Leigha Dean, a local up and coming crossfit athlete and member of the local crossfit box, Crossfit O’Twelve, made an extraordinary showing in the Taranis Titan Challenge in the Victoria area Nov. 2-3.
Dean’s success emerged early in the challenge, as she earned second place in the second of nine rounds. This event consisted of 20-15-10-5 rep rounds for time: toes to bar, hand release push ups, burpees, box jumps 24”/20”.
Over the two days, Dean ranked 10th of 36 women competitors....a notable accomplishment for an athlete new to crossfit competition. Dean has only been involved in the crossfit community for under 10 months.
Dean says, “It was about three months ago I started pounding it down, readying myself for competition.
“It was an amazing experience to be competing with women who had so much more experience in the world of crossfit competitions. The first event happened to be in my area of comfort, and that helped to settle my nerves and give me confidence that I would be able to make a strong showing.”
Coach Kaiya McNeill-Payeur says, “Crossfit O’Twelve has been open for just over a year. Having one of our athletes work so hard and achieve such success in such a short time is wonderful.
“Coaching her to achieve this success is inspiring, and drives us to continue to help all our clients reach their athletic potential.”
The Taranis Winter Challenge has been running since 2009. It is an individual and team competition that takes from 80-100 individual competitors and 20-24 teams.
Competitors come from all over western Canada and the U.S. Pacific Northwest United States.
For those new to this emerging sport, crossfit is many things. Primarily, it’s a fitness regimen developed by coach Greg Glassman over several decades.
Crossfit itself is defined as that which optimizes fitness (constantly varied functional movements performed at relatively high intensity).
The top awards in crossfit are earned at the International Crossfit Games, where the Fittest Man and Woman on Earth are crowned.