Back Room Talk Coach Spotlight: From MMA Fighter to Multi-Model Gym Owner: Brandon Wilton's 16-Year Journey Through Coaching
This episode of Back Room Talk explores the remarkable journey of Brandon Wilton, a gym owner and coach whose 16-year career demonstrates how business survival requires constant adaptation while core principles remain steady. Brandon's story reveals the evolution from early CrossFit affiliate struggles through multiple service models to his current hybrid approach that serves both group and individual design clients. His journey illustrates that successful gym ownership isn't about finding one perfect model, it's about continuously solving problems while staying true to what serves clients best.
The Unconventional Entry: From Aimless to MMA
Brandon's path into fitness coaching began without clear direction: "I wasn't really doing anything with like anything with my life. I got out of high school and just worked, fire department, managed a restaurant and just kind of wasn't sure to do with myself, kind of, kind of screwed around for a few years out of high school."
His fitness journey started with mixed martial arts: "Did you get to got into MMA and did that for quite some time." This experience with combat sports provided his first taste of physical challenge and structured training.
The CrossFit Connection: Finding Challenge and Purpose
Brandon's introduction to CrossFit came through social connections: "Got connected with some people about CrossFit. It's kind of like the, let's go like this. And these people picked it up and then it had CrossFit."
What attracted him initially wasn't entirely clear even to himself: "I'm not really sure what I enjoyed about it. I think it's just the, the toughness or the gravitas that came with it or what have you."
The Deeper Discovery
As Brandon reflects on his early coaching days, he identifies the real appeal: "What I think I, as I reflect back on it, enjoyed about it the most was like all of the problem solving. I got to help people. got to look at all of these complex problems and put them in my hand and play with them."
This combination—helping people while solving complex puzzles—would become the throughline of his entire career.
The Accidental Entrepreneur: Starting Without Skills
Brandon's entry into gym ownership was opportunistic rather than planned: "I just got an opportunity where it's like, you want to start a CrossFit gym? so I started with a silent partner, one other partner who I since had bought out within the first year."
He entered with critical gaps in knowledge: "I enjoyed something about helping people. I was not aware of that at the time. I just knew that I enjoyed it and I enjoyed the fitness aspect of it and all of the challenges that came along with it. Again, no business knowledge."
The Financial Crisis: Sink or Swim Moment
Within the first year, Brandon faced a defining decision. His business partner delivered sobering news: "He was like, yeah, we're broke. So you can either take the debt or we can split the debt or you can take it all on and go your own way."
Brandon's response shaped his next decade: "I was like, all right, let's do it."
The Grind Years
To keep the gym alive, Brandon worked extraordinary hours: "I was working on the fire department, three to four days a week, 6 PM to 6 AM. And I was managing a restaurant Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then the gym was open all the other times. So I was working a lot of hours, hundred hours or so."
His survival strategy was straightforward but unsustainable: "I would just take my personal money, just dump it, dump it into the gym to pay payroll or pay bills or do whatever."
The Missing Skill
Brandon wishes he had tracked things better: "I wish would have known enough to track a little bit more in the beginning, but I just knew I wanted to keep it open."
The Partnership Solution: Finding Carl
Brandon eventually brought in Carl Case as a business partner: "Eventually I brought on my current business partner, Carl is a fantastic business partner and he, we both kind of helped support each other for the, for the years after that."
Their complementary skills created balance: "He sees more of the CFO, I'm more of the CEO kind of things. Like I enjoy that portion of it. He enjoys the meticulous nature of all of the financials."
Both remain active in coaching: "We both take on clients and stuff like that."
The Facility Evolution: Growing Into Space
Brandon's gym took an unconventional path regarding space: "We've always been in this facility and I would say it was like too big for us to start and then we have grown into it."
The current setup provides ideal conditions: "Our current setup is very nice. It's like 6,500 square foot. It works perfectly for what we need it for."
The Service Evolution: From Pure CrossFit to Hybrid Model
Brandon's gym journey mirrors the broader evolution of the fitness industry. Starting in the early days of CrossFit, they experienced the full spectrum: "We started so early on in the CrossFit, you know, scheme of things. was CrossFit and then it was like all of these stratified things of CrossFit, CrossFit football, CrossFit endurance."
The Complexity Phase
Working with Chris Cooper, they expanded services dramatically: "We split into, it did a thousand different services."
The Current Model
Years of experimentation led to their current hybrid approach: "Now I have group and I do individual design and my clients that leave, work with them remotely a lot of times."
The Present Moment Philosophy
When asked about his favorite phase of the journey, Brandon offers mature perspective: "Wherever I'm at now, that's usually where I'm pretty happy. It's like, it's easy to look back and see all the difficulties, but gosh, so much in terms of value that I got out of some of the past suffering in business."
He emphasizes the value of direct experience: "You're dabbling it long enough to realize the problems yourself? And then you, then you go through and correct, which is so much of a better lesson than just being told what to do all the time."
The Grand Canyon Analogy
Brandon uses a powerful metaphor: "I can tell you what the grand Canyon looks like. I can explain it and talk to you about it all day, but until you go there yourself, you will not fully understand it. So I think a lot of good value and experience there."
The Coaching Team: Structured Specialization
Brandon's current coaching team includes six people total, with clear role divisions:
Individual Design Coaches
Brandon, Carl, and Robbie handle ID clients
Group Coaches
Aaron, Doug, and Emma lead group classes
Additional Responsibilities All coaches contribute to various aspects of business operations including client management and specialized projects.
The Hybrid Model Challenge: Making Both Work
Running both group and individual design simultaneously requires intentional systems. Brandon explains their approach:
Culture and Communication
Brandon rejects the notion that one model is superior: "If you want really high priority on social interaction and you like group stuff, but you're willing to take a hit on design or some of the other holistic portions of it, then I think group might be best for you."
For individual design: "If you want things that are aligned specifically for you, you know that you are moving in right direction... that might be right for you."
The Key to Success
"I think it's transparency... it's not this vibe out there that one thing's better than the other. I'm not trying to like leverage things or go back and forth."
The Equipment Balance: Systems for Sharing
Brandon manages equipment logistics through planning: "Essentially, I make an assumption when I'm writing group design that I have X amount of equipment to work with, which leaves half of the equipment for individual design."
They communicate proactively: "We do have conversations and meetings every week on like, hey, maybe we don't have 15 people programmed for the skier gone, you know, on Mondays or something like that."
The Culture Factor
Brandon emphasizes collaboration over competition: "Understanding how to work in with each other and use same pieces of equipment, sharing, you know, skills that adults have communication, conflict resolution, all of that."
He contrasts this with typical globo gym culture where asking to share equipment can offend people.
The Anti-Dogma Approach: Thoughtful Program Design
Brandon's programming philosophy reflects evolved thinking about CrossFit culture:
No Rx Weights
"I don't put Rx weights on the board for group class. think that's stupid. All right. Crossfit people come at me kind of thing."
Instead, he focuses on intention: "I'll put intention on the board."
No Leaderboards
"I don't do a leaderboard because I think it creates more compensatory behaviors."
No Open Pressure
"We also don't really do the open because I don't want to force my general population people thinking that this is the goal that they should be striving toward is like 30 muscle ups per time."
The Fitness Trend Perspective: HYROX and Beyond
Brandon takes a pragmatic view of fitness trends like HYROX and DEKA:
"When people come to me with them, I'm like, is this fun for you? Like, do you want to do this in group? Okay, here's how you could play with it... If you want something and you're like serious about it, I can design something."
The Cyclical Nature
He maintains perspective on trends: "The high rocks and Deco will go away and then something else will come and then, you know, whatever the case is."
The Goal Philosophy Evolution
Brandon's thinking on client goals has matured significantly over his career:
The Journey
"I couldn't flip flopped on that a little bit here and there. was like originally like, yeah, have a goal, have something to train for. And then it shifted to, you know, intrinsic motivation."
Working with Sharon Preet
Collaboration with human behavior specialist Sharon Preet influenced his current approach: "We've talked to him, we talked about clients were like, that's a five year project. That's a 10 year project, right? Like these timelines of what do we need to do right now?"
The Pragmatic Solution
"If my programming is not fun, first off, I can write you the perfect program. And if you don't do any of it, then how am I going to help you? So let's make it fun."
The Nutrition Parallel: Trying On Different Approaches
Brandon compares fitness exploration to nutritional experimentation:
When clients want to try approaches like keto: "What do you know about it? Why do you want to do it? Okay. Here's what I think is going to happen... I'm cool guiding you through this."
He uses outcome-based decision making: "Did we get what we wanted out of it? That's great."
The Health vs. Aesthetics Question
Brandon distinguishes between different definitions of success: "Do you want to be lean or do you want to be lean and healthy? Those are different things."
He acknowledges potential conflicts: "If you give somebody something harmful, 500 calorie diet, right? And they lose weight, they're like, Oh, look at me. Well, we got to talk."
The Intake Process: Every Client Starts With Brandon
Brandon personally conducts calls with all prospective members: "Everyone who starts here starts with some conversation with me typically."
The Purpose
"It's about managing expectations and it's about alignment. it's about figuring out, this going to be the right place relative to like your, everything that's important to you, your values, right?"
He focuses on genuine fit: "The money that you want to spend and how important the goals are."
The Questions
His process centers on understanding: "What do want? What do really want? Okay. What do you expect out of the service?"
The Sales Journey: From Icky to Ethical
Brandon's relationship with sales has evolved significantly:
The Early Discomfort
"Sales were just icky and I felt weird asking for money."
The Learning Process
Working with Josh Singer and exposure to various sales methodologies helped: "I thought I was good at it until I met Josh Singer... And then I was like, yeah, I think I'm good. No, I'm not."
The Current Philosophy
"Taking everything in that I believe in and then making it my own of like, what is this holistically, ethically when it comes to, uh, sales."
Client Demographics: The Real Goals
Brandon observes consistent patterns in what clients say they want:
The Common Language
Tone
Lose weight
Get stronger
"I need to get flexible" (this one triggers him)
Don't want to get injured
The Secondary Desires
Energy
Function ("I just want to walk my kids up. I want to chase my kids down")
The Deeper Truth
Brandon references Precision Nutrition philosophy: "You don't buy a drill or you're buying a drill to put a hole in the wall to put photo on the wall so that you get this feeling out of it."
The real goals are confidence, feeling sexy, and deeper emotional states. His job is uncovering these: "Finding out, let's get on the same page about what that means."
Advice for New Coaches: Business First, Then Philosophy
Brandon offers hard-earned wisdom for emerging coaches:
The Priority Order
"You could go on this spiel about like, you know, I think that your purpose, mission values, principles, and self-awareness... but you got to make money before, so you can stay open so that you can learn these lessons and have these opportunities."
The Essential Focus
"Do your due diligence and making sure that you have a viable model and the prices and what you're going to sell and how you're going to sell it... If you cannot attract a person and get them into your gym and convert them to a member and keep them and deliver a service, then... it doesn't even matter."
Stay Simple and Reflective
"Stay really simple. figure out what it is the service you want to provide and what that looks like within the marketplace and then implement on it and have a system by which you reflect."
Question Everything
Brandon emphasizes avoiding dogma: "The dogmatic nature of a lot of cross-rechamps is like, nope. This is the way and the truth. And I'm like, yeah, but is it? But is it like, here's where I could see it'd be good for it, and then here's where it would fall flat."
The Mentorship Imperative
Brandon's strongest recommendation for new coaches: "As soon as you can afford it, get some mentors. We've had so many mentors over the years, really good ones."
He couples this with introspection: "Get quiet with yourself and get to know why you're really doing what you're doing more often. And that came a little late in the game for me."
The James Fitzgerald Impact: Uncovering the Map
Brandon was fortunate to experience CCP during James's teaching era:
"When I started OPEX, it was like the James Fitzgerald four hour calls where we just like riff on things. And I think things were a lot more open-ended."
The Revelation
"It's like I had a map and part of the map was covered or at least a large portion of it. And it just helped uncover what I don't know quite a bit of."
The education provided new perspective: "It gave me more of a 360 degree of how I can view fitness, like how somebody's beliefs and, you know, their, how their food and how everything just kind of like interacts because we don't exist in, you know, a vacuum."
The Two Key Lessons
Brandon identifies the dual value:
The Art: "The holistic nature of things"
The Science: "Principles, lean into principles over over what's fun and exciting"
Technology Integration: Systems and Automation
Brandon embraces technology strategically:
Business Operations
"Love me some systems and I love, automating things... using ZPR to tie things in together."
He's realistic about his approach: "I always feel like I am way better at finding problems than I am at like solving them. I'll solve 10 problems and I'll find 30 in the process."
Program Delivery
Brandon uses CoachRx for both individual and group clients: "It's been fantastic to use Codirects. I use that for individual and group for both of those things."
He specifically utilizes the live function for group classes.
The AI Exploration: Practical Applications
Brandon actively experiments with AI tools, primarily ChatGPT:
Creative Uses
He mock-interviewed with ChatGPT while doing dishes, having it ask him questions in preparation for conversations.
Research Applications
"Have it vet itself and have it, have it pull up articles, use size space, use things that like extract the main sources so that you can double check it stuff on it. But I do like it as a first pass for things."
Custom Learning
Brandon creates specialized learning environments: "I will take it and it will create a, create its own folder and say like, all right, let's feed it all of these PDFs. Here's 15 different PDFs."
He uses this to challenge his own biases: "Now pull everything, use this, use everything outside of this and now let's have a conversation around it."
The Peer Learning Circle
Brandon participates in regular coaching calls with peers including Clalia, Kyle, and Justin:
The Structure
Originally weekly, now bi-weekly: "We, we talk about whatever's top of mind."
Sometimes structured with guest experts, but often organic: "It's usually just like what's top of mind or what are we struggling with? What's new?"
The Value
Brandon emphasizes the importance: "Meeting with other coaches and having conversations, especially like outside of my bubble, as well too, has been just incredibly valuable."
The accountability factor matters: "People will call you on their call you on your shit, you know?"
Current Learning Focus: Human Behavior and Pain
Brandon's recent education has centered on two main areas:
Human Behavior
Working with Sharon Preet on behavior change: "Human behavior over the last three or four years have been just fascinating."
He sees the interconnections: "You get a client and they're like, I've been stress eating... Well, you're letting your boss overstep your boundaries... and then it becomes more about human behavior and less about the stress eating. That's the symptom and this is the source."
Pain Science
Brandon is expanding his knowledge of pain management: "Pain, get a lot of people that just like under under uncovering one, scope of practice and where I can sit within this understanding of pain, injury, flexibility."
He's working with Kelly Starrett through Ready State: "That's been interesting... trying to expand my knowledge in that direction. Because you get so many people like, I pain. Well, that's a complicated topic."
The Client-Centered Problem Solving
Brandon's approach to business development is reactive in the best way:
"It'll be client driven, right? Client comes to you with a problem. Problem is X. Huh. I don't really know how to solve X. Where would I go to solve X and then go and just grab things."
This leads to exploration: "Is this something I want to get into? Is it something I want to either convert everything into or draw in parts of it."
The Refinement Process
Sometimes exploration leads to elimination: "Eventually in certain cases, I'll start going in that direction. I'm like, I don't like, I don't even want to solve this problem anymore. Like this is not worth it to me. Like they really start to nail down your target audience."
The Long-Term Vision: Beyond CrossFit
Brandon is currently rebranding the gym to reflect its evolution:
"We're rebranding right now with Boris... CrossFit and that threw up red flags... as soon as I say that word, people are like, I know what that is."
The Broader Identity
"We've been doing a lot of rebranding with Boris and we're going to be launching that toward the back end of the year... CrossFit Southern exists out of this business, but this business is larger and, you know, we have a bigger goal than just, you know, the group classes."
The Professional Identity: Problem Solver First
Brandon's career demonstrates that successful gym ownership requires:
Continuous Adaptation Willingness to evolve services based on client needs and market realities
Financial Sustainability Understanding that staying open enables the opportunity to help people
Systems Thinking Building processes that support both business operations and quality coaching
Ego Management Being willing to question everything, including your own assumptions
Client-Centered Focus Letting client problems drive business development rather than personal preferences
The 16-Year Lesson: Stay Open and Stay Curious
Brandon's journey from broke gym owner working 100-hour weeks to successful multi-model facility operator demonstrates that there's no single path to success in fitness business. His willingness to:
Work multiple jobs to keep the doors open
Question CrossFit orthodoxy while maintaining what works
Invest in mentorship and education
Build systems for efficiency
Explore new technologies and methodologies
Maintain peer relationships for accountability
These factors combined to create a sustainable, evolving business that serves diverse client needs while maintaining professional standards.
Connect with Brandon
Those interested in Brandon's approach can find him:
Instagram: @coachbrandonwilton
Email: brandon@crossfitsouthrnd.com
Location: Currently rebranding from CrossFit Southern
Focus: Hybrid model serving both group and individual design clients
Philosophy: "Lean into principles over what's fun and exciting"
Brandon's story reminds us that successful coaching businesses aren't built on finding the perfect model, they're built on solving problems consistently while staying curious, humble, and committed to serving clients well.
Next Steps
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