CrossFit Games Open WOD 4: Wall Balls, Double-Unders and Muscle-Ups

The 2012 Reebok CrossFit Open competition is now almost complete, as WOD 12.4 was posted on March 14 and completed on March 18. 

More than 70,000 athletes worldwide are competing in the Open, with only the top 60 male and female finishers in each of the nearly 20 regions moving on to the regionals in April and May. There, up to three athletes from each region will qualify to compete at the CrossFit Games in July for the title of Fittest in the World. 

As with WODs 12.1, 12.2 and 12.3, WOD 12.4 was not a walk in the park—it consisted of as many rounds of the following exercises in 12 minutes: 

• 150 wall balls (men: throwing a 20-lb. medicine ball to a target 10' high on a wall, women: a 14-lb. medicine ball thrown at a 9' high target; this is a familiar benchmark CrossFit workout, affectionately known as “Karen”) 
• 90 double-unders (jumping rope with two swings of the rope for every jump) 
• 30 muscle-ups on the gymnastics rings (also a standard CrossFit benchmark workout) 

So far, only a select few have successfully included a single round of workout 12.4. That is not surprising, as most of our species is physically incapable of performing a muscle-up. 

2011 CrossFit Games finalists Jason Khalipa, Pat Barber, Miranda Oldroyd, and Neal Maddox, are featured here doing WOD 12.4 in San Jose, Calif. They make it look easy, as the three men all completed one round and were well into their second set of wall balls (video courtesy Reebok CrossFit Games). 

At the close of WOD 12.4 at 5 p.m. PDT on March 18, Maddox was in seventh place, Khalipa 10th and Barber 17th among all the male competitors.

Other 2011 CrossFit Games stars in the top 25 worldwide through WOD 12.4 include defending world champion Rich Froning, and past Games competitors Dan Bailey, Brandon Pastorek, Albert-Dominic Larouche, Chase Daniels, Nick Urankar and fan-favorite Chris Spealler.

On the women’s side, Games stars Julie Foucher, Annie Thorisdottir, Kristan Clever (who won the OC Throwdown in January) and Camille Leblanc-Bazinet all are in good position. 

As the Open draws to a close, there are several formerly lesser known men and women near the top of the leaderboard that seem poised to make a run at the Games title this summer. On the men’s side, Southern Californian Kenneth Leverich is third overall. Orlando Trejo also appears to be a legitimate threat from the Latin America region. 

On the female side, Andrea Ager and Madelyn Curley, both of Los Angeles’s Brick CrossFit, are in the top 15 worldwide, as is Emily Bridgers, of Decatur, Ga. 

The final workout of the CrossFit Games Open will be posted at 8 p.m. EDT on March 21.  Expect one last round of muscle-burning and lung-busting exercises.