Wod God

Arguably the greatest athlete in the history of the CrossFit Games, four-time champion Rich Froning manages to retain an air of calm at all times. It’s a quality that infuriates his competition yet endears him to his teammates and brands alike. It turns out 10 years of hoisting barbells overhead is the perfect preparation for carrying the weight of an entire sport on your shoulders

- Scott Henderson

WALKING INTO Brisbane’s notorious CrossFit Torian gym on a sweltering day, it isn’t multiple CrossFit Games champion Rich Froning who catches my attention. Well, it is and it isn’t. My gaze is immediately drawn to a 2.5-metre high mural of Froning’s face, a striking tribute to one of the sport’s pioneers, and a suitably imposing image to confront upon entering one of this country’s foremost CrossFit boxes.

“I don’t know why they chose a shot of me looking so cross,” muses Froning, his laidback attitude jarring with the ferocious intent captured in his painted visage. There are only two murals on the wall of Torian. Froning’s and that of local CrossFit hero Tia Toomey, who’s also here today gazing up at her own painted image.

It’s not really surprising that Froning’s face adorns the wall of a gym on the other side of the globe from his native Tennessee. The sport of CrossFit wouldn’t be the cult it is today without him.

The term GOAT gets thrown around far too freely these days, and in a sport as young as CrossFit, it’s perhaps foolish to laud one athlete over all others. But given the incredible physical demands of the ‘sport of fitness’, perhaps an exception can be made. After all, it takes a man blessed with singular determination and a unique capacity for hard work to reach the dizzying heights Froning has achieved.