What is the CrossFit Open: registration date, deadlines and price of the event with the most participants in the world

CrossFit is one of the sports disciplines that has experienced the greatest growth in recent years in Spain and in a few days the most anticipated event of the year for thousands of 'crossfitters' is coming. In February the 'Open 2025' arrive, something like the 'Olympics' of CrossFit and a democratic way of ensuring that whoever wants to can fight for a place in the final of the Crossfit Games, the most important international event in this sport.

If you're an amateur and you're just starting out doing burpees, it doesn't matter. You can test your strength against Mathew Fraser, Justin Medeiros, Tia-Clair Toomey, Laura Horvath, and the rest of the people in your box.

To do so, the first thing you have to do is sign up for this first stage, the registration for which begins this Wednesday, January 15 , and is done through the official website of the American company that owns the largest fitness brand on the planet. The price of the CrossFit Open worldwide is 20 dollars.

Anyone who wants to measure their physical abilities against the rest of the planet (in the last edition, 150,000 men and 124,000 women signed up) and demonstrate different physical abilities : strength, speed, endurance, joint range of motion (including flexibility and elasticity) to determine which athlete is the most versatile in the event is eligible. Of these, only 30 men and 30 women will compete for the title known as 'Fittest on Earth' .

The competition, a good way to check if you have done your homework during the year, lasts three weeks, starting on February 27th . In each week, a training session is published that no one knows in advance, and which must be met with standards adjusted to each age category - the minimum age to sign up is 14 years - and level of physical performance. The boxes usually schedule the wods ( workout of the day ) of the games during the competition to make it easier for athletes to sign up for the competition and test themselves.

«It's a celebration of the CrossFit community, where the values ​​of sport, unity, camaraderie and sportsmanship are present. It's also a world-class test of physical fitness and it helps us to challenge ourselves and bring out the best in each one of us,» explains Nahún Villanueva , co-owner and head coach at ClubOne CrossFit , one of the reference centres for the practice of this discipline and which is located in Madrid. «They are for everyone, regardless of each person's physical condition; each training session proposed by CrossFit has different adaptations depending on the abilities of each athlete,» says the expert.

The personal record of each athlete who wishes to participate is certified by qualified judges for this purpose, present in the boxes around the world where the tests are carried out , and is uploaded online to the official CrossFit website , which allows each participant not only to keep strict control of their records , but also to be able to assess their individual physical level by comparing it with the rest of the participants in their own training center as well as around the world.

"Our best marketing tool is everyone who tries it and gets hooked, because it inspires those around them. It's a workout that changes people's lives in a very profound way. The best investment in health," said Don Faul, current CEO of the company , in a recent interview.

Although it is difficult to establish an exact number of people who practice this booming discipline, CrossFit Spain strives to make an approximation. Each box has about 175 users on average , so there are about 110,000 users who practice it in our country. The average price of monthly fees for this sport ranges between 75 and 100 euros .

There has been some controversy lately over the rate increase by the American multinational, something that has made the 'crossfit' community position itself in two opposing camps after the decision to raise the fee for gyms from 3,000 to 4,500 euros per year . This circumstance has caused the brand to lose more than 100 boxes in our country in recent months.

Currently, the network has 590 boxes distributed throughout Spain , in contrast to the 692 centers of this type of training that the brand had in the country at the end of 2023. It is the fifth market globally.

If there is something that characterizes the great athletes of this training system that has become a sport, in addition to their incredible physical strength, it is their mental strength . This training combines tests such as weightlifting (snatch and clean and jerk) , powerlifting, strongman, gymnastics , or athletics among others, and "is based on functional movements, constantly varied and executed at high intensity," as indicated by Nat Díez, general director of CrossFit in Spain.

“There are many aspects to the same sport, you have to train very hard to be able to master everything. It is very important to be patient and disciplined, to keep your mind clear, to have positive messages and to always rely on the group,” says Aniol Ekai (Pamplona, ​​1997), one of the two Spaniards who participated in the 2024 CrossFit Games held in Texas. “It will help you live longer, and you have to know that you don’t have to be fit to practice it, but rather do it to be fit,” explains Fabian Beneito (Valencia, 1996), the other Spaniard who competed in the USA and who knows perfectly well what it is like to reach number one in Europe. Both train with Training Culture , a CrossFit programme that brings together the Spanish elite of the discipline in Zarautz (Guipúzcoa).

The aim of athletes in this discipline is to successfully overcome any circumstance or physical challenge that is put before them. It is not unusual to see them rowing, competing on a mountain bike, climbing a rope, swimming, crossing a football field doing a handstand, doing shoulder press exercises and deadlifts or performing different repetitions suspended on rings.

The system for naming wods is using the year of the season, for example in this year 2025, the first number corresponds to the year and the next is the order of the week. The first wod, or workout, will be 25.1 , the next 25.2 and the last 25.3 .

So if someone tells you that they found 21.3 difficult, they are referring to the Open in the third week of 2021. Last year was the first time that the American company announced the opening of the event from Madrid as the venue, announcing the first high-intensity training session from the Caja Mágica.

The first WOD will be published on February 27th , and you will have until March 3rd to complete it without uploading your score to the official CrossFit website. The second one will have to be completed between March 6th and 10th, while the third one will take place between March 13th and 17th. Only 1% of the participants will make it to the semi-finals, which will take place between April and May.