness Supplements

Check out the full line-up at Transparent Labs, whose products are all third-party lab-tested and free of artificial sweeteners and colors. Developed for peak performance and optimal health, find exactly what you need.

QUALITY FIRST.

HIGHLIGHTS

Celebrating a PR, hosting a fundraiser, this, that, or otherwise? Send us a tip.

• 🏋️‍♂️Congratulations to regional athlete Corey Lunney on the snatch triple at 225 pounds/102 kilos.

• Nice work to Games athlete Lena Richter on the hand-stand walking skills.

• Happy five-year affiliate anniversary to CrossFit Ballito in South Africa.

• Great job to the kids of Organizacion de AMIGOS who tackled Open workout 24.2. 

• 🏆Congratulations to Tudor Magda and Emily Claw on winning Open workout 24.2.