13 Years: The Gym That Became a Career

Thirteen years ago, this gym did not exist. And about five years ago, it very nearly stopped existing. This episode is the whole story, told honestly, to mark Wicklow Strength and Fitness turning thirteen.It began as CrossFit Wicklow, founded by Chad and Clara Biddle, and Liam walked through the door as a member around its first birthday, not a natural athlete, but someone who found in that room the training, the community, and the sense of being capable that changed the direction of his life. Years later, in 2016, it became WSF. And in 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, it became Liam's, bought with a personal loan and his parents' help, his mother borrowing from the credit union and his dad chipping in, because the banks would not touch a loss making gym in a locked down industry.Liam tells it all: the founders who started it, the access gym that was such a disaster it had the Gardaí waiting outside one day (and why killing it was the birth of the premium gym you know now), the leap of faith that nearly broke him, the slow rebuild to real momentum by mid-2022, and the planning battles still being fought today.But the heart of the episode is what he is proudest of, and it is not the member count or surviving Covid. It is that this is a career now. When he started, working in a gym did not pay and people burned out and left. He has spent thirteen years changing that. The team grew from one (him) to six, and every one of them has a story: Conor, who joined at sixteen and is now General Manager; Eddie, who came for work experience at eighteen and is now Head Coach; and Katie, who left the industry burned out, convinced you could not earn a living in it, and came back to build the youth programme.A thank you to the founders, to his parents, to the team, and to every member who has ever shown up. Here is to the next thirteen.Want to be part of the next chapter? The door is open: https://api.grow.pushpress.com/widget/bookings/intro