CrossFit: Tia-Clair Toomey could surpass Mat Fraser in GOAT debate with two more games titles

The 27-year-old Australian can equal Mat Fraser’s title count with a win at the 2021 CrossFit Games

Two victories will see her become history’s most decorated CrossFitter for both men and women

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Tia-Clair Toomey can chase Mat Fraser's GOAT status this year. Photo: CrossFit Games

Patrick Blennerhassett

Patrick Blennerhassett is an award-winning Canadian journalist and four-time published author.

Published: 8:00pm, 8 Mar 2021Updated: 8:36pm, 8 Mar 2021

The retirement of Mat Fraser has left a deep, cavernous hole in the men’s division of CrossFit. The five-time reigning champion laid waste to the competition for half a decade, dispatching all who tried to challenge him.

Outside a minor blip at the 2019 CrossFit Games, when he was penalised for dropping a weight out of his rucksack (which was more of an equipment mishap than anything), Fraser never looked in trouble of losing his champion status.

Noah Ohlsen got a taste of the white jersey at those games, only to have Fraser go full beast mode and snatch it back from him before the weekend was over. If anything, it was an even more impressive showcase as Fraser went to another level we didn’t even know existed.

Fraser retires as CrossFit’s GOAT (greatest of all time). No one in the men’s division is even close to him except Rich Froning, who won four titles from 2011 to 2014 before he headed off to dominate the team division with CrossFit Mayhem Freedom. Froning has captured multiple team titles, and may very well so do again when the 2021 CrossFit Games heralds the return of the team division after a year off due to Covid-19.

But when you start any GOAT debate, it always begins with who has the biggest trophy chest filled with the most impressive hardware. Unless Froning shocks the world and decides to return to individual competitions for 2021, which won’t happen, Fraser has got him by one, and no amount of team gold will move the needle, unless he defies Father Time and gets into double digits.