Modern Wisdom - #141 - Ryan Fischer - The Life Story

Episode Date: February 10, 2020

Ryan Fischer is a multi-sport athlete, coach & gym owner. Ryan is one of the most interesting characters in fitness. From being among the top BMXers on the planet, to almost making the USA Bobsleigh Team and competing multiple times at The CrossFit Regionals. He's been a pilot, homeless, lived in his car, then started a million-dollar gym to now has become a household name in the world of programming and coaching. Nothing but good vibes today as Ryan gives us his entire backstory and displays how you can overcome adversity with hard work and a positive mindset. Extra Stuff: Follow Ryan on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/ryanfisch/ Check out Ryan's Website - https://www.gymryan.com/ Take a break from alcohol and upgrade your life - https://6monthssober.com/podcast Check out everything I recommend from books to products - https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Join the discussion with me and other like minded listeners in the episode comments on the MW YouTube Channel or message me... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ModernWisdomPodcast Email: https://www.chriswillx.com/contact Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oh hello friends, welcome back to Modern Wisdom. My guest today is none other than Ryan Fischer. Athlete, coach, gym owner and all-round mad guy. I've been wanting to sit down with him for ages. Ryan's backstory is one of those tales that just doesn't sound real. From being one of the top BMXs on the planet to moving to Hawaii to become a pilot, to moving back to the US and becoming part of the Olympic Bob Slay team and then getting injured and then missing it and then going to regionals for CrossFit and then being homeless and living out of his car. It's a real whirlwind and it just totally shows me why Ryan is so popular online. We also get into Ryan's principles for training and programming, his thoughts on diet,

how he started his gym, his advice for budding gym owners and entrepreneurs. So yeah, sit back, relax and get ready for the wise and wonderful Ryan Fisher. Ryan Fisher in the building. How are you, man? Super excited. It's been a long time coming. It's been a very long time coming. You have missed each other like three different times time zone problems but I've got you. I've locked you down. How's the bicep? How's the injury? Oh well actually that is coming along. I have like maybe three more weeks until I can kind of cut loose but right now it's been it's been one hell of an experience. I've never had to stay so diligent about something for so long.

Like I've literally had to do nothing for two months. And then after that, it's been very, very lightweight for the last month. And I'm just dying to get after it again. But I think it's been good for me now because I've been getting after it for such a long time that they have a little bit of a break, but I get. You probably give another bit of your body a rest as well. Yeah. Yeah.

It's interesting. I've had a little bit of an injury as well. And one thing that was a question that's come through in my mind was, who are you without your fitness? You know, without that endorphin kick every single day. It's like being on a drug for all your life and someone taking it away. For me, it was more like my whole life is fitness in terms of like my business and like things that I sell

and everything and like I feel like me looking good is part of all that and just like it kind of gave me a little bit of stress and anxiety. And then I was like, oh, wait a second. Like all the stuff that you've made, you've already made. You don't like need to currently look amazing in this exact moment. And then there's other things that you want to do

that have nothing to do with that. And I've spent this entire time focusing on those things. And I don't think I would have gotten as far into some of these other projects that I have if it wasn't for the injury. It's a good way to kind of force fitness out of your life for a little bit and give you give you time to focus on other stuff, right?

Yeah, for sure. Cool, man. So, first off, how do you describe what you do? Someone says, hey, hey, friend, I've met you at an event. What are you to tell me who you are? What do you do? That's funny because I get that question a lot because everybody knows that I do a lot of things.

So, I'm always like, shit. I guess I tell everybody that I guess the short part would say I do a lot of things. So I'm always like shit. I guess I would tell everybody that I guess the short part would say I'm a fitness entrepreneur, but usually I say I own a bunch of fitness companies and I own a social media agency. That's usually what I say. So I do have books that I sell that do very, very well. So there's probably like almost 10 different books that I sell daily. And then I have my Earn Your Carbs Challenge, which is, it used to be the Carbs cycle challenge and then the Keto cycle challenge.

Now I'm just turning it all into just the Earn Your Carbs challenge and you get the pick which way you want to go. So if you like high fat diets, then Keto cycles away to go. If you like high carbs, then then keto cycles are way to go. If you like high carbs, then keto, the carbs cycles are way to go. And you just pick it, and I get these people in a group on Facebook. We do live Q&A together. They get all this information. I've created a website that you put in your daily energy expenditure and all the numbers and stuff pop up.

It's custom to me. And then they get books and workouts and all sorts of stuff. And it's this big thing that I just did for fun for my gym and I would post them on social media on my CrossFit chalk Instagram because that was my first gym, was my CrossFit gym. And people were like, I wanna do this challenge, it looks really good.

And I was like, all right, well, why don't you Venmo me or PayPal me and then all of a sudden, like all these people were even willing and PayPal me and I couldn't keep up with it. I started I'd be sitting home on my phone and I'd be like oh my god well this person and I have to let him into the group and before I knew it I'd be on my phone all day for like two thousand bucks for the month or something and I'd be like man I just got to be a better way to do this so eventually I started to figure out a better way

to do that and now the challenge is it's a little bit easier to purchase and a little bit easier to manage. But as I got better at that, I realized that there was a better way to sell your products as well. I got into social media kind of marketing. Then from there, I just created the marketing agency that helped me in the beginning. I had all those people quit their job and then we kind of just did it for other people. So now a lot of my really good friends who are like kind of big in the fitness industry,

I run all their ads for them and I just take a percentage of that of the sales so that everybody seems to want to work really, really hard to get that person to make money. So in short, I created that agency basically to help other people. And then I have my stuff that's all helping at the same time. And then I run my gym.

I run my, I live here in Orange County, California, and I run my gym every day. And I run the Instagram. I run the Instagrams for both. Is that still you? You have an outsource, the Instagram to anyone else? Nope. Wow. You know, you get to your sort of size of kind size of workload and sometimes you've got the social media assistant

you dictate across the room, they put the poster, whatever. I have someone who does stories for CrossFit Chalk and then they'll answer some of the DMs but I always make the post. That's an interesting takeaway for Jimone. There'll be a lot of Jimone is listening, a lot of athletes listening, people who maybe have aspirations to own their own facility eventually. And it's interesting that you've held onto that sense of connection between you and marketing. So with the post for the Jim, they're so important to me because what you say is going to resonate with somebody on some level. You might say something, like sometimes I'll talk about like why we do hip thrusts. And I don't think that my person that works the desk can, you know, really talk about hip thrust in like in a way that a people want to do hip thrust.

I don't think anyone can talk about hip thrusts in a way that makes anyone want to do hip thrusts. That's single like split squats man. No one wants to do split squats. Yeah. But then I'll also write like, well, hey, like well hey like if you you know do you follow across it do you follow a chalk online programming or whatever if you dole then you know blah blah blah and like I don't think anyone's gonna want to take you know pride and initiative into saying these little things that kind of hook people in. So I always do the post and there's definitely days that go by where

I'm just like I'm so fried on my own Instagram That I just don't even do a post it happens for sure. I don't think I made one yesterday My own Instagram is a beast so it's like I'll answer at least a hundred DMs a day I have I always do a post no matter what I always do my my stories. No one's ever answered a DM in my Instagram. I mean, that's how we connected, right? You know, I'm hustling you slide into the DMs and we finally get the date right for this. So yeah, I've got a friend, George McGill,

who talks about that. He says the barbell strategy for certain things, like all in or all out for a lot of things. Get the people that do the stuff that you're bad at to take that over and then continue to double down. So yeah, what I wanna do, I wanna get, I wanna have the definitive guide to Ryan Fisher's life, right?

I wanna, anyone that follows you online, for the people who don't, you have an interesting, very interesting background, and you hear these stories on your insert or social media or whatever, little separate bits, little chunks, and that obviously sort of ties people in, but I wanna hear, I want the full Monty, right? I want Start to finish. Tell us how how we get to you being sat here in front of me in orange county

How where do you want to start? Let's start a childhood man. Where are you from? Oh? Shit. All right cool This might take a while by the way We hear for but I'm good for it. So childhood I lived in Tom's Irving, New Jersey. It's a little beach town, central part of New Jersey, all the way in the East Coast. It's obviously a lot farther away than I am right now. And as I grew up, this is actually part of the story is, I always felt like there was something wrong

with me in my family. I grew up in a big family. I had, I have five brothers and sisters that I lived with in a house, but then I have three other sisters from my dad's side. None of us have the same two parents at any point. I didn't know that realistically until I was like 18. And then I found out who my dad was when I was 18.

And then I met him when I was 24. And when I actually met him, it made a lot of things in my life, you know, make me understand a lot of things. Like I genuinely, as a kid, was like, I don't get it. I don't know why I'm here. Like I would feel like I'd wake up

in the wrong family every single day. But cheap. It was such a strange feeling. And it took until I was 24 to figure out why I felt that way. And basically, as I grew up, I was always just like a fucking madman. Like I wanted to, my mom bought me a bike one year for Christmas, and I just never put it down. Like I would ride everywhere.

Like I remember getting like flat tires on my bike and having to call my mom. And at the time I had this giant monstrosity of a phone and it was like it was it was a prepaid phone and I had like 10 minutes on it and I'd call my mom and I'd be like hey I'm all the way out here you need to pick me up I got a flat tire and she'd be like that's like a 35-minute car ride which like I'm a 20 miles or something on a bike would be like you know super far and then she. On a bike would be like, you know, super far. And then she'd come get me and be like, what is wrong with you? Like you're 12.

You're not allowed to ride your bike this far. And then I started to like really get into it. And then my mom was like, well, maybe we should look into. He's obviously really good at riding his bike. So I started like BMX racing. And that was like my first, my first like addictive sport that I ever did and I raced all over I was um I was number 15 in the country most years that was like my 10 to 15 range and then one year I was number one and then I had to go to Australia for World Championship but nobody in my

family really like flew they're all kind of scared of flying so I never went. Oh man what a shame but even just forfitting like to go to World Championship like I was like 35th in the world that like, flew. They're all kind of scared of flying, so I never went. Oh, man, what a shame. But even just forfitting, like, to go to World Championship, I was like 35th in the world that year, which is pretty cool. Oh, fuck. And then, in the high school, I transferred, like, all that riding and stuff, kind of transferred into, you know, I had some pretty good cardio, so I started running track

and cross-country. I also played football, I played lacrosse. I did all the sports, but nothing really. I didn't really love anything to the point where it felt like really like, you know, sweep me off my feet. I did like track a lot, but I had a coach who he ran us so much

that like I wound up getting kind of like a little bit of knee pain and it was a lot. I was around like 80 to 100 miles a week as a young kid, which is a lot. I don't love you know what that is, and try kilometers for you. No, no, no, no, we're miles as well, man. That's the only thing. You're on the wrong side of the road. You're using Fahrenheit instead of Celsius, but I'll stick to the fact that you know that miles is miles, right? That's good. All right. So from there, I wound up thinking I was going

to go be a pilot someday. After all the sports and everything, I actually got a really good scholarship to run at an Ivy League school, which is Cornell University, if you know who they are. And I turned it down because I was kinda overrunning. So then I was like, all right, I wanna go be a pilot. That sounds cool, it sounds fun.

It's right out my alley, you know, it was kind of an adventure, kind of junky. Military, military pilot pilot or like commercial stuff The commercial stuff. So I actually moved to as soon as school was over You know, obviously I didn't really like the way I felt in my family. So I One as far away as possible. I lived in New Jersey and I lived in Hawaii So I got far away. I went to pilot school. I got my helicopter license. That was my first first job. So I was a helicopter pilot and I kind of missed like doing other things. I missed like working out and I missed that feeling. So one day I was actually just walking through the dorms

where I was living for, because I was going to school as well. And there was a sign that said, tryouts for Bob Sled and Skeleton for the US Olympic team or whatever. In Hawaii. In Hawaii. So they Verizon, the phone company. They were going to every single state, all 50 states, trying to recruit people.

Shit. And I see this sign and I was like, man, that would be sweet, you know. So I was like, I just decided that was just going to go to tryouts and see how I did. And I went to the tryouts and I got like third in the nation. So it was having never, having never, never Bob slated before. No, but the, the, the, the combine was a three rep max back squat. Okay. Yeah. A wonder, a wonder at max power clean, a vertical jump.

There was a sprint where they had timing eyes and it would be 15 meters, 30 meters, and 45. And then there was an underhand like medicine ball toss. So like out of all the numbers, I had these crazy scores. I didn't even have any idea that I was, you know, even when it was all said and done, I was like, is that good? And they're like, dude, those numbers aren't same. So before I knew it, like within like six months, I had flown

out to Utah and lived in Utah for about five years. And then actually made it all the way up to like potentially being on the Olympic team. And I hurt my hamstring and I never went to the Olympics. Fuck. I know. So that's twice now that you've got essentially next to the top. How old do you hear that 22? Is that the edge?

Yeah. Right around there. Cool. So by the age of 22, you've got to the top flight in two different sports, two very different sports, ones on ice, ones on a bike. And both times through kind of no real error or inability on your part you've just kind of fallen short. Oh well that transfer is over again when I go to CrossFit.

There's a theme there's a theme happening here. So yeah like what was you talking like? What was your time like in Utah? Do you enjoy it there? I actually hated it. Like, why? The entire time I lived there, I was like, this is so boring. Um, there's really nothing to do here. I lived in Park City, which is a very small town up in the mountains.

There's no demomens. And I, yep. I mean, you can definitely feel the Mormon influence, but you know what funny story is, I didn't even know what a Mormon was. Some, one of the guys on my team was like, we were training together, he was a, I started as a skeleton athlete, so head first. Fuck, that's the real scary one, man.

That's the balls to the wall one. I wasn't big enough for Bob's like yet. I was only like 165 pounds. Okay. 165 pounds. Okay. 165 pounds, I was pretty small at the time. And I only think I qualified for it was skeleton at that time. So in the beginning, I started at skeleton camp and was with these kids who all did skeleton.

And this one kid who was really, really good, he was telling me I was gonna go on a mission. And he's like, hey, I'm going on a mission. And I'll be back, I'll be gone for like two years. I was like a mission like you going in the Marines and then you in some crews And he's like no, I'm bored man. I was like Yeah, but a mission is like military stuff, right? And no and he's like no He's like, do you know where you are right now? And I was like, no, I have no idea And then he tells me like what more men people are cuz I had dude, I had no, thank God he told me though, because I went

on some dates with some girls where it made a lot of sense. So, so, after all that, where am I now? So I'm in Utah, yeah. And then as I get older, now I look back and I'm like, man, I really messed it up because Utah is a really cool place. There's all these hikes to do that I'm into now and all these great places to see. And it's an amazing place, actually.

And at the time, I just, I was one of those people who was like 1,000% into something and didn't care about anything else. And I look back now and I see the younger version of myself in my gym, the manager of my gym right now, this girl's summer, she's just, she's so into CrossFit, it's the only thing that matters and nothing else matters. And I get that, like I was there for everything I've ever done. And I just think I'm like, man, if you to just brought in

a little bit more flexibility into your life, like you just like the few other things, I think you'd be better. because there's years of my life that I almost don't even remember because I was so strict on my life. Like I didn't go out, I only ate this, I only went to bed at this time, like I always worked out. Like everything was so structured and I didn't even care about anything else.

I was like, I don't give a fuck, I'm just gonna be a machine until I just win everything. Isn't it interesting? So we love athletes that are at the peak of their sport, right? You look at someone like Eddie Hall, world's strongest man, but he was adamant that if he'd kept going for a couple of years, it had been divorced from his wife and probably dead from a heart attack. But as the people for whom sport is everything they've got or everything they want, they have to make those

sacrifices because if they don't you'll get out competed by the Eddie Hall of Bob sled or the Eddie Hall of like skeleton or whatever But you are right like when you look back the benefit of 2020 vision in hindsight is that you can always think fuck if I'd sacrifice 2% of that I could have benefited maybe 20% of life I could have gone gone done a, ever friend who lives in Utah, and out of her front door, I saw this video and it's just normal, total normal neighborhood, but the background's just mountains, like some Lord of the Rings shit. I'm like, that looks so amazing, but obviously for you, you will let that head down, crack on. And that's the sacrifice

you've got to make, but like you say, with hindsight, it's more challenging. Yes. I look back and I'm like, I really wasted some years for sure. But I mean, for me at the time, I would, I would tell you that I was happy and I was, you know, I was doing what I, what I love to do. And that's really the trade off. I wonder as well, if you'd changed that, whether you would have been happy, you now in that life might have been happy with the change up, but you then didn't want it at all. Or you did, don't you know what I mean?

No, I don't think I would have. I think I probably would have been miserable. I would have been like, you're taking me out of what I think is best for me right now. Fuck you, older Ryan. Younger Ryan, now what you're doing. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, there's such a different definition of what happy is now. It's unreal. So I guess from there, I start to realize that, you know, I don't want to do this again for another four years, right? The Olympic, nobody gives a shit about my sport until the Olympic year. Even world championships is like the exact same thing as the Olympics and people don't

realize this, but like the the World Championships that happen every year for Skeleton, Bob's Lead, skiing, snowboarding, everything, is the same thing as the Olympic year. It's just that you don't have the whole world watching. And for us, for the sliding sports, we like to call them Skeleton, Bob's Lead, Luzge, nobody was there for World Championships. Nobody was there for the national events, like,

none of that stuff. So there was really no allure during that time. So to stick it out for another four years, to potentially get to that moment and potentially get injured again or something was very scary to me and I was like, no, let's maybe just like go into the military to go be a pilot. I originally wanted to do or I'll do something else. Now now that I'm gonna, you know, this really great athlete, maybe I'll do like special forces or something like that, just because to be in a helicopter, it doesn't seem like it's probably best suited for me

at this moment. So I started looking into all the special forces branches, like the army, the Navy, their force, all this stuff. And a friend of mine said, you know, you should really try doing CrossFit. I think it's a great training tool for anybody going to the military, even if you're going to go in and be a pilot, you still have to get through

boot camp and stuff. And it'd be great to have this under your belt. So I walk into a CrossFit gym and the owner of the gym, his name is Tommy Hackenbrook. If you know who this is, the year I walk into his gym, he had just gotten second place at the CrossFit games. So I didn't know who he was. But as I walked in, I saw his eyes locked on me and he was like, oh, this guy.

Like, he could just tell. Cause I was like, really, really fit from Bob's lead. And I think I was like almost, I was almost like 200 pounds at the time and just jacked. And my entire CrossFit career, I've been probably 175 to 180 pounds. So I was a lot bigger than I am now. And I remember walking in and he saw me and we had this intro class together

where he gives me like a, we just do like a pretty basic workout. And there's five other people that are there for this basic workout as well. And after the workout, I remember he's just looking at me and he's like, dude, I need someone like you to train with. And I'm like, well, I don't know how to do any of this stuff. I'm just here because I heard that this was gonna be cool.

I wanted to go in the military and he's like, well, if you agree to come at certain times, like when I train, you don't have to pay for a membership and you can help me train for events and I think that, I think this might be something you really like. Is this in Utah? This is in Utah, in Salt Lake City.

Go ahead. So I decided I was no longer gonna do Bob's side anymore and I moved from Park City to Salt Lake City, which is like 30 minutes down a giant mountain. And then, that's the most like Utah direction ever. It's like go 30 minutes down a giant mountain. That's the most like Utah direction ever. It's like go 30 minutes down the mountain. You will find the city. So the city was there.

And I'm living in the city and I'm finishing my degree at the university. And I go to this gym and I meet him. So then we just start training all the time. And probably within a few months I had articles about me all over the place that I was like this freak athlete, and everybody was excited to see me go to regionals, and excited to see me go to the games, and you could look up old articles, I was like the dark-course athlete, and all this stuff, and it kind of gave me a big head. I was like, oh yeah, I'm going to fucking crush this for you, you know?

So I went to my first regional, which would have been, had I gotten top three, I would have went to the CrossFit games, and it was almost like everybody was like, oh Ryan's definitely getting top three. And I went and I got like 14, because I had absolutely no idea how to compete. Like I was insanely good, but I had no idea what I was doing. Like handstand pushups, for instance, you had to flip up on the wall and do a handstand pushup

with your butt facing the wall. And I would lay in my stomach and walk my stomach to the wall and then do handstand pushups. Okay. Because I was too scared, I was too scared to flip. I had never done that yet. Okay, yeah. And I saw the workout and the first workout

that really screwed me for the whole thing was, it was a thousand meter run, 30 handstand pushups, thousand meter row, that's it. Which is such an easy event now, people would kill that. Now it would be like a hundred handstand pushups and then a thousand meter row. So I get on the wall and I walk by self up, it's our two handstands and the guys like, dude,

no fucking rep like what You think you have to flip up, but I'm like dude. I'm like terrified So like I try to flip up, you know, I had done it at the gym a few times and I just never liked the feeling But I got it done and after that event I knew I was basically fucked so now I should just have fun and just enjoy the moment and Then after that I was like well fuck this like I Fuck the whole military thing every I have to come back and I have to own this, you know So the next year I came back to regionals and I got fourth place Shit one outside one outside of the game What regional is ETA

It was Southwest at the time. That was the regional. But then I moved to California because in my head, after that second year. After that first regional, I moved to California. So I moved to California because I figured no matter how the next year went in CrossFit or whatever, I still want to be on the military. So all the Navy SEALs and stuff we're training in San Diego

in California. So I moved to San Diego to train with military guys. And then during that time I kept doing my training for regionals and I got a job at a CrossFit gym. So I moved out to San Diego, I start training and I go to the regionals and I want to be getting fourth place which suck and the whole reason I got fourth fourth place for this particular event I got top five in every single event at regionals I would have destroyed regionals but one of the events I got like 24th place because I didn't I didn't know how to do a hang clean like I had done power cleans and shit,

like in my training, but like doing hang power cleans with 225 pounds to me was like devastating. Cause we had to do 30 of them in a workout and I like could not hang on to the bar. So everybody was doing like sets of two to five reps at a time and I was doing like one at a time. So I wound up getting fourth place and I was like, oh my God.

I was like, fuck this, you know. So after this time, after that year, that's one thing that's like really start to change from me. This is when I really start to figure out who I'm going to be and what my future is going to be. Because after Regionals, obviously I want it to be a complete maniac and just be the most diligent person You ever see in your life and just crush everything But I was having problems at work and I hated the gym that I worked at the girl who owned it was running it

More like a boot camp in a crossfit gym and I was a die-hard crossfitter. I wanted to see Lifting in the workout. It's not just like long met cons every day. I wanted to see you know skill work I wanted to see lifting in the workout, it's not just like long Metcons every day. I wanted to see skill work, I wanted to see like true crossfit. So we bumped heads a lot, and eventually I got to the point where I was like, you know what, I don't respect you as a gym owner. Like I don't like what you're doing, it's not the right way.

You guys hired me to do a job, let me do it. And she's a female, so you tell a female, you don't respect her, it doesn't work out very well. I didn't like theoretically tell right respect her, I told her like I actually don't respect you. As a human. And she just lost it. So like, if you want to get in this big fight, and I was like, you don't look fuck you, I quit anyway, I don't care, whatever. And she had three partners and her three partners were begging me to stay. So I tried to stay for a couple more weeks, but I'd see her every

day and I was like, I can't do this. It's like walking on eggshells at work, I don't like it. So I had about $5,000, maybe saved up. So I quit about two months went by with my $2,000 month rent. And now I have like a thousand bucks left, but not really a thousand. The guy had spent money on food and gas and you know, living my life. So I got like a couple hundred dollars left. And I had written emails to every gym in town

that I want a job. I had applied for a million different jobs. I had two internship opportunities, one with Stanford and one with Notre Dame, because I had done really well in school, and I could have went and become a strength conditioning, an assistant strength conditioning coach, but it was non-pay for like nine months or something. And I didn't have any money, so I called the schools and I was like, hey, I want to take this internship, but I need at least like, give me housing, give me like a student athlete meal plan, give me something that I can live on.

And none of them were willing to do anything. So I had to turn down these amazing opportunities. So from there, I'm just like, basically like, fuck, I don't know what I'm going to do, the sucks. And I had gotten a membership, a very discounted membership. It was like $2.00 a month, but these guys let me work out for like $30 a month at this gym called Pacific Beach Crossfit. And that's where I met a man named Anders Varner and another guy named Brian Borestein,

who Anders Varner now, my podcast is on his network, Fireball Shrug. So when I first met him, you know, they're going off my resume and on his network, Farble Shrug. So when I first met him, they're going off my resume. And my resume says, I just got in fourth place at Regionals. I was a health doctor pilot. I was on the Olympic Bobslet team. This guy's a freak. Yeah, I have my degree in exercise,

physiology, degree in nutrition. All these different things. And my friend is like, dude, this guy is going to be intense. And then I walk in the gym. And we do a workout together. And then like, holy dude, this guy is gonna be intense. And then I walk in the gym and we do a workout together and then like, holy fuck, this guy is cool. They really liked me. And I, but I just got done telling him I had no money and the reason I hit him up is because,

I just want him to place the train. So they were like, well, dude, you can train here. You can't train here for free, but you can train here for $30 or whatever. And it was really, really cheap. So I was like, all right, cool.'t train here for free, but you can train here for, you know, like $30 or whatever. And it was really, really cheap. So I was like, all right, cool. I couldn't even afford that. And like, after I think like this next month,

my mom might have given me money for rent because I remember still having a house to live in. Are you still in, is this San Diego still this gym? I'm still in San Diego. Yeah. So I like gain the respect everybody in the gym. Everybody started to love me. And after that month, my mom was like, you know, I like gain the respect everybody in the gym, everybody started to love me. And after that month, my mom was like,

you know, I'm not gonna help you anymore. I just really, there's no need for me to help you. You need to figure your life out. And I really think you should go back to school. I think you should give up on this whole CrossFit thing. And I don't really like the idea of the military and like all these different things. So, man, I had a lot to think about.

And I think what really started to happen was I just was running out of money and I didn't know what to do anymore. So I had to come, come to grips with my friends and tell them, like, hey, I don't have any money and I might have to drive all the way home to New Jersey to my mom's house and then go back to school and do something I potentially don't even want to do. So everybody in the gym was like heartbroken over there. So like, no way, like not Ryan, like blah, blah, blah, we wanted him to stay and there was this girl named Aaron Dwyer.

And she's like, you know what, you can sleep on my couch if you want for as long as you need to get on your feet. But I had never talked to this girl in my life. She just like, everybody seems to like you, I'm a nurse, I'm not home all that much. And it's there for you. And I originally turned it down and then got to the point where I had to move all my stuff out of my house that I was living in and I

sold all my stuff and I had slept in my car for like a week and I was like just was like, I can't do this. This is not, this doesn't, right, you know, so during that week actually, as when I started to steal, I started stealing, like food and groceries and stuff from the grocery store because I wanted to stay and I didn't have any money. Why did you turn it down originally? Why did you turn her off a down? Was it pride? No, definitely not. I was definitely like willing to take people's help. It was just that, I didn't realize I was that far down. Like where like that was what I needed, you know, I kept, I always, in my mind,

I'm like such an optimistic guy, and I'm always like pretty, pretty bubbly. I always feel like everything's gonna work out, you know? But like it was that one moment where it was like, dude, it's fucking not gonna work out. You've been in your car for a week, you've been, like, standing stuff from Whole Foods, like you gotta take the couch.

Yeah, so, and it was also like weird because I didn't know her. It was like I genuinely, I didn't take classes with her, I didn't work out with her, like I didn't know her at all. Like, I know her as well as we know each other on this podcast. So, I was like, all right, you know, I'm gonna do it. And I wind up sleeping on her couch for like four months.

It was a long time. And it was a very embarrassing time. Like to wake up every day, just knowing that you're like in somebody's space and they probably thought you were going to be there for like maybe a month. And now it's like four months. So that started to feel very, very shitty. And I'll never forget, during that whole time, I'll never forget what it was like to go to bed.

So like every single night when I would go to sleep, it would just be full anxiety. Just like, why are you even sleeping? You don't have anything together. You have no reason to wake up tomorrow rather than to wake them to work out. You're a fucking bum. What are you doing?

What do you mean? And it really crushed my soul like every day. I was like, man, I looked at my resume and I was like, this is who I am, but like this is where I'm at right now and I don't understand it. And it was hard, man. I was really hard to sleep. It was really hard to just like want to show up the next day,

but I kept showing up and doing what I did best at the time. And this is when I really feel like, you know, when all else fails, like just keep doing what you love and there'll be a way that it works out. Everybody in the gym at the time had kind of signed me up for this competition called the OC Throwdown and it was, besides the CrossFit Games, it was the biggest CrossFit event

in the world. And you would do these workouts and and you would tape your workout, and you'd put it online, and then you'd get placed, first to a thousand or whatever. And getting invites was like all the top athletes in the world, like all the best cross-bathletes. If you've been to the games, you've got an official invite to this competition.

But a lot of them still had to do the open online workouts. I got second in the world on these online workouts and it was the first time anybody had ever seen me work out who hadn't been to regionals. So like social media wasn't that big yet. It was kind of like just starting. I think Instagram had like just started. So I would go crush that regionals and the only people who would know me are like, the local crowd.

But now the whole world knew who I was, and they're like, wow, this guy's insane. And like at the time, I never worked out in shoes. I always worked out barefoot, because I had one pair, I had like one good pair of shoes, and I didn't wanna ruin them, so I'd always just take them off. So like all of my old videos, I'm back squatting, everybody was really into the 20 rep back squat

back then and I'd be, I'd be doing 20 rep back squat and like 365, 375 pounds and I'm barefoot and like, sweaty feet on a slubby floor. There was one time I did 335 and I lost count so instead of 20 I did like 30 reps and I have all these things like recorded and I would start putting them on Facebook and people were like this guy is insane because like no one had had numbers like that in CrossFit like yeah like strong man and all that I'm sure it was going on everywhere but in CrossFit man I was snatching 275 when like 225 was cool and like I was back squatting 500 pounds when 360 five was man, I was snatching 275 when like 225 was cool. And like, I was back squatting 500 pounds

when 365 was cool. Like I was so beyond the numbers. And then all of a sudden I started throwing down like insane Metcons. I was doing Fran and under two minutes. You know, I was doing grace in like a minute, you know, like just crazy, crazy things. Like everything was unbroken.

I was like two minutes faster than everybody on Helen just crazy stuff so Everybody was really really excited to watch me go to those he throw down and actually compete and then I get my letter that says hey, you know Welcome to the throwdown and you know you gotta Sign this out like fill this out and then pay and it was $200. And I was like $200, I was like, there is no way I can go into this. So I never, I just let it go. And I get a phone call like a month later from the guy who's throwing the event.

And he says, hey, you never filled out the thing that everybody wants to see you. And I'm like, dude, I'm really embarrassed to tell you this, but I am legitimately, like I have nothing. I'm sleeping on some gross couch There is I don't I to be honest. I've been stealing food for like four months like I genuinely have nothing I'm like out that like the no shoes that you see in the videos. It's not a joke. That's like real-life shit. So He's like well All right, I understand your situation. Let's just, we'll comp your, we'll make it free for you.

And if you win, you just pay me back. And I'm like, all right, cool, you know. It's like, it all excited. Like, all right, I'm going to go to this big event. This is going to be crazy. So I went to the big event and I'm still sleeping on the couch. Did you have shoes by this point? Bar of borrowed shoes.

So my one pair of sneakers I did wear for certain events, and I have photos of them. Actually, the original sneakers are still in my closet in my room. I never got rid of them. I haven't worn them in like probably six or seven years, but they're just in my closet. I can't throw them away.

Probably for the best that you haven't worn them. I can't bet. I wouldn't imagine what sort of a state they're in. So, at the actual event, I needed like lifting shoes and knee sleeves and belts, all that stuff was borrowed and like all my clothes were like stolen. Like I mean, it was just a complete, I was a complete like yard sale stuff. So I got second place at this event and I had beaten people who were top three at the CrossFit Games and it was a huge, huge deal. And the scoring was all messed

up. So like in reality, they found out later that I'd actually won the event, but it was too late to give me prize money or anything like that, which I would have changed my life. No prize money for second place, no? No, 10,000 for first that would have totally changed my life. I would have been like, that would have been like, holy money, I'd have been like crazy. So you think about that as crazy. So after that, I did get a bunch of sponsors. They got like ProGenex was a protein sponsor.

This clothing company started sponsoring me. All these other gyms, you know, were like, yeah, you can totally work at my gym, like I had all these job opportunities. So, I wanted moving to Los Angeles and I did not like that experience, like at all, I did not like living in LA, I didn't like living in the city, especially Los Angeles. It was where I was at, like I obviously didn't have a lot of money, it was very poor and like, just super grungy dirty. And the gym that I was working out at wasn't very, they weren't very known for being a very good gym. They were kind of, you know, Ronny Teasdale? No. He was kind of,

he was kind of a badass at the time where he was very, like, controversial type of person. He wrote a big article once about how like that people were ruining the world and like ruining the people and like okay yeah yeah this guy this guy's intense. So CrossFit really hated him because he wrote all these crazy controversial articles and he was an amazing athlete actually he had done a regal several times and almost went to the games as well. But now you have me linking up, going to his gym, I start like coaching a ton of classes,

start saving up dough, and then I wanted to train more so I started getting more into like personal training and I'll never forget the first time, because I don't think I'd ever made more than $25 an hour in my life at that time. And I'll never forget having this kid come in. He was like an actor and he was getting ready to be on an Apple commercial. And he wanted to look good, right?

And I'm like, all right, yeah, well, you know, you can come in. You got to come in like three, four days a week and, you know, we'll do this in this. And I showed him like what we would do, like a strength template and all this stuff. And he was all excited. And he said, well, how much is it? And in my mind, I was like, dude, I'd be so happy if I just got like $50. But I didn't have any money and I'm like still coming out of this whole of no money. And I'm like, it's $100 a session. And I really don't like to work with people unless they buy at least like 10 up front because

let's me know that you're committed. And I remember him just being like, yeah, like no problem, you know, and then after we got done talking, he walked away, I'll never forget. I went inside the bathroom and I just started screaming. I was like, oh my god, I'm about to make a thousand dollars. This is insane. So that feeling just like never went away. So I started just selling people on personal training all the time and I was like, started getting really good at it. And then eventually after about a year,

I had saved up $60,000 in cash. Like I paid for all my expenses. I had $60,000 saved. Where are you keeping that? $60,000 shoebox under the bed? No, I put it in the bag. Oh, all right. Okay, okay. I wasn't like investing in anything.

I was just seeing a savings account. Okay. So I wound up at one of these competitions that I went to during that time, I met with this kid named Kenny Leverich and he was across with games athlete and he was just like begging me to come move down to Newport Beach where he lived,

which is where I live now. And it's obviously a much different vibe, totally different place. So I'm on the beach now and it's more of like a town type of feel, like more like family like and stuff. It's not like grungy, bum's running around the neighborhood type of place like where I was in LA. So obviously I loved it here. And he got me a job at the gym that he worked at. So I moved and I was only there for, I think I was there for like a year and a half before I decided to open my own gym. So my time in

LA and that year and a half, that was when I had $60,000. So all of that time and I met these two guys that I was personal training at the time who looked like bombs by the way. They looked like normal, total normal dudes. They always even sounded normal. I never heard anything crazy come out of their mouth and they just always asked you what I wanted to do with my life and blah, blah, blah. They always saw something in me that they just thought that I had a little something extra than the other coaches. So I was like, well, I would love to own my own gym, but there's so many around, like at the time, the Orange County area, which is where I live,

we had like a record, we had, I think we had 16 gyms in the area, like in a small 10 mile radius, like not very much. So to open a gym here was like considered madness. So I told them that, I'm like, well, I love to own my own gym, but there's 16 here. What do you want me to do? And he's like, well, I think that the person sells the gym. So like, I think that you would be fine. And I'm like, I disagree.

I feel like people come because their friends are here or because it's the closest one. So if that's all I have to work off of, I want to make sure that when you walk in, there's no way you walk out. So if you guys give me a million dollars, I will open a gym. And they were like, fine, like it was nothing. And I was like, okay. So it was literally that simple. To them, it was just like, okay, go find your space, go fucking pin it out, and let's go. And I was like, wow, okay.

So within a couple of weeks we had found this space. It wasn't even for rent. The CrossFit chalk gym that I own right now was a real working gym at the time. And we gave them, at the time, they wanted $200,000 to leave, because they had put $700,000 in upgrades to the building. And they're like, we'll leave if you give us this much money.

And we're like, no, we're not giving you a penny more than like 50 grand. So eventually they took it, we took over the space, and then I created what now is Cross with Chalk, and I did not need a million dollars. I needed like 250 grand was like still more than I could spend pretty much at the time. But I did need money for like salaries and pay and like, what if we didn't make money for a year, like a lot of different things.

But the gem is like a legitimate million dollar gym Which at the time was completely unheard of like after I opened my gym I Was in almost every single cross magazine immediately like the way that it looked and like the way that I was running yet and all this like was Was completely unheard of at the time what was different about it When you walked in it looked almost nicer than like an equinox, but it was like a functional fitness gym. I had all of the competition plates lined up

against the wall on a rig, like $30,000 in competition plates, which at the time, you know, doing my due diligence of other gyms and what they had and what they were offering, like everybody had at the time, the rubber plates. Nobody was putting in these expensive plates. Like if I put rubber plates in, my whole gym would have been seven grand.

And everybody was all about starting in your garage, and then eventually going to a small space and then a bigger space and like going step by step by step. And I was always under the impression, the most, the most, well, the gyms that was really doing well, like all the gyms that are doing well, you have like soul cycle, you have berries, boot camp, you have, I don't know, whatever you guys have by you, but like they're, they're big franchise

gyms and they never come out and they're like, you know what, let's just start this soul cycle on a garage and then if it gets bigger, we're going to go to this small space and then if that gets bigger, we'll go to a really nice space somewhere and see what happens. They're like no let's just walk and go to the nice place now. Let's put 50 bikes in there. We're going to fill it. How do you feel when you walk in a gym and there's two rowers and four kettlebells and you're like it's two hundred dollars a month and we're going to do this and you're like what?

It doesn't make any sense. So that to me always blew me away. And I was like, if I ever get to open a gym, I'm never gonna do that. That seems absolutely ridiculous. So, you know, I decked the whole gym out and all the nicest stuff. I had 10 assault bikes.

I had 10 rowers. I had fucking like 80 kettlebells, all these dumbbells, like stacks of dumbbells. Like at any point, anybody in class can have any weight they want and I would never have to worry about not having enough equipment Which was always embarrassing as a coach because you have a workout with an Rx weight and Then like half the people couldn't do it. Do you remember when the 22 and a half kilo dumbbells came out was it 171 or 181 and there was like you were seeing all these videos going out online of someone with that fifteen-keyla dumbbell with a couple of plates duct taped on the end of them yeah yeah that was ridiculous so like

also crossfit really fucked that up though because like everybody in the free world had like 45 pound dumbbells but nobody had fifties and was like, even now I have this giant stack of 45s and a giant stack of 50s. And I'm like, do I really need two stacks of a five pound difference? But, yeah. That was Ro trying to make some money. They probably had tons of 50 pound dumbbells

sitting around and like, what do we do with these? Guys, no one's using these 22 and a half kilo dumbbells. What can we do? Dave, mate. Is there any chance that you could, yeah, brilliant. Thank you very much, cheers. There's Dave Castro just that we've got like a rogue t-shirt for every day of the year. Oh yeah. My goal was to make it to the CrossFit Games and wear a t-shirt that says, my mom don't like you and she likes everybody and it has Dave Castro on it. The Justin Bieber line. Yeah, Dave Castro, funny story, Dave Castro

was the second ever podcast that I did. So I got invited down. Oh, really? I got invited down to 18.0 by Reebok. They did that. Remember that? Did you ever see that? Yeah.

So they're 18.0 announcement. And I'm sitting down with Dave. And I've done one podcast before this, right? And I love podcast. I've been a guest or whatever, but I'd never done one before and you sit down and Dan Bailey was coming up after Dave So Dan Bailey was number three and Dan's already met me. Hey, man How's it going this that and the other and then Dave's kind of he's kind of a bit And I'm intimidating to kind of speak to and I didn't really know how it was gonna go and then Just before we started Dave was that so what we doing here? And I was like, I'm about to record a podcast.

David said, don't really do podcasts. I was like, right, okay, well, I'm just going to get you to count to five for me, please, David. That's okay. And I just kind of steamrolled through that. But and then I asked him, what does he say, would you rather fight 10 duck sized horses or one horse sized duck? And I was just asking him whatever I could think of to try and lighten the mood a little bit. And I asked him about, who would you not want to face out the CrossFit Games in the Hunger Games? And he was like, I don't know what that is.

I was like, it's kind of like Battle Royale. And he went, Battle Royale. Do you mean WWE? And I was like, no, Dave, where have you been? Do you not watch any movies? Yeah, he hasn't really been to a lot of places, I don't think. No, he's kind of in his role. And he's not a happy man, so.

Anyway, he was interesting, the difference between him and Dan, then Dan comes out and Dan's just like super funny, super relaxed. But yeah, so you're in the gym, you've opened the gym, you've got $30,000 with weights, plates, and bars, and all that stuff. Yeah, and I probably spent about a hundred grand on equipment, $100,000, probably on equipment. And then I put it like I maybe another $100,000

into like the build of the building, just like painting and changing things, making it nicer. My bathrooms were like $250,000, but I didn't have to do that. It was the person before us that was part of the money they wanted to get back. So now I have like, theoretically, about a million dollar gym. And my first day open, I had like a hundred members. And I didn't even do any pre-sales. I just like opened and everybody came.

Because during that time time I was posting on Instagram because Instagram was just starting to get big and I started posting like hey I just bought a 30 grand in Olympic lifting plates. Here's the space before all the weights. Here's you know where we are in town which is like a really nice commercial area and everybody else was in industrial areas and like there was the first time somebody was going to go and spend like my rents like $11,000 a month. It's crazy and everybody everybody before that was spending like three four thousand dollars in like a little garage style space

So I'm in this nice area everybody sees the gym all painted and pretty then they see the weights come in then they see all these Rigs and all this stuff all the rowers all the bikes they're like, holy shit, this place is gonna be insane. So, without me knowing, everybody's putting in the 30-day notice at all the gyms, you know, and they're all like getting ready to come. And I have a video on my computer, like the first day, I'm just packed. And everybody told me, you know, if you get 100 members in your first year, you're doing really good. I had 100 members my first day. you know, if you get a hundred members in your first year, you're doing really good. I had a hundred members my first day. Shit. But, I'm so anal and I'm so like, you know, I'm so grateful for this opportunity.

I don't want to blow it, you know. This last year has been very stressful for me, you know. Like I had a lot of ups and downs, like the last three years, really. And it was very important to me to have the right people there. Like when it started, I had zero coaches. I coached every single class, every single day, for two months before I hired my first coach. What was the timetable?

So 5AM was the first class, and then 7.45 PM was the last one. So I would get home at usually about 10, and then get back to the gym at about 4 a.m. So I Would leave the gym at 10 but I'd have actually went to bed would be like midnight and then I wake up at 4 Sometimes I'd wake up at like 3 because I'd be nervous to wake up at 4 and then Before I knew it I was only sleeping like 3 4 hours a night for Those whole two months and I was like a complete zombie. But there was this other girl who had gone to regional. I had met her a few times and she kept emailing me, you know, I really went going to coach there and blah, blah, blah.

So I was like, all right, well, you know, you come and let me, we'll see how you do and whatever. So she did a great job and I had to like watch her every day for like a month. So it basically was like me still running all the classes every day. But I'd get to like kind of sit off to the corner and just, you know, get to write workouts and do management stuff. Which I didn't realize how much really went into it. You know, I thought opening a gym was, you know, you open it and you have this many members and this is your expenses and off you go. It's not like that at all. So people always ask you about opening a gym now. And I'm like, please for the love of God, you're not open a gym like you. You genuinely just don't understand. And I was so lucky in my opportunity and like, I'm something tells me you don't have the same luck that I had at that moment because

You don't have the same luck that I had at that moment because Just like the height of CrossFit the height of my career like The insanity of what my gym looked like the fact that Instagram was climbing at the time I had so many things in my favor that people just don't have now that for you to replicate that is almost impossible But and I was like the top trainer at the gym I was at like everybody wanted to go with me. Like the the owner of that gym was never there. He didn't care about the gym. He didn't stop in like it was there was no connection to him. So when I left it was just natural for them to come. I think like 40 people probably came from the gym that I was at before and then

everybody else just saw us on Instagram. So that was, I can't, I'm kind of all going on. And during this whole situation, I'm still training for regionals. And everybody's throwing it. Four hours sleep a night. Yeah, and everybody still wanted to see me go to the games and all that. But the year prior to this was when I actually threatened

to murder that judge in front of everybody. Yeah, tell us that story. So, this was before the gym was open, and this is while I'm still saving money, I understand it in the future, I'm probably going to open a gym and like my whole life before that time, I just got done being homeless like all these different factors like Cross with my life basically And I'm in this moment and I'm doing a workout that is the one workout at regionals that I could not wait to do and it was 21 15 9 deadlifts at 3 15 and box jumps at 30 inches. I Had done 21 deadlifts

Probably 10 seconds before anyone else even got off the bar. Because 315 to me at the time was nothing. I had a 600 pound deadlift. I was probably the only person that crossed with the hat a 600 pound deadlift at the time. And 315 to me felt like 225. So I fly through it, I get all my box jumps done, I go back to the bar, and now I just start getting no rep like crazy, like rep no rep no rep no rep And there's parts of it where the guys no rapping me. He's not even looking at me like

You're mean. He's over here. He's like no rep no rep. He's like looking at the head judge And I'm like you're not even watching me work out. This is ridiculous like was it for extension. Is that what the criticism was? It was for bouncing extension, is that what the criticism was? It was for bouncing. They said I was bouncing the weights. And you can watch the video on YouTube. It's all over the place. And I'm just, the weight is very, very light to me.

So I'm just going up and down very, very fast. So it looks like I'm bouncing it. And it's the first year they had ever had competition plates. And competition plates don't really bounce at all in general. So in the moment, I'm like freaking out, I can feel that, because the year before that, I got in fourth at Regionals. And this was my year, like I was gonna go to the games

100%. Even with all that, I got dead last in that event, right? Because I freak out, I tell the judge in the middle of the workout, dude, I'm gonna fucking kill you, you're ruining my life. A lot of people like to remember that I'm gonna fucking kill you apart, but they don't understand that I said, you're ruining my life after that.

Because I can feel like everything, Bob's a skeleton, being homeless, owning that gym, like not owning that gym, working out that gym that I hated, like not having any money, stealing, everything is in that moment. and I'm like, I'm gonna go to the CrossFit Games and everything's gonna be fine. And he was taking it away from me in that moment. And the only thing I could think of is like, dude, I'm gonna fucking kill you. Like you're ruining my life.

And I guess I like screamed it and scared the fucking guy and he was like freaking out. And then basically, they had to make an example out of me and like afterwards like Dave capture comes over and like publicly Hemioliates me and like points to me and tells me that I'm a terrible person all over CrossFit and they Exploited it all over the website like Ryan Fisher is you know completely out of line and maniac and bubble a ball I got last place in the event obviously because obviously, because they would never give me a rep. So I eventually just like did like 100 deadlifts instead of 45. And then I wouldn't sign the paper at the end.

It was just like a giant fucking ordeal. Huh, so after that moment, I was considered the maniac for CrossFit. And then opening my gym Actually seemed even crazier at the time because now there are 16 gyms in the area I'm the complete maniac guy that probably nobody wants to go to his gym because you look him up And he looks like Johnny Mac and Roe like fucking smashing tennis rackets everywhere so

like Like my mom was like begging me. She was like, Ryan, your name is not good. You shouldn't open a gym and all these different things. But it worked out. And the gym was doing well. So, with all that being said, the hype for me to go back to Regionals was pretty big. Everybody wanted to see me compete again.

And they wanted to see me kind of overcome the odds. And that was when I thought that I'd wear that Justin Bieber shirt and my mom would like you to like everyone. Because my mom fucking hates the guy and she actually called him one day and told him how much she hated him. Your mum rang Dave Castro. Yeah, because after the whole regional event,

like he literally ruined my name. I think it was so bad. And I was like such a good cross-bitter and everybody just, everybody still to this day remembers me as the crazy person. Until they meet me, they're like, man, I thought you were gonna be totally different. Like you're actually really nice and blah, blah, blah.

And I've, everywhere I always thought you're insane. So she got his phone number at one point somehow and was like, I can't believe you ruined my son's life and like blah blah blah and like all this stuff So I just was like man, I think if you're the games one day I want to have this shirt that has like the Justin Bieber little quote on it and it just be so funny I love the fact that mums get in to that sort of a thing You know, I don't know whether you watch the Conor McGregor fight this weekend, but at the end of the fight

So he's just smashed Donald Saroni in 40 seconds, right? And Donald Saroni's grandmother comes over and has a word with Conor. And it's like, it's so funny, even at the absolute top flight of the sport, or, you know, regionals, this huge event, Conor McGregor, biggest fight around the planner, it's like, you still got to answer someone's grandmother. Like the grandmother comes over, wags her finger in your face, you're like, oh shit, that's his grandmother, like, I can't,

I can't. And even. I saw that, yeah. It's hard as nails, but you probably still like, weirdly intimidated by the grandmother. Yeah, it's probably, I can imagine for sure. Well, he's, it looks like he sets a nice thing store. So yeah, I mean, all that stuff was kind of going on and through my head and in my life and

It was a crazy crazy time for sure and I'll never forget all that but Dave Castro He didn't go away after that for me When I was opening my gym he tried to take it away for me. Oh, I I Wanted to call the gym because they wouldn't accept any of my names for the gym. I really wanted chalk and I wouldn't accept it. And I really wanted this other name, like diesel. I wanted like sweat.

I wanted to call my gym crossfit sweat. All these different things, they wouldn't accept anything. And I was like, fuck this, you guys suck. I'm gonna call my gym crossfit untitled because you guys won't even settle on a title. An untitled actually means by definition that it's on a title and untitled actually means by definition that it's beyond A title and that you know, it was like this really interesting definition for what it actually meant

And I didn't want to be associated with CrossFit almost at that time anyway So someone I had wrote about this on Facebook and I was like I'm gonna call my gym CrossFit Untitled because it means this and this and this and this and CrossFit's never been really good to me anyway And then someone's screenshot it and sent it to Dave and then Dave writes me an email and he says you will never own a CrossFit gym You know, so you can get you can get rid of this this name that you want to call it and you know basically go fuck yourself So I'm like all right., well, there goes that. I guess I'm just opening a regular gym now.

So I write to Kathy Glassman, which is Greg Glassman's wife at a time. And I say, hey, you know what? I'm actually not going to be opening a gym, apparently. Dave is actually really upset with me. You know, I don't have the greatest history with you guys. And maybe it's best I just move on and just open my gym as a regular gym. And we just forget this whole cross-it thing. And then she's like, oh, wait a minute.

You know, we do have this one chalk contract. It's been taken for six months, but no one's ever opened the gym, so maybe you can have that one, but you have to pay the affiliate fee right now. And I was like, done. I've been fighting for that name for almost 100 emails. We went back and forth, 88 emails, and every email that I wrote had five names on it. So for my gym.

So if you can multiply 88 times five, that's how many names that I suggested before we landed on chalk. It was a nightmare. And then even since then, Dave will be in the area and he'd never stopped by my gym. He always stopped by this one gym. It's like a few miles away and he stops there multiple times.

Yeah. Because he always takes photos like in his affiliate, in the affiliates. And like you never go to the same affiliate more than once. Like you'd go to a different one. But he's been to the same one multiple times now. You put beach, he's got his one favorite. That's interesting. Yeah. And he never comes to mind. So it's funny. But regardless, after all that, the gym,

I went to regionals again. It wasn't what I thought it was going to be. Obviously, I had a lot more scrutiny on me for judging. Like there was more judges watching me and they wanted me to they didn't ban you after the they didn't ban me now I mean a fucking kill you ruined my life that that wasn't really a ban but it was worthy of public denouncement yeah and they really wanted to see me freak out again so they tried very very hard and I got drug tested all the time like it was ridiculous how much I got drug tests like couple of months. Menon games athlete. Yep, and then my buddy who was a CrossFit Games athlete was never getting drug tested. And I was like, this is ridiculous.

You've gone to the games three times and you've maybe been drug tested one time and it was at Regionals. I get drug tested just like sitting in my house like fucking reading a book, you know what I mean? It's ridiculous. I was always getting drug tested just like sitting in my house like fucking reading a book, you know what I mean? Like it's ridiculous. So I was always getting drug tests. I had that body that everybody wanted to fail. Everybody's like, this guy's definitely on drugs and I'm like, no, I actually just, I really do eat insanely well. Like I never ever cheat. You guys are always out partying and eating fucking donuts and shit.

And I'm actually only eating chicken and broccoli. So I just looked the way that I did, but anyway, after all that, the gym was picking up more and it was something that I started to really pour my heart into and it was, I was starting to realize that, you know, maybe I was, maybe meant to be a business person and I had come so close to so many things, right? Like we had talked about in so many different sports. And business for me didn't really feel like I had to ever win anything. It was just kind of, you know, how big can I grow this thing?

How many people can I help? Like, there's a lot of things that make you bigger, but there's no, like, qualification process, really, you know? You have to evaluate yourself and make sure that you have all your ducks in a row, if you will, but yeah, you can go as far as you want and there really is no first place or whatever. It's just where are you comfortable going? During that time, I didn't like when Jim started small and they started to build, like I said, I wanted to come out, guns blazing. I also didn't like that gyms would put their workouts

on their website. I always thought it was weird, like every CrossFit gym, you could just go to their website and see their workout. Like that was totally normal. I could look at any CrossFit gym in the world. There are thousands of gyms. I could look up their email address or their website, go to their page and I could see their workout

Still a personal every single every single day, right? So I was like this is so weird. I am not doing that so I never did But the gym kept getting more followers and Instagram and people would be like Every once in a while out post a workout that we did and they'd be like dude that workout looks awesome or every once in a while I would post a workout that we did. And they'd be like, dude, that workout looks awesome. Or what are you guys doing in there? Like the gym looks amazing. Like you have so many members,

like and I just opened and like all this stuff. And about three years of this went on, where people would ask me to do the workout. I got to the point where like, I'll never forget I had a phone call from someone in Norway asking me what the workout was for the gym that day. I was like, you're from Norway. Like why? One, I'm probably spending money on this phone call, but I don't want to be spending. If you reversed the charge, you see a Mr. Person from Oslo. And like, why do

you care that much about the workout? And I started to realize that I made workouts much, much different than everybody else. I didn't really spend time looking at other people's websites. But when I realized what I was making, I realized it was much, much different. And I had a drop-in who this lady would drop in the gym all over the world for work. And she was like, this is my favorite gym. It's the best program I have ever done. You really should put these workouts online and charge people. And I was like, all right, I'll give it a go, you know? And I was like, I'll charge everybody like a hundred bucks a month or something.

And my friend was like, nah, why not wanna do that? That's kind of a lot. Like maybe like $20, something really cheap. And I'm like, $20, you know how long it takes me to do this? Like, you gotta your mind. And then all my friends were like, well, you're probably gonna get like a, you might get like a hundred people that buy it.

And I'm like, well, that would be cool, I guess. I guess I could settle for that. It made extra $2,000 a month. I was making like $4,000 a month at the time. Like, that was my salary for the gym with $4,000. I'm like, if I had a hundred people on this, for $20, I'd be stoked. So, I make it $20. The first week that it's out, I made $4,000. And I was like,

holy fuck. I was like, I just doubled my salary. And I was like, this is insane. So, I still didn't even market it, because I was kind of embarrassed to be the guy who didn't go to the CrossFit Games and I'm marketing CrossFit programming, you know? Like, because you have like Invictus and like, you know, Rich Froning, which he didn't even have Mayhem at the time,

but Invictus had a bunch of athletes and they had programming, they didn't even charge for it. And then like, Comp Train with Ben Burdron, he wasn't charging for it. And like now all of a sudden you have CrossFit Chalk, which is the guy who threatened to murder someone who wants $20 for his programming. And it's like, it's like dude, I don't know about all this.

And I'm like, well fuck, I just made $4,000. I think a lot of people really, whether I'm this person who murders people or not, like people really like my workouts. So. A good workout, yeah. A couple of months went by and it went from, like I was making $4,000 a month off of it

to like $10,000 a month. And I was like, wow, like maybe I should market this thing. Maybe I should actually talk about it. And I still like was like hesitant. So I would, I would do a couple of posts like, hey, I have this programming in blah, blah, blah, blah, if you guys want to follow it. And before I knew it, dude, like even just casually

would start bumping 15, $20,000 a month. And I'm like, holy fuck, this is insane. You know, like I'm making five, six times what I'm making in the gym. And it's really not any extra work. It's the workouts that I'm already doing, but the workouts kept getting more stressful to make for me. Because now I'm like, well now,

it's not just my gym members I wanna please. I want all of these people to look at these workouts and be like, fuck, that's dope, you know? Even still, like I've owned the gym now for six years. I'm the only person who's ever made the workouts and It went from taking me a couple hours to taking me like an entire 24 hour day to make workouts now because I'm so like I need them to be fucking insane And now I have free programs it started off as just CrossFit and then I I added the sweat program to it Which is the conditioning program because I started to see that a lot of people

weren't really stoked on CrossFit all the time. And they still wanted to come to the gym and do that that circuit like training but they didn't want to lift all the heavy weights. So I created the sweat program and then a lot of people were like, well hey, what do I do when I travel? So I started making this thing called the Daily D which is the Daily Dumbbell program and it's just dumbbells jump rope pull apart. So now I have these three different programs. I want all of them to be awesome. So I'm making like 21 workouts every Sunday for the week. And it gets to be pretty hard.

But anyway, I started marketing the program more and it got to the point where it was making, you know, make almost like seven figures in a year now on just on my program on that. And then it kind of just took off on its own. Make almost like seven figures in a year now on just on my program on that and then It kind of just took off on its own. I even still I barely ever talk about it Like if you follow me on social media, you might see me like post a repost someone's thing and it says, okay You can swipe up if you want to join I Talk about it more often on the chalk Instagram, but on mine. It's like very very rare

Mm-hmm. I don't like to be very salesy with it. Now it's at the point where people just talk about it and it kind of just flows. But then the challenge is started, right? I wanted to make things cooler for people in the gym, so I started doing the nutrition challenges. And then it was the same thing. People wanted to do the challenges, and then I opened it up to everybody. So then you have the challenges, you had that. My knee is getting worse and worse because it was, when I was about 30, it was when my knee was really bad. And I was pretty much deciding if I was ever going to compete again because my knee was,

since I was like 27, my knee had been bothering me. I had a really bad snowboard accident and tore my ACL, had full reconstruction in my knee. I tore like everything in there. And throughout like all the lifting, through Bob's lead and skeleton and CrossFit doing pistols and squatting every single day and doing crazy shit and running marathons and all sorts of stuff, my knee was a shot. And even now my knee is just like totally gone. So I started training differently in my own training and I started bringing in a lot more bodybuilding stuff, but I loved the sweat of CrossFit. And I loved the bikes and the assault bikes

and just straight just dying. So I started mixing together some old ideologies I found and some old articles from this guy named Pat O'Shea from the 70s and it's kind of the original methodology that Greg Glassman took over and created what we know of as CrossFit today. So I started taking a lot of these things and I mixed it with bodybuilding and I started creating this thing called high-intensity, interval bodybuilding. Because I love that term, hit training. It was like the most Google term and I was like, well, how how can I spin off that? So I was like, all right,

well, I'm going to take everything I love about CrossFit and everything I love about bodybuilding. And I'm going to mix it together. And I'm going to call it high intensity interval bodybuilding. And I'm going to call it HID instead of HID. And then that fucking thing exploded. So I kind of like stumbled upon everything. And when people ask me like, how everything actually happened, I tell them that I actually just wanted people to stop emailing me and stop contacting. It kind of like stumbled upon everything. And when people ask me like how everything actually happened, I tell them I actually just wanted people to stop emailing me and stop contacting. So like, the cost of a program was just people

to stop emailing me and stop asking what the work I was. So I made that. The nutrition programs were all because people kept asking me if they could do what we were doing. And I was like, all right, well, I need to figure out how to stop all these emails. And then people asked me what I was doing with my programming. And I was like, all right, well, this is what I'm doing. So here you go. Here's an ebook. You can buy that.

That was like my first ebook. And then all that shit just took off. And it was really just a way to get people to stop talking to me. And then lo and behold, I'd become a podcast there. Now I talk for a living. I know, yeah. Man, so I had a podcast. I did a podcast quite a while ago. It was about a reality TV thing that I went on.

And it was precisely the same. It was the fact that loads of people would say, hey man, so what was it? What's it actually like on Love Island? And I was like, right, I'm going to do this podcast. And now for the rest of time, all that I ever need to do is send them one YouTube link. It's like, there you go. That's an hour. And I've just scaled the, the response. And one thing I really want to delve into is what makes your programming different? Do you have some principles that you stick to? You know, there'll be a lot of coaches listening, a lot of guys from the

UK, a lot of guys from the US. And they'll be thinking, fuck that, I want to upgrade the way that I program for my gym. I want to make the members feel gassed when they step in, it's going to be different. What is it? So, yeah, and I actually just made a video about this on my Instagram yesterday. I don't know if you saw it or not. It might be in the show notes below. So basically, I'll never forget my first time that I genuinely wanted to get good at making workouts. I don't remember the age that I was at, but I know I was in college, and I remember the movie 300 came out.

And it wasn't just Gerard Butler who was all ripped. Like, you know, like the main character, it was everybody in the movie. Like everybody was ripped, and everybody was like, what the fuck are these people doing? Yeah. It was the first movie where everybody was ripped, and everybody was like, what the fuck are these people doing? Yeah. It was the first movie where everybody was ripped and everybody was like going crazy. It was on the cover of Men's Health magazine and everything traced back to this guy named Mark Twight. And Mark Twight owned a gym called Jim Jones, which is another famous kind of

branch of Jim's. Well, it's actually only one gym, but they do seminars and stuff kind of like CrossFit. To interject there. Sorry. Anyone that's listening who knows who Mark Twight and Mr. Blevin's his partner are, they have a seminar in the UK in the middle of April. And I've finally got a reply of Blevin's himself. And I might be able to get him on while he's over here, which would be really, really cool. So that would be cool. Yeah. He's an interesting guy. If you've not checked out the Dicec podcast, which is their thing, they're cool guys. They're underground.

They're kind of anti-marketing. I really like their vibe. Dude, I wanted to go to their gym so bad. Like, at the time when I was living in Utah, you would see Jim Jones shirts, but you never knew where the gym was. And when you went to the website, it actually said like we will not disclose location because we are by referral and

You have or if if it's not by referral you need to tell us why you want to work out here and like they only Accepted people to work out there. It was so bad. It was so bad ass. I was obsessed. I was like I have to work out here And like I would send the emails and like, I have to work out here. And like I would send the emails and like my responses were never good enough. And like, it was ridiculous. I was like, fuck this place, you know, like this is insane. Yeah, so making work out 300 men's self.

Yeah, so I start looking into what he was doing. And he, I want to actually meet him one of his trainers because I never could work out at his gym. And I start asking them about what they do and what their secret sauces and bubble bath. And they start talking about this thing called IWT training, interval weight training. And I looked that up, and that was basically

invented by a guy named Pat O'Shea in the 70s. So if you look up now, like the principles behind gym challenge, you can just Google it and it talks about IWT and Pat O'Shea. And basically, a lot of the stuff that they were making was he was the first person, Pat O'Shea in the 70s, making these high intensity interval workouts with compound lifts. So I know all this information at that time. I'm going to school through exercise physiology. I understand the body when I'm done with school. I'm pretty smart. I wind up being on the Bosnian team. I wind up doing 10 years of CrossFit. I wind up owning my gym for six years.

All these different factors that come into play. I trained tons of different athletes, football players, wrestlers, UFC fighters, all sorts of stuff. And I come into like one conclusion, right? Over time, we're all gonna get injured. At some point, if we're gonna be sports specific, if we're all gonna do CrossFit, we're gonna get injured at some point. We're all gonna do UFC, we're all gonna get injured at some point. If we all just do bodybuilding, we're probably gonna get injured at some point,

but lot lower risk. Because there's not a lot of rapid movement and stuff like that. More of an overuse injury than anything. But all of us are in this weird place where we all mentally like to be fucked. We all like to be in this crazy, ridiculous conditioning base where we just like to die. Right? And that's why I listen to this podcast. Probably everybody who's part of this has at some point been on the ground full covered in sweat.

And all these other athletes, they like doing football and you have seen all these things because there's a lot of grind to it. So I mixed together the old school IWT stuff, the things I liked about CrossFit, the things I didn't like about CrossFit I got rid of, right? In my training, you don't see a lot of overhead squats, you don't see a lot of handstand pushups,

you don't see a lot of muscle ups. I have them as advanced options for people who are, they really want to be good at CrossFit. Like my CrossFit programming, there's advanced options almost every day. And I like to fancy like both crowds, you know, the competitor and the person who's just doing this to look good, and they just love functional training. So that's what makes mine so different. And I also a big fan of maximizing my time. Like I always thought it was weird that people spent 15 minutes doing a clean and jerk,

and then they would have a 15, 20 minute conditioning piece. So I'm like, well, why don't we do an e-mom what we're doing? Like the other day, literally just two days ago, my workout for the day was on the first minute you do 15 burpees and on the second minute you do three clean and jerks. And then after three minutes you go to two cleaning jerks, and then after three minutes, you go to one cleaning jerk, but you're always doing 15 burpees. So in like a 20 minute window, you had done 150 burpees,

and you had built up to a 100 max cleaning jerk. And in other days, I'll do something where it's like a front squat and a rope climb, or like a front squat and like a lateral lunge, like a leg superset, or I'll do, like, the first piece will be, we'll do like five heavy strict press into like 10 dumbbell bent over rows

into 50 double unders, minute rest, and you keep going through that sequence for 15, 20 minutes. So it's like a whole compounding super set. So I'm a huge fan of doing super sets, and the reason for that is, people are here, because want to do a workout that takes limited time and gets them out the door. But your my responsibility when you walk out the door. When you tell someone where you work out, I want you to be proud of where you work out.

And when you say my name and my facility, I want to make sure that we're doing the best that we can for you to look the best you can. Because if you look mediocre, I'm going to feel mediocre when you tell people you work out of my gym. So, I'm not going to just give you some little 15 minute piece. I'm going to give you like a 15, 20 minute compounding piece with a bunch of other stuff. And then we're going to do the same conditioning that everybody else does, but in my own format, even when I think about conditioning, I think of way different factors and other people.

I can't stand when someone has a conditioning component and there's something in there that slows you down. Well, I know. There's like 15 wall balls, maybe it's like 15 wall balls, 15 toes of our 15 power cleans at 135 or something like that, right? It's like, all right, well, 15 wall balls I get, 15 toes of our, you're not gonna have very many people

hanging on the bar for 15 reps. So let's go ahead and take that down to like maybe seven or eight and then power cleans like 15 Is kind of a lot in that aspect because you're gonna be sitting there doing one at a time Let's say it's a 10-minute am rap now You only got like three rounds of this workout like for most people, right? So let's go, you know 15 wall ballsballs, seven toes of our five power cleans. And then I'll go Rx plus option and I'll do 15 wallballs, 10 toes of our seven power cleans and I'll make it 155.

You know, something like that. Rather than just write that original workout, I'll write two different versions of it. And I think that it gives it the stimulus that it needs for both crowds. What's the sort of adaptations that you're seeing from this sort of a workout because there'll be some people, you know, you've got a power lifter who's listening or a weight lifter who's listening, and they think, well, you're going to drop down that top end power.

You're not going to be able to do a true one rep max if you've got to do 15 burpees in between each round. Or you've got someone who's maybe more into them on a structural side of things, and they're going to think, well, you're not going to be pulling so much on the row, or if you've got to do wall balls or deadlift or whatever in between. So what are the sort of adaptations that you see? So that's kind of like what Pat O'Shea's thing was back then,

was that you could actually lift maximum loads, even with the conditioning component mixed in. And I just did, you know, whenler, if you ever heard of the whenler template, which 531 method, I just did a you know, Wendler, if you ever heard of the Wendler template, which 531 method, I just did a Wendler 531 method. Granted, I've had this gym for six years. I've had members online for about two and a half now. And I created my first Wendler template that was mixed with IWT format from PatternShift in the 70s. So, the first week for instance,

you have your dead lips, it's 65, 65, 75, 85%, on your first week of lips, there's a little bit heavier percentage on week two and three and then week four is your recovery. So you're even programming the D-loads in there as in 531? Yep. So the first part like on on on week one of this particular template, I did every four minutes by four rounds. So I put a time cap on it and then I also added a conditioning component in.

So I did every four minutes by four rounds. I did 400 meter run by in and then your deadlift at that percentage that you're supposed to do that day. And then the next week I did 400 meter run by-in and then your deadlifts at that percentage that you're supposed to do that day. And then the next week I did a 20 cal assault bike by-in and then your percentages for your deadlifts. And then week three, I did a 500 meter row by-in and then your percentage for the deadlifts for that week and that's the max out week. So the first two weeks I did every four minutes by four rounds and then the last week I did every five minutes by five rounds I added an extra round add an extra minute of rest I Got more PRs than I've ever seen in my entire Years of owning the gym online program. I mean there's literally gold stars on my water fight count like just

Like just ringing straight across the board. So People are using the conditioning what I think it is is a lot of people under warm up. So you have these long conditioning pieces mixed in with the lifting and it's actually warming them up to the point where they're actually doing things right for themselves. And then also the stress of time is actually letting them do the lift in an appropriate manner. Because a lot of people will either take too much time off, right? They sit around and talk to their buddies for five, six minutes and do the lift and it's heavy as fuck all of a sudden.

Or they don't take enough time off and they're lifting it too soon. So now when you have this window, you want to be at the end of the window on time, right? Because you're like, oh my god, I'm pretty tired from the row or the run or whatever. I'm going to wait. So they wind up waiting and they wind up without knowing it, resting just the right amount of time to do that lip. So for me, it's actually a really smart way of doing it. Because if, you know, if you knew exactly what you were doing every single day, you probably wouldn't be coming into a classroom setting, right?

You're probably there because you want some guidance. So I am trying to figure out the best way to guide people and when people find my programming, they realize that I'm really doing it in such a way that I'm maximizing the amount of time they're there, I'm maximizing their strength gains, their results, all these different things, off of just stealing a whole bunch of ideologies and just making them one. Very different to CrossFit. When you think about CrossFit, especially traditional CrossFit stuff, like it's very different.

Well, I'll do high intensity interval bodybuilding days, like the stuff that I write in my e-books. I'll do days of that stuff in the middle of a week. That's like very CrossFit-y. And I'll just have like one day where we kind of do a bodybuilding circuit, but it's in a conditioning format. And not everybody loves it, for sure. Like they're there to do strict cross-fit, but not everyone's getting hurt all the time. You know, like I have a very, very low rate of people getting injuries. And it's because we spend

time doing like isolated movements on certain muscle groups and letting those muscles get stronger. So that when you're doing a dynamic portion of that lift at some point with those muscle groups, they're not gonna get hurt. There's not like me, but my torn biceps, like that's probably overused from a lot of years of doing hundreds and hundreds of thousands of muscle ups and thousands of snatches,

and you know, just a ton of different things. There's not a whole lot of people now that I know who absolutely love CrossFit. So the gym that I train out has 800 members. You would absolutely love it, man. It's like a playground for fitness. Like... About 800.

800 members, yeah. Rebot CrossFit Timeside in the north of England. It is a leaco certified, a leaco weight placed in bars, calibrated the complaints, the weightlifting plates, the powerlifting, little steel plates, all the bumpers, like a 60, 70 foot rig in two rooms. It's just, it's beautiful. But we don't know. Is there an open gym? Is there an open gym? 6am until 9pm every day,

except for weekends, and you can always open gym. There's always open gym. Some of the classes class size tops out about 40 people. And yeah, Jordan, interestingly, the guy who owns that, he went through like, I'm gonna get this wrong, he's gonna kill me, but I think he went through like seven sites before this one. So he was the first version of the gym owner that you described. The start in a studio, move up to a slightly bigger studio, then a garage, then under an arch, then a industrial unit, slightly bigger industry in it. And now he's got something underneath a carpet shop,

the whole basement underneath a carpet shop. And there's a full body building side to it, there's a full weight lift inside. And it's so cool. It's legit, I'll send you some videos, I'll send you some email on email when some don't. It's beautiful, right? But with that, even I see now in those classes,

I think the removal of regionals has played quite a lot into this. But people aren't in love with CrossFit. I think they're in love with the sweat. They're in love with the community. They're in love with a lot of the things that Crossfit really brought together and created as a community. But you know, you're right, the overhead squat workout, the real high skill, under load and fatigue workouts where you know, even the best athletes, the most robust athletes

that are in the gym. No, I'm probably dicing with death a little bit here with regards to maybe where my shoulder position is or maybe where my lower back feels at the moment or maybe how my knee feels at the moment or something. Now people doing like deadlift running, like heavy deadlift coupled with running, coupled with box jumps, stuff like that, you're like, fuck man, like, you know,

there's something risky going on here, a little bit. And I wonder how much you can sacrifice on that pure CrossFit side. You know, the golden era 2009, 2010 programming crossfit, sacrifice on that, and then get back in terms of safety, get back in terms of, you know, the hypertrophy response, which is whatever anyone who says that they do crossfit and don't want to be an unbelievable condition is lying to themselves and lying to the people they're talking to. Yeah, I can't stand that shit. They're like, I just really want to feel good and, you know, whatever.

And I'm like, you're telling me that you don't want to look better. There's no fucking way. You know what I mean? Like, there's just no way. Like, everybody wants to look good, you know what I mean? And I think that's a big reason people like my programming too is because I do some of that bodybuilding stuff in there I am all about people looking good right like when you say my name you say my jam I want you to look good. So that is a thing that I definitely concentrate on and I don't think it takes an exercise

Physiologist or an athlete who's been competing for 10 years to look at a crossfit workout and say That's fucking dumb like why am I gonna do? 21 159 of overhead squats and something else as fast as I probably can? Like, an overhead squat is absolutely 100% meant to be like concentrated on, like making sure you're in the right position, making sure you're not just, just doing something, you know what I mean? Like even snatches, like're in the right position, making sure you're not just doing something. You know what I mean? Even snatches, when in the world have we ever done

30 snatches for time in history, it's always been like, you never see a way to do more than five maybe at most. And even those guys when they get older, they're fucking limping around and they're all fucked up and we're doing 30, sometimes 100 in a workout, right? Like if it's lighter, I'm saying 30 as in terms of like Isabelle, like Isabelle

is a workout, but it's a lot of impact on your joints and your cartilage and all the stuff on your body. And I know that CrossFit this year really wanted to make it, they wanted to get back to old school style and really like come back to the roots of like wide-grade glass and originally started it. And then they fucking throw pistols in the open. And I was like, what the fuck is this?

Because that's another movement that should be done like slowly and methodically, not like fast. And like, yeah, you can do it slow and methodically, but you're gonna get last place. So. Well, look at regionals. Look at regionals when everyone's chests,

everyone was popping a chest. Yeah. You know that was at 2018 or something like that? That was my last regional I competed in. Okay, but you came out of it with the chests still attached. Yep. Yeah, but not a lot of people did. They say that everybody who tore was like potentially

on steroids, so I was like, all right, I passed. Again, I passed. That's the limit, Stess. You guys never believed me. Yeah, no, until now when I still got my pectoral attached, yeah, interestingly, there was a couple of powerlifters I'm friends with, and they said that a pector is like a root one identifier of someone who is on pets,

especially when they, so they're going into the squat bench deadlift, right? But yeah, you're totally right. Like, there is some stuff, and I just think that's dumb. Like, it just doesn't really work. I was talking to Dr. Stuart McGill, back mechanic, so good friend of mine, I went and stayed with him in Canada last year, and I was talking to him and he said he once saw a CrossFit athlete

who had nine bulging discs. I think the total number of vertebral bodies that you have is 17. So it's like more than half of the gaps between, and that includes like all the shit that's right up here, right in the back of your neck, like more than 50% of, and this was just compounded over time. And you think, what the fuck is going on here? Dude, I remember one of my first,

probably my third or fourth regional event, we had to do a three rep max overhead squat off the ground. Do you remember that? Yeah, yeah. It was the first overhead squat in history that we ever had to do, but we also didn't have a rack. So we had to clean it, throw it on our back, then pop it up. Dude, people were getting so fucked up trying to throw it on their back. I'm like, and have you ever done so many handstand pushups in your life?

That was just like one example. Here's another one. If you ever done so many handstand pushups like in a workout, let's say you did a hundred, where your neck is like fucked up. Yeah. Like I don't think we should do

keeping handstand pushups ever. And then I also don't think that we should be doing, I don't even think we should be doing handstand pushups to be honest. Like there's presses I think are such a great movement and there's no need. I mean, I think if you're doing strict handstand pushups and you're doing them correctly, I think they're okay.

But most of the time, it's for time. So like even if it's strict, you're gonna fucking hit. And it's like, why are we doing this? I don't understand. Walked away from just like half an inch shorter than when I walked into it. I mean, how cool would it be if the CrossFit Games was just like a one mile run for time,

you know, like a 400 meter sprint, like all the max lifts, like, and a few conditioning workouts that had a whole bunch of, you know, pull ups and toes of our and shit in that. Maybe a swim and a bike and stuff like that. But general events, what's wrong with that? There's really nothing wrong.

You can vary them a little bit. Maybe one year, it's a 5K run in the other year, it's a mile, and the other year, it's like a 800 meter sprint or whatever. Basic track events and then basic lifting,, basic lifting, some power lifting, some a little bit of gymnastics work, that's not like devastating to your body. Like there's a better way to do it. Is that sufficient?

Yes, is that sufficiently exciting spectacle for the people that are there to watch, do you think? It can be, dude. If you had all your favorite cross-platform athletes, you want a 400-meter sprint for time, I would love to watch that. That would be fun. That would be fun.

Or like a 2K row. Yeah, a 2K row or a mile run. A 500 meter row would be amazing to watch. Just because like people skidding. Skidding the concept to use all over the place. They would be dying. Or you've seen like the indoor cycling, where they go around the circle.

Like get everybody like that. that would be fucking rad. Fully gasped. Yeah. Yeah, it'd be awesome. I wonder how much sort of CrossFit set it to stall out because it has been going so long. And there is this sense that you got to do more better, different, harder, faster, stronger, all this shit each year. I wonder if there is a risk there of things getting too intense, think either this constant requirement to one up the year before, you know, this year we're gonna let the audience get involved.

This year we're gonna get an octopus to pick the balls out of the thing and he's gonna tell us what the work is gonna be, you know? Yeah. I mean, I don't know. It's hard for me because I always feel like the last like two or three years, I'm like, man, CrossFit's getting smaller and smaller and smaller. Like I feel like the excitement level of someone to do CrossFit in my gym is getting

less and people just want to come in and do this like crazy workout kind of is getting less and less. And I keep thinking that CrossFit's getting less But there's still just as many people who want to go watch the CrossFit games and buy all the CrossFit shit online We're just not seeing them every day, but I I keep thinking at this rate. I'm like They have to stop all this like CrossFit Games has to stop they have to be spending an enormous amount of money for the games and all these things where it's not a lucrative scenario for them anymore. And I keep thinking it's going to happen and it hasn't happened. It keeps on taking over. The machine keeps on moving, man. It's interesting because you've

got CrossFit as a sport, competitive sport, and you've got CrossFit as a training methodology, right? And there's nothing else. No one says I'm training UFC. They say like I'm training. Well, the people that don't know what they're doing might say that, but they say I'm training MMA. You know, like I think that it's the fact that you have CrossFit as a competitive sport is one thing. But the more GPP kind of foundations of Y-Glassmen created CrossFit is something else. And you're totally right. Anyone who follows is it at CrossFit Health? I think is something else. And you're totally right. Anyone who follows, is it at CrossFit Health? I think if you followed that on Instagram, it's like they've got models of an old lady's front room and some 60 year old guy bending over with a two gallon milk jug, like doing bent over

rows with a two gallon milk jug because they're setting their stall out. It's like, look, we're getting back to GPP, we're getting back to the fact that this just makes you better at life, fitness for life, not life for fitness. And it's interesting, man. I wonder, I wonder where it's going to go. Look, right, I could, honestly, man, I could go on for, I could keep, I could dig back into this. If you've got time, I'd love to get you back on at some point soon. I want to delve into a million other things, but we've done it. We've done an hour and a half, man, and it's like, I know. You have to go to work. No, this thing is me going to work. I just start working. Oh, yeah. But this is part of work. Right. Look, um,

working people go, they want to check out some of your, your, um, e-books and your platforms and stuff. Where should they go? They can probably find everything on my Instagram, which is Ryan Fish, RYAN, FISCH. And I have one of those little link trees in my bio where it has They go. They can probably find everything on my Instagram, which is Ryan Fish, R-Y-A-N-F-I-S-C-H. And I have one of those little link trees in my bio where it has a connection to pretty much everything. Or if you want to follow just strictly the gym stuff, it's just CrossFitChalk on Instagram. We have CrossFitChalk.com.

And then my personal website is gymRyan.com, which is G-Y-M-R-Y-A-N. See what I did there? Kind of took the gym Jones kind of deal. But then also like everything for me started with a gym so has some... I have some secret underlying. Yeah, yeah, it's kind of cool. Yeah, so. Man, it's been it's been absolutely awesome. Thanks so much for your time. from.