Mat Fraser (athlete)

Mathew Fraser (born 1990) is an American professional CrossFit athlete, competing from 2014 to 2020. Fraser is the first and only person to win five CrossFit Games titles, winning the 2016,[3] 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020 CrossFit Games consecutively.

Mathew Fraser
Personal information
Birth nameMathew Edward Fraser
Born (1990-01-25) January 25, 1990
Kingston, Ontario, Canada
Education
OccupationCrossFit Athlete
Height5 ft 6 in (168 cm)[1]
Weight195 lb (88 kg)[2]
Websitemathewfras
Sport
SportCrossFit
Achievements and titles
World finals
  • 2014 CrossFit Games Runner-Up
  • 2015 CrossFit Games Runner-Up
  • 2016 CrossFit Games Champion
  • 2017 CrossFit Games Champion
  • 2018 CrossFit Games Champion
  • 2019 CrossFit Games Champion
  • 2020 CrossFit Games Champion
Regional finals5-times Regional champion
North East (2014)
East (2015, 2016, 2017)
Central (2018)

Fraser has a background in Olympic weightlifting and was a junior national champion. He made his debut at the 2014 CrossFit Games and took second place after a strong performance.[4] He was a favorite to win in 2015 with the retirement of four-time defending champion Rich Froning Jr., but was edged out in the final event by Ben Smith. The following year, Fraser took first place by a record margin, and won all the following four CrossFit Games. The 2020 Games were his final Games, which he won with a greatly extended record margin of victory of 545 points, as well as setting a record of five consecutive championships wins.

Early life

Mat Fraser was born to Canadian Olympic figure skaters Don Fraser and Candace Jones in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, and spent his early childhood in Sharbot Lake.[5][6][7] His mother worked as a doctor while his father was a stay-at-home dad.[8][9] The family moved to Colchester, Vermont in the United States where Fraser attended schools. He has been athletic from a young age, learning to swim when he was one, water-skiing at 18 months, downhill when two, and going up the stairs in a handstand when he was five.[10][11] He played football in middle school, but became interested in weightlifting when he was 12 years old after a coach saw him trying to compete with a friend lifting weights, and introduced him to a weightlifting coach who taught him how to lift weights with proper techniques.[12] After graduating from high school, he started to train full time in Olympic weightlifting at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado as a resident athlete on scholarship.[13][14]

In 2009, a few weeks before he was due to compete in the Junior World Weightlifting Championship in Bucharest, Romania, he injured his back doing a clean-pull, which was further damaged in a squat after he was encouraged to train a week later.[15] Although in pain, he went to compete in the Championships, but after returning home it was found that he had suffered two breaks in his L5 vertebra.[14] It required him to wear a plastic brace on his torso for four months, but it failed to heal properly on its own.[8][16] He refused a spinal fusion surgery as it would have ended his athletic career, and he elected instead to have an experimental surgery that involved having his back re-broken, inserting a protein sponge to help heal the bone with two plates and six screws attached to his lower spine.[14][12] The rehabilitation lasted a year, although he resumed training after four months.

After his injury, Fraser enrolled at the Olympic Education Center at Northern Michigan University to study math and physics while he also recovered from his operation.[17][8] He gave up weightlifting as a sport after two years in Michigan, and went to Rocky Mountain House in Alberta to work on the oil fields for four months,[18] before returning to Vermont to start a double major course in mechanical engineering and engineering management and a double minor in Math and Business at the University of Vermont in Burlington.[17] Fraser started training in a CrossFit gym when he was 22,[10] and competed in CrossFit events in 2013, but initially, he competed only to earn some pocket money while he was studying.[19] Although he had originally intended to pursue a career in engineering, a stint as an intern in an aerospace company in 2014 convinced him to focus on CrossFit.[17][20] By the time he graduated with degrees in engineering and business in May 2016, he had established himself as a CrossFit athlete enough to commit to the sport full time.[19][20]

Career

Fraser came from an Olympic weightlifting background[21] where he earned his first national title in weightlifting when he was 13 years old and was the school age champion in 2003, 2005 and 2007. In 2009, he became the junior national champion.[13] He injured his back in 2009, but not knowing that he had a broken vertebra, he went on to compete in the Junior World Weightlifting Championship in Bucharest, Romania, and ended up 15th out of 16 in the 77 kg men category.[14][22] After spinal surgery and rehabilitation, he competed in two American Weightlifting Open competitions; he was placed third in the 77 kg men category in 2010,[23] and fifth in 85 kg men in 2011.[24] He retired from the sport after his final weightlifting competition as funding was cut after Chicago lost their bid for 2016 Summer Olympics and he had lost interest in weightlifting.[25][15]

Fraser first became involved in CrossFit while he was still competing in weightlifting – he was looking for a place to do Olympic lifts to keep himself fit when he was home in Vermont during a school break from Michigan. Although not interested in CrossFit, he chose a CrossFit box (gym) because CrossFit boxes allowed Olympic lifters to use their equipment in towns without Olympic facilities.[17] When he was studying in Vermont, he trained at Champlain Valley CrossFit, where he was introduced to CrossFit as a sport and was encouraged to compete in CrossFit events.[17][26] Fraser started competing in 2013 in various local competitions, and with only a few months of experience in CrossFit, he finished fifth in the CrossFit North East Regionals, which was not enough to qualify for the CrossFit Games.[17][27][28] For a time he also competed as part of a team; he was with the New York Rhinos team in the NPGL in 2014,[17] and in the Built By Bergeron team in 2015,[29] which finished third in the CrossFit Team Series that year.[30]

2014–2015: Runner-up

In 2014, Fraser won the North East Regionals, which gained him some attention.[31] In his first appearance at the CrossFit Games, he ended the competition as runner-up to Rich Froning. He had seven top 10 finishes in this year's events; he tied for first place with Froning in the Overhead Squat, and finished second in Midline March and Thick 'N Quick. He also won the Rookie of the Year award.[17][32]

In 2015, Froning had retired from individual competitions, and Fraser was widely expected to win the 2015 CrossFit Games.[25][33] Although he started well, a number of bad performances in the third day of the competition, particularly in the Soccer Chipper event that he failed to finish but won by Ben Smith, lost Fraser his large lead over Smith, which proved decisive in Smith's eventual victory in the competition.[34][35] Fraser later described his second place as a "devastating loss" and his "biggest failure", a "lesson I will reflect on the rest of my life".[36] He said: "I hated my 2015 medal. To me it just represented the cut corners, the slacking off, the thinking I could out-train a bad diet." He added: "If I had won in 2015 while carrying those bad habits, I would've kept those bad habits. I would've thought I could do this while eating terribly. I can do this while training sporadically."[37]

2016–2020: Champion

At the 2016 CrossFit Games, Fraser performed consistently well in events he had previously struggled in. He started his campaign with a win in the 7k Ranch Trail Run even though he was not known for running or endurance.[38][39] That was the only event he won, but he came second in seven events and top 10 in nearly all events, and the consistent all-round performance allowed him to dominate the field and emerge as the winner. He won with a 197-point lead over second-place Ben Smith, which was the biggest margin of victory in the history of the Games.[38][40][41]

The following year Fraser was again dominant at the 2017 CrossFit Games, winning four of the last eight events (Triple-G Chipper, Muscle-up Clean Ladder, Heavy 17.5, 2223 Intervals), the first time he won more than one event in a single Games. He finished in first place, extending his record margin of victory to 216 points over Brent Fikowski.[42][43]

Mat Fraser in 2018

In 2018, Fraser's consistent performance again allowed him to defend his title at the 2018 CrossFit Games. He led from the third event onward, winning in two events (Fibonacci and Aeneas) with top 4 finishes in 10 of the 14 events and only one outside the top 10 11th on the Marathon Row. He won with a record number of 1,162 points, and a record lead of 220 points over the runner-up Patrick Vellner.[44][8]

Fraser qualified for the 2019 CrossFit Games by winning the first ever sanctioned event held in Dubai under the new qualification system.[45] At the CrossFit Games itself, Fraser faced a strong challenge from Noah Ohlsen despite winning 6 events in this Games. He started well with two wins, but a couple of stumbles on day 2 of the competition saw him trailing Ohlsen in points by the end of the day a sandbag falling out of his bag in the 6k Ruck event near the end of the race resulted in a 60-second penalty and a 17th-place finish,[46] followed by a worse 21st finish in Sprint Couplet. Fraser managed to claw back the deficit in the later events of the competition; a couple of first-place finishes (Split Triplet and Clean) and his second and first finishes on Ringer 1 and Ringer 2 in the last day gave him a small lead over Ohlsen. A win in the final event The Standard made him champion for the fourth time, but with the smallest winning margin since 2010. This win equaled Froning's record of four consecutive wins.[47]

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced major changes to the 2020 CrossFit Games. The competition was separated into two stages; in the first stage, 30 men competed online and Fraser won four of the seven events.[48] The field was then narrowed down to the top 5 men who competed in person in the final stage. Fraser dominated this much-reduced group of athletes, winning ten of the twelve events, only beaten to second place in Swim 'N' Stuff and CrossFit Total.[49][50] He won with a greatly-extended record margin; his points total of 1,150 was nearly doubled that of that the runner-up Samuel Kwant (605).[51] He also set a series of other records in the Games: most number of wins in a single Games (10 in stage two, 14 including stage one), most number of cumulative event wins (29), most number of consecutive event wins (6), the first continuous unbroken lead in the Games, and his fifth title surpassed Froning's record of four.[52][53]

On February 2, 2021, Fraser announced on Instagram that he has retired from competitive CrossFit.[54]

Training and diet

Since switching to CrossFit, he has not followed any sort of routine training program due to the constantly varied movements found in CrossFit and the CrossFit Games. In his early years in CrossFit, he did not dedicate his training to CrossFit with only 12 hours a day of training a few times a week,[55] did not maintain any kind of diet and would often eat an entire pint of ice cream or a half-dozen donuts. After coming in second to Ben Smith at the 2015 CrossFit Games, he changed to a better diet and dropped ten pounds, eating no "junk food", soda, and little of pre-packaged food.[56][57][58] He does not adhere to a specific diet such as paleo or counting macros, which is common in CrossFit. In general, he eats what he wants and when he wants it, aside from ensuring that he eats well.[58] Fraser tends to eat four to five big meals a day when training, which include mainly meat and vegetables, along with sticky white rice.[56] In the off-season when he does not train, he may eat only one or two meals a day, but his food intake may reach 6–7,000 calories at the peak of his training.[57] He also sees sleep as very important for recovery after training, and makes sure that he has regular sleep of 9–10 hours.[59][60]

Fraser does not have a fixed set of training routines, but he does maintain some structure in his training. During a CrossFit season, his training varies with time, but he trains a minimum of two sessions a day four days a week. He may have three track sessions, three or four weightlifting sessions, a couple of sessions on swimming and one on road bike.[61] He warms up and cools down before and after his training.[60] The training may depend on what was done the previous, a day concentrated on conditioning may be followed by strength work the next, and he tries to fit in conditioning, cardio, and technique work in a day.[58] He also focuses on his weaknesses, for example, after he struggled in flipping the pig (a concrete block encased in rubber) in the 2015 Games that contributed to his failure to finish the event, he bought a pig so he can practice with it.[8] He does not train in the off-season after a major competition. When preparing for a competition, the training ramps up over a set time period of 12 to 16 weeks, but he cuts down on the training slightly when close to the competition, and avoids workouts that can have an adverse effect the following day.[57][62]

In Vermont, he trained at Champlain Valley CrossFit and a home gym in the basement of his parents' house.[63] In 2017, he started moving to Froning's hometown of Cookeville, Tennessee, where he trained at CrossFit Mayhem and later at Calfkiller Crossfit,[64][65] as well as in his own home gym.[66]

He often trained with female athletes in preparation for the Games, for example with Katrín Davíðsdóttir.[67] For the 2019 and 2020 CrossFit Games, he trained with female champion Tia-Clair Toomey after she moved to Cookeville in 2018.[68][69] Toomey's coach/husband Shane Orr also served as Fraser's coach.[70]

Personal life

Sammy Moniz and Mat Fraser in 2018

Fraser lives with Sammy Moniz, who created the website Feeding The Frasers dedicated to food she cooks for Fraser.[71][72] He does not drink alcohol, and has described his drinking problems as a teenager that led to his being sober from the age of 17.[9][73]

Fraser has sponsorship deals with a number of companies, including Nike, Rogue, Compex, Theragun, Xtend, and Beam.[58][74][57] Fraser's Nike sportswear, such as his personal editions of Metcon cross-training shoes,[75][76][77] features his motto "Hard Work Pays Off" or its acronym HWPO.[8][78]

CrossFit Games results

Year Games[79] Regionals[80][81] Open[82][83]
2014 2nd 1st (North East) 7th
2015 2nd 1st (East) 1st
2016 1st 1st (East) 7th
2017 1st 1st (East) 1st
2018 1st 1st (Central) 1st
Year Games Qualifier Open
2019 1st 1st (Dubai)
1st (Rogue)
1st (world)
1st (United States)
2020 1st 1st (SiD)[84] 2nd (world)
1st (United States)

References

  1. Mat Fraser Retirement. YouTube.
  2. "Mathew Fraser". games.crossfit.com. Crossfit. Retrieved July 1, 2019.
  3. Cecil, Andréa Maria. "Fraser Wins First Games, Davidsdottir Repeats". CrossFit.com. Retrieved July 25, 2016.
  4. "Mat Fraser Gears Up for the 2015 CrossFit Games". Muscle & Fitness. Retrieved October 11, 2015.
  5. "The Real Deal: Mat Fraser". CrossFit Games. July 1, 2014.
  6. Butler-Hassan, Samantha (October 26, 2020). "Sharbot Lake man proclaimed 'Fittest on Earth' for fifth consecutive year". The Star.
  7. Green, Jeff (July 28, 2016). "Mat Fraser, the "world's fittest man" hails from Sharbot Lake". Frontenac News.
  8. Millar, Jamie (August 7, 2019). "In His Own Words: How Mat Fraser Became The Fittest Man On Earth". Men's Health.
  9. Whipple, Tom (February 8, 2020). "Is CrossFit star Mat Fraser the world's fittest man?". The Times.
  10. Apstein, Stephenie (December 29, 2016). "Training with Mat Fraser: Inside the gym with the 2016 CrossFit Games champion". Sports Illustrated.
  11. Samuel, Ebenezer (October 18, 2019). "How Matt Fraser Became The CrossFit King". Men's Health.
  12. "Superhuman Feature of the month: Mat Fraser". Hydragun. September 7, 2020.
  13. Wild Hudson, Robbie (2018). "Transformations – Mat Fraser Before He Found CrossFit". Boxrox.
  14. "Lifting Off: Falling for Crossfit". Vault.
  15. Danforth, Austin (October 19, 2014). "Colchester man finds 2nd calling in CrossFit". Burlington Free Press.
  16. "mathewfras". Instagram.
  17. Imbo, William (November 2014). "Mathew Fraser". Box Life Magazine. pp. 30–37.
  18. Wild Hudson, Robbie (November 22, 2017). "Hard Work Pays Off – 7 Top Training Tips from Mat Fraser". Boxrox.
  19. Granda, Pamela (November 29, 2019). "'Fittest Man on Earth' Mat Fraser on money and investing". Yahoo! Finance.
  20. "Mat Fraser: The Fittest Athlete in the World". Edgar Daily. December 23, 2018.
  21. "Interview with Crossfit Superstar Mat Fraser". jsstrength.com. Archived from the original on February 17, 2018. Retrieved February 11, 2018.
  22. "Results by Events". International Weightlifting Federation.
  23. "2010 USA Weightlifting American Open". Olympic Weightlifting on the Web. Archived from the original on June 19, 2019.
  24. "2011 USA Weightlifting American Open". Olympic Weightlifting on the Web. Archived from the original on June 19, 2019.
  25. Barroso, Mark (May 28, 2015). "Mat Fraser gears up for the 2015 Crossfit Games". Muscle & Fitness.
  26. The Darren Woodson Show Ep. #81 Mat Fraser Part 1 - 5x Fittest Man on Earth. December 28, 2020. Event occurs at 45:57–57:00.
  27. Bric, John Michael (May 20, 2013). "2013 CrossFit Regionals: North East Results". The RX Review.
  28. "Athletes Competing in CrossFit Open Workout 17.3 Announcement – Mat Fraser". Unbreakable Athletics Academy.
  29. Mitchell, Megan (August 21, 2015). "Super Teams of the Crossfit Team Series". CrossFit.
  30. "CrossFit Team Series Prize Winners". October 22, 2015.
  31. Schermerhorn, Keka (July 1, 2014). "The Real Deal: Mat Fraser". Cross Fit.
  32. Warkentin, Mike; Cecil, Andréa Maria (July 28, 2014). ""Fourging" Elite Fitness". CrossFit.
  33. "Fittest in Fierce Fight at CrossFit Games". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Retrieved October 11, 2015.
  34. Saline, Brittney (June 5, 2016). "First-place Fraser". CrossFit.
  35. "2015 CrossFit Games Recap". BoxLife Magazine.
  36. Ferriss, Timothy (November 21, 2017). Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World. p. 426. ISBN 9781328994974.
  37. Edmonds, Will (July 25, 2019). "Mat Fraser: The Loss that Launched a Legacy". CNN.
  38. Wild Hudson, Robbie. "Katrin Davidsdottir and Mat Fraser are the 2016 CrossFit Games Champions". BoxRox.
  39. Pyfferoen, Brian (July 21, 2016). "Mat Fraser Starts Strong at The Ranch". The BarbellSpin.
  40. Pyfferoen, Brian (July 25, 2016). "Mat Fraser Wins 2016 CrossFit Games by Largest Margin in History". The BarbellSpin.
  41. Free Press Sports Staff (July 24, 2016). "Colchester's Mathew Fraser wins CrossFit Games". Burlington Free Press. Retrieved July 25, 2016.
  42. Tao, David (October 17, 2018). "Mat Fraser, Tia-Clair Toomey Win 2017 Reebok CrossFit Games". BarBend.
  43. Lofranco, Justin (August 7, 2017). "The Top 10 Moments from the 2017 CrossFit Games". Morning Chalk Up.
  44. Atkin, Nick (August 6, 2018). "CrossFit Games 2018 winners: leader board, results, recap as Mat Fraser, Tia Toomey rule after Two-Stroke Pull, Handstand Walk, Aeneas events". South China Morning Post.
  45. Tao, David (December 21, 2018). "Mat Fraser & Sam Briggs Win Dubai CrossFit® Championship, Qualify For 2019 Games". BarBend.
  46. "Scoring Adjustment - Mat Fraser, Ruck". CrossFit Games. August 2, 2019.
  47. Sweeney, Ben (August 5, 2019). "Mat Fraser Is the World's Fittest Man for the Fourth Straight Year". Men's Health.
  48. Agnew, Mark (September 17, 2020). "CrossFit Games 2020 workouts: awful Annie, friendly Fran, nasty Nancy and a one-rep max front squat". South China Morning Post.
  49. Danger, Jessica (October 26, 2020). "For CrossFit Games Finalist Samuel Kwant, Fitness Is A Family Affair". Bar Bend.
  50. Gutman, Andrew (October 26, 2020). "Jeffrey Adler Beats Mat Fraser In Event 3 Of The 2020 CrossFit Games". Bar Bend.
  51. Mestel, Spenser (October 26, 2020). "Mat Fraser Wins the 2020 CrossFit Games for Fifth-Straight Victory". Men's Health.
  52. Wiese, Kay; Genetin-Pilawa, Joe (October 25, 2020). "The most event wins of any athlete, with 29 event wins in his career". Morning Chalk Up.
  53. Friend, Brian (October 26, 2020). "CrossFit Games 2020: Mat Fraser raises the bar to level others can only dream of". South China Morning Post.
  54. "BREAKING: Mat Fraser Announces Retirement From Competitive CrossFit". BarBend. February 2, 2021.
  55. "Our Interview with Mat Fraser". Europa FF.
  56. Connor, Jenessa. "Want to Be a CrossFit Games Champion? Here's Your Guide". Men's Journal. Retrieved February 11, 2018.
  57. English, Nick (January 30, 2020). "We Interviewed Mat Fraser To Learn Everything About His Diet". BarBend.
  58. Abbate, Emily (July 30, 2018). "The Real-Life Diet of Mat Fraser, the Fittest Man on Earth". GQ Magazine.
  59. Jennings, Michael (February 6, 2018). "Training tips from the fittest guy on earth". Men's Health.
  60. Kalina, Kailan (December 17, 2019). "Mat Fraser's Top 5 Training Mistakes to Avoid". Bodybuilding.com.
  61. "Q&A With CrossFit King Mat Fraser". Men's Fitness. July 19, 2020.
  62. Skiver, Kevin (June 8, 2018). "Two-time CrossFit Games champion Mat Fraser details his regimen, knows there's a 'timestamp'". CBS Sports.
  63. "A Look at Mat Fraser's Home Gym (World's Fittest Man)". Garage Gym Reviews. January 4, 2019.
  64. Wild Hudson, Robbie (October 26, 2017). "Mat Fraser Moves to Live in Rich Froning's Hometown of Cookeville, TN". BoxRox.
  65. The Darren Woodson Show Ep. #83 - Mat Fraser Part 2 - 5x Fittest Man on Earth. January 3, 2020. Event occurs at 55:50–57:20.
  66. Williamson, Lauren (April 17, 2020). "How Mat Fraser Is Keeping Fit In Isolation". Men's Health.
  67. Mestel, Spenser. "5 Training Tips from Two-Time CrossFit Champ Mat Fraser". Men's Journal.
  68. Atkin, Nick (March 22, 2019). "CrossFit Open 19.5: Mat Fraser and Tia-Clair Toomey face-off for the first time in epic showdown". South China Morning Post.
  69. Morton, David (October 26, 2020). "How Mat Fraser & Tia-Clair Toomey Work Out In Lockdown (And What They Watch on Netflix)". Men's Health.
  70. Kyllmann, Caro (September 26, 2019). "Shane Orr Moves into Coaching Role with Mat Fraser". BoxRox.
  71. "An Interview with Sammy Moniz, Founder of Feeding the Fraser and Fiance of the Fitteest Man on Earth". WIT Fitness. March 26, 2020.
  72. "Ep 153 – Mat Fraser + Sammy Moniz: Sweethearts on a Mission". Pursuing Health. July 21, 2020.
  73. Ellis, Philip (December 8, 2019). "CrossFit Champion Mat Fraser Reveals He Has Been Sober Since He Was 17". Men's Health.
  74. Wild Hudson, Robbie (October 21, 2019). "Mat Fraser and Tia-Clair Toomey – The Recovery Methods of Champions". Boxrox.
  75. Varry, Peter (May 25, 2018). "CrossFit Champ Mat Fraser Gets His Own Nike Metcon Shoe". Footwear News.
  76. "Nike Metcon 5 (Mat Fraser edition) review…". Chalking Fitness. August 25, 2019.
  77. Santiago, Elliot (July 28, 2020). "Nike And Mat Fraser Introduce The MetCon 6". Sneaker News.
  78. "HWPO. How Mat Fraser's college mindset became the mantra of the training obsessed". WIT Fitness. January 13, 2021.
  79. "CrossFit Games Leaderboard". CrossFit Games. Retrieved October 12, 2015.
  80. "Leaderboard: Regionals". CrossFit Games.
  81. "Leaderboard: Sanctionals". CrossFit Games.
  82. "Leaderboard: Open". CrossFit Games.
  83. "Mat Fraser". CrossFit Games.
  84. "Strength in Depth Leaderboards". Strength in Depth. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.