Coach Chris received his CrossFit Level 1 Certification in September of 2018. By day, he is a full-time Lead Technician at American Superconductor. He has a wife, Lorie, and two children, Tori and Alex. His hobbies include road cycling, mountain biking, hunting, and CrossFit.
Chris has always been athletic from a young age, playing multiple sports. Due to his size when he was younger, 6’3” at age 12, he excelled in basketball, football, and track.
During high school, Chris began playing volleyball competitively on the beach. Upon graduating, he began to get into weight training/bodybuilding and competed in bodybuilding competitions.
“I always stayed fit through lifting weight during my 20’s, then really fell in love with road cycling, and from there on was primarily a cyclist riding thousands of miles every year. I continued weight training as part of my routine, played pickup volleyball, and ice hockey all through my life to stay fit along with cycling. In 2010 my wife talked me into trying CrossFit at the age of 40, and from my first class, I was hooked. I got stronger than I had ever been fairly quickly and began competing in CrossFit as a Masters athlete. Mostly, I loved the class aspect of CrossFit—learning the movements and watching people improve their fitness. During classes, people would always tell me that they thought I would make a good coach, so I decided to take my Level 1 in 2018 and passed! I began coaching in 2019 after bringing my coaching interest to the attention of my gym, EXP. Since that time, I have been coaching 6 classes a week.
The main reason I coach is to help people achieve their goals, whether it’s lifting a certain weight, attempting a new movement, or helping them compete in other sports. I just love the proud looks on the athletes’ faces when they achieve their goals! It makes me feel proud to know I helped them in some small or large way!
I may not be as strong as I used to be now at age 50, but I still try to maintain the benchmarks I set in my early 40’s. Being able to hang with the young guns from time to time makes me realize what I’m doing at CrossFit is still effective and can lead to a more active life in the future.
My personal fitness philosophy is: do what makes you happy and keeps you feeling young and inspired!”