Everybody expected Lazar Dukic to finish first, or close to it, in the swimming competition of the CrossFit Games in 2024. The 28-year-old Serb, however, never emerged from a Texas lake on that sweltering day in Fort Worth, and the fallout from his drowning resonates a year later, writes Calum Marsh at Rolling Stone. It remains unclear what happened, but Marsh's story paints a picture of a chaotic event:
- At the last minute, race organizers changed the rules and told swimmers they did not have swim within buoys. "Without being oriented by them, the athletes would be spread out more haphazardly across the span of the lake," writes Marsh.
- They had to wear goggles provided by a sponsor, and many swimmers said afterward the goggles clogged up immediately. Combined with the rising sun in their line of sight, it was a "pure white-out," one athlete says.
- One female Italian swimmer began to struggle early and decided to bail. "But when I looked around, no one was there," says Elisa Fuliano, referring to anyone who might help her from a boat or paddleboard. "I saw nobody." She finally made it to shore on her own, away from the competition. Other critics agree that Crossfit didn't have enough people on the water, including medics.
- The story also describes much chaos in the aftermath of the race as organizers mistakenly said Dukic had completed the swim, at one point confusing his brother for him.
"Everybody just wants to be like, 'Well, he drowned, and we missed him in the two split seconds that happened,'" reporter Mike Halpin of the Crossfit blog Known and Knowable tells Marsh. "No. The whole thing wasn't officiated very well. And in that process, this happened." Crossfit says it has since banned open-water events from competitions and has made other safety improvements, though critics say the company is still not being transparent enough with the investigation into Dukic's death. (Read the full story.)
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