S05E159 - CrossFit Owners - 908 Athletics Tim Carroll: Passion, Partnership, and Perseverance
Ready to get inspired by a story of passion, resilience, and community? Join us as coaches David Syvertsen @davesy85 and Sam Rhee @bergencosmetic sit down with Tim Carroll @tim.carroll, the dynamic owner of 908 Athletics @908athletics, who reveals his transformative journey from a finance career to not only a CrossFit affiliate owner, but the owner of THREE gym locations.
Curious about what it takes to start a successful gym empire? Tim shares the secrets behind his entrepreneurial leap, highlighting the essential role of his now-wife, Erin, whose unwavering support and practical execution brought his vision to life. From the nitty-gritty of building a 1700-square-foot gym to the critical importance of a supportive partnership, Tim’s narrative is a testament to the power of combining passion with practical support. Learn how the right team and strategic decision-making can make all the difference in creating a thriving gym community.
Balancing the needs of an evolving fitness community is no small feat, and Tim offers valuable strategies for maintaining a high-energy, inclusive atmosphere. Listen as we discuss adapting business models to meet the changing demands of both owners and members, the significance of hiring the right people, and the evolution of gym culture. This episode provides actionable advice on leadership, creating positive client experiences, and sustaining the intensity and spirit of CrossFit as members age. Whether you're a gym owner, coach, or fitness enthusiast, this conversation is packed with practical tips and heartfelt reflections that you won’t want to miss.
@crossfitbison @crossfittraining @crossfit @crossfitgames #crossfit #sports #exercise #health #movement #crossfitcoach #agoq #clean #fitness #ItAllStartsHere #CrossFitOpen #CrossFit #CrossFitCommunity @CrossFitAffiliates #supportyourlocalbox #crossfitaffiliate
S05E159 - CrossFit Owners - 908 Athletics Tim Carroll: Passion, Partnership, and Perseverance
TRANSCRIPT
Speaker Names
David SyvertsenHost
00:05
Hey everybody, welcome to the Herd Fit Podcast with Dr Sam Rhee and myself, coach David Syvertson. This podcast is aimed at helping anyone and everyone looking to enhance their healthy lifestyle through fitness, nutrition and, most importantly, mindset. All right, welcome back to the Herd Fit Podcast. I am Coach David Syardson. I'm here with my co-host, dr and Coach Sam Rhee, and we have a very special guest sitting in between us, and we all did not plan this outfit. By the way, it does look good, though. We have the owner of 908 Athletics, tim Carroll. Tim, what's up, man?
Tim CarrollGuest
00:41
Hey, how are you guys? Thanks for having me on.
David SyvertsenHost
00:50
I'm really excited to be here today. Yeah, I mean, hey guys, if I could create a visual for aging like fine wine, these two gentlemen sitting to my right would be A and B, or I should say A1 and A2, because these guys are two people that I look forward to, both look up to, both in and out of the gym, in and out of the CrossFit space. Guys that are very fit, very healthy, have a strong passion for CrossFit. And this is actually kind of launching off our first episode of a series under HerdFit podcast that is going to be called Owners Helping Owners, and Tim has been an owner for 14 years, almost 15, right, correct, october 15.
01:23
Wow, and that is I mean that is truly one of the oldest and I would even say at this point, one of the most successful crosses worldwide, not just in New Jersey, not the area, not the country worldwide, and he's a huge resource for me. We've we've traded ideas and thoughts over the years. Even just observing them from afar has inspired Bison in multiple ways. The two gyms that I've modeled Bison after, especially at the start, have been CrossFit Hoboken and CrossFit 908. Tim, speaking of CrossFit Hoboken, where did you start this whole thing?
Tim CarrollGuest
01:56
So my first affiliate ever that I joined was CrossFit Hoboken. I found out about CrossFit through a buddy and basically was, you know, trying to do it outdoors. And then I was living in Manhattan and I was trying to do CrossFit in a New York sports club and bringing dumbbells up and downstairs. It didn't really work well. But then I moved to Hoboken. That was 2007. And I joined. I mean, it was one of the only ones around and I immediately joined. I was like I didn't care what the cost was. I was like I'm coming to this gym and it was in 800 square feet in a really seedy building in Hoboken. It was definitely a little skeptical. There was one bathroom that was used by homeless people as well and I still didn't even care, but it was great. Yeah, crossfit Hoboken is where I got my start.
David SyvertsenHost
02:38
I got certified while I was there as a client and then I started shadowing and helping and as they grew, they needed some more coaches and I started to coach there yeah, and when I had started CrossFit a few years after that, I was still learning kipping pull-ups on a workout where we had a workout called Badger and it's three rounds of an 800 meter run, 30 squat cleans at 95, 65, 30 pull-ups. It's a hero workout. And I remember showing up all fired up and Craig Parcells was coaching the class and we said, you know, he always liked to give the best score of the day and he goes. Hey, one of our former members who opened up a gym, named Tim, did this workout. I think it was in the low 20s and I was just like holy cow, I didn't finish it, I got capped out out, um, and I remember me like this guy's a freak.
03:23
You were there, I didn't say hi to you, I didn't look at you, I was just like this guy is jacked, he's yoked, he's fast, everything, um, and I that's when I started from afar, kind of like all right, who is this guy? And then I read up on your background. You were working in finance. Um, left your career to open up the gym and again, that's like what, where I was at with tofaro, it's like it, kind of like it was one of the initial inspirations of Bison came from that night. That's why I remember so clearly what the workout was and what your time was and how badly you beat me in that workout. And just here we are all these years later and it's funny to see things come full circle like that. Sam, you actually interviewed Tim during COVID. Yeah, from Botox and Burpees and why.
Sam RheeCo-host
04:08
Tim, because I saw how much you modeled Bison after 908. I had done barbells and beers. It was a great competition, really enjoyed it. He seemed to have all his stuff squared away, like just everything was really done and executed appropriately. And so, you know, when I talked to Tim, it was really surprising. There was a lot I didn't know. I didn't like you had done it all.
04:33
You had been to regionals. You had been part of the Professional CrossFit League. What was it called? Again, grid League, grid League, grid League yeah, you had all this experience. Gridley yeah, you, you had all this experience. You also had a lot of health background because you have type one diabetes and so you know, learning all of those aspects about you, like what your background was, what you had experienced, building your gym, building yourself after having and going through health as well as athletic challenges that was really really impressive. And that actually was why I kept doing the podcast, because when I met someone like Tim, I was like, well, if I can meet someone that interesting and talk to him for an hour, let me see who else I can talk to and find out. That would be. I mean, not everyone is as interesting as Tim, but it was a good start.
Tim CarrollGuest
05:23
Never been called interesting, but I'll take it as Tim but it was a good start.
David SyvertsenHost
05:27
Never been called interesting, but I'll take it. So Tim is the owner of three different gyms right now. We're going to get into that later in this episode or next, but let's kind of quickly go over some of those early days, just so that we can kind of set the foundation that you opened up your original gym in Berkeley Heights, new Jersey, correct, and you're still there. The mothership is still there, but you actually moved spaces within that complex, correct? And can you just reflect a little bit on those early days of what it was like to own a gym? The fear, the anxiety, but also the ambition, sure.
Tim CarrollGuest
06:02
So so we opened up um in 2009, october 2009,. And I was subleasing like 1700 square feet and at the time I had just quit my job. I had proposed to my now wife, erin Um and I I had been doing CrossFit for probably two years at that point and I was. I was like everyone else in the beginning of CrossFit, I was just madly, madly in love with it. I was like there's nothing else for me. I want to do this.
06:27
And when I was fed up with my job in the city, I was like this is not a fad, it's not a trend, this is here to stay, for sure. Because I saw at CrossFit Hoboken just the bonds that were formed between people. I saw just the level of athleticism that someone could gain through doing CrossFit and I was like, for sure, this is here to stay. And so you know, I think what helped me was I sort of had a dumb confidence going into opening up my gym like this is going to work. I didn't think about if it's not going to work and my worst case scenario was like, oh, it doesn't work and I try to go back and get my MBA and go back into finance and just be miserable and live that life you know, and so my then girlfriend, but Erin, she supported me in opening it up and like it is for all owners in the beginning.
07:15
You work all the hours, right, you open, you close, but because it's this new thing and there's novelty and you love it so much, you're not thinking about, oh, I got to wake up tomorrow early or I have to close late tonight. You're happy to do it all in the beginning. So I feel like you know, if you're starting a business and you're not that way about it, it's probably not going to go well because you just got to be so passionate about it that you don't care about that. Of course, it gets to a point where where you get past the novelty and you're like, okay, I don't want to wake up at 4 am tomorrow and hit coach, but in the beginning it was all love and I was just like you know what I'm going all in and we opened up with like 11 clients, half of whom were friends and family, and that was yeah, back in 2009.
David SyvertsenHost
07:59
Wow, that's awesome. Yeah, I want to give Erin a shout out. I mean, she's going to come up several times in these next two episodes, but Erin is now Tim's wife, as you said, and she really is a huge, huge asset, brain of the operation type. Like I know, every time you run a competition, you always make her uncomfortable with the compliment you give her, but she really is the brains behind it. You know, if you want to just dive in, because this is actually somewhat common that a couple married, dating, engaged they do this together, or you could even say friends do it together.
08:30
There's a relationship. You didn't do this by yourself at the start. You had that support system. Can you kind of just like give some advice, as if you had someone sitting here that's thinking about doing this someday and they're like, hey, I'm independent, I'm strong-minded, I can do this by myself. How much did you and your relationship with Aaron and obviously ended up in a beautiful marriage with kids and everything, and you guys are, you know, just a great power couple I would say how much that. How much did that really help you guys at the start, knowing that you were never by yourself you had that support system with you really helped you guys at the start knowing that you were never by yourself.
Tim CarrollGuest
09:05
You had that support system with you. It was, I mean, it was honestly huge right because we were still kind of in the infancy of our like relationship. But when I decided to quit my job and open up the gym, she was fully supportive. When we got engaged, we moved out of Hoboken, we moved in with her parents, she was fully supportive.
09:22
And I think what's really helpful about my relationship with Aaron is that I was, and I still very much am, like the pie in the sky ideas guy, like how about this idea, how about this idea, how about this idea? And she's she's much more like well, how are we going to execute that? How is that even possible? And like not that she's always playing devil's advocate. But I do think that for me who was like oh I, I can do all these things, she grounds me on some of them and then makes me realize that not every idea I have is brilliant. And so that's really helpful with opening a business, because you can certainly get way ahead of yourself in terms of all the different things you want to do and all the shiny objects.
David SyvertsenHost
09:57
Yeah, yeah, the different. I mean Ash and I. Whenever we my wife and I, whenever we have discussions about the gym, it usually turns into a disagreement because we have the same thing. It's not that her ideas are worse or better than mine and vice versa, but we have different approaches to situations and I think that's really important for the longevity of a gym.
Tim CarrollGuest
10:21
Totally because it slows you down, right, instead of just going all in on something. You have that disagreement, maybe you get into a little bit of an argument, and then a day passes, two days pass and you're like, well, actually we should probably write about that, right? I can't actually do that, and so that's helpful, because otherwise you would just start doing everything you thought of and a lot of those things probably wouldn't be the best, yeah.
David SyvertsenHost
10:40
Now. So you guys are burning the candle from both ends. Popular, saying that many CrossFit owners can relate to. At what point did you start to look at this situation and say, all right, this is a real business. We are open so many days per year, more than almost every business known to mankind right now. I mean, we are here at Bison. We're open 363 days a year. We're 363 as well, and it's great. What two days are you off?
Tim CarrollGuest
11:05
We are off on Christmas Day, yep, and we close the day after our holiday party. Oh nice, that's smart. I guess Sam make a mental note of that. Maybe 362 now with barbells and beers, but we still allow anyone from Berkeley Heights to go to.
David SyvertsenHost
11:19
Westfield that morning. Okay, so think about that. I mean, how many businesses do you know are open that many days, or who are expected to?
Tim CarrollGuest
11:25
be open like on every holiday, right?
David SyvertsenHost
11:32
It's like, hey, we all have off from work, but please make sure that your coaches are here for me to work at yes, that's a great point or when there's, you know, eight inches of snow on the ground, but again, that will come up as well later on. But at this point right, we brought that up because the schedule is very intense. It's holidays, it's morning, it's late, it's when general public is not working, that's when you have to be open. At what point were you saying all right, aaron and I can't do this alone. Was it a year in, was it quicker than that, when you actually started to hire some coaches to help your community out?
Tim CarrollGuest
12:04
It was definitely the majority of the first year was all me. I had, initially, when I opened up, my cousin, who was a trainer, was going to help me out a little bit, but it didn't. It didn't really pan out. He wasn't coaching that much. And then I had a early on client who was also in love with CrossFit, who eventually became a coach for me, and I'd say like, probably within that first year, aaron and I got married, basically a year into it, and I was like, okay, like as the schedule got more robust, I was like, all right, we added a 5am. Now we've got two 5ams, you know. And then the 5amers, of course, are like we want five of them. And it got to a point where it's like, all right, I can't open and close right, cloping or whatever people call it right every day, um, and so I immediately was like, all right, let's get a coach in to do two of the 5 ams, right, and give me a little bit of relief.
12:48
And then that's just one of those things that you know as, as the business grew which you know, 2009, 2010, it was early days crossfit, it was not that busy, but I'd say like when, um, what were those? The groupon kind of deals came around and we started doing that stuff and we would get like 30 people in for a free intro class. It was like holy crap and that was probably like that 2013, 14 area where we had taken several years just to get to 100 members and then we jumped like 50 clients in less than a year. And it was kind of one of those things where it's like, all right, we need more classes and there's other aspects of the business that need focus other than just coaching. When you have 11 clients, all you need to do is show up, coach them. They go home, the gym's clean, you go home, right, yep. Once you get above and beyond that, the expense side of the equation goes up quite a bit. You're looking for bigger space, you're looking for more equipment, you're looking at okay how do I promote myself?
David SyvertsenHost
13:51
And I think if you're coaching all those classes you lose a lot of your creative juices to do that stuff. Sam, reflecting on what Tim's saying right now and you were one of the OG Bison members, you were here very early before classes were big Can you, from that client perspective kind of see, did you ever notice as a member you know that the coaches, you know me back then really that guy was closing the night before and here he is opening the morning. Did you start to see a difference in me at some point? You could be honest like, hey, you're just tired all the time. Hey, it's a little extra moody this morning. Or was the passion burning high so much that, hey, everything was fine?
Sam RheeCo-host
14:18
What Tim is describing is a fairly organic growth process, and I think you also found that growth process organically when you added people in. So when it, I don't think you ever got to the point where you were going to break. You bent and then you you added as you needed and, and the people that you added were good choices, and so it made it natural, it almost seemed natural, to have the coaches that you added in as part of the group Right. It didn't seem contrived or faked or substituted.
David SyvertsenHost
14:54
It was good, yeah, now to set that up for Tim. You're at this point. You've acknowledged that the business is getting too big for you to do everything and you want to hire some people, and you have some people. Did you hire in-house? Only Was it always someone that was a member at your gym first, knew your operation, knew CrossFit, was taught CrossFit by you, so you know where their foundations are in relation to this. Was that always how you hired early on, and has that carried on into the current stage?
Tim CarrollGuest
15:21
So with our original location in Berkeley Heights heights, it was always internal. All of our coaches came internally, which was great. I mean, I didn't know how to source external coaches at the time and I think, like early days crossed, that I felt more comfortable with someone who had been under our you know tutelage for two to three years than I did just finding some random person. Maybe now you have coaches that have jumped around, they've been coaching for five plus years and you can find better talent, right. But it just felt more like, okay, this person really loves CrossFit. You know they seem to want to coach other people. They would be a great addition to the team.
15:57
But as we grew and then we looked to open up in Westfield, we had a staff member, christina, who's our kind of like general manager head coach, who we knew could do so much of the backend. Like Aaron, it was also a great coach, very friendly, but we needed more help than just her. And so someone did reach out from another CrossFit gym at the time and I met with her and I really liked her and so we hired her. So that was kind of like the first outside hire and it worked out really well as well. Good.
David SyvertsenHost
16:25
Now, what do you look for? What did you look for has this changed in? In hiring your coach? So if you and Aaron were sitting at home and said, hey, we have to add to our staff right now part-time, full-time, whatever has that changed since that? 2011, 12, 13 era?
Tim CarrollGuest
16:44
That's a good question, I think to. So to answer the first question, right, what am I looking for in a coach? I think what a lot of people talk about is like you want to hire the person, right. So I think you want to hire the person that you like, that other people will like that's that's going to fit in with your culture. So still, top priority for me would be like could I come on a podcast with them and sit next to them for an hour and then just kind of shoot the breeze, like if I can't do that, I'm probably not interested in you being a coach for me, right? If I can't go and have like a drink at the bar with you or go out and have lunch and not be super awkward, you're probably not going to be a coach at 908. Sam, good news.
David SyvertsenHost
17:20
We can coach for Tim.
Tim CarrollGuest
17:21
We can coach for Tim.
David SyvertsenHost
17:23
We have to make it an hour, though he said an hour.
Sam RheeCo-host
17:26
Do you know what I mean, though? No, absolutely.
Tim CarrollGuest
17:28
It's just that litmus test of whether or not you and I could get along, and I mean that might not be the right answer, but also, I own the business, so I get to make those decisions.
David SyvertsenHost
17:37
That's 100% the final answer. It's ironic because we are in the process of adding to the staff in the next year I'm not going to put a timeline on it and it's a discussion that we have a lot and that it's always circles back to the same exact thing. It's you hire the person, you'll, you'll. You know you don't hire necessarily the coach, you hire the person and that person needs to a love cross, it want to help people, be selfless, and you know you could, you could throw. We actually did a whole episode on what make, what is the ideal coach? And they can all be different.
18:08
Did you try to over the years, or did this happen naturally? Did you try to find different kinds of coaches, different personalities, or did you want, because you, you can hang out, you can go get a loud, energetic cheerleader. The other one could be analytical and really maybe even borderline boring. But I remember at Hoboken that was one thing I noticed about their staff and this was after you left that you had Rocky, who I was just afraid to make eye contact with. You had Stefan Barr, who would make people sleep in class because he was so boring, but you learned so much from him. He was very analytical. You had Craig, who's kind of like a mix of everything, bennett. I mean, do you think about that even to this day, that you want to have different personalities because you want to fit the need of so many people that come to your gym?
Tim CarrollGuest
18:59
So I would say this At one point I felt like I needed to hire the L4 know-it-all coach and then I quickly realized that, like you said, sometimes you get the most knowledgeable coach but people in class are, like you know, either turned off by it, they're bored by it, they feel like this person's arrogant, they're a know it all, and so I quickly pulled back from being like that's who we need in class.
19:23
I felt like we're always going to need someone who, when a client walks in the front door and they smile and they greet him by name, the person's like I like that person and I think the reality is, like as much as we know about CrossFit and fitness, our clients are there just to work out. Not every single one of them is 100% invested in the programming and what cycle we're on and at the end of the day, if the coach makes them feel good and feels like the coach is looking out for him, gives them a modification, all that stuff they're going to have a positive experience. So as long as the client's having a positive experience in the class, I feel like I'm okay. So the you know L5 guru like knows everything about every L undulating this and that like that's. I don't think that we're in the market for that person. I do think that person could maybe sit in the background and look at the programming and give you some guidance, but I don't think that's who I necessarily need out on the floor.
Sam RheeCo-host
20:18
Okay.
David SyvertsenHost
20:19
Sam thoughts on that, Because we've been talking about this a lot for a long time now.
Sam RheeCo-host
20:22
Yeah, I agree, and only because I feel like, as a coach myself, I am not the most skilled, because I feel like, as a coach myself, I am not the most skilled, knowledgeable, like find the fault, you know, correct flaws, type of person. I am trying and I'm continually working on that, but I have a lot of. I think a lot of my legitimacy as a coach goes because I work out with these guys. I know them, they know me, they trust me, they know I'm trying really hard to make sure that they're, you know, getting a positive experience that day, and so, as a coach, they cut me a lot of slack sometimes because of that. Said then, whether or not I like really zeroed in on whether their knees and hips were rising at exactly the same rate on their cleans, they still got something out of it and I'm still working on that part of it too.
Tim CarrollGuest
21:19
Right, yeah, it's not like you're ignoring it, but like you're giving them a positive experience in class. Right, that's right and I think that, yeah, I totally agree with you that you just want the coach to make the class feel like they're cared about. It's not the coaches ignoring being technically sound. You always want them to continue to progress and get better.
David SyvertsenHost
21:34
Yep, but I don't, I'm not sure that, like the knowledge is all you need One of the standout coaches meetings that we've had, sam, there's two that stick out in my head, but one of them was when we went over like, hey, the job is no longer coaching, teaching cleans, it's creating the experience, it's making that a great hour that people are paying, I would say, an above average rate in relation to gym memberships.
21:59
Now we can get into like, hey, what's economic, what's a good deal, what's a bad deal? But you're not just signing up to work out, you are signing up to have someone plan it out and program and coach you and watch you and support you and create a great experience. And those are the coaches that I think are very long lasting and can get to a point where they're never comfortable. I was just telling Tim and he felt the same way that whenever I coach a class before, I'm always nervous before I coach, and I don't think that will ever be the case, and I related it to what do we tell people when they get nervous before an open workout and they're like why am I nervous? What's the answer, sam? Because you care, because you care, and that's why, if you're not nervous before you coach a class, that's a red flag and you could fix it.
Tim CarrollGuest
22:44
But you have to just be very emotionally self-aware. I don't coach many 5 ams anymore at all, but when I do, I'm there usually around 4.27 in the morning Setting eight alarms on your phone. Yeah, and I've got all the machines lined up the way that I want them. I've rewritten the warm-up six times because I didn't like the way it flowed, and then by like 4.42, I'm just twiddling my thumbs waiting for people to walk in the door. Is this the right playlist? It's 15 years later and I'm still completely nervous and sleep like crap the night before.
David SyvertsenHost
23:18
Yeah, yeah, that's it. So we talked about you starting, we talked about you adding to the staff and how that's changed and how much, how important. I really think it's one of the most important decisions that gym owners ever going to make is who's going to work there and coach there. Your all right, trying to balance this. I need to take care of myself. You know your own individual self, yourself as a husband, yourself as a father now, and also I mean tim is the one of the most decorated and highest level athletes I've ever personally known.
23:44
He's definitely the highest level athlete sitting at this table, for sure, and he's one of not the case one of the one of the og regional athletes multiple times. And that how did you balance? Because this is something I think a lot of gym owners struggle with, and whether they're competitive or not, or we're competitive or not, you still want to put a lot invest into your own fitness and your own health, and there's a lot of elements to being a gym owner that are not healthy um, sleep cycles, stress levels, um, you know, getting a quick wad in before your coach or after coach, before you go home, not warming up properly. How did you balance that? Because I've always been curious how, how did you get and reach and stay at that level while you were growing CrossFit 908 with help, but you still did it into one of the most successful gyms we've ever seen?
Tim CarrollGuest
24:37
That's a tough question, you know. I think I'm not going to use like kids as a crutch in anything, but a lot of the success that I had in CrossFit competing was prior to kids, right. So I we had maybe a coaching staff of two or three people at Cross9 at the time, and so I competed at the 2011, 12 and 13 regionals, and then 14, we did it as a team those are all pre-kids and so I was, you know, I, if I coached the morning, I was at the gym at six and maybe I had a class at 9, and then at noon and I had these big breaks where I wasn't out there running Facebook ads and marketing and doing all these other things. So I'd be like, all right, I should train more, I want to do this, I want to do that.
25:18
I had that burning desire to get better and I didn't have a lot of other responsibilities at the time. I had one gym so I could pour myself into training, even if it wasn't the right type of training or whatever it was. I could hit two workouts a day, I could lift extra, do all that stuff. And so you know, I see people out there like who is it? Travis Mayer is making his eighth appearance. He has like 16 kids he coaches. I'm like that's amazing, right, like he does all that despite having a ton of responsibilities. I think I was able to be hyper focused on just training and then I think clearly that kind of shifted as, um, you know kids and that kind of stuff came about and the businesses got bigger and more demanding yeah, so in 2012 I opened up with the.
26:10
So Craig Parcells opened Hoboken with Eddie San Giacomo. Eddie and myself and another guy, Mike Gallant, opened up CrossFit Jersey City in 2012. I forgot about Jersey.
David SyvertsenHost
26:19
City.
Tim CarrollGuest
26:19
And so I owned that for two years, and then we sold that to Russell Francis, who now owns it. It's now called JC Fit Co. And they've got two locations in Jersey City I forgot about Jersey Fit. Yeah.
David SyvertsenHost
26:29
Okay, jersey City, yeah Now. So now, like same church, different pew here Did you have to? Over the years, how did you go about lightening your load as a coach? Because, like you know, and where did you find one? Like, how many classes did you feel like you should be coaching? Because you still want to have a presence there, but you also want to get other people in that room to a provide some relief. For you, but also for the sake of the members, I think it's helpful for them to have a different voice here and there. You can't always have the same voice year after year after year um, you don't want an angry dad up there every day exactly yeah, why is the chalk spilled?
Tim CarrollGuest
27:08
you know you need someone else that doesn't care that much about that kind of yeah you know did.
David SyvertsenHost
27:13
How did you? Did you seek advice? Did you kind of just go on feel, was it Aaron's decision, like what? Where did you find the line of like all right, this is too many classes for me to coach in addition to everything else while I'm also trying to train? Or was it just kind of trial and error at point?
Tim CarrollGuest
27:29
I think it was more trial and error, because there was never a black and white like oh, it's this amount of classes I need to coach. But every time you'd bring a coach on, you wouldn't just like hire them for 5 am on Tuesday and then you'd come and coach the 6 am. You'd be like all right, I'm gonna put them on for a while. I can remember vividly several years. It was like 11 classes a week. It was like I had this set schedule that I was hitting all the time and then when Westfield opened, it took another leg down because I was like all right, I got to be there physically, I got to see what's going on with that and then, most recently, with the opening of the third gym, actually like just kind of came off the schedule fully. And now I'm I'm much more. You know, with three gyms and you know 12 to 15 staff members, there's a lot of filling in. That needs to happen. It doesn't mean I'm coaching a ton, but I also need to be like available.
David SyvertsenHost
28:26
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's I think we're really going to dive into the whole multiple gym in the next episode. So we have like one more thing I want to kind of dive into for the next like 10, 15 minutes. This is something that, again, it's really very I almost feel selfish asking these questions, because it's very relevant to what we're going through.
28:50
Well, yes, this is all directed to picking his brain for yourself, which is good. Yeah, this is actually not for you guys. No, but I also know, because I have to imagine, that if what I'm thinking and going through and what we're going through, several other gyms that have been around for 10 years now are there or they're heading there and this second question is something that's on my mind 24-7. It really is is something that's on my mind 24-7. It really is.
29:09
With an aging group of members right, founding members because we're all getting older, do you ever feel the need to get younger, whether it be your staff or new clients, new leads, or do you simply have to pivot things within your culture and your programming? So, basically, we have members that have been here for 10 years now. They were 25. They were. Now they were 25. They were 30. They were 35. Didn't have kids. Right Now they're 35, 40, 45, 50, 55,. Okay, they might not have the same passion and burning desire to come in and get excited to do Fran or chest-to-bar Fran or heavy grace, like they used to. Right, is it your job to pivot how you do things as a gym owner and programmer? All right, whoever's doing the program there, because I know it can bounce around a little bit, or do you simply have to find the same kind of people that you found 15 years ago? That's a loaded question. It is so. We did an episode on this last week. Are you trying to get new members? Are you trying to retain everything you have?
Tim CarrollGuest
30:13
Okay. So I think there's two parts to the answer. One is if you have clients that have been with you, like we have we're turning 15 in October we will have a client that has been with us for 15 years. That's awesome, awesome. So you need to see what the needs of your community are right.
30:29
If you started out and all everyone was in their thirties now they're in their fifties like there's no way you can tell me that you can still program the exact same things you know, program for the best and scale for the rest. I think that is a great ideal. I think in business practice we tend to try to program for the rest not meaning like it's watered down but then we give some scaling up options for those that want to be competitive. So I don't feel the need like we need to just get a bunch of young people in here. But I will tell you that I don't feel like we are seeing people in their mid twenties like running towards CrossFit, and I think there's several other options that are much lower barrier to entry for that demographic, and we're now struggling with lots of competition in the boutique group fitness space. So, as much as I would love to have some 20-year-old fire breathers that are in there that are all about competition, stuff like that.
31:25
I think you can't take your eyes off of who's been with you for five plus years and what their needs are, right or what, what their desires are. At the end of the day, we're serving, like, our general community around us, right? We're not serving just athletes that want to go to the crossfit games, right? Um, and I think as a prudent business owner, you need to recognize that and figure out okay, obviously we're never going to get away from strength training, but maybe, maybe we're not programming ring muscle ups and squat snatches very often because we see it causes a lot of shoulder issues and stuff like that.
32:00
People have mobility issues. They come in two to three days a week. They want to feel good, they're not spending time working on all of these positions, and so I think sometimes that's where the ideal of CrossFit and sort of the business side of it do diverge, and I know people would argue with me on that, but I'm just speaking anecdotally, right, 15 years in. I started when I was 26. I'm now 41. I'm a dramatically different athlete than I was then.
David SyvertsenHost
32:24
My body feels dramatically different Sam thoughts on that, Because we've had conversations about this as much as any topic in.
Sam RheeCo-host
32:34
I don't think you've followed that honestly, especially with the programming, because your programming is heavy as shit and it's getting worse. Dave's yeah, Not mine, he's like frigging scaling up for everything. What used to be 95 is now 105, 115, like 125, or what was 45 for the women is now 55, 65. I feel sorry sometimes for the new athletes that we have, because they're scaling. They're going to scale forever, right, because back in the day, what was RX is no longer RX.
Tim CarrollGuest
33:04
Yep, it's like so CrossFit's done that too. I mean, you see the weights that are on these bars, that they have the clean ladders. The clean ladders are going up to 365. Yeah.
Sam RheeCo-host
33:13
That's really heavy weight. Nobody programmed 135 pounds. Only the elite or good athletes at your gym did 135-pound snatches. Now it's like you better if you don't do that, you're scaling and I'm still like can I still do a?
33:27
couple, I don't know, I'll try, but I will say so. I think there is a divergence in philosophy between what I see with Tim and you in terms of the philosophy of greater community versus performance athleticism. But I think you've helped figure it out in the sense like there are people that still want that as their ideal, totally, like maybe they can't get there, but they want someone who's going to help them get as close to that as possible. Yeah, nobody wants to do a stupid bootcamp where you're just sitting there and just like zooming for 30 minutes Like they want to push. Yeah, and so it's finding that balance between being accessible, not scaring people, but also like knowing, like you're you are pushing them to some potential without the risk of, or excessive risk of, injury. And that's a really, really hard line that when I see owners grapple with that's tough. That's why I can see you staying up every night thinking about that. How do I tailor what?
Tim CarrollGuest
34:36
our approach is yeah, I think for me it's like, you know you, you end up kind of projecting your own insecurities around it. You're like, oh, are these people going to leave because we're doing too hard of workouts and stuff like that? But then the other side of it is you don't want to extinguish someone's fire, right? You don't want them to look at the program and be like, ah, it's not really crossing anymore, we're not lifting enough barbells, and so that's definitely been a huge point of stress over over the long term, with 908 for me and it's.
David SyvertsenHost
35:01
It's not a scientific answer. You know, like I don't think you're ever going to wake up and be like, oh, that's the formula. Yeah, like you know, tomorrow's workout, for example, sam is. You know we started a new system here, tim. We do it once or twice a week. It's called the level system, where, like, level one is like an rx plus caliber workout. You should probably only do it if you're competing or really really fit within those movements. Level two is like your typical bison rx. Level three, it's just like a hair under but it's still considered. And if you do level one tomorrow, like if you came in, I'd make I'd make you do level one tomorrow.
35:32
But the movements are, it's running, wall walks, 135 snatches and ring muscle-ups, like that. That is a hard combination of movements. Yeah, no crap. And if someone comes in that just started crossfit and they don't really have any of those things, it's and you're looking around, it's intimidating, it's hard to be around, or the. The thing that is really tough to cope with is the group of people that three years ago wanted to do that, but they no longer can or don't want to train that way, but they're still a huge part of the community. That, to me, can be one of the hardest things to deal with, because you want to be loyal to them and support them and respect them, but at the same time, you have those 10 people over there that want to still do that.
Tim CarrollGuest
36:18
Yeah, and that's where it gets personal. We all have those clients right, and even I've been in that position where I want to do something, but I know, given my current situation it's not ideal for me, but that's definitely going to put a damper on your eight-year client who three years ago wanted to do that and now doesn't. But they see everyone else doing it and there's just that there's always that kind of like I wish I were doing that in CrossFit, right? Yeah, there's all those shiny objects. Everyone wants to. Everyone wants to be able to do a muscle up right, climb the rope, do handstand pushups do double unders, no problem.
David SyvertsenHost
36:53
Like people want to do that, absolutely yeah, and it's it's if we are going to push people to being the best version of themselves and take care of themselves outside the gym. A lot of these issues aren't just like, hey, this barbell's too heavy. It's like, hey, I don't move well when we do a warm-up together or I don't do mobility on my own, and again, we don't want to get too preachy there, but that's why this is a really loaded situation. That's hard to answer and you know. But I can definitely see Tim's perspective of like that is kind of where there's a disconnect between these 15 year affiliates and the direction which CrossFit's going. And you know we're all about, hey, let's get new affiliates, let's do give them these starter packs and all this stuff.
37:27
Where I think the future of CrossFit, the growth of CrossFit, needs to come from people like Tim, where you're just like here's what I've been through for the last 15 years and this is what I'm doing that I would take his advice over any starter packet that CrossFit would ever hand down to me, because he's in it, he's been in it. Let's relate this to your, your fitness, because you're no longer a. You almost made the games one year, right? No, I didn't, I didn't. We're pretty far up there one year. Well, at regionals, yeah yeah, I finished.
Tim CarrollGuest
37:57
I think I was like the three years. I did it individually. I was in the teens, like 16, 18 and 20 or something.
David SyvertsenHost
38:02
That's almost making the games all right now because you don't pursue that anymore. Right, and he has signed up for the bison brawl. Rumor has it they're favored to win the, the masters division, right now. We'll see um, but because you don't pursue that, are there any insecurities that you feel that just because you don't pursue the highest end of cross anymore? And you were at the highest of the high and aaron was too with her, uh, when she was on the team and she's incredibly fit. Both you guys are now and you guys still do crossfit. But there's things you don't want to do. You've had injuries in the past you don't want to do. You've had injuries in the past. You don't want to push the needle. Do you feel pressure that you're no longer quote, setting the example of being that top-tier athlete that others can follow, and are you fearful that it might dampen their flame a little bit?
Tim CarrollGuest
38:52
I think, yeah, the easy answer is yes, for sure. I think, as soon as I felt like I was taking a step back from trying to put my all into competing, that maybe that started to, like you know, put the flame out, for some other people could have, like you know, they would look at me and say, well, if he's not really that into it, am I really that into it? Um, and I think it wasn't that I didn't want to pursue being, uh, an athlete and trying to get further. It's just that I changed my priorities right. I don't I have no grand illusions that I could have gone to the games. I did feel like the landscape shifted in 13, 14, 15, where you went from weekend warriors making it to regionals to now you know Matt Fraser's on the scene and he's, you know, former Olympic hopeful and you know he's training five hours a day. And I was like I don't want to train six hours a day, I don't want every waking moment to be about fitness. But there was also a part of me that wanted to make it to that level. And then I did feel like, when I pulled back a little bit, going from regionals where we had like 60 people come up and watch us as a team. It was just like such an amazing community event. And then just the energy in the gym after that was amazing. To go from that to like that was my last year competing.
40:09
And then it was the Open. And then you know people that are super fit in your gym but they don't want to do the Open because they're nervous about it or it's going to make them feel less than you know, than their self-worth, right, they're going to feel crappy because they can't do a certain movement. Right, we started to get into that zone of like well, now they're not doing the open anymore. Now he's not doing the open or he's injured, and so, um, I think the the short answer is is yes, and that's that sucks, because I'd never want that flame to go out for people. I want people to come into the gym and just be all jazzed up about CrossFit and I think, unfortunately, if I took a backseat to it, then maybe other people kind of just joined me.
David SyvertsenHost
40:47
Yeah, it's a ripple effect. I mean everything you do in a ripple effect. And we've all been in the gym before where you're surrounded by people that are really going after it. It's awesome to be around. There's almost nothing better.
Tim CarrollGuest
40:56
Yeah, there's almost nothing better. Yeah, that's unbeatable. I mean, when we get to like when I got to even come in and work out with you, yeah, like I, just those types of things were always my favorite. We used to always go to Brazen Athletics and I work with Jay Schroeder and just like the energy there was palpable and those days they're kind of they're long gone because I don't have those like four hour stints midday where I can just go do that stuff. But yeah, when you come to Barbells and Beers, right, and you guys are out there with three teams on the floor and the bison community is cheering and it's just like it's so hard to beat that vibe and that's where, when I was going for and we would throw down with our coaches and other coaches and people in class. That's to me one of the best things about CrossFit, yeah.
David SyvertsenHost
41:40
And that's and that's like, where can you find that flame without having to put yourself through the blender all the time? Yeah, like your body, you know, can only handle so much and you only want to do so much. And, sam, you know, here here at Bison, you know we have a, I would say, a fairly high competitive vibe here. You know people Very high, very high People that sign up for comp, people that make quarterfinals, and then we had this week this year we had to shut the gym down one night to fit everyone in for quarterfinals.
42:06
I personally still love that and whether I'm involved in it or not, like I just love the energy, like you can, like what Kathleen says if you could bottle that and sell it you'd be a millionaire Like just that feeling and what it does to the motivation levels, can you? You know you've seen people in this gym kind of go back and forth with their love for competing versus I just want to come and work out. And you've kind of been I mean Sam's been he was like our OG age group qualifier, him and Kathleen Staunton, and you remember those days like we just trained for it so much fun.
Sam RheeCo-host
42:40
It was so much fun and horrible at the same time.
David SyvertsenHost
42:42
Yeah, can you see what I'm kind of talking about in terms of, like, do you ever feel pressure now as an owner, as a gym, that, hey, you need to be pursuing your top level, you need to be going dark two days a week?
Sam RheeCo-host
43:05
No, because I'm old, like I'm 54 and uh, and I don't feel that and, trust me, it kind of sucks, because I will give it my all and I'll look at my numbers and be like, well, that fall off is starting to get pretty dramatic, and even the stuff that I'm good at, it's hard to match up against the people at our gym now. So it's been a gradual erosion of my ego and I think that that's the best thing you can do is to just take it as it comes, like I've seen you also grapple with it. I think that's why you're asking Tim Absolutely Because you're looking for guidance in terms of as you are no longer the alpha, the person who's sort of tip of the spear in terms of athletic performance, and you see others like how do you push them without looking like you're slacking Right?
David SyvertsenHost
43:47
giving up gritting. Exactly, it's just more like a pivot because, to wrap this question up an episode, what can an owner, tim, do, a coach, someone that's you know was like the alpha, as Sam put it what can they do to still set the foundation, still be the example, still be the the leader? Like I'm huge on leaders are actions, not words. Do you still show up to class? Do you still warm up at the class? Do you still do? Do you still scale when you need to scale? What are the things you can do? You know?
Tim CarrollGuest
44:25
beyond doing 15 unbroken muscle-ups and snatching 235 to really lead the way for your members. So I do want to make a quick point because I think as much as Dave says he's looked up to 908, I look up to Dave in this way, which is Dave to me is like the ultimate coach supporter. Any competition any of his members are having, he's there right by them and I think that honestly, dave, you certainly love competing more than me and I think that, um, maybe I never was just a hundred percent into being the best coach I could be. Maybe I was opening up a gym because I wanted to run a business and I loved CrossFit. And I think that's where I see the difference and I think that even if you were to pull back at all, you would still be at every competition. You would still be talking to people about strategy and how to do that. And I think where I pulled back on CrossFit and some of that stuff, and maybe because I felt insecure about not being able to compete anymore, I just stopped talking about the competitive side of things and how to do better at this thing and the strategy on that. That's where I don't think you'll ever fall back on and I don't think you need to worry about pulling back on athleticism, because I think you're the people's coach and they're always going to look up to you. In that regard, I think coming into class is a great way to keep your relationship with clients.
45:41
So Aaron and I take class every week. Right, I rarely am working out on my own. I try to hop into classes at both of our affiliates as much as I can. If I need to scale, I scale and people will be like why did you do that? I'm like leave me alone. This hurts, you know, but I think that's also leading by example. Maybe then that person's like oh, I can, I don't have to do that as well. Or why are you? Why are you biking today? I'm like, oh well, I heard this. Or why are you not doing muscle-ups? Why are you only doing pull-ups or something? Why, I heard you know. So there are those things that you can lead by example in that and make people feel like, okay, it is okay to pull back a little bit.
David SyvertsenHost
46:18
Yeah, all right. Well, that's going to be the natural break of this episode. We're going to record one more for next week, guys, but that was a really good kind of like all right, the start of 908 Athletics and kind of leading up to the current and the next episode. We're really going to kind of lead up to some of the biggest decisions Tim has made in the past few years and also, more importantly, the future, because Tim's not done yet. So, thank you, guys, and we'll see you next week. Thanks, guys, thank you everybody for taking the time out of your day to listen to the Herd Fit podcast. Be on the lookout for next week's episode.
