The Real-life Diet Of Mat Fraser, The Fittest Man On Earth

The back-to-back CrossFit Games champion shares his secrets for dieting, training, sleeping, and staying positive throughout all of it

- Emily Abbate

SOMETIMES, BESTOWING A MAJESTIC-SOUNDING TITLE ON THE WRONG PERSON CAN BE DANGEROUS. (For example: ‘president’.) And it’s easy to see how christening someone the ‘Fittest Man on Earth’ might quickly give rise to an ego as large as the presumptive titleholder’s biceps. This, however, is not the case for Mat Fraser, the 28-year-old American who has won the CrossFit Games for the past three years in a row.

At 1.7m and 86kg, Fraser can nail a 220-kilogram back squat and breeze through 50 pull-ups in one fell swoop, and his successes have earned him endorsement deals with high-profile brands like Nike, Rogue, TheraGun, and Compex. We recently caught up with him during a brief break in training to learn how a champion CrossFitter eats, sleeps, and trains and how he looks out for his mental health in between everything else.

GQ: What did the stakes feel like when you went for your third title in a row? Was the ante at another level?

Mat Fraser: It was kind of the same, actually. I look at it this way: I’ve already dealt with the absolute worst-case scenario. [Ed note: Fraser came in second in both 2014 and 2015.] I’ve gone there and lost, and then gone there and lost again. After that, there’s not too much more that can go wrong. I’ve figured out a lot of the kinks on my end. Now, it’s about showing up on game day.

GQ: When it isn’t game day, what does a day look like for you?

MF: I’m usually up between 7:30 and 8:30 in the morning. My fiancée has breakfast ready for me, so I’m having coffee and food within two minutes of being awake – your classic three-part breakfast of bacon, eggs, and oatmeal. I’m at the gym by 9:30, and that session goes until about 13:00.