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How Many Qualifying Spots Each CrossFit Semifinal Will Have

The Quarterfinals just became THE tournament to watch!

After much debate on how the Strength of Field worldwide ranking system from CrossFit would work, now we finally can take that away from the theoretical camp and see exactly what it means and how it will shape the CrossFit Games.

CrossFit has revealed that it will use the D’Hondt method to decide how many of the 17 non-guaranteed qualifying spots each Semifinal will get.

The top 100 athletes in the worldwide ranking system after the 2023 Quarterfinals will be used to determine how many each Games qualifying spots each Semifinal will have.

Remind me: Out of the 40 total qualifying spots available for the CrossFit Games, only 23 were previously assigned and spread to the 7 Semifinals. The last 17 spots will be determined by CrossFit’s new worldwide ranking system.

Worldwide Ranking System

As discussed before, the new worldwide ranking system was developed by CrossFit to determine how strong each Semifinal is going to be according to the athletes competing in them.

When first talked about, Semifinals would no longer have a fixed number of qualifying spots for the Games. New this year, CrossFit would assign a minimum number of qualifying spots for each Semifinal.

gui malheiros at the CrossFit Games

The remaining 17 spots not guaranteed were up for grabs according to how strong each of the Semifinal is. And that is where the D’Hondt method comes into play.

D’Hondt Method Explained

We don’t need to get all technical here, but you should know that the D’Hondt method, also called the Jefferson method, has been used in the past to “allocate seats in parliaments among federal states, or in party-list proportional representation.”

If you really want to know, the Hond’t method formula is:

  • Number of athletes within the top 100 worldwide divided by the additional positions awarded plus 1.

This is why CrossFit revealed not long ago a list with the top 100 men and women worldwide according to their new worldwide ranking system.

* Note: only athletes who have participated in the previous year’s Individual Quarterfinals are eligible to be on the list – this is why Annie Thorisdottir, for example, is not on the list as she competed in the Teams Quarterfinals in 2022 despite finishing 3rd Fittest on Earth the year prior.

How Many Qualifying Spots Will Each Semifinal Have

In the end, how many qualifying spots each Semifinal will have? The first non-guaranteed spot will go to the “strongest” Semifinal which, at the moment, is the North America East for both men and women (calculations are made separately for men and women).

  • 37 women and 38 men of the top 100 worldwide ranking system are set to compete in the North America East Semifinal.

After that, the D’Hondt method begins taking effect in which the number of the formula is ranked against other regions for the amount of qualifying spots left (in this case 16, as the 1st qualifying spot went to North America East).

And after much calculations and seeing which Semifinal has the highest number after each round, this is the number of how many qualifying spots each Semifinal will have according to the current worldwide ranking system.

WOMENGuaranteedAdditionalGames Qualifying Spots
NA East5712
NA West538
Europe5611
Oceania*314
S. America202
Asia202
Africa101
MENGuaranteedAdditionalGames Qualifying Spots
NA East5712
NA West549
Europe5611
Oceania303
S. America202
Asia202
Africa101

Tia-Clair Toomey’s Pregnancy Likely to Change the Table

As mentioned earlier, CrossFit will use the updated worldwide ranking system after each Individual Quarterfinal to determine the relative strength of each Semifinal and, therefore, decide how many Games qualifying spot each competition will have.

As it stands, CrossFit has Tia-Clair Toomey as the 1st in the worldwide ranking system and she is the reason why the Oceania Semifinal would get an additional qualifying spot in the women’s division. However, that is likely to change.

Toomey won’t be competing this year due to her pregnancy, and once the ranking system is updated after Quarterfinals, her name will not be featured on the list. It is very likely that Oceania will lose that spot and North America West would get it, making both men and women qualifying spots exactly the same.

Tia-Clair ToomeySource: Courtesy of CrossFit Inc.

At the moment, as far as BOXROX knows, the person who could tip the scale back to Oceania would be athlete Bailey Rogers who currently sits in 127th place in the worldwide ranking system. If she ends up in the top 100 after Quarterfinals, she could keep that extra qualifying spot in the Oceania Semifinal.

“Note that in the final round, South America, Asia, and Africa would have needed a score higher than 4.86 to be awarded an additional qualifying position. Said another way, if any of those regions had just one more athlete within the top 100 worldwide, bringing their original score to 5, it is likely they would have been awarded an additional qualifying position. This illustrates the ability of Semifinal competitions to gain more qualifying positions as more athletes in their region enter the top 100 worldwide.”

This is to illustrate how important being in the top 100 worldwide can be helpful to an athlete’s region, giving more importance to doing their best in each stage of the CrossFit season.

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