Whether or not he is competing, teaching, or broadcasting, Miazga at all times brings ardour to his pursuit.
Final up to date on September twenty third, 2024
Tom Miazga’s titles embody paralympic swimmer, coach, and now eight-time Fittest Seated Man on Earth.
The 2024 Adaptive CrossFit Video games by WheelWOD was held in San Antonio, TX, this previous weekend, and Miazga returned for an eighth time to defend his title within the “Seated with Hip Perform” Adaptive division.
This was the primary time WheelWOD hosted the CrossFit Video games. In earlier years, the WheelWOD Video games served because the end-of-season championship for Adaptive divisions not hosted by CrossFit.
This 12 months, WheelWOD expanded the general discipline from eight divisions to fifteen.
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Some Background
Miazga, who lives in Cedarburg, WI, didn’t come into CrossFit pondering he’d be a aggressive athlete however was pleasantly shocked to search out that he was fairly good on the sport.
- “I by no means even supposed to affix CrossFit for a aggressive motive within the first place. I had retired from my skilled swimming profession and was simply trying to preserve my physique transferring and luxuriate in a neighborhood environment,” Miazga advised the Morning Chalk Up in an interview. “And I simply discovered myself utterly engrossed in CrossFit as a result of I used to be simply studying a lot extra about myself than I ever anticipated.”
Miazga has competed within the CrossFit Open since 2017 and has taken first place in his division yearly, together with 2024.
He’s additionally competed within the WheelWOD Video games (separate from the CrossFit Video games competitors) and has received his division yearly since 2018.
- “The WheelWOD group has at all times executed a unbelievable job making the Video games really feel elite, making them really feel like that is the season-ending second,” Miazga stated.
The WheelWOD Video games has served as the most important competitors for adaptive athletes whose season usually ends after the CrossFit Open.
In earlier years, the Video games solely allowed the highest 5 athletes of three adaptive divisions to compete in individual. WheelWOD’s takeover as competitors host has widened the athlete discipline and divisions tenfold.
- “We get to do every thing beneath the watchful eye of the group that’s been doing this for years, after which we’ve the group that’s received the assets and the alternatives and the viewership to say, ‘hey, we are able to actually placed on a grand present.’ And I believe we’re actually excited,” Miazga stated.
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New Alternatives
Apart from being an athlete, Miazga has additionally had the chance to be part of the published workforce at previous Video games competitions, together with working with ESPN in 2023. It’s a place he stated he by no means thought he’d be in however discovered it “very humbling, to say the least.”
- “I’ve liked the published gigs. I’m excited by it, as a result of I’ve such a ardour for CrossFit, and I’ve such an pleasure behind what I do, and I completely get pleasure from teaching daily and simply being within the CrossFit sphere,” he stated.
Miazga additionally interviewed able-bodied athletes finally 12 months’s Video games, together with occasion winners and general leaders for the ESPN broadcast.
- “I’m simply pleased with myself to say that I’ve earned sufficient cred within the broadcast world to maneuver away from simply the adaptive aspect and truly be a face of CrossFit that individuals could acknowledge sooner or later,” Miazga stated.
Earlier than CrossFit, Miazga competed as a swimmer on the 2008 Paralympic Video games and received six medals on the 2007 Parapan American Video games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
- Whereas his swim profession didn’t proceed as anticipated, his pivot to CrossFit has opened extra doorways than he ever thought potential.
Teaching and Discovering Steadiness
Apart from his personal coaching as a Coaching Assume Tank athlete, Miazga coaches at his native affiliate Adapt and Conquer CrossFit.
- He’s additionally an teacher for the Adaptive Coaching Academy, which is a nonprofit group aimed toward offering coaching schooling and sharing accessible and inclusive health coaching practices.
If that wasn’t sufficient, Miazga runs an area swim membership with over 300 swimmers referred to as Ozaukee Aquatics.
He says that one of the crucial tough elements of his persona is that he has extremely excessive expectations of himself, which is mirrored within the many hats he wears each day.
- “I believe rising up with a incapacity, one of many issues that I had loads of points with was at all times sort of attempting to show that my incapacity wasn’t the factor that individuals noticed in me. And I believe due to that, I most likely care a bit bit extra in regards to the opinions of others than I ought to,” Miazga stated.
If he isn’t within the water teaching a swimmer, he’s on the fitness center teaching a CrossFit member and at all times questioning whether or not he’s executed sufficient for another person.
He credit his success to the sensation of by no means being glad.
- “I get pleasure from it. I like my life. I’m actually pleased with what I’ve been capable of accomplish and what I get to do each day,” Miazga stated. “Nevertheless it’s not with out regularly attempting to refine that. And that’s a tiring course of. And it asks for lots of psychological willpower that generally I don’t at all times have daily and I’ll be the primary one to say that it stresses me out.”
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Featured picture: @tommiazga / Instagram
