Every sport lives and dies with star power and the Sport of Fitness will be missing some of their stars this year. We know for sure that Zachary (ZA) Anderson will be out this year with a back injury, thanks to his Facebook page. There are also a handful of Games veterans who's names are suspiciously absent from the 14.1 results leaderboard. While I was inclined to think it might be some late validation issues, the Games Update Show this evening dropped a delicious tease at the end of their five minute show. They ended with a comment about big names being absent from the leaderboard and that it would be something addressed in tomorrow's update show. So we do know there will be some big name athletes who won't be returning in 2014. Here are list of possible "absentees"
- Mikko Salo: he was first one that caught my attention earlier today. It looks like he's registered but he doesn't have a score yet.
- Matt Chan: exact same scenario as Salo and Chan tweeted this evening "he forgot the Open started last week." While that totally impossible, it does sound like he won't be competing in 2014, for whatever reason.
- Aja Barto: he's from my region so I might be more familiar with him than most be he's a veterans Games athlete. It doesn't even look like he's registered this year. I found an article right before the 2013 Games where he talked about the strain of running a gym and training full time. He talked about the possibility of giving up the competition side to focus on his gym. He's also very big into Olympic lifting so he might have gone that route as opposed to CF.