CrossFit Athletic Group

[This was originally written on May 15, 2020 but was kept unpublished because I was also waiting to see if Dillon and Lira were going to make the list by June 14, 2020; the fact that they didn't can give you an idea of some of the fitness level of the kids you're going to read about. By the time things settled in I kept pushing this back and back because I wanted to keep the focus on what was happening right now instead of what happened 10 years ago. So this is more for my own records, and I figured I might as well just publish it.]

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Every gym has an identity, and ours is youth: we revolve around high school kids. Sometimes they've been better represented at the gym than others, but we are always going to chase having a really dope high school crowd. Needless to say we have seen some stud teenagers come through - especially on the girls side. I will go on record to say that the Champions Club has been home to the fittest high school girls in the state of Michigan over the last 10 years. I would put Emma Wonsil, Lauren Higgins, [insert a Banet here], and our current crew including Madison, Dillon, Lira and Jessica against any high school, CrossFit gym, or other athletic training facilty. Give it a few years and Natalie and Conamora will be right there as well.

I knew in January that this was going to be the most difficult list, and it was by far. Numbers go into it for sure, but in the end the rankings on this list come down to who I think would come out averaged on top after a Champions Club Summer. I'm just playing this one by feel. One caveat: I consider Summer after your senior year in high school as good for this list, considering they weren't in college yet. We also used to have Athlete Profiles that Bubs, Murley, Emma, and myself did a lot of work to keep up; those are linked in their names.

Enjoy!

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11. Bubs

Mariah Fielder is a fitting person to start this list because her personality and intangible gym contributions overshadow the fact she was really, really good at CrossFit. She was a softball/volleyball standout at Foley, and also ran on a Regional runner-up 4x400m relay team (a few days before having shoulder surgery). By the time she was a senior and her conditioning caught up with her strength she had the capacity to compete near the top of the Champions Club leaderboard in any workout at any time domain. She won Athlete of the Winter '11-'12 and Athlete of the Summer later that year, almost won it in 2013 despite being in a sling most of the Summer, and finished off her high school career with a memorable Murph workout.

From the Vault: Our Guide to the Great Valley

10. Katie Bromm

One of the things lost in the lore of Katie Bromm is how freaking strong this kid was. Despite having legs that stretch 3/4 of her body, Bromm had really impressive deadlift (225-lbs), clean (125 lbs), and split jerk (also 125) numbers. We really started to see this capacity grow as a Sophomore, when she came off an Athlete of the Fall in 2012 and Athlete of the Summer in 2013. Bromm was a 5(!) sport athlete as a junior in high school: cross country & volleyball in the fall, basketball in the winter, and track & softball in the spring.

From the Vault: A Wild Katie Bromm Appeared

9. Sydni Golfin

How dope was Sydni Golfin, you ask? Check out her 4th round of a pull-up sprint hero workout:

Sydni was brought into the Champions Club through a volleyball connection as a junior in 2010 and was overlooked by a few others who joined that fall as well (Murley, Aly, Bubs, Anita, the Moms). She kept doing her thing quietly in the background until she got all of our attention emphatically in the first week of July 2011 (she finished 2nd in Athlete of the Summer that year). That deadlift video is something that gets stuck in my head because we all thought it was great form at the time, but didn't have the eye to see her lower back round. This would prove to be significant because Syd fought through some back issues late in her high school career. Still, she managed to play volleyball and run track, and was also one of our original 3 coaches, and the first in charge of running a Babies session.

From the Vault: Sydni roasts me and Ryan in deadlifts and squats

8. JZ

Jacob Zelenak might be the most entertaining kid on this list; he shares the same sense of humor as me and can recite Django and Inglorious Basterds word-for-word. That, alone would have been good enough for honorable mention. But the truth is JZ is, pound-for-pound, the strongest person I've ever coached. A young-for-his-grade junior in 2014-2015 was doing heavy cleans, squats, snatches and deadlifts while burning through medium-range benchmark workouts like Filthy Fifty, and almost nailed a 54-in. box jump. And he's probably second to Aaron Sexton in terms of fastest white kid in the gym's history. Matter of fact, just click the JZ tag and you'll see all his highlights, including his Athlete of the Spring 2015.

From the Vault: Quote of the Week vol. 54: Secret Sauce Edition

7. Lauren Higgins

In high school there was a stereotype that was commonly attached to St. Anne's girls: insane book smarts, historical lack of actual smarts, solid stable of athleticism, not much work ethic to back it up. Also a certain mean streak that showed from time to time. Lauren Higgins was a St. Anne's girl by registration only. I'm trying to find a good adjective to attach to her, but it's proving more difficult than I thought. I mean, she's definitely had people like Ricky question her intelligence before, and I suppose what she's doing to Carter in this picture could be considered mean... but there is just this lovable, innocent, unassuming athleticism about Lauren that made her one of the biggest mysteries in Champions Club history. She was part of the first Summer in 2010 as an 8th grader, then kind of disappeared until Summer 2013 when she finally got a car, at which point she set the Champions Club on fire with her athleticism and personality.

From the Vault: An Email from Lauren Higgins

She was Cecilia before Cecilia and Katie Shakes before Katie Shakes in terms of the heavy lifting/great endurance combination. Summer 2014 showed Lauren absolutely dominant in workouts going into her freshman year of college, narrowly missing out on a banner to...

6. Jason Withorn

My favorite 80's Workout dress-up of all time. In between the community involvement and the coaching (one of the youngest CrossFit L-1's ever, by the way), Jason truly did not have a CrossFit weakness. Summer 2014 coming out of his sophomore year was Jason's playground, doing things that not many high schoolers are capable of - or adults, for that matter. He worked endlessly on his technique, mobility, and nutrition and developed a great rivalry with JZ and Saporito.

Jason came in as an 8th grader with Ricky, Lil' Kim, Aaron Augustyn, and crew in the New Old Weight room in 2012. His trajectory was going straight up from the day he stepped in, and established himself in late 2013-2014 in 2014 when he got Athlete of the Winter. He was the ring leader of the Freaks generation, and unfortunately got caught up in the tire incident - something I still feel badly about - but recovered and edged out Lauren by a nose for Athlete of the Summer 2014. 

From the Vault: Some Days Even My Lucky Rocketship Underpants Don't Help

5. Erika Banet

I think Erika Banet is the most underrated Champions Club kid we've ever had in terms of CrossFit ability. She probably gets as much attention as the other Banets on here, but I still feel like she flies under the radar. It was just one of those things where her prime (up to this point) came when our high school crew was loaded with over half of this current list. As a sophomore Erika was thiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssss close in 2015 to pulling a back-to-back Athlete of the Spring and Athlete of the Summer, and would've been the youngest non-Frankie for either award.

Erika came in with the Summer 2013 Rookies (along with Elizabeth and Aaron Sexton) and will always be one of my all-time favorites to coach. As a young high schooler she had the capacity to be right there with Shannon and Murley on any given workout. Even though she is number 5 on this list - which is based on what's been put on paper - she would probably be my first pick for a teenage CrossFit team (boy or girl) if I knew she was locked in for 3 months. 25(!) pull-ups in a row as a freshman(!!) (cold, no warmup, no chalk, right after basketball practice) is no joke.

From the Vault: Intensity FYI

4. Ryan Richard

While Ryan's prime was his freshman year in college, he still was an absolute stud as a senior in high school in 2011-2012. He was part of two competition teams (his performance in one of them put him at number 3 on the All-Decade Lift for Beast Modes) and set records in lifts and benchmark workouts (250-lb. clean and jerk and 2:37 Fran). The thing that stands out to me the most about Ryan was his ability to go to "that place." He is the first kid I've ever coached in CrossFit, so I assumed everyone could just do that. But it became apparent over the years that was not the case. Whether it was fear of losing, adreline in the moment, or simple curiosity to see how close to death he could get is a mystery to me. All I know is Ryan was one of the fittest high school boys in all of CrossFit at that time.

From the Vault: Tribe Wars - Conquered

3. Elizabeth Banet

God must've known that CrossFit was going to be a thing when he invented Elizabeth Banet in 1998 (did I guess the year right?) You could not ask for a better build to do pull-ups, handstand push-ups, cleans, pistols, and running at a high intensity. Emma and Murley spotted Elizabeth's potential within the first Rookie session of Summer 2013 and since then everyone just kinda conceded she was the top dog of the generation soon to be known as The Freaks. Lucky for me, Elizabeth never once gave off a hint of arrogance that would alienate her from the group.

As a junior in 2015, her performance in the CrossFit Open Teenage Division would have been good enough to send her to the CrossFit Games had she signed up - which is even more impressive considering she cut each of her last 3 workouts in half because she had softball practice later that day. Read that again.

Elizabeth's peak was later on that year when she edged out two of her sisters, Lauren Higgins, and Katie Shakes as the Athlete of the Summer. She also made the All-Decade list for the Bring Your A-Game session, the only high schooler to do so.

From the Vault: I Am The CrossFit Oasis, I Got a Cup of Your Time I Won't Waste It

2. Jennifer Banet

In Summer 2013 we were gifted 4 Banets: David (who didn't stay long) and Jacqueline, Elizabeth, and Erika. We also knew there was one more sister who was scratching and clawing to join as well, but was not allowed to do to a parental rule about being out of 8th grade before lifting weights. So for an entire year Jennifer Banet had to watch her sisters get all this attention while she was stuck doing Billy Banks DVD karate kicks in her basement. When she finally jumped on board in our 3-person Rookie session of Summer 2014, it was evident good things were going to follow, and she did not disappoint. But Elizabeth, Jacqueline, and Erika always had that one-year head start and Jen was Ringo playing next to John, George, and Paul; the following Summer she finished 3rd in Athlete of the Summer behind Erika and Biff.

Despite dipping in attendance for a year and some change, the potential was always there for Jennifer and in early 2018 we started to see it come on. By the end of the spring she had won MVP on our track team and set Champions Club records in Helen and Murph. Then she followed that up with a Summer for the ages, culminating with her name in the banners.

From the Vault: The Story of Jennifer in America

Back in Summer 2018 I remember thinking (and probably writing) that Jennifer Banet is the fittest high school kid we've ever had. Part of the difficulty with doing a post like this is most of it has to go by feel. In August 2018 that's the way I felt. So I was really leaning towards putting Jennifer at number 1 on this list until I started writing Emma's section out. The numbers that back Emma being in the top spot are just stoopid...

1. Emma Wonsil

I think the only thing I would like to have a do-over on is how I coached Emma Wonsil. Jarrod from CrossFit BMW uses a burner-on-a-stove analogy for training athletes, making sure not to keep the heat turned up for too long or else the pan will overflow. I definitely kept the heat turned up too long with Emma. She did one-on-one sessions with me her 2nd semester of her senior year, coming into the gym during her 7th hour priv. At the time she was in every day (literally, in the Ashley Fry/Katie Bromm sense), then headed out to either softball or track practice (or sometimes both). She was on a strict 3-block meal/1-block snack Zone Diet, slept well, and found time to be the Salutatorian of her grade. And she coached for me - which, ask any of our previous ones is enough to drive someone over the edge. After that spring Emma's involvement in the gym steadily went down to the point where it is now. Again, that is on me.

But dude... about that senior year. Take a look a this excerpt from her Athlete of the Spring post:

Helen as rx'd - 9:12

1 RM Clean - 155 lbs

300 lb deadlift (to be completed tomorrow) DONE

30 31 consecutive pull-ups (to be completed tomorrow) DONE

Nasty Girls - 8:17

400m Dash Regional Champion

400m Dash Catholic League Champion

100m Dash Catholic League Champion

400m Dash victory and home run within 20 minutes

Minus the Nasty Girls tribute video, all of that stuff happened within 3 weeks of each other. Not 3 months or 3 years... 3 weeks! Her 155-lb. clean happened 5 days before she ran a 1:01 400m dash at Regionals. She set a Champions Club girls record for Helen 9 days before she deadlifted 300 lbs. SHE RAN A 1:02 400 IN A MEET THEN HIT A HOME RUN IN SOFTBALL 20 MINUTES LATER!!!

If you were to randomly kidnap 17-year old Emma Wonsil on any given day from April 15 - June 8, 2013 and tested her fitness and athleticism, right then and there she would've had the capacity to be a:

• State-level sprinter in track
• State-level mid-distance runner in track
• State-level softball player
• National-level teen CrossFitter
• National-level teen powerlifter
• National-level teen Olympic lifter

Kids specially train for months and months to get one of those things, allowing everything else to suffer. Emma... I need to come back to this.

/5 weeks later

Yeah, still at a loss here. Ol' girl was the real deal, dude. I can't imagine a kid being much fitter than this. Love ya kiddo, hope we catch you again.

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Honorable mention: we had some late bloomers in Nicole Murley, Ricky Carey and Jacqueline Banet - who were good in high school but did their best stuff after they graduated. Then you had the not-quite-enough-time list of David Saporito (only had him for 6 months,) Lira Bordoley (same,), Dillon Sharp, Jessica Suchta and Madison Bettys, who didn't have enough time to solidify a spot on the list.