At 57 years old, Kim Camacho of Eureka works out for four hours a day, six days a week.

Eureka High School sophomore Clara Allen, age 15, works out four, sometimes five hours a day, five days a week.

For most of us, that’s an absurd amount of gym time, but these two are uncommonly driven. And they have a goal in mind. Separated by more than four decades, Camacho and Allen are among the fittest athletes in the world in their respective age groups, and next week they’ll be among a tiny, elite fraction of the world’s CrossFit athletes — those who’ve earned spots as competitors in the 2016 CrossFit Games.

It’s hard to overstate just how challenging an accomplishment this is, at any age. CrossFit, a high-intensity, constantly varied exercise regimen, has exploded in popularity in recent years. There are now more than 13,000 CrossFit affiliates around the globe. More than 324,000 people competed in the qualifying round for this year’s games, known as the CrossFit Open. That field got narrowed in a series of regional competitions to just 320 individuals who will compete in the various age divisions at the games. (Camacho is in the masters 55-59 age division while Allen will battle other teens in the 14-15 division.)

In other words, fewer than one in a thousand people who enter the CrossFit Open actually make it to the games. And yet Humboldt CrossFit, which has a little more than 200 members, is sending two. (Disclosure: I’m also a member there, though nowhere near their level, and my wife coaches there part-time.)

For the uninitiated, CrossFit incorporates a wide variety of movements — everything from gymnastics and calisthenics to weightlifting, plyometrics and more — constantly mixed and matched so no two days are ever alike. The rabid enthusiasm of some CrossFitters has earned the sport plenty of recognition and some spirited mockery. But those who love it, like Camacho and Allen, really love it. 

Or maybe it’s more like love-hate. Regarding the intense workouts-of-the-day (known in CrossFit circles as WODs) Camacho says, “They’re horrible! But you always come back for more.” After one of her recent training sessions she took a few moments to describe her routine. A typical day during training starts at 5:30 a.m. with two straight hours of working out, she said. Afterwards she goes to her full-time job, managing Eureka Pro Floor, and when she gets off work it’s back to the gym for two more hours of training. When she gets home in the evening she has just enough time to eat dinner and clean up before heading to bed. Six days a week.

Not many people of any age could endure such a grueling routine, let alone those approaching 60, but Camacho has been exercising pretty much her entire adult life, dating back to Jazzercise in the 1980s. “Still have the outfits,” she said with a smile. 

She first tried CrossFit about eight years ago while visiting friends in Sacramento. At the time CrossFit was a niche activity, popular mostly among hard-core cops and firefighters. The class, Camacho said, was “hellacious.” But she got props from the coach, who said he couldn’t believe she stuck in there. “Cuz it was horrible,” she said. “But it was so fun.”

When she got back to Eureka, she convinced her trainer at CalCourts to start a CrossFit class. Two early fans of the new workouts, Will Zerlang and Tim Welsh, opened Humboldt CrossFit in 2011 to meet the growing demand for the sport. 

What motivates Camacho to work so hard? “God, I don’t know; I wonder sometimes,” she said. But ultimately it’s her friends in the Humboldt CrossFit community that drive her. “Once you kind of get that bug, you want to do better for yourself and you want to do better for the people around you, because they’re so helpful and so wonderful, and so you want to do well for them.”

At the games last year, competing in big stadiums in front of screaming fans, Camacho did very well. She finished ninth in a field of 20 women in her age group, with a 2nd place finish in one of the seven events. (One big perk of getting to the games? Corporate sponsor Reebok kicks down with about $3,000-worth of gear, Camacho said.)

Allen, meanwhile, is just at the start of her CrossFit competition career. Last year was the first time teens were invited to compete at the games, and Allen remembers thinking immediately after the announcement that she had a chance, despite the fact that she’d been doing CrossFit for less than a year. “I kinda came in with high expectations,” she said.

Allen comes from an athletic family. Her mom and sisters have all done CrossFit, and her older sister is a now competitive weightlifter. Plus Allen already had two years of competitive gymnastics under her belt, which gave her a leg up on many of the CrossFit movements, not to mention a thirst for challenges. 

“I love competing, so I came into the sport wanting to compete and do well,” she said. Under the personal guidance of trainer/co-owner Zerlang (who has made it to CrossFit regionals himself many times over the years) Allen progressed quickly. She worked especially hard on weightlifting, which gymnastics hadn’t trained her for. And during the CrossFit Open this year she finished second worldwide among 14- and 15-year-olds.

Asked what her friends at school think of all this, Allen laughs. “They’re trying to understand CrossFit, but they don’t really understand it,” she said. “So guess I’m just ‘that strong kid’ in the school. They’re always just grabbing my arm, my friends. They’re like, ‘I like your muscles.’ They don’t really understand how important the games are, how big it is.”

A documentary on last year’s games, called Fittest on Earth, gives some sense of the size and intensity of the multi-day competition. Here’s a trailer:

Early in the movie CrossFit Games General Manager Justin Bergh says, “To be an athlete at the CrossFit Games, you have to be among the most disciplined and committed individuals on the face of the planet.”

Welsh, one of Humboldt CrossFit’s co-owners, said Camacho and Allen fit the bill. “Kim Camacho is the most dedicated and persistent athlete that we’ve had in the gym,” he said. “She shows up every day; she does everything that’s asked of her; and [her success] is the product of a lifetime of fitness.”

Allen, he said, has “great genes” for the sport, and she too has been dedicated in her training. “For a young woman her age to put in the time and effort that she’s put in, it’s no surprise that she’s as successful as she is. And with her level of talent, the sky’s the limit.”

Zerlang, who has personally trained both athletes, echoed that praise. “They’re both genetically pretty built and gifted for it,” he said. He also attributed their success to their steady effort and the motivation provided by everyone else in the gym. 

Camacho agrees, noting that this year is no fluke. Since opening five years ago Humboldt CrossFit has qualified four athletes for the games.

“What people need to realize, too, I tell them: There are two people from Humboldt CrossFit going,” Camacho said. “We had two people last year. There’s gyms — how many can even say they sent someone to regionals, let alone the games? People don’t realize how incredible that is for a gym to put out the type of athletes we do. It’s amazing, and it’s because of the coaches and the people here.”

Both Camacho and Allen said they plan to continue doing CrossFit well into the future. Allen’s goal is to one day be crowned the “fittest woman on earth,” the title given to the winner of the games. Camacho said she’ll keep doing the grueling workouts, whether or not she’s competing. She did say she might take a vacation after this year’s games. 

Of course, her vacations aren’t like most people’s. Wherever she goes she makes sure there’s a CrossFit gym nearby.