Jack Rozema | The Athletes of the 2024 CrossFit Games

We sit down with Jack Rozema as he heads into his rookie season at the CrossFit Games.  Jack called his shot on our Semifinals episode and now that he has made it this far, what is next?

What is Clydesdale Media Podcast?

We cover the sport of CrossFit from all angles. We talk with athletes, coaches and celebrities that compete and surround in the sport of CrossFit at all levels. We also bring you Breaking News, Human Interest Stories and report on the Methodology of CrossFit. We also use the methodology to make ourselves the fittest we can be.

Hey, hey, still.

Let's go.

What's going on, everybody?

Welcome to the Clydesdale Media Podcast.

My name is Scott Switzer.

I'm the Clydesdale.

He is Jack Rosema, CrossFit Games rookie.

So pumped for you, man.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

So you competed at the Syndicate Crown.

We talked just before you

competed down there.

And I'm actually going to

share a reel that I made

about the statement you

made before you went in.

And it'll kind of set the

tone of where we are today.

All right.

Sounds good.

So with that, here we go.

Boom.

Uh-oh.

You got to click the little, yeah,

there you go.

Speaker button.

The top 15 at the games.

Um, I want to play stop 15 and get,

and then get invited and compete in rogue,

um, and Scotland this year.

So those are kind of my goals.

I mean, I just look at it as I'm in a good,

you know, I'm 28.

Like I said,

my training last year has been great.

Um, that's my goal.

I want to,

I want to go win every event

that I'm going to,

that I'm a part of and just

put the best version of my

skills and hard work, um,

and support system out there

and see what happens.

And so that being said, I don't,

I'm of the viewpoint that

whether I'm in the West

East or even Europe this year,

it looks the most stacked

when you just look at the

scores of all the semi-finals.

It doesn't matter what

semi-final and I'm gonna go

to the semi-final.

I'm gonna podium at the

semi-final or be close

enough to it to secure my

spot at the games.

And it doesn't matter where it is.

That's kind of my mindset.

So a lot of people after

that made comments that you

were pretty confident going in,

but it all came true so far.

Yeah.

Yeah, everything except podium,

making the podium at semifinals.

You threw that little like

or close enough to it.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I think I just – that was reflective

of like I knew I was – if I

executed the way that I really wanted to,

I knew it wouldn't really be like, oh,

he's – like, oh, I'm scratching,

just knocking at the door

at the 11th spot.

I knew that that was

probably not going to

happen if I executed to the level of –

what I did in testing,

I guess you could say,

and just how it was,

how my body was feeling

going into semi-finals and

just the preparation,

the hard work preparation

has been coming in.

It's not so much just random

confidence that I got out of nowhere.

It's the confidence that

I've gotten through a very,

very hard year of training and focus.

So that was where I came from.

So I think it turned out

when all was said and done, your region,

your, I guess, region,

probably was the most stacked.

Yeah.

When it came down to

semifinal scores as opposed

to quarterfinal scores.

Okay.

And I think you upped the skill,

you upped the weight,

and the East was probably

the most dominant around the world.

You go into the weekend –

And not bad start, but kind of slower,

and then you gain momentum

as the weekend went on.

Yeah.

Did you see that kind of

coming with the events the

way they lined up?

I definitely did.

I knew Sunday was going to be a good day.

I guess I just only know

that because of the last two workouts.

I knew the snatch ladder,

whether it's a lift or a complex,

is going to be good for me

or a ladder type thing.

And then workout six,

I just knew from testing, just watching.

And that was a good part.

I think that's what made the

East stronger as well.

We had two weeks of watching

the other events,

the other semifinals go.

But my testing in event six,

I just knew that it was

going to be sub 245,

probably closer to sub two,

probably closer to 230, which I did.

Because I knew if I just hit

the RPMs on the bike,

I knew I can do 15 ring

muscle ups unbroken, no problem,

even with a high heart rate,

and pick up the dumbbells

and don't drop them.

My grip wasn't even a factor

when I tested it.

So it was really just those

last two workouts, I was like,

I'm going to top five both

of those workouts.

So just points-wise,

there's a lot of points right there.

So the one I was most nervous about,

I would say,

is just the handstand walk one,

because I knew it was going

to come down to just pure

execution and handstand

walk speed in that.

And that's been a problem

for me in the past when it

comes to just handstand

walking next to a lot of

elite athletes that has

held me up in the past.

So I did not, like you said,

get the start I necessarily wanted to.

I came up way too hot on the

run on workout one and just

couldn't hold the pace.

A few guys passed me that

actually did execute it well.

And I was like a full minute

ahead of them after like

the first two rounds.

So, yeah.

That was,

and then my not great finish on

workout two that we just

talked about before we came on,

where I was feeling horrible after.

I knew that it was possible

to be where I finished.

I thought I,

obviously everyone has things

that they could have done

better afterwards,

but I knew that if I was

right around 10th going into event five,

it would all be,

it would be solid as long as I executed.

So before we went on the air,

you talked that event two

wrecked you pretty good.

Yeah.

And in addition to that,

your shoes came untied.

Yeah.

One question I ask a lot of

the athletes is you finished the weekend.

What did you learn to take

with you to the games or

take with you into training

leading up to the games?

For me, I think I learned everything.

even more so than just,

I have to stick to my

strategy and my pacings and

you're not going to be able

to test every workout.

Like we did,

obviously everyone going into

semifinals knew exactly how

they should pace them.

Um,

but I still think those first two

workouts, my first two rounds,

each workout was five rounds.

My first two rounds were

just too fast for my body to hold up and,

and stay at that pace other

than the obvious, um,

double knot your shoes and

make sure that they're as

tight as they possibly can

because that was annoying

but other than that I mean

it's just the what I

learned is based on my

experience doing events and

what my coaches have to say

about that event and how I

should pace it I just

really need to stick to

that game plan knowing that

even if it's coming out a

little slower than I would

like to it's going to end

up with a better finish

because I stuck to my

strategy and I was able to

to be more in the realm of

like a negative split

versus coming out hot and

then just trying to hang on,

which historically didn't

go well for me that weekend

with the first two workouts.

So just trusting in the plan

and buying into your

strategy and your plan.

We've talked before about

you being a mayhem athlete.

Who is your specific coach?

uh I would say jake locker

is like my actual specific

coach he's who I talk with

the most um a lot on a

one-on-one basis so jake is

so what kind of I mean that

dude's been to the games a

lot with athletes what

confidence does it give you

that your coach has been

there several times leading

up to the games yeah it's

definitely it's definitely a lot like uh

I didn't have that initially,

like in my first couple

years in the sport,

because I just never really

bought into one specific

programming or thought that

I necessarily needed a

coach because for one reason or another,

I just thought that it

wasn't necessary for me at the time.

And that probably was the

wrong line of thinking.

If I would have maybe gotten

a coach earlier,

maybe just would have been

small increments of improvement.

packed closer together in time.

So it's definitely,

it's a lot of confidence

knowing that it's just not you.

It's not just you going into it.

You got a lot of people in

your corner that can see

things that you don't,

that know and have seen

athletes that have similar

strengths and weaknesses

and tendencies in your shoes in the past,

and this is what they did.

And it's just, you know,

if you want to go fast, go alone.

But if you want to go far,

go together type thing,

like I fully believe in that.

So for sure.

So that's a great segue to

something I want to talk about,

but I want to finish up with,

what have you noticed

difference in the

programming now that you're

games training?

You know, we hear all this like,

and I love games training, or man,

games training is really hard.

What have you seen as the difference?

It's really not that different.

Like I,

I honestly don't see much of a

difference other than just maybe,

maybe like a little bit

more total volume across

the week because you're

just getting ready to do 12

to 15 events in a weekend

versus six events in a weekend.

So it's really just getting

acclimated to a little bit

higher volume and maybe a

little bit more odd object stuff because,

you know, maybe something like a,

like the parallel bars might

come into more,

might come into play at the game,

something like a flip sled or a pig.

And then you know that now

we know for sure that

there's going to be a swimming event,

which you know there's not

going to be a swimming event in semis.

So just those couple of

different differences like that.

come up and but 95 of it is

just doing what got you

there continuing to do it a

little bit better um from

just a focus and optimize

like make sure I'm warming

up and cooling down and

mobilizing and sleeping as

much as I possibly can like

just trying to make

everything fire on all

cylinders even more so but

it's not changing a whole

lot of content itself so

when I think I've told you

this before growing up I was a swimmer

Right.

Swimming and wrestling were

in the same season when I grew up.

Yeah.

And if you were a good swimmer,

you were a really shitty

wrestler and vice versa.

Yeah.

How is your swimming?

My swimming historically has

not been great.

So I've been doing a lot.

Just a lot of reps,

a lot of volume to change that.

Luckily,

there's one of the females that

just came here to Fort Knox

to be on the fitness team as well.

She swam at West Point.

Her name is Marie Docken.

So having a collegiate level

swimmer be able to help me.

And we've gone to the pool a

few times and just worked on things.

efficiency things and

breathing things and just

uh different things like

that so just taking

advantage of the resources

and friends that I have to

get better as much as I can

so I'm looking for I'm

looking forward to it like

when in the past I would be

uh really apprehensive to

do it but I know now I'm

more confident that now

that what it looks like is

a run going into the swim that I can run

significantly harder than I

would in the past and still

feel comfortable to just

dump it to just jump in the

water and start swimming so

well I'm excited to see how

much better I feel even

than like wadapalooza back

in january um because

during that swim event I

didn't do very well either

so it's it's just something

just something I'll keep working on

What I find interesting

about the way this one is lined up,

and we don't have a lot of details,

but speculation is it's

going to be a pretty decent

run before you get to the swim.

Yeah.

If you just look at the map

of the lake and kind of how it's set up,

that's a lot of running

before you swimming under

fatigue is different than

swimming yeah and I don't

think like everybody

watching understands that

yeah like when you dive in

fresh it's a different ball

game than running three and

a half miles say and then

begin to swim for sure do

you do anything at the when

you go do pool work where

you try to get your heart

rate up before you dive in

Not a whole lot.

Just like I'm kind of limited to that.

They don't really let you

bring equipment into the

pool here at Fort Knox.

It's kind of like the only

one I have access to.

So, I mean,

you can do stuff like air squats,

a bunch of pushups and air squats,

jumping air squats,

something to try to tire your legs out.

But luckily, I mean,

I'm planning on going to

train some more mayhem here in July.

So I'll undoubtedly do a few

run swims that are all outside.

So I'll just I'll keep doing

I'll keep doing what I can.

Yeah.

As a former swimmer, that's my tip.

Get that heart rate up and

learn how to breathe under

fatigue in the water.

That's the key because that

keeps panic down and then

your stroke doesn't suffer because of it.

Yeah.

Yep.

Will do.

So the other event that's

been announced is Chad.

Thoughts on that at all?

I mean, not really.

I'm more so curious now that

Dave has also said

something essentially

saying it's not going to

just be Chad straight 1,000 through.

There'll be some whatever

twist or whatever he said.

So I'm just more so curious

to hear what the twists are

and what will make it different.

I think it's a terribly

boring event to watch,

but I think that's kind of

the point why Dave

programmed it because he was like,

I know that there's going

to be this backlash and I

kind of like it.

So I think he'll...

I think he kind of got a

little bit out of that

programming in the games.

But I think it'll be

interesting for sure that

it'll be the event on

Saturday right before the cuts.

Yeah.

And I think...

dave has said repeatedly

that he likes the mental

test that it brings and

when you put it right on

the cut day that's even

more mental to it yeah and

I think that that that's

just typical dave like he

there's there's a theme to

what he wants to accomplish

with that workout and it's

going to be high stress

yeah mental struggle can

you can you dig deep

Yeah, and after doing six,

you probably won't be

feeling great after doing

six events already before that.

So it's different than doing it fresh,

but yeah.

So you mentioned earlier

about going farther together.

Mayhem had a slew.

I don't even know if that's

the right term.

Bigger than slew of athletes

at North America East.

And a lot of people qualified for Mayhem.

What's it like being a part

of that team that...

That's having success.

And then you, but in addition,

because there were so many,

there's a handful on the

other side of the cut line as well.

Yeah,

it was a little bittersweet in that

because I knew Dre, I knew Seth,

I knew Tyler Christoffel.

We became good friends too.

So it's hard to.

it's hard to like see that happen,

know that.

And basically we knew that

going in with the few guys

that were going to be at

the top of non mayhem

athletes that we were going

to basically steal spots from each other.

But I think it's obviously

just speaks to the culture

and the quality of,

of the community that they have there,

that we're all right there in that,

in that space.

But I love, I mean, my vet,

like their faith family

fitness service values are

what my values are too.

So I can't think of just a

better place to be,

affiliated with and be a part of.

And so that was always my

mindset going into the last

season was I'm going to

just fully buy into what

they're doing and what they

have to offer and see what

it does and see what it

does for me individually.

And if it if it works out good,

then I know that I made the

right decision,

which it seems like I did.

So it's it's just a more

it's just a testament to

what they have and the kind

of people that they attract

in that in that environment.

Yeah,

your heart just breaks for someone

like Tyler who has been at

that cut line or whatever

you want to call it so many times.

But if anybody digs into faith, it's him,

right?

And so that you just pray is

what gets him through these

times and back at it.

But that workout, Boz developed it.

And I don't know how much testing was done,

but it ate up a lot of

people and some people thrived in it.

And the leaderboard changed

a lot in every region based on that,

that dumbbell lunge.

Yeah.

Yep.

No doubt.

No doubt there.

Jake Chapman chimes in.

Do you think it'll be cuts during Chad?

So like bottom 10 or cut it

to 50 reps next 10 at 500,

another 10 at seven 50.

I don't know.

I don't, I don't know.

I don't think I get it.

And I get what he's saying now.

No, I don't think it'll,

I think it'll be just 10

after the whole workout.

Yeah,

I think everybody will do the whole

workout.

One,

you don't want to embarrass anybody

during a workout and have

their game season end.

The other thing is Dave is

very big about the mistake

he keeps quoting is when

Tia almost finished a

workout in the first round

and everybody else went three or four.

She did two minutes of work.

Everybody else did nine.

That was unfair.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think this is in the

reverse and the winners

would be the ones doing the most work.

Why would you penalize?

Why would you penalize the best for,

for making it the furthest?

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's an interesting question.

Like it'd be, it's funny.

It's fun to talk about, but yeah,

I don't think it'll be,

I don't think that's what

will actually happen.

but I have no idea what the twist is.

And I think,

I think Dave is half of his hints are,

are bogus anyway.

Yeah, for sure.

He just likes to stir the

pot of get people guessing stuff.

So you got to,

you got your interview done with Dave.

What was,

was there any nerves or anything

about going live with Dave?

No, not really.

No, I mean, I don't,

I don't really get nerves

talking about stuff like that.

It was fun.

I'd never talked to him for that long,

I guess.

I'd seen him a few times here and there.

I think we had a conversation.

It was last year at the West

just about the military in general.

It was a very short,

few-minute conversation.

I think it's funny how he –

I don't know if he just has –

a lot going on and maybe a

bad memory when he talks to people,

or if he,

it's intentional that he like

comes on and acts like it's

his first time talking to

every single athlete.

He knows absolutely nothing about them,

but I think I, I think it was fun.

I think that was funny, but.

I, I,

I think it's authentic.

I think especially if you

run into him at an event,

he has so many things going

through his mind that

nothing's going to stick.

Everything's just going to

be a surface conversation.

And it doesn't mean he's not

genuine in that conversation.

I think the capacity to hold

in more info is not there.

Yeah, you're probably right.

For him,

that's his Super Bowl or playoff game,

and he wants to make sure

it's all going as smooth as possible.

Yeah, definitely.

I'm most curious to see what

the events on the football

field is going to be,

whether it'll be one event

on the field or one event

around the track.

I hope there's

I just hope that there's

something exciting going on there,

like a sprint or a hurdle

that they've had in the

past or something like that.

Yeah, I don't know.

I hope it's exciting.

It's primetime on ESPN.

It's open to the public so

everybody can come in.

You want it to be like a

rock star event that people

can easily follow and be

able to cheer for people

and understand who's winning,

all of that kind of stuff.

Early on in the games, like 2010,

they had an event where it

was like a – it was a

moderate barbell cycling,

and then you had to run a 400.

So you'd, like, go on the field,

do your barbell,

run around the track once, come back in.

And I thought that was

really cool back – and that was 2010.

Dave loves to throw back, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And you have it all again,

so hopefully it's – Yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

Um, but anyways,

did you learn anything from Dave?

I know some people, uh,

I think it was down pepper

said that he watches them

with an athlete's

perspective just to see if

there's like a hint, a tweak,

something here or there

that you can pick up on.

Um, no, I, I guess I didn't really,

I didn't try to pick up

anything like that.

No.

I was more curious about his

reaction when I asked him

about the swim event because I said,

what is the swim event?

And he said,

you'll just have to wait and see.

So I thought he was talking

about the event that was

released that week that he

said was going to be

released that ended up being Chad.

So I thought when he said

that it was going to be the swim event,

which it wasn't.

So like you said,

I think he just – I think he likes to –

act more like mysterious and

with the with the the clues

that actually don't mean

anything and they're not

actual clues like so I

don't I don't really try to

like decide one way or

another because I don't

think I'm going to be right

in the end anyway so it

doesn't doesn't matter yeah

I think they said last

night on the spin austin

hatfield's interview austin

said he can't he's not good

at swimming yeah and then

dave said you're gonna love event one

Oh, did he really?

Swim.

That's pretty clear.

So you can only believe part

of what he says.

Yeah,

and I think maybe he's being more

direct as the athlete

interviews keep progressing

on and it gets closer to

the games because I think

that was – I think it was –

was it Victoria Campos'

interview when he said when

Chad was going to be

which wasn't like prior information.

And I think it was when he

was interviewing her that he was like,

it will be event seven on Saturday.

So it's like,

I think just as we get closer

to the games,

he's being more and more

direct about what stuff will be.

I think he's getting more

relaxed too about, you know,

if you don't interview people every day,

that's a new, new skill to learn.

And now he's 50 or 60 in.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sure.

At it.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, for sure.

For sure.

so I want to finish up with

uh in in the video we

played at the top of the

show you declared you're

going for top 15 at the

games still the goal yeah

yeah I would say so um

Like, I just, I feel like that's,

I don't know,

a good number to kind of

shoot for your rookie year.

So I don't want to go there.

I certainly don't want to

get cut on Saturday or going into Sunday.

So I want to be able to

compete the whole weekend

and finish strong.

And if I do those things,

that should be where I end up,

if not a little better.

So I think I'll,

I think I've been taking the next,

I think I've been taking

June and July with a good

headspace and a good plan.

with the people behind me.

So I think it's,

if all goes well going into the games,

then I think that's where I'll end up.

I had a talk with Ariel

Lowen yesterday who was

named captain at FitFest in the UK.

You have Waterpalooza SoCal

now that's doing a North

America versus the world.

FitFest is doing Europe versus the world.

The higher you finish at the games,

the more likely these

opportunities are going to

pop up for things like that.

For sure.

You're still being active duty.

Would you be able to take advantage?

Because you've said you want

to go to Rogue Scotland.

Yeah.

But then these other things

could pop up where you

could be on Team North

America or Team World at the UK.

Would you be able to take

advantage of those opportunities?

I think most likely, yeah,

if they did present

themselves and it made

sense that it was something

that I wanted to compete in.

I think the situation that I

have right now is pretty –

it's pretty good and

flexible and leadership was

understanding that like,

if those events came up, then it would,

I would logistically be

able to figure it out.

Yeah.

So, and that's part of it too.

Like that's part of that

goal to finish high is just,

is just present more

opportunities for myself to

get better in the sport.

So that's what I'm,

that's what I'm trying to do.

Why is it important Rogue Scotland?

Is Scotland a place you've

always wanted to go to?

Yeah,

I think just I've always been like

last year,

I put 100% effort into the

Rogue Invitational

Qualifier because I really wanted to go.

They just run an awesome event.

And I was just I was like

two or three spots, I think,

out of getting out of

getting invited from the qualifier.

So it's just been a goal of

mine because they run a great event.

Rogue seems to go over the

top of everything they do.

And then just the added the

added perk of traveling overseas for it.

Yeah, for sure.

We wanted to get them anyway

so that we had them,

but I've had my passport for a little bit,

but it was kind of just

like that little extra push.

Like my wife and my daughters,

we got them passports like

last month kind of in anticipation.

I mean,

we want to go like vacation to

Mexico eventually and just

like other things like that.

But it's kind of like put a

little more onus on me even

more so to try to qualify

for Rogue because it's like, hey,

now there's literally

nothing stopping us from

taking like a family trip

there as well if I qualify

because we got the passports,

we're ready to go.

All right.

Truly last question.

Kid Fest and SoCal are like exhibitions,

right?

It's not a competition to win.

How hard is it to go do an

event like that and turn

off the gas pedal?

I've yet.

So, I mean,

that's a good that's a good question.

I've yet to go into a

competition where I'm like,

I'm just here to have fun

as an exhibition.

Like even Guadalupe, the last two years,

especially this past January,

like I was going there like

I tapered a little bit.

I guess I don't I didn't.

Pete for it the same way I did semis,

but I definitely wasn't like, ah,

this is just an off-season competition.

It was like, no,

I'm traveling from Kentucky

to Miami to compete,

so I'm not just going to do

and spend the whole week there,

be away from my girls and

everything like that just

to go there and compete for fun.

I'm always trying to have fun,

but it's like I...

I don't know.

It's still up in the air of

whether I'll do an

off-season competition like that,

like one of the

Waterpaloozas or anything like that.

I can't really answer that question.

I don't know what it's like

to just go there and just wing it,

I guess, for lack of a better word.

I think there are other

people who can't turn it

off either and probably

give everything they have

even during an exhibition.

Yeah.

Right.

I think that's,

I think that sounds good in theory.

Like that's what you're

going to do going there.

And all the way up to like three, two,

one go,

you're not taking it as serious as

you would,

but then once it actually starts,

you're going to,

you're going to give a

hundred percent during the workout.

So yeah, no,

we'll see what the next season holds.

young rogue is in my neck of

the woods stay here for a

while Aberdeen sucks but

Scotland is beautiful

Aberdeen sucks I think just

yeah Scotland that area

Scotland my family has a

little bit of like Irish

roots so I definitely want

to go visit Ireland one day

so I've just and I've never

been across the Atlantic

Ocean so just anything like

that would be a

once-in-a-lifetime trip to

be able to do so

All right, well,

I promised you 30 minutes.

We're at the 28 and 20 mark.

My man, good work.

I did it.

That is so hard for me,

but thank you so much for doing this,

Jack.

Of course.

Good luck at the games.

I got my plane ticket.

I've got my hotel.

I just don't have my media credentials yet,

but hopefully those come in

the next day or two.

I was going to say,

I think that those will, yeah.

I've seen a little bit about that,

just the controversy with that.

So hopefully you can get one secured.

Yeah.

Well, good luck down there,

and hopefully we'll see you in Texas,

man.

Yep.

Sounds good, bro.

Thanks.

See you later.

Best of your day, man.

You too.

Bye.