The Final CrossFit Open 2026 Workout Is Here—And It's a Doozy

Friday, March 13 marks the end of this year's CrossFit Open — much to the delight of CrossFitters everywhere.

This year's Open workouts have so far been very rough on the legs. Open 26.1 consisted entirely of wall balls and box jump overs. While Open 26.2 had some upper body work with pull-ups and muscle-ups, it was still more lower body-focused with overhead walking dumbbell lunges and dumbbell snatches.

After a week of anticipation, the last workout of the 2026 CrossFit Open is here — and it's a doozy.

CrossFit Open Workout 26.3

For Time — 16 minute cap

2 Rounds

• 12 Burpees Over Bar
• 12 Cleans (65lb/95lb)
• 12 Thrusters

2 Rounds

• 12 Burpees Over Bar
• 12 Cleans (75lb/115lb)
• 12 Thrusters

2 Rounds

• 12 Burpees Over Bar
• 12 Cleans (85lb/135lb)
• 12 Thrusters

Dave Castro's Final Clues

As is tradition, CrossFit Games Director Dave Castro dropped his final round of hints on Instagram.

First, he posted a grainy aerial photo of a city with a small X in the upper left corner. While cryptic to most, some geography savvy CrossFit athletes had some solid hypotheses.

"That’s an aerial photograph of Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria," one wrote on Reddit. "26.3 will be an AMRAP of Bulgarian split squats for time." 

"Close. That’s actually Bucharest, capital of Romania," read one reply. "26.3 will have a Romanian deadlift 1RM."

"Great guess," chimed another. "But it's Moscow, Russia. So it'll be 263 Russian KB swings for time."

The second clue, posted the morning of the announcement, was a bit more direct. It began with a close-up of a (presumably AI generated) cat and zoomed out to show the cat jumping over a barbell and attacking the camera.

The consensus around one of the movements was clear. "That's a burpee over the bar if I ever saw one," one person wrote in the comments.

As for the other movements, there was one common guess: deadlifts. One commenter suggested it could be a repeat of Open 22.2, an ascending and descending ladder of deadlifts and bar-facing burpees with a 10 minute time cap.

A much more fearful commenter suggested it could also be a repeat of 16.5, a descending ladder of thrusters — a notoriously difficult movement — and bar facing burpees.