Dave Castro
Dave Castro has been for 15 years, the creator and director of the CrossFit Games. Subsequently, he has been director of the CrossFit Training section and general manager.
The January 4, 2022 dismissed of all its functions by Eric Roza. He would later be reinstated in the company and regained the management of the CrossFit Games.
Date of birthJuly 20, 1977
Place of birthBorn in Mexico: San Jose, California. His parents were born in Mexico.
Height: 1.83 m
Weight: 84 kg
Instagram: thedavecastro

2024
The Professional Fitness Athletes Association (PFAA) has released a statement demanding the resignation of Dave Castrosupported by leading athletes such as Annie Thorisdottir, Brent Fikowski and Patrick Vellner.
CrossFit Games 2024
Dave Castro recovered to 100% the programming of all the individual events of the CrossFit Games.
However, the tragic death of Lazar Djukic during the first event, which included a 5.6 km race and 800 meter open water swim, once again raises serious questions about the safety of athletes in this type of event, reviving concerns similar to those raised in previous years with events such as Murph.
Prior to the CrossFit Gamess, Castro interviewed all the individual participants on his YouTube channel.
2023
Castro is appointed General Manager of Sport for CrossFit following the dismissal of his long-time right-hand man, Justin Bergh.
2022
Return
Six months after Dave Castro was fired, he was brought back to the company in a different role. The co-creator of the CrossFit Games would work directly to improve affiliate relations.
Dismissal
Start the year with big changes for CrossFit in general and for Dave in particular.
Roza fires Castro over the phone and asks him to agree on the message they are going to give publicly about the firing. Roza suggests to Castro that it looks as if they have reached an agreement, but Castro refuses and the message he gives is clear: he has been fired.
This is the email Roza writes to CrossFit employees to announce the change.
Team,
I have made the difficult decision to change the leadership of the Sports team to better support CrossFit's future plans, and Dave Castro will be leaving the business.
Over the past fifteen years, Dave has played a key role in building CrossFit into what it is today.
His vision, creativity and drive have grown the CrossFit Games from an informal competition in the backyard of his family's ranch to a global phenomenon with hundreds of thousands of participants and millions of viewers worldwide. Dave was also a central figure in the growth of CrossFit's training business, helping to scale the seminar department to reach tens of thousands of trainers.
All of us in the CrossFit world owe Dave a debt of gratitude for his contributions, and we wish him well as he takes his talents to their next chapter..
Dave has assembled a world-class team, which will now be led by Justin Bergh, and we are excited to see this new generation of leadership build on his legacy as we work together to take our sport to the next level of success.
Hope to see you alltwo at next week's meeting.
Best regards,
With just 7 weeks to go until the Open, Castro tweets "I wonder if they are still going to use my WODs for the Open".
2021
At the end of the year, Castro announces that he is ready for the new season. In keeping with his own style, he warns that the next Open will be tough and will include at least 1 or 2 new movements.
2020
He leaves his position as CEO to Eric Roza
Finally, Eric Roza becomes the new CEO and owner of CrossFit. Dave Castro remains a key player in the company.
Dave Castro was CEO of CrossFit for a few days.
June 2020, Dave named new CEO of CrossFit after the controversy derived from the comments and e-mails from Greg Glassman.
The intention is to take another course in the company and recover the thousands of boxes with intentions to end the affiliation wing, the hundreds of athletes who refused their participation in CrossFit Games 2020and most importantly, the trust of the community.
Dave's first message after becoming the new CEO:
Thanks to all of you who have shown support for CrossFit in these difficult times and trust that we will regain your confidence.
Dave Castro
On the same day Dave Castro makes a call with several affiliatesamong them the very same Rich Froning.
Conditions in the ZOOM call
Those present on the Zoom call set several conditions to be able to regain confidence:
- Greg should sell and be completely removed from the organization.. The idea of affiliates buying CrossFit is the most desired. I also think we need to be patient with this because the last thing we want is for him to quickly sell to the wrong person/group.
- The inner circle of headquarters leadership that surrounded Glassman must go. This does not include Dave.
- CrossFit must be managed by a truly unbiased board of directors. who does not work for HQ and who represents diverse stakeholders and segments of the community.
- CrossFit HQ needs to take tangible steps to increase diversity and accessibility.
After that call in which several of those present condition their support on Greg leaving the company completely, Dave makes a new tweet.
Thanks to the CrossFit athletes Games 2020 for joining the Zoom call on such short notice. Good discussion to include more work together in the future and these will be the last Games I will schedule. The 2021 season will most likely be scheduled by Rich Froning.
Dave Castro
Despite announcing that Rich would most likely be the programmer for the 2021 season, Rich writes a message following questions he receives that discredits what he calls to be his "very good friend" Dave Castro.
I consider Dave a friend, and a good friend at that. I first heard the statement about being the programmer next season during the Zoom call, the first time I had ever heard anything about it. While it is a dream job and honestly one of the highest honors I could have or be awarded in the sport, I think there is a much bigger issue that needs to be handled right now and that is the community and affiliates.
Rich Froning
CrossFit Games Director
We all know Dave Castro for his great ability to keep the game interesting.

Since the Open, Games plays to give clues from his instagram account. for the entire CrossFit community to rack their brains trying to figure out before anyone else, what Dave is referring to with the track and know the WOD in advance.
In the Games, he uncovers events, some with time to prepare, some with little time, and some with none at all.
For the first time in the history of the Games, the athletes faced the Chaos in 2018. They knew neither the exercise they had to perform nor the repetitions, they had to follow the guidelines of their judges. The only information they received from the judge was: move on to the next exercise which is x, once they had completed the repetitions.
Military background
As Dave himself explains, starting with the film The Rock His interest in joining the navy was born and in the library he began to gather information.
Castro began training on his own to prepare to become a Navy Seal. This is something he did in parallel to his studies, since he had obtained a place at California State University. After 3 months at the university, he decided to leave his studies and join the Navy boot camp in 1997.
Thereafter, he spent 13 years in the U.S. Navy.
While in Afghanistan, Castro met Mark Twight, one of the most renowned climbers in the world. The climber told him about Crossfithis training method. Dave was somewhat skeptical at first, but once he tried it and saw the results firsthand, he was hooked.
Dave later began training at CrossFit headquarters, studied L1 and gradually developed his role as a training director.
It was not until 2007 that Castro invited Greg GlassmanThey went to their ranch in Aromas and began to develop the idea of the Games.
The first edition of the CrossFit Games was held at the Ranch on June 30, 2007 and 60 athletes participated. The prize for that edition was $500.

Games Director is Paleo
Castro declares himself a faithful follower of the paleo diet even though she has to struggle with the customs at home with an attachment to Mexican culture, as her mother continues to insist that she eat typical foods.
As his popularity grew so did all sorts of opinions about him. T-shirts printed with phrases such as: Dave Castro is a prick (Dave Castro is an idiot).

On the more personal side, we do not know where he lives, it seems that he is married and has children.but we do not have an official source to confirm these rumors.
Book by Dave Castro
Dave published a book where he tells the story of all the research he does to build an event like the CrossFit Games.
- Castro, Dave…