Why I Started CrossFit Huddersfield
Why I started CrossFit Huddersfield….
Well as some you will know. I didn’t, at least not in it’s original form.
I was never hugely in to fitness. Yes I did a bit of sport at school (usually when semi forced to) but as a kid in High School in the nineties, sport wasn’t all that cool.
As an adult I joined a regular gym, messed about on a cross trainer or a treadmill, occasionally took a spin class and even more occasionally picked up a couple of dumbbells.
Then I started to have regular training sessions with a PT which in turn made me realise that actually I kind of enjoyed training. My fitness increased and my body started to change shape as I lifted more weights.
Then I met my future husband, got engaged, booked the wedding and training stepped up to look great in the dress! Back then I didn’t see exercise as anything else other than a necessity to look good.
Fast forward 7/8 months (yep that was a shock!) and I had had my baby boy via c-section and at around the same time my PT opened a small studio where they were offering functional classes.
Classes had never really been my thing. Despite what people think I am an introvert. Lots of people, loud music, sweaty bodies scared the sh1t out of me but what can I say other than I loved it and when the gym grew and they became CrossFit affiliated (CrossFit Huddersfield) I was hooked.
The progress I saw at 32 shocked me. I had never thought I would be back squatting or jumping on a 30+ inch box post c-section but I was. This is what I love about CrossFit. People really can do things that they don’t think they can. A couple of weeks ago one of our members who is in her sixties got her first double under. Another one that struggles with running ran The Race For Life. We have had members do all sorts of challenges, competitions, fundraisers etc and we all get on an do it all together.
Over the next few years I trained at a few different CrossFit boxes, learned loads of cool skills, got strong and made friends for life.
After having my son my return to work was less that pleasant. There was no return to work procedures in place. Lots had changed in the time I had been off and I felt like I was left to drown.
More to take my mind off my work life I decided to take my CrossFit Level 1. Which I passed! Yey!
I then went on to qualify as a Personal Trainer and started to take on a few clients around my “Day Job”
After one particularly bad day in the office I left and went straight to the gym to blow off some steam. I ended up offloading to the owner and he offered me some coaching hours there and then. I will forever be grateful for that. I truly believe I was nearing a full breakdown and this was the escape I needed.
I went home, discussed it with my husband and the next day I handed my notice in. The scariest thing I had ever done but also the most freeing.
From there I built up a client base and cut my teeth learning how to be an effective coach. I watched other coaches, stole bits that worked, discarded bits that didnt and just tried to absorb as much as I could everywhere I went.
After a few years I felt ready to take the next step and the hunt was on to find premises. Wow that was hard and probably a separate blog! With no luck and some lost money I was ready to give up.
BUT THEN….my husband received an email from the box he attended “Colne Valley CrossFit” advising all members that they were closing imminently. A couple of hours later Jack and Katy were sat at our kitchen table and we made plans to takeover (it wasn’t as easy as that sounds, and we had a few setbacks but we got there in the end)!
A couple of years in and the gym where it all started had given up their affiliate name of CrossFit Huddersfield and it felt like it had come full circle.
So to answer the original question - Why did I start CrossFit Huddersfield?
To give myself, my family and everyone who walks in that door a better life than they had before they did. Is it hard? Absolutely. Is it worth it? Absolutely.