Four athletes sanctioned in CrossFit Open

CrossFit’s latest rules story is not really about one athlete anymore. It’s about the Open itself — an online competition that only works if score submissions, videos, and athlete profiles can be trusted. This week, four athletes were sanctioned for breaking 2026 CrossFit Games rules. Two cases involved edited workout videos. Two involved fake birthdates. ### Who got sanctioned? The named athletes are Ilse Boevink and Angelo Di Milo. Both received four-year sanctions tied to edited video submissions during the 2026 CrossFit Open. CrossFit did not publicly name the other two athletes because they are minors, but both were hit with one-year sanctions for falsifying their ages when registering for teen divisions. ### Why are edited videos such a big deal? Because the Open is built around remote validation. Athletes complete workouts during a set competition window, then submit scores that are judged either live or by video. The 2026 rulebook explicitly includes video-submission standards, and the Open ran from February 26 to March 16, 2026, with scores locked after the weekly deadline. If a video is altered, the whole ranking system starts to wobble. ### What happened with Ilse Boevink? Boevink’s case was the one most people already knew. She had posted one of the fastest times in the world on Open workout 26.3 before her score was zeroed out. CrossFit later issued a four-year sanction after concluding she edited her submission to gain an advantage and falsely verified the equipment used. The sanction runs through February 26, 2030, and cannot be appealed. ### Why does Angelo Di Milo matter here? Because his case shows this was not just fallout from Boevink. Di Milo, in the men’s 50-54 division, also received a four-year sanction for edited video submissions. Archived scores cited by The Barbell Spin show marks of 285 reps in 26.1, 12:53 in 26.2, and 229 reps in 26.3 — results that would have given him 27 points and apparently second place worldwide in his age group. His submitted videos were later deleted. ### What about the two teens? Those cases are simpler but still serious. One athlete entered the 14-15 division and another entered 16-17, but both had falsified their birthdates during registration. That brought one-year sanctions instead of four-year bans. The difference makes sense — fake age data is not the same kind of act as altering performance footage — but CrossFit still treated it as a formal rulebook violation. ### Is this normal for CrossFit? Sanctions themselves are not unusual — CrossFit already publishes lists for drug-policy violations and has a long rulebook for online competition. But this cluster stands out because it is