The First CrossFit Open Workout of 2026 Is Here. How Crazy Is It?
It's every CrossFitter's favorite time of year: the CrossFit Open!
Every March, every CrossFit gym in the world does the same workout for three consecutive Fridays. Athletes can either do the workout for fun, or they can sign up for the Open on CrossFit's website and be part of the worldwide leaderboard. After the Open, the fittest of the fit (who are built like tanks and train like it's their professional career) compete in the CrossFit Games.
What keeps the Open exciting: the workout isn't announced until the day before, leaving everyone spending the week wondering what it will be. Typically, it's either an AMRAP, where you aim to complete As Many Rounds As Possible within a given time frame, or for time, where you aim to complete a series of compound movements as quickly as possible.
Well, the first CrossFit Open workout of 2026 is here. Here's how bad it is:
CrossFit Open Workout 26.1
For Time — 12 Minute Cap
- 20 Wallballs
- 18 Box Jump Overs
- 30 Wallballs
- 18 Box Jump Overs
- 40 Wallballs
- 18 Box Step Overs with Medicine Ball
- 66 Wall Balls
- 18 Box Step Overs with Medicine Ball
- 40 Wall Balls
- 18 Box Jump Overs
- 30 Wall Balls
- 18 Box Jump Overs
- 20 Wall Balls
What CrossFit Athletes Expected
Over the last week, CrossFit Games Director Dave Castro dropped hints about the workout on social media.
First, he posted a video of a bull or bison statue, specifically focusing on the eye. This led athletes to "bull's eye," a euphemism for target, suggesting the workout would contain wall balls or burpees to target.
Then, he posted (what appears to be) an AI-generated video of large boulder-like objects falling from the sky and forming a pyramid, only for it to immediately explode.
This clue was much more cryptic. One person thought the video indicated thrusters, writing, "It's burning and going up."
Others took the pyramid to indicate an ascending or descending ladder, where the amount of reps gets smaller or larger each round.
Some took the clue extremely ominously. One person wrote, "So we're going to explode and die?"