Second fittest woman in Africa

Nicole Seymour, owner of Iron Angel Gym Ballito, earned the title of second fittest woman in Africa at The Reebok Crossfit Africa Regionals in Johannesburg from May 30 to June 1.

Over the months of March and April Crossfit athletes competed in an online open where five workouts over five weeks had to be completed to grab a place in the 2014 regionals.

More than 138 000 people worldwide competed in the online open.

Top athletes in the open in each of the 17 regions around the world qualified for the second stage.

The grueling three day quest to find the fittest men, women and teams in Africa took place at The Coca Cola Dome with a total of 46 men, 36 women and 29 teams (three guys and three girls in each team) competing.

Seymour battled through a variety of brutal Crossfit events against strong competition and came out in the top three women.

All the athletes were fighting for a spot in the Crossfit Games Finals to be held in California.

Seymour has only been doing Crossfit for little over a year.

Last year she competed in the regionals for the first time after only starting Crossfit a few weeks prior to the competition and was knocked out in the third round.

This year Seymour meant business, training for the first time with a Crossfit coach, Blaize Swiegers of Iron Angel Gym.

“Blaize was such a huge help training me, watching what I ate, helping me stretch, knowing what I was physically capable of and when to push my limits,” said Seymour.

“I had improved so much within the last eight weeks before regionals because of him.”

Seymour had a really strong and successful second day at regionals.

She lifted 10 pounds heavier than she had trained in one of the events, surprising herself by lifting over 62 kg when she had been training with only 50kg.

“I was told that I must have been the happiest second place finisher they have ever seen,” said Seymour.