Chrish Newell finds strength in new sport

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Instead West advances to play West Valley — a 2-0 winner over No. 1 seed Colony — in the championship game at 6:30 p.m. Saturday at Wasilla High School. JDHS had beaten their Railbelt Conference foe West Valley three times this season.

“I think back to what could have been,” Lehnhart said. “If we hadn’t lost guys like Noah (Ault), Jesper (Bennetson) and others to injury, but we next-man-upped it and I’m really proud of the guys that finished it off. It is pretty hard for me to be discouraged. I get to come back, and I’ve done this many times, so I am more into how hard and how well they played. But for them I’m sad because it is nice to be in the final and they played well enough to be in the final.”Chrishtianna (Chrish) Newell, a 2012 Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé graduate, always had a particular strong point in sports since her Crimson Bears soccer days, which is now perfected into the competitive world of obstacle endurance contests of Spartan Deka and HYROX.

“Functional strength and mental toughness,” Newell said of her new love for HYROX endurance and strength competitions. “I’m not the fastest runner, but I can suffer with the best of them, and that’s a country wise email marketing listhuge asset in this sport. Plus, I’m used to training through setbacks, so I know how to keep showing up.”

Chrish Newell, right, and partner Jess Contreras, left, at the Sled Push station during the HYROX 2025 Atlanta Doubles in late April. They qualified for the World Championships scheduled Sunday, June 15, 2025, in Chicago. (Photo courtesy Chrish Newell)
Chrish Newell, right, and partner Jess Contreras, left, at the Sled Push station during the HYROX 2025 Atlanta Doubles in late April. They qualified for the World Championships scheduled Sunday, June 15, 2025, in Chicago. (Photo courtesy Chrish Newell)

Newell, and partner Jess Contreras, will be showing up at the HYROX World Championships in Chicago, Illinois, June 12-15 at Navy Pier. The duo are competing in the Pro Doubles Women’s 30-39 age group after they finished first out of 850 teams to qualify for the World Championships in Atlanta last month. Only the top team moved on.

“We race on the 15th,” Newell said. “My competition partner I met when I first moved to Portland in 2019 and became good friends with. We’ve been competing against each other for a while. She’s a strong runner and I have some more strength so we balance each other out well.”

Newell, currently on the Dean’s List at Oregon State University — Doctor of Veterinary Medicine Candidate, Class of 2027, International Veterinary Student Association Junior Rep — is also balancing her second year of veterinary school around her competitions and is in the middle of finals while still training for the Worlds. She had a final scheduled for Friday the 13th, the day she is flying into Chicago but her professor is allowing her to take the final early so she can make it to the race.