Latest / Clydesdale Media Podcast / Brandon Fontenot - The Athletes of the 2024 Legends Masters CrossFit Games

Transcript

Brandon Fontenot - The Athletes of the 2024 Legends Masters CrossFit Games · Clydesdale Media Podcast

0:12
hey hey let's go I was born
0:14
to kill it yeah I was meant
0:15
to win I am down and
0:17
willing so I will find a
0:18
way it took a minute night
0:20
didn't have to ride away
0:21
when they get hot in the
0:22
kitchen you decide to stay
0:23
that's how it winters
0:34
what is going on everybody
0:35
welcome to the Clydesdale
0:36
media podcast my name is
0:38
Scott Switzer I'm the
0:39
Clydesdale and we are
0:40
highlighting the athletes
0:42
of the 2024 legends masters
0:47
crossfit games and I have
0:49
with me today none other
0:52
than Brandon Fontenot
0:53
Brandon what's going on not
0:55
that much not much he's
0:57
glad to be here so uh
1:00
I have to say that of all
1:01
the athletes I've researched,
1:02
you have the smallest
1:04
online footprint of anybody
1:06
that I've looked into.
1:08
Oh, for sure.
1:10
I was told I needed to start
1:12
doing a little more of that this season.
1:14
And one of the guy that does
1:16
all the video and that if
1:17
you if you look through my
1:18
Instagram or anything like that.
1:20
There's a guy that's done,
1:21
he's just taken over like
1:23
videoing and trying to
1:24
capture this moment for me.
1:25
And he was supposed to give
1:26
me a list of things that I
1:27
was supposed to start
1:28
posting on social media.
1:29
But I'm old school,
1:33
not really into all that.
1:35
Well,
1:35
I usually like I have a couple key
1:37
things that I always look
1:38
into to try to find like
1:40
the history of people.
1:41
And that's like LinkedIn
1:42
accounts and bios on websites.
1:46
And you own a gym and I went
1:47
to your bio and all it does
1:49
is have your three credentials.
1:52
Yeah, well, I don't know anything.
1:54
Maybe I need to get more
1:55
savvy on that there.
1:56
I don't know.
1:58
Or you can just stay private.
2:00
Yeah, well, I mean, it isn't really that.
2:02
I like to reach out to people,
2:04
but I'm not really into that yet.
2:09
Other people said I need to
2:09
get more involved in it.
2:12
Yeah.
2:12
I, you know, it is what it is.
2:14
I have to do it because of this job and,
2:19
and be on social media, but, but it is,
2:22
it's work.
2:23
It's a lot of work.
2:25
Yeah, see, I have two Facebook accounts.
2:27
There's one Facebook account
2:29
that's linked to my
2:29
Instagram that I can't get
2:31
into because it got hacked like seven,
2:33
eight months ago,
2:34
and I couldn't figure out
2:35
how to get back into it.
2:36
So we just created another
2:37
Facebook account.
2:38
So there's still stuff going
2:40
in that Facebook account
2:41
that's linked to my Instagram,
2:43
but I can't access it.
2:44
I can go in there.
2:45
If someone comments,
2:46
I can go in there and like it,
2:48
but I can't do anything else with it.
2:51
So let's learn about you
2:53
right here on this podcast.
2:56
Did you have any athletic
2:57
background before CrossFit?
2:59
Yeah, in high school I played baseball.
3:01
I went to a small...
3:04
uh, high school, uh,
3:05
it was like 361 students
3:07
from preschool to the 12th grade.
3:09
So there was just enough
3:10
people to make a baseball team.
3:12
Um, they call it a class C school.
3:14
So it was very small.
3:16
Uh, it was 21 kids in my graduating class.
3:18
I used to tell people I was
3:19
top 21 in my class.
3:21
so, but, uh,
3:23
Yeah,
3:23
so I played catcher four years of
3:26
high – well, actually six years.
3:27
I actually played high
3:28
school baseball for six
3:29
years because they let us
3:30
start in middle school just
3:31
to be able to make enough
3:32
people for the team.
3:33
Oh, wow.
3:33
I thought you were going to
3:34
say they held you back a couple.
3:36
No.
3:38
No,
3:38
so I played high school baseball for
3:40
six years, and that's basically it.
3:43
I didn't really start any
3:44
fitness until when I was 35, I believe.
3:49
Okay, so –
3:52
So I did see in your
3:53
Instagram that you have a
3:54
heck of a weight loss story.
3:56
Yeah.
3:57
Yeah.
3:58
Does that coincide with
3:59
finding CrossFit or did you
4:01
find it before CrossFit?
4:03
I actually, so I moved out when I was 16.
4:07
I went to work, started life,
4:09
had to get going a little early in life.
4:11
And so I started work.
4:15
And just life coming in.
4:17
I met my wife.
4:18
We had kids.
4:21
I was about 26 when we got married.
4:24
And if I got that wrong,
4:26
she'll correct me later.
4:27
But so and then we just kind
4:31
of both just got happy.
4:33
And next thing you know, we were we were,
4:35
you know, we put on a few pounds.
4:37
so uh I had never really you
4:39
know I farmed and had cows
4:41
and stuff like that so I
4:42
never really did anything
4:43
fitness wise and uh so I
4:46
just got tired of uh you
4:48
know having to hold my
4:50
breath to tie my boots so I
4:52
one day I was like uh and I
4:54
didn't really know what I
4:55
weighed and you know I
4:56
didn't really pay no much I
4:57
didn't really pay attention
4:58
to none of that and so one
5:01
day I went and bought me a
5:01
pair of shorts and I know
5:03
it's strange but I didn't have any shorts
5:06
And, uh,
5:06
and I went and I joined the gym
5:08
and I'd go before I went to
5:10
work every morning because
5:12
it was a 24 hour gym.
5:13
I didn't know.
5:14
I didn't want anybody to see me there.
5:16
So I joined a gym and, uh,
5:19
I would go run a mile every
5:20
morning on a treadmill.
5:23
That was my thing.
5:24
I made myself run a mile
5:26
every morning and it would run walk.
5:30
So sometimes it was 10,
5:31
15 minutes to get through a mile,
5:32
but I did that.
5:33
And it got, you know, he, uh,
5:36
I reached out to me and said, Hey,
5:37
there's a 5k at our, in our hometown, um,
5:41
in not far from where I live.
5:43
Won't you sign up for it?
5:44
So I'm like, yeah, sure.
5:45
So I was probably the only
5:46
person that trained six
5:47
months for a 5k and it started,
5:51
I started enjoying running.
5:53
So I got into that and at,
5:57
at 35 or something, I believe at 35, no,
5:59
37.
5:59
And I, uh,
6:04
did another 5K,
6:05
then decided to do a marathon, no,
6:06
a half marathon.
6:08
So a guy reached out to me and said, hey,
6:09
why don't you go,
6:10
we're gonna do a trail run in Sealy,
6:14
Texas in Stephen F. Alston State Park.
6:17
So it was a half marathon.
6:19
It was four,
6:19
three mile loops at night with
6:21
a headland.
6:22
So I'm like, yeah, I'll do that.
6:24
So when I did my first half
6:25
marathon there in Texas,
6:28
Um, I said, well, I've already ran a half.
6:30
I might as well do a full.
6:32
So, uh,
6:33
it's trained for a full marathon in
6:35
Baton Rouge, Louisiana marathon.
6:37
And I got into some running
6:38
groups and got involved,
6:40
actually created a,
6:41
the little community I was from,
6:44
I created a running group,
6:45
the Reeves runners.
6:47
Um,
6:48
and we would just meet up and run every
6:49
evening and, uh, always, uh,
6:53
and then the following year
6:54
I was going to do two
6:55
marathons in one year.
6:57
And, uh,
7:00
it, I ended up,
7:01
I ran one marathon in Pensacola,
7:03
went to do my next one.
7:05
I did my last long distance
7:06
run and I did something to my knee.
7:09
I had went and got some orthotics,
7:11
some different, uh,
7:13
I went to a podiatrist in
7:15
Houston and got some
7:16
orthotics for my shoes.
7:18
And like a fool,
7:20
I went and ran a long
7:21
distance in those new shoes
7:23
and it inflamed my knee.
7:25
And I couldn't even run
7:26
three miles without, uh,
7:29
it flaring up.
7:31
So I kind of got a,
7:33
it was scary because I
7:34
didn't want to get back to where I was.
7:36
So running kept me from gaining weight.
7:38
I felt like,
7:39
and so I kind of almost on the
7:42
side of depression there because I,
7:44
you know, this guy was crazy.
7:45
You know,
7:45
you were depressed because you can't run,
7:47
but it was more that I
7:48
didn't want to gain that weight back.
7:51
And my wife said, Hey,
7:52
won't you try CrossFit?
7:54
And I'm like, nah, I ain't gonna do that.
7:56
I didn't really want to,
7:57
I didn't have no idea about that.
7:59
So I went to, I was like, well, all right,
8:02
well, I'll try it.
8:02
So I went to my first
8:03
CrossFit gym and one of my
8:07
friends now was actually
8:09
coaching that class.
8:10
Well, I couldn't even climb a rope.
8:13
That was pretty embarrassing.
8:15
And so, and it transpired from there.
8:19
So I actually started CrossFit in 2018.
8:26
2019, something like that.
8:27
So your first open was 2018.
8:29
Yeah.
8:30
So I actually started, I started,
8:33
funny story is I started a
8:35
week before Murph.
8:37
in 2017.
8:38
So it was after the open.
8:40
So I couldn't do the open.
8:41
I did Murph full and
8:44
couldn't extend my arms
8:45
because I didn't know you could,
8:46
I didn't know you could, uh,
8:47
partition Murph.
8:48
I mean, I didn't know you could, uh,
8:49
do a half Murph.
8:50
I, I, I partitioned it, but I, I just,
8:53
I was like, okay, they said, Hey,
8:54
we're doing Murph today.
8:54
I'm like, okay, what is that?
8:55
And they're like, you go run.
8:56
I'm like, well, I can run and it's pushups,
8:58
air squats and, uh, pull-ups.
9:00
I'm like, well, okay, let's do that.
9:02
And, uh, yeah,
9:03
well I did the whole thing and, you know,
9:05
it wasn't in a,
9:06
blazing time, but I still did it.
9:08
And, uh,
9:09
I didn't know what was going on
9:10
because for about a week, I couldn't,
9:12
my arm stayed like this.
9:14
And I thought I was like,
9:15
I've been screwed myself up.
9:17
So yeah.
9:17
Tying your boots was way harder then.
9:19
Oh yeah.
9:20
Yeah.
9:20
Yeah.
9:20
Yeah.
9:21
Yeah.
9:22
It's, it's funny.
9:23
You had a week.
9:24
My first ever workout was Murph.
9:27
Oh, wow.
9:27
I was 450 pounds for my first workout.
9:35
oh wow very very very scaled
9:38
oh wow wow that is awesome
9:41
though um and so two years
9:45
after the fact I was able
9:46
to do it rx no vest but
9:49
still do it rx and like
9:52
last mile I'm bawling the
9:53
whole time yeah for sure
9:58
of, of just how far I had went.
10:00
So, yeah.
10:01
Yeah.
10:02
Oh yeah.
10:02
You know, that's,
10:03
that's what I did on my marathon.
10:05
Um, when I was,
10:07
I was had about a half a
10:09
mile left on my marathon
10:11
and I'd experienced that same thing.
10:12
I had had a,
10:14
life like you know on that
10:16
last home stretch of that
10:17
marathon you had everybody
10:18
on the side of you and
10:19
you're running and you see
10:20
the state capitol in baton
10:21
rouge and you just I just
10:24
relived my whole life in
10:25
that last half mile my
10:26
wife's like what are you
10:27
doing why are you upset I'm
10:29
like I have no idea but I'm
10:30
just boohooing here yeah I
10:33
was not upset I was just I
10:35
was so thrilled at how far
10:36
I'd come yeah but that's
10:38
what that's what that was
10:41
Oh, for sure.
10:41
That's no, no, that's exactly what I was.
10:43
That's,
10:43
that's what I'm getting at there too.
10:45
Yeah.
10:47
Yeah.
10:48
CrossFit's an amazing thing.
10:49
So you, you,
10:50
the first day you couldn't climb a rope,
10:53
you decide to do Murph a weekend,
10:56
something hooked you in
10:58
those first five days to
11:00
make you do that.
11:02
And honestly,
11:02
I don't know what it was like.
11:04
It was like my, and during the process,
11:05
I'm like, no, I don't like this.
11:07
I don't know why I'm doing this,
11:08
but afterwards I'm like, okay,
11:09
I'm coming back tomorrow.
11:10
And then I came back and
11:12
then it was I went to a 5 a.m.
11:13
class and every morning at 5 a.m.
11:16
I was there.
11:17
And then I wanted a little
11:19
more than I started competing.
11:21
And then it was just it was me.
11:25
I have to stay signed up for stuff.
11:28
I always have to be registered.
11:30
I always say that I registered for,
11:34
you know,
11:35
like the high rocks coming up in
11:37
November after the after the games.
11:39
Um,
11:40
I'll probably end up trying to do
11:41
legends again.
11:41
It just,
11:42
I have like a long-term goals and
11:44
short-term goals.
11:45
So.
11:47
Yeah, it makes sense.
11:47
You have to have a goal on
11:50
the horizon to shoot for.
11:52
Yes, that is correct.
11:55
My goal was actually to do an Ironman.
11:58
That's the only tattoo that I... I mean,
11:59
nothing against tattoos.
12:00
I have nothing against tattoos.
12:01
But I don't see one that I
12:02
would like except for an Ironman tattoo.
12:05
And I'm still... I don't know.
12:07
It's still a possibility.
12:09
So we'll see.
12:11
Yeah, I grew up as a swimmer,
12:12
and I always wanted the Olympic rings.
12:15
Oh, okay.
12:15
Because when you make it to the Olympics,
12:17
you get to get the Olympic rings texted.
12:19
Yes.
12:19
Yeah, I saw that.
12:21
I've been watching that.
12:21
I'm like, oh, that's pretty cool.
12:23
Yeah.
12:23
Well,
12:24
one of the friends I talked to before
12:26
this was Corey Leonard.
12:28
Okay.
12:29
He's in the chat, and he said, man,
12:30
I had no idea how similar our story is.
12:33
Oh, cool.
12:35
He also told me that he has
12:37
competed against you several times,
12:38
and you have whooped him
12:40
every one of them.
12:41
I don't know.
12:42
Corey's come a long way.
12:43
Corey's a good dude.
12:45
Yeah, I like Corey.
12:47
He is.
12:49
So is it safe to say,
12:51
as a CrossFit athlete,
12:53
you are an engine guy
12:55
because you did all this
12:56
running before you came in?
12:58
Is that what you're best at,
12:59
or have you evolved into
13:01
something that you have
13:04
other wheelhouses now?
13:06
Well, I don't know.
13:07
I'm, I would, I'm, I think,
13:09
I would think I'm pretty strong.
13:10
Uh, I'm just, uh, I can just tough it out.
13:15
That that's my thing is like, okay,
13:17
that pain will go away.
13:18
Like I can just kind of sit in and, uh,
13:23
It's going to hurt,
13:24
but this is just a temporary hurt.
13:27
Nothing I'm doing is not permanent.
13:30
I know the feeling afterwards.
13:35
It's that rush afterwards
13:37
that I'm going for.
13:40
So at what point in the
13:42
CrossFit journey did you realize,
13:44
you know what,
13:45
I might be good at this and
13:47
might need to really push?
13:49
Because at some point you
13:50
signed up for TFX, you signed up for MFC,
13:54
you signed up for some of
13:55
those bigger competitions.
13:57
What was it that triggered that?
13:59
Well, two years ago,
14:00
it was actually two – I was
14:04
always – like during the Open,
14:06
it was always you questioned yourself
14:09
um when you would come in
14:10
100 you know 100th in the
14:12
world or 130th and you're
14:15
like man that's a big gap
14:16
between there and and
14:18
making the top 30 or the
14:19
top 40 you know king am I
14:21
good enough for that and so
14:24
whenever you and when you
14:25
go to do tfx you know when
14:27
I did tfx and I won tfx but
14:30
that year two years ago I
14:31
had set a goal out I told a
14:33
friend of mine said hey
14:34
I want to,
14:35
there's a couple of big comps
14:37
I'd like to qualify for.
14:39
And then I would love to try
14:40
to qualify for the games.
14:42
My rookie,
14:43
my rookie year as a 45 year old.
14:45
I had heard somebody say the
14:46
other day that they don't
14:48
look forward to aging up.
14:50
I don't age me up.
14:52
Let's go.
14:53
And so I set a goal out, you know.
14:57
So last year, actually,
14:59
right before the quarterfinals a week,
15:01
I did beach brawl and ended
15:02
up doing something like
15:03
tricep and a cleaning jerk.
15:05
And so I was out for
15:06
quarterfinals last year,
15:07
which was fine because that
15:09
wasn't my goal to make the
15:10
games that year.
15:11
It was just to make Legends
15:12
Masters Fitness Collective
15:13
and then the games this year.
15:15
And whenever I made Masters
15:18
Fitness Collective, Roy,
15:20
Vijay and Rudy and a lot of
15:21
them reached out to me and said, see,
15:23
you do belong in this group.
15:25
And whenever they said that, it was like,
15:29
OK, you know,
15:31
these people are talking to me.
15:32
You know, even Jason Grubb,
15:34
me and my son went to the
15:35
CrossFit Games to watch CrossFit.
15:38
The previous two years,
15:39
the first year we went,
15:40
I actually have a picture
15:42
where I saw Jason there, met him,
15:44
and we talked back and forth.
15:45
Actually,
15:46
he helped me out a lot in my
15:49
beginning of the journey.
15:50
And just that he started, he said,
15:54
you need to put in your
15:54
mind you're a CrossFit Games athlete.
15:57
You need to just everything you do,
15:59
say you're a CrossFit Games athlete.
16:02
And when you start living,
16:03
when you start putting that as your title,
16:06
I guess you could say,
16:07
I don't know if that's right.
16:09
But everything you start
16:10
looking at is in a totally different way.
16:12
The way you eat, the way you train,
16:15
the way you sleep,
16:16
everything you start looking at.
16:17
Would a CrossFit athlete do this?
16:20
And that's the way it just transpired.
16:25
Yeah, that's awesome.
16:27
And now you are.
16:28
Now you actually are in the title.
16:31
Yeah,
16:31
that sucked because I can remember I
16:34
went to Mayhem for semifinals.
16:35
So I'm driving home.
16:36
I drove to Mayhem.
16:37
It was about –
16:39
Seven, eight hour, nine hour drive.
16:42
And I'm driving back.
16:44
The weather's gotten bad.
16:46
And they released the
16:47
leaderboard unofficially.
16:49
And my wife and a friend of mine,
16:52
they text me or called.
16:54
They said, hey, you're 36.
16:58
You made it.
16:58
And I'm like, huh?
16:59
I said, it's not out yet.
17:00
And they're like, well, they said, well,
17:02
aren't you excited?
17:03
And I'm like,
17:04
I don't want to get excited
17:05
until this stuff's over with.
17:07
Roy texted me, he said, hey,
17:08
congratulations, you made it.
17:10
I had to ride on that for two weeks,
17:12
not knowing that I'd made it or not,
17:14
because it was, I mean,
17:15
I was on the cusp there.
17:16
I mean,
17:17
I was 36 spots and it was like 10
17:18
or 15 points.
17:19
And I'm thinking, you know,
17:23
I've started looking
17:24
through my videos and say, hey,
17:26
are they dinging me?
17:27
I got an email saying, hey, you're,
17:30
video for workout three or whatever,
17:32
whenever they is good.
17:35
And so I'm like, okay, well that's,
17:36
what does that mean?
17:37
So then I would text Rudy
17:39
and I text Jason and I would say, hey,
17:42
You know,
17:42
I'm wanting some clarification
17:44
with them saying, hey, you're okay.
17:46
But there's like, hey, just be patient.
17:48
You know, we all are.
17:49
This is the wait.
17:51
So we wait two weeks.
17:52
I believe it was about two weeks.
17:54
And, you know, everybody's like, well,
17:55
Brandon, did you qualify?
17:56
I'm like, not until that point.
17:57
Whenever I got that email saying, hey,
17:59
the leaderboard's finalized.
18:01
You're invited to the CrossFit Games.
18:03
Yeah, it was pretty sweet.
18:05
I was actually at my gym when I got that.
18:08
That lady videoed me getting that.
18:11
That's incredible.
18:14
A lot of my best friends in
18:15
the sport are Masters athletes.
18:17
My co-host on Sunday night,
18:19
she waited the two-plus weeks.
18:25
One of my dear friends is Dex Hopkins,
18:27
and he finished 41st.
18:29
Oh, I saw that because I met Dex at MFC,
18:32
and I was watching him.
18:34
I'm like, man, that sucks.
18:35
But then he got in.
18:37
He did.
18:37
He moved up to 40th with two days to go.
18:40
Yeah.
18:41
Yeah.
18:41
So it was good.
18:42
It bittersweet, kind of good, but bad.
18:44
You said somebody else got
18:45
knocked out for him to get back in.
18:46
So it kind of, yeah.
18:48
Or hopefully they just withdrew or,
18:50
or some, you know,
18:51
declined the invite or.
18:52
Yeah, but that was before the,
18:54
that was before the invites went out.
18:56
So.
18:58
So someone got penalized, I guess, but.
18:59
Yeah.
19:00
So I watched the leaderboard, you know,
19:02
not that I didn't, I mean, you know,
19:05
I may have looked at it
19:06
once or twice a day for two
19:07
or three weeks.
19:09
Refresh.
19:10
And every age group.
19:11
I wanted to see if there was movement,
19:13
where the movement was going on.
19:14
So I could actually follow
19:15
and see which age groups
19:17
were getting video submissions, you know,
19:20
who was getting reviewed there.
19:21
Cause I would see it like a,
19:22
I would even screenshot it
19:23
to see if the numbers would change.
19:25
You sound like Lynette
19:26
Berger because I've been with her like at,
19:30
at reveal time.
19:32
And she's just like, refresh, refresh.
19:35
Yeah.
19:35
Every 10 seconds.
19:37
Like just open.
19:38
Yeah.
19:41
Rudy's warming up.
19:42
Rudy's doing his thing.
19:43
But Lynette takes all that on and just,
19:46
you know.
19:46
Yeah, but I tell you what,
19:47
like we talked earlier,
19:49
but when I went to MSC, I had met her.
19:52
You know, like I said,
19:53
we met Rudy and Lynette.
19:55
And I was there,
19:56
and she actually took me in
19:58
under her wing.
19:59
Like,
20:00
I was competing against Rudy that year,
20:02
and she was sitting there telling me, hey,
20:04
this is Rudy's warm-up.
20:05
You can do this, this, and this.
20:06
There was one workout she
20:07
came to me and said, hey,
20:08
this is your workout.
20:12
And we're fixing to go on the floor.
20:15
And she says, don't hold back.
20:17
I mean, I'm like, you know,
20:19
that was pretty legit.
20:21
Yeah, she's a pretty awesome coach.
20:24
Someone who's only been
20:26
doing it for two years.
20:28
Yeah.
20:29
Yeah,
20:29
it's awesome to see her development
20:30
as well.
20:31
And Corey Pipeson,
20:33
I can't express how good of
20:35
people Roy Veger and Rory
20:39
Vijay and Rudy Berger are.
20:41
Oh, for sure.
20:45
So you're a Mayhem athlete.
20:47
That's correct.
20:49
Why did you choose Mayhem?
20:51
Because of their beliefs,
20:53
they they're structured
20:54
everything in their faith,
20:55
family and fitness is is it
21:01
falls in the same kind of
21:02
beliefs that I have.
21:04
And then so it's kind of to be, you know,
21:07
you surround yourself with
21:08
like minded people.
21:10
And sometimes you question
21:12
yourself if it's, you know, you know,
21:14
like when I'm with the semifinals,
21:15
you you don't know, you know,
21:18
if you're welcome there or not,
21:19
like because you don't know
21:20
if you can compete at that level.
21:22
But when you get there and
21:23
they treat you like your family,
21:26
and I didn't really have
21:27
much family when I grew up.
21:29
So a lot of people take that
21:33
for granted whenever people
21:38
treat them good.
21:39
And with me, it goes a long ways.
21:41
And they've been behind me
21:44
for this whole time.
21:47
So the question I have is I've,
21:48
I've interviewed a lot of
21:49
the mayhem athletes.
21:50
You guys all went to Cookville for semis.
21:53
So there you are, you, Ryan Redkey,
21:56
you're in the same age group.
21:58
You're in the same division.
22:00
What's the dynamic like?
22:01
Is it still very supportive?
22:03
Oh, very much so.
22:04
Uh, they, um, there was times where, cause,
22:07
uh, we, we, we go toe to toe.
22:09
There was one workout we
22:10
were supposed to do together.
22:11
Me, him and Corey,
22:13
it would meet him and me.
22:14
It was me, Ryan and Corey.
22:16
And J-Web were in the same age group.
22:21
And, oh,
22:22
it was – it just gave you more of a push.
22:24
I mean,
22:25
we were sharing stuff back and forth.
22:28
Ryan is a brains whenever it
22:30
comes to numbers and stuff
22:31
like that because I would ask him, hey,
22:33
do you think I qualified?
22:34
Do you think I made it?
22:35
He said, man, it's going to be close.
22:36
He knew it was going to be
22:37
close whenever it was over with.
22:39
I mean,
22:39
the dudes – he already knew all that.
22:42
But, no,
22:42
everybody – there was no – we
22:45
would show up.
22:47
Throw down, and it was pretty legit.
22:54
Brett Owsley, Brandon is just a good dude,
22:56
one of the hardest workers I've met.
22:58
Yeah, him and Jonathan Varela.
23:01
I watched him do a workout,
23:02
that last toe-to-bar workout,
23:05
and that was my inspiration to go harder.
23:09
They were actually the younger,
23:10
the 40 to 44.
23:11
So, yeah, they're good guys.
23:15
It sounded like it was just
23:16
a really cool atmosphere to be in.
23:19
No, it was.
23:20
I was worried because my
23:22
buddy of mine that co-owns
23:24
the gym with me, him and his wife,
23:26
they were headed up there with me.
23:29
I follow Mayhem Athlete.
23:34
He sends me emails throughout the week.
23:35
He's going to be my coach
23:37
when I go to the games.
23:41
Between him and Jordan Webb,
23:43
they both kind of
23:45
transpire there.
23:46
But when we got there,
23:47
I was worried because you
23:49
go up there for semifinals,
23:50
you've you've prepared for
23:51
this for two or three years
23:52
to make the games.
23:54
And, you know,
23:55
the big excitement to go
23:56
train at Cookville or something like that,
23:58
you don't want to be caught
23:58
up just in the hype of
24:00
competing at Mayhem because
24:02
it wasn't to go visit Mayhem.
24:04
It was you're training to go to the games.
24:06
I mean,
24:06
you're you're you're fixing to do
24:07
this workout.
24:08
So I was so worried because
24:10
my training when I train
24:12
I train at the oddest hours.
24:14
I'm at the gym at 3 in the
24:15
morning and then when I get
24:17
off in the evening.
24:18
So I'm thinking, well,
24:20
I have that same ability to
24:23
do that there or whatever I want to do.
24:26
And whatever we wanted, we got.
24:28
You had all the elites helping load bars,
24:35
helping judge, rooting you on.
24:37
were in that in the back
24:38
room where all the athletes
24:40
you know where you see all
24:41
the games the other games
24:42
athletes competing and we
24:44
had full range to
24:45
everything I'm sitting in
24:46
there it was pretty cool
24:47
because I'm getting on in a
24:48
cold plunge and there is
24:49
there's a rich froning
24:50
getting dry needled on a
24:51
table and uh they make fun
24:54
of me but um it was just
24:58
yeah surreal so it was an
24:59
experience this whole year
25:00
has been a great experience
25:02
that's so cool that you've
25:04
you've got to experience that um
25:08
I wanted to ask,
25:09
who are you taking with you to the games?
25:13
This is probably the
25:15
emotional part for me
25:16
because words will never
25:18
express how much I
25:19
appreciate the people that
25:20
are at our gym and stuff.
25:22
We have like almost 50
25:24
people coming to the games.
25:26
That is awesome.
25:27
My wife, my daughter, her boyfriend,
25:31
and I've tried to count it before.
25:34
It's right at 50 people.
25:36
They're coming to support me.
25:38
And that's what I tell
25:40
people that whenever I was, well,
25:41
you know, Mayhem sent out,
25:43
sold these jerseys for us
25:45
to kind of help go to the games.
25:47
It's kind of, you hate to ask, hey,
25:48
will you buy a shirt to
25:51
help support me going to
25:53
the games when they're
25:54
going to the games as well.
25:56
And they're on their own dime, you know,
25:58
so it's kind of, it's,
26:01
you almost feel selfish in a way.
26:03
So what's it going to be
26:04
like when you're on the
26:06
floor and you look out at
26:07
the crowd and you see 50
26:10
people in your jersey?
26:13
And there's more.
26:15
There's these jerseys.
26:16
There's Let's Go Brandon with my face.
26:21
I don't know.
26:23
Every once in a while, whenever it hits me,
26:25
I get the chills.
26:26
Maybe get a little
26:27
teary-eyed a little bit.
26:29
But it's going to be pretty amazing.
26:35
You own a gym.
26:36
Is that your full-time gig?
26:38
No, I actually work for the railroad.
26:41
I'm an electronics
26:41
technician for the railroad.
26:44
It sounds super smart,
26:45
but sometimes I kind of
26:46
make it sound better than what it is.
26:48
Well,
26:48
I program crossings and stuff like that.
26:51
So I co-own a gym with another guy,
26:53
Ben Bynes.
26:56
He's super sharp when it
26:57
comes to programming and
26:59
working with a lot of people.
27:01
And I'm just kind of the
27:02
face and the energy behind the place.
27:05
so one year, uh, we were in CrossFit three,
27:09
three or four years.
27:10
And he's like,
27:10
how about we open our own place?
27:12
I'm like, yeah, sure.
27:13
So we opened up our own place.
27:14
We were looking just,
27:15
just enough people to, uh,
27:18
to pay the bill.
27:19
And, uh, it just grew and grew and grew.
27:21
We actually opened COVID year,
27:23
heck of a year to open.
27:25
And, um, now we're in,
27:27
we're in a bigger facility.
27:28
That's three times the size.
27:29
And we're probably running
27:31
about 150 members now, but, uh,
27:35
So we have six coaches that help out.
27:37
So they actually – ever
27:39
since the training for this started,
27:41
they've kind of just said, hey,
27:43
you sit back from coaching and stuff,
27:45
and you just don't worry about it.
27:46
We got this.
27:47
And it's been kind of nice to have that.
27:52
It'll be nice someday if I
27:53
get to be the eye candy of a gym.
27:58
I don't know about the candy.
27:59
It's the goofiness.
28:03
Yeah.
28:04
Well, that's awesome.
28:05
So what are your realistic
28:08
expectations this year?
28:10
See,
28:10
a guy asked me that he's going to get
28:12
mad at me if he's watching this YouTube.
28:13
So I've got to say this, that I'm going,
28:15
I'm not training.
28:16
I haven't been training for
28:17
the last two years just to go to show up.
28:21
So don't get me wrong,
28:23
but I've already won by
28:25
making the CrossFit games.
28:27
But when I qualified and
28:30
You have 50-something people
28:31
coming from your gym.
28:32
You have all that support behind you,
28:34
so there's no telling what
28:35
you'll be able to accomplish.
28:39
The other thing, too,
28:39
is you have a lot of race experience.
28:41
You've done TFX.
28:43
You've done MFC.
28:44
You've done Legends, right?
28:45
You've been on the floor
28:46
against other people.
28:48
A lot of people are good at
28:48
online competitions.
28:49
It doesn't mean that that
28:51
translates over to
28:53
head-to-head competition.
28:54
But that was and that's
28:55
where I'm pretty good with
28:58
a heavy stuff and the skill stuff.
29:00
And that's what I'd like.
29:01
And then in and like,
29:03
I'm not a good home run
29:04
hitter where I'm going to
29:05
knock something out of the park.
29:06
But if you get like,
29:07
if you give me eight or nine workouts,
29:09
and I'll start slowly
29:12
coming on down that leaderboard.
29:14
So so we'll see.
29:17
Well, Brandon,
29:18
this has been a blast
29:19
getting to know you.
29:21
We're going to be there in Birmingham.
29:23
We're going to be behind the
29:24
scenes recording a documentary,
29:26
just chatting with you guys
29:28
as you're warming up and in
29:29
the corrals and cooling
29:31
down and recovering and all
29:33
that so that you guys have
29:35
a cool documentary to look
29:36
back on after all this is done.
29:38
Oh, awesome.
29:39
Awesome.
29:39
Thank you.
29:40
And, uh,
29:40
thanks for the support you're
29:41
giving to this community.
29:43
Yeah, man, this has been a blast.
29:45
Um,
29:45
I think you're like my 13th interview
29:48
this week.
29:48
Yeah.
29:49
Yeah.
29:49
I've watched them.
29:50
So I've been, and I've tried to,
29:51
I was like, okay,
29:52
I'm going to practice up,
29:53
but there's no practice for this.
29:54
You just got to jump straight in.
29:57
So thank you for making it.
29:59
Thank you for making it, uh, you know, uh,
30:04
thank you for making it where it hasn't,
30:05
I was nervous up to this point,
30:06
but it's kind of like
30:07
talking to another buddy of mine.
30:08
So, yeah.
30:09
And we just try to be conversational.
30:12
Nothing.
30:14
No hard news here.
30:15
Uh, David Johnson.
30:16
I see you soon, Brandon.
30:18
All right, man.
30:20
Um, well, thank you for doing this.
30:21
Thank you to everybody in
30:22
the chat for making this a
30:23
great interview today.
30:24
Um,
30:26
Support the channel.
30:27
Like, subscribe,
30:28
hit that notifier so we can
30:30
keep doing these things and
30:31
supporting the Masters community.
30:33
With that, thank you, everybody.
30:35
We'll see you next time on
30:37
the Clydesdale Media Podcast.
30:39
Bye, guys.