CrossFit Athletic Group

The longer this Champions Club thing goes on, the more I am beginning to believe that we are going to eventually see a very definitive divide in the before-Summer 2019 time and after-Summer 2019 time.

One of the main characters at the Champions Club from 2014-2018 was Aaron Sabal, aka the Hot Doctor, aka the Anti-Football Dictator.

Sabal came in through Binno (who, let me tell you, was an absolute character) right before Summer 2014 with a lot of previous CrossFit experience and fit in to our form standards right away. Over the years he compiled quite a few highlights:

- dopest freestanding handstands ever

- you guys might remember this one from July 4th

He also has contortionist friends and friends named Merlin. He picked up an Athlete of the Week in Summer 2016. He was Athlete of the Winter earlier that year, and won the Shark Week workout the following Summer. He graduated from Doctor School. But the paragraph from his Bye Bye post might summarize him best:

Don Brown created a new defensive position for Michigan's football team called the VIPER. It's a hybrid position that is kinda a mix of all the positions except maybe DT. The player has to be supremely athletic, physically intimidating, and have a sweet first name like Jabrill or Khaleke. Aaron Sabal has none of these characteristics but the idea about him being versatile is spot on.

The direction our gym has been going since Summer 2019 has been talked about a lot recently, and it's something I didn't fully appreciate until yesterday; I felt it before I saw it. I was about to start the 4:30 session (late, as usual) when I sensed an odd disruption in the group's frequency. Something over by the pull-up bars just didn't seem right. There were baseball kids, soccer kids, coaches, very athletic moms, a D-1 track kid... and one freaking nerd who just seemed to appear, like that, like he recently passed his Apparation test. I stopped where I was and just pointed, stuttering "Sab... Sab... Sabal... That's Sabal" to nobody in particular. That's when the dividing line really hit me: there were 14 people in the session and Crystal was the only one who knew who Sabal was. That would be like Evan Pugh popping into a 4:30 session in 2025 and nobody knowing who he is.

Sabal's form still looked as spot-on as it was the day he left, and despite his repeated claims of being out-of-shape, he managed to put up a good time at one of CrossFit's most brutal benchmark workouts. He'll be in town for a few days, and I'm not sure if he's going to make it in to the group sessions or not, but I just wanted to let you guys know that Aaron Sabal would be a fit to the Champions Club no matter what year it is or what crowd was around. He's one of the gems of the middle years for sure and did a lot to hold this place together.

Great to see you nerd!

ps. there is also a baby Sabal now