The Sevan Podcast - #731 - CrossFit Affiliate Series | Patrick de Goede of CrossFit Damascus

Episode Date: January 3, 2023

Support the showPartners:https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATIONhttps://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK!https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

bam we're live good morning gonna be a great show today part of the affiliate series uh i i haven't done this before and uh 700 shows my guest is here there was something on my mind so strong that i wanted to get it off my mind before i started the show i got this dm today not accurate i got it yesterday at uh 3 28 p.m it says seven i'm watching the old behind the scenes it is a crime crossfit got rid of you and the behind the scenes team it opened the sport to masses i cannot tell you uh in in the history of dumb things that were done. I know it's self-serving to say this, but firing me was complete fucking idiocy. I'll start by telling you this.

I never hugged a single person inappropriately at work, let alone fucked one of my employees. I was the furthest thing away from a micromanager. at work, let alone fucked one of my employees. I was the furthest thing away from a micromanager. I was available 24-7, 365 days a year, Christmas, everything. I never fucking took a day off. I gave all my employees the chance to come up to me, call me, approach me at all time. Imagine, like 70, 80 people. Always. I was always available. If you called me or text me and I didn't get back to you, I would get back to you. I did not micromanage. I gave you the tools you needed to fulfill whatever project you wanted. I was friends with all the other executives. Yes, there were a ton of people who didn't like me. In hindsight, I think they didn't like me because of my proximity to Greg,

but really they should have loved me because of that. Because I was so close to Greg, close to Nicole, close to Bruce, close to Dave, I could get almost anything done in the company. And then on top of that, you can just look at any of the metrics at CrossFit Inc that I was in charge of while I was there. They skyrocketed, especially in my last two years, probably the best two years I was there. Absolutely nuts. I was the greatest contributor by number of pieces of content to the CrossFit Journal or the CrossFit Media Machine than anybody, than probably any three people combined, to be honest with you. And I just, when I saw that today, I was like, that's nuts. And then I'll tell you one more thing.

I didn't have to do the behind the scenes. No one asked me to do it. It wasn't part of my work schedule. And yet it made it so 12 weeks of the year, I had to work 80 hours instead of 40 hours. And I had kids. It was nothing that was ever asked of me ever, ever, ever. I just did that. You know how few executives anywhere would pick up a camera? It would be below them to do that. And I just saw that and I'm like, man, they really, really shit the bed. And there's things that I can do that no one else can do

and no one else will ever be able to do. I know they say everyone's replaceable. It's not true. It is not true. Anyway, just, I saw that this morning. I don't say that with any anger or braggadocio, but I was just reflecting on just my contribution. and uh and and and you know i i would argue that that's why there's been a drought of uh good content in a long long time okay that's it did those thoughts and opinions are of my own and no one else's not even caleb's patrick hi hey how's it going? Awesome. I just got so fired up this morning in the shower. I'm like, man, they really screwed up. They did. They really screwed up. Trish, we know, Savant, we've seen the downfall.

Well, thank you. Man, that's one of my harshest critics right there, Trish. Patrick is on another planet. It's called Africa. I wonder how many Americans have visited Africa, Patrick. We've got a U.S. embassy here, so I think a good couple. Fifteen? But I mean, even to the continent.

I wonder if it's even 1% of Americans have visited the African continent. I think you'd be right. And you know, go ahead, go ahead. No, it's a very, where I am in Namibia, it's a very popular tourist destination. But I'm getting some weird error message here. What does this say? Can you see me? Okay, cool. My screen's gone black.

Anyway, it's a popular tourist destination, but it's a huge continent, and I really don't think – I lived in the States in California in 1989 for almost a year, and it was clear that a lot of Americans didn't know much about Africa or had been to Africa. You lived in California in 1989, you said? Yeah, in Laguna Beach. Wow, that's a good spot. It is.

How old were you in 1989? Early 20s, 21, 22. Okay. I forget. So we're about the same age. I graduated from high school in 1990, and I was probably 18. Yeah, I graduated in 85. If there are these places that have this enormous effect on the human psyche,

if you're an American and you've never been there, and one of them is most of the the african continent visiting china visiting india where if you think of life as a social experiment it's just a complete different social experiment that they're running in africa or china or india and until you see it and by see it i mean actually you know spend a month there two months, try to have a life there. You're kind of just missing out. You're almost like an incomplete human being. Yeah, I think there's a, there's a, so certainly when I was a youngster and when I was in the States, I, I think America has always been like a, it's been a huge superpower, but I think there's risk in that because I think many Americans, and this is a generalization,

but I think many Americans believe that the world begins and ends with the West Coast and the East Coast of the USA. And there's obviously a lot of stuff that's going on out there. That's not the case. That's so different. That's so different that's so so so different i mean there's people who live in tents and like and when i mean tents i mean um you know uh domiciles made of mud and thatch all over the world whole villages yeah it's not a camping trip for the weekend no it certainly isn't. And there's obviously, there's places that are more remote. I think Africa has some of the last real wildernesses on the planet.

And so there's places that are more remote. But I think it's just a very different kind of living. And I think the Peace Corps, the American Peace Corps, does a great job of getting American youngsters out to other places around the planet and having them experience what other cultures live like. So I think that's a good thing. And it doesn't take long for the mind to reset either. You know, you could take someone who's a complete city dweller,

you know, maybe never been off the island of Manhattan and take them into Africa, into a village. And, you know, the first 15 days might be hard, but after that, the brain really will reset. And, uh, within 90 days, you will have a whole new person. There's actually a movie. Um, I've talked about it a bunch on the show. I wonder if you've seen it. They take a bunch of boys from Baltimore, inner city, Baltimore. And they take them to a school and, uh, somewhere in Kenya where there's basically where there's no electricity. And within six months,

the kids don't want to go back to America. They're like, holy shit, this is so much better than the inner city in Baltimore. What is that movie? It won the Academy award. Uh, Oh,

look, Caleb's. Oh yeah. Boys of Baraka. Dang. you're good. Check this out, Patrick. This is a great movie. The Boys of Baraka. I'll have a look. Is that is it on Netflix? Is it elsewhere? Where do I find that? That is a good question. Did that win the Academy Award? Definitely had to have been nominated. Where were you born, Patrick? So I'm born in Namibia, in the capital, in a place called Vintook, which is, I don't know, well, I guess it's considered a city.

We have around, I'd say, 350,000, 380,000 people. And the country is very sparsely populated. In fact, I think it may be, if not the least, then certainly one of the least populated countries on the planet. We have a population of around two and a half million people. And it didn't get its independence here. Let me throw something that I learned, too. It didn't get its independence until 1990 from South Africa. And they gave it to South Africa after World War I when they took it from the Germans.

It was the League of Nations, which we know today as the United Nations. Yeah, that's right. You've done some good research. Spot on, man. So are there a lot of Germans there, a lot of South Africans there? A lot of South Africans. Well, South Africans, I think for the longest time, when we were part of South Africa, we were governed as a, I guess, like a fifth province. And so the Southern African culture between places like South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, maybe Botswana to a lesser degree, is quite similar. Definitely a strong, strong throwback to the German time. So lots of German architecture, lots of German-speaking people. But when I say lots, that's relative to the population.

So Caucasians, whites are very much a minority here. The big ethnic group are the Osho Bamba. They are probably, I'd say they make up 60% of the populace. But I guess the throwback to German architecture or German culture is very, very strong because there's lots of prominent buildings like churches and old administrative buildings and stuff like that that are kind of,

you know, that are very definitive of that era and of that time. By the way, that's Caleb below you. Caleb, nice to meet you, man. It's fascinating, too. Here we are with technology, the three of us on three different continents.

Where's Caleb? He can't say, but I assume he's an American soldier, so I assume it's in a desert somewhere. Okay, nice. That's pretty cool. It's all right. How, how, how does,

how did someone like you end up being born on the African continent? How did your parents end up there in Nambia? So, so my, my mom's parents fled Germany at the end of the second world war. So my mom was German. And my dad grew up in South Africa in Johannesburg and of English. And sorry, one of the cats is just missioning around there. Cats are welcome.

Cats are welcome. Cats are cool. This is Jinx. So yeah, so my mom's parents, my grandparents fled Germany at the end of the Second World War looking for employment, sailed to Cape Town in South Africa, and then came up to Namibia by rail and settled here. And my dad came from South Africa as a traveling musician and a traveling salesman. He came up here in the early 60s to look for work. And so they met and here I am. Wow, that's crazy. Why were your parents fleeing Germany?

Are you Jewish? No, I'm not. But I think my grandfather had served in the German military, but I think they were pretty, from what I remember from stories, I think they were pretty disappointed in the way things had turned out. And I think Germany at the end of the second world war was probably a shitty place to be um and he had a he had a master craftsman certification as a as a vehicle mechanic as a like an ldv heavy duty vehicle mechanic and so there was there were people looking for that kind of skill out here and um he knew some other people and they said there were opportunities in Africa.

And so they set sail for Cape Town sometime, I think around 1944, 1945. Uh, so right at the end of the world war and, um, kind of made a new life there. Crazy. I, um, I'm also, I'm also blown away at the fact that there was a railroad that went all the way from South Africa to Nimbia in the 40s. Is that rail still act? Could you take a train all the way down to South Africa today? You could. There's a no longer serves. I don't think it serves passenger traffic anymore. There's been quite a bit of decline in some of the infrastructure, but certainly from a goods

point of view, there's a rail line that connects the west coast of Namibia, which is a port called Walfish Bay with the capital, which is where I am, and then into into the inland so we're kind of like a big I guess like a big sort of a transport hub into the center of Africa You've got a yeah, there's a bunch of maps you can point it there and then all the way down to South Africa So harbors are very very limited along the west coast so kind of luck down there I don't know you can't see me on the screen, but on the west coast of that map there There's very limited harbor access and so Cape Town is a big harbor. There's, but on the west coast of that map there, there's very limited harbor access. And so Cape Town is a big harbor. There's a couple along the west coast.

And then on our side, there's Walfish Bay, and that sort of serves. So there's a really big and well-established rail network in Africa and in Southern Africa specifically. And so you're born in Nimbia, and were you born in that town? What did you call it? Windhoek? Windhoek, yeah. Windhoek. Oh, you're born there? I was born there in 1967, so I'm 55 years old.

I've pretty much lived here all my life. I mean, apart from traveling to the States a little bit and seeing some of Europe, I've lived here for most of my life. And do you know how many people lived in Windhoek when you were born? No, no idea. Probably, I mean, 350,000. Now I'm guessing maybe under 100,000,

maybe 80,000. I really don't know. And that is the biggest city in Nimbia. Nimbia. Nimbia. Thank you. nimbia namibia namibia thank you namibia yeah it's the biggest city in namibia three syllable three syllables namibia yeah bingo crazy what what that I hear? Do you own birds or that's wildlife? That's wildlife. I live outside town on a nature estate.

I have a property that's in the bush and we have game that runs around and we have birds in the trees and it's really busy out there. What are the politics like in Namibia? Is it a safe place? Yeah, very much so. So when we became independent from South Africa in 1990, the United Nations played a really big role in that process. It was called Resolution 435. And I think the eyes of the the world as well as the continent were very much on

namibia to see whether we we whether we would be a successful democracy um so i think everybody was watching and um there's a ruling party they they are and they've been in power since since independence um and i think they'll continue to be in power for a long time to come, simply because the populace that votes for them is the majority. But it's good politics. I mean, it's shitty in some ways. There's corruption and there's nepotism. There's inequality in many ways.

But I think there's – I've yet to, I've been fortunate to travel quite widely and I don't think I've been to a country where I've seen like really good spectacular governance across the board. So I think a lot of people assign that to being Africa, you know, that it's African politics. But I think in many ways, Namibia has risen above that. We're well managed in an african context and do all the people there get along does it is it has any of our we have a we have a sickness here in the united states we have a lot of sicknesses and i apologize to um i saw that um people were wearing masks in namibia and i apologize on behalf of all the citizens of the united states for spreading our fear uh to you guys um but but it seems like everyone here um

is looking for a problem and some of those problems spread to other countries but you're you know we live in a country where i think it's 16 of the people have melanated skin and you live in the inverse of that. But, God, that would be so great for so many Americans to have to go to Africa. What's it like there, being that you're the pale face and the melanated people are the dominant people? Right. the dominant people right so i mean we we've been what we've been independent for 30 32 years 32 is that right 32 years 35 years whatever it is um and i think there's a lot of unity amongst namibians i think because we're such a small nation there's a very strong sense of national

pride um and although there's although there's some racial tension, I think some of that is a hangover from the apartheid era. I was raised in that. I grew up in that time. I think we've done really, really well at disabling that and dismantling those mechanisms. And I think by and large, Namibians are easygoing, peace-loving people.

And although we have 13 ethnic groups here, you know, so there's huge potential for conflict. And not everybody gets on all the time. But I think as a nation, we're a peace-loving bunch. And I think by and large, people get on well, which I think is maybe contrary to expectations. You kind of think that there'd be that there'd be friction between black and white, but there really is. I've seen worse elsewhere, a lot worse elsewhere.

In the United States, if a if a white police officer shoots someone who's black or arrest someone who's black, that's how they report it in the paper. Right. They they they they fan the flame even though it's not relative to the story at all that's how they report it do they do that there no they don't i think again there's a hangover i think sometimes um and i think the press plays a huge role in this i mean even with our local media you know i think the battle that you guys are fighting with mainstream media over there and the narratives is really difficult and it's

very poisonous and dangerous. Over here, I think sometimes there's a throwback to that or people make it something that it isn't. But if you read the common thread on, say, a newspaper article where invariably there was some sort of context of color,

racial denomination, that's very, very quickly dismantled in the comment section. Somebody will come up and say, oh, so-and-so because he's a white or because he's a black or whatever. And 30 people will chime in and say, you're full of shit and kind of move on. That's cool.

Can you tell by everyone's last name? That's very cool. That makes me happy to hear that. Can you tell by people's last name that's very cool that makes me happy to hear that what can you tell by people's last name um what their ethnicity is like before someone meets you when they see your name will you pronounce your last name for me so it's a hard g it's dutch i would have never got it close that wasn't bad i would have said De-goed. Dehuda, do people know right away, before they even meet you, what you're going to look like? Yeah, I think so.

I think it's safe to say there was quite a bit of, I guess, cross-population with the Germans when they were here. So I think a lot of the I think there's a lot of the the Buster people that have German names where the German surnames have infiltrated their culture. But by and large, the ethnic groups here have very distinct names and the languages are distinctly different. So you can figure out I mean, you'd figure out with my name that I'm

not African or I'm not of African descent. I'm a first-generation Namibian. But for most of the locals here, you can figure out they have like little, not sure what you call them, like little punctuation marks on top of the O's and the E's that kind of signify that they're either Damara or Nama or Herero or Shibambo, whatever the case might be. But I mean, I'm a bit of a giveaway with the Dutch surname. Are they called tribes? Do they call them tribes?

Yeah, yeah. And there's still a lot of tribal, there's still like a lot of, I guess, a lot of tribal culture, you know, in some parts of the country. If you, let's say up in the north, if you want to access land, let's say you want to develop land as a tourism endeavor, you need to go bring him some sort of a uh i guess like a like not an offering but a um some sort of a buy-in in the form of a goat or a sheep that kind of thing so there's still a lot of really like strong traditions that are in place amongst the the various ethnic tribes um do they do you own the property you're on are you allowed to own property there you personally yeah yeah so property is i think if you do a google search you allowed to own property there? You personally? Yeah. Yeah. So property is,

I think if you do a Google search, you'll find that property in Namibia, specifically in Vintook, but also elsewhere in the other towns is some of the highest priced real estate in the world, which is crazy. But yes, you are allowed to own it. Unfortunately, many, many Namibians don't have the means. So there's a whole bunch. I think our unemployment rate is 57%. Wow. Which is really, really high. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's super high.

That's like Philadelphia. That's like Philadelphia. Right. So if you include the rural communities, though, then it's not as bad as it sounds. There's a lot of people that are subsistence farmers, that are rural farmers, who are essentially considered unemployed. But it's still a very, very high unemployment figure. And the cost of living is very high. And unfortunately, there's quite a big disparity as well between the haves and the have-nots.

So owning property, it's completely possible, but it's expensive. When you say there's a disparity between the haves and the have-nots, does everyone still have a cell phone? Do these tribal people have cell phones? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they have cable TV and they definitely have mobile phones. So that's been very kind of accessible. And I don't know whether it's affordable, but a lot of people deem that a priority or a necessity. So you can drive through any rural village in the country and there'll be satellite dishes affixed to a mud hut so that they have cable TV. So someone might have to walk 500 yards to get water, but they still have Android. Yeah, 100%.

That's exactly, I mean, that's a great description. I don't think people realize that about about that about africa how many people actually have to um travel to get water i mean it is a i don't know how it is in uh namibia i'm sure there's certain parts but there's there's definitely places all over africa where that's what that's the primary you know objective every day you'll see lines of people waiting for water or you'll see the women walking with the giant yellow jugs on their head, and you'll see just lines of people walking down the road back and forth. And some of those people walk 10 miles just to get water each way. A lot of people.

A lot of people. Yeah. So, I mean, that's still very much part of rural Namibian life. Namibia is very centralized. So most of the commerce and most of the industry happens in Bintik, which is where I live. And then there's this huge expanses. Think Utah, think Nevada, kind of you'll travel a hundred miles between two towns. And then in the north, it's even more, it's kind of even more spread out. So in the north, it's even more spread out. So in the very, very far north where the majority of the population lives, that's kind of like an industrial hub as well, like a commerce hub.

But between that, there's just lots of people that live as subsistence farmers. So they're cattle herders, they're sheep herders. And for many of them, they walk a long way to get to water they walk they walk a long way to get to water the kids walk a long way to get to school um what are you zooming in on there i'm on my phone so i don't have great i don't i don't have great he's just he's showing the he's just showing the country right so that big green dot on the top there that's the atosha pad yeah that's a national park yeah that's a national park and then the area's a national park. And then the area, say,

if you go say 12 o'clock from that. So from the three o'clock of that green dot. Yeah. From that. So if you go hard, uh, zoom it the other way, like drag it the other way.

Yeah. So to that side, to the West. Yeah. That's, there's lots of people there that are just, you know, that literally just live in the sticks

and that are herding cattle and that are herding goats, herding sheep, and they live a meager existence. Is Namibia one of the driest places in Africa? Did I see that? One of the very lowest rainfalls, particularly the brown area that you can see on the map. So the Skeleton Coast and the Namib Desert are a big part of what makes up our, I guess, our country. And I think the Namib Desert has something like five millimeters of rainfall per annum.

And then for the rest of the country, it differs. I mean, I live in the center, so it's a little bit more, we maybe get around four or five hundred millimeters a year. There's places in the north against the river that get pretty high rainfall, but by and large, it's a little bit more, we maybe get around 400 or 500 millimeters a year. There's places in the north against the river that get pretty high rainfall. But by and large, it's a very arid country. Yeah, I think I read that it gets on average 14 inches of rain a year, which is like, we had that much here yesterday. Right. Yeah, it's very specific things that people farm and that people grow, people farm with. It's not a particularly lush place. When you were born there, what was growing up there like? You went to school, you went to typical school, went to elementary school, junior high, high school, you played sports?

Yeah, I mean, very, very very very much country living i i guess the best comparison to namibia would be kind of again maybe utah that kind of landscape and so kind of lots of rural towns very easy very easy going but remember i grew up in the uh in the sorry i'm just ferreting around. But remember, I grew up in the... Sorry, I'm just ferreting around here with the dog. I grew up when the apartheid era was very, very much in force here. And so many of the schools were segregated. My parents were adamant that I would go to a school which was multicultural.

So I went to school with black kids. I think at the time it was the only school in the country where there was a mix of whites and blacks and coloreds and people of different ethnic backgrounds. Was that illegal, Patrick? Was that illegal? Like, did you go to a school that was illegal? It was frowned upon.

You know, it wasn't illegal but it was kind of we were definitely the we were definitely so this is what would this be this would be primary school the first primary school I went to that was all white and then I went to this

next school which was a private school and it was run by a bunch of Catholic monks and Dutch Catholic monks and they had a policy that they were multicultural and multiple ethnicities and so I went to this school and said my best in fact my best friend at school was a was a kid whose parents were of color and And his mom was very involved in the liberation struggle of Namibia. So it was kind of like a weird, it was a weird time growing up. But we were all being groomed for the military at the time.

National conscription was the thing. So everybody, every able-bodied male at the age of 18 was conscripted for two years of military duty. And so, you know, growing up was very, it was very easy. It was lots of wide open spaces and just like basic living. You drank from the hose pipe. That's me on the, with a big cheesy grin on the far right. And I'm, what am I? I'm about, I'm 19 there.

So you did go to the military. You ended up doing two years in the military. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Will your kids do that? No. No, so that came to an end when we became independent. Okay. For people who don't know, what was apartheid? So the South African...

Apartheid? So the South African apartheid, probably, I mean, it's a generalization, but in many ways, not really different from what Hitler was doing with the Jews in Germany and Europe. It was essentially a policy of segregation where people of color, i.e. everybody other than whites, was considered a lesser being. And so there was massive segregation. People were forced out. The white populace had access to all the amenities, all the education, all the commerce. And the blacks were essentially, I mean, there was no slavery, but it kind of borders on slavery.

And so there were massive sanctions. Like there were certain jobs they couldn't have, things they couldn't do, places they couldn't go? They had no, so at the time, they had no access to any sort of skilled positions. So they were all used, and this was South Africa, africa which included we were then we were called southwest africa so we're in namibia now we've been in namibia since independence but we were southwest africa and and and the policy was or the governance was all of south africa and that included southwest africa and uh so so all

people of color had no access to any kind of well-paying jobs. They were used as gardeners, as laborers. They're like a really dark time in the history of southern Africa. And this was law. This was more than just cultural norm. This was law. Like in Europe, Jews weren't allowed to live in some cities. Jews weren't allowed to live in the city. Jews weren't allowed to live in the city.

They had to live on the outskirts of the city. There were laws like that. It was no different. It was no different. Okay. Yeah. Magnus, sorry, Magnus Holmgren, a little like California against the Mexicans. Shut the fuck up.

Not even close. Not even close to true. Not even close to true. I let Mexicans clean my yard once a week not even true you asshole let me tell you working at crossfitting in santa cruz i think 40 of the employees were mexican including the great dave castro so you shut your pie hole magnus okay uh okay i apologize sometimes i have to fight with the guys in the uh in the chat here so very so very similar to what was going on with the Jews.

They were considered dirty. They were forced to live on the outskirts of town. They couldn't have certain jobs. Yeah. And so I think just kind of real hardcore racism that was enforced by law. And obviously, I mean, South Africa was ostracized from the rest of the world in a huge way. There were political sanctions. There were sporting sanctions.

There were all kinds of sanctions brought against South Africa. And the South African governments at the time were essentially fighting a communist threat. The Soviets were well embedded in the Soviets and Cubans were well embedded in Angola and in Mozambique and countries that surrounded South Africa. And so whilst they were enforcing the apartheid regime, we were also at war with what we were told was essentially like the red tide, you know, the commies were coming. So, wow wow so that's a really tough time for the country basically you have no ally from the west or the east they were just isolated um pretty hands tied tied behind their back by west the west and meanwhile the east was thinking about coming

in while they were weak and taking over yeah and i mean so so the apartheid thing and i don't know enough about it i'm certainly no expert on the matter. I'm just kind of recounting what I remember and what we were taught. But Africa had been colonized in so many ways by people, by the Dutch. South Africa was effectively colonized by the Dutch in 1657. And so it comes as a long, like centuries history of slavery and land grabbing and stuff like that. And then I think in the time where I grew up with the apartheid government, it was kind of brought to your head because it had gotten completely out of control. And where I live now, Namibia, there was a faction that was fighting for the liberation of Namibia,

which was then called Southwest Africa. So the current government, the ruling party, they were effectively in exile, they'd been displaced. And the same thing was happening in South Africa, with the ANC, with Mandela, you know, they'd all been imprisoned and been exiled, etc. So it was like a really big, heady time. The late 60s into the, I guess, the mid-80s were like a really volatile time in Southern Africa. And Zimbabwe had fought their own bush war, you know, with Mugabe coming into power.

So the southern continent or the southern part of Africa was very volatile and very unstable three decades, four decades ago. Did you play sports as a child? No, none. No, none. No, my dad was a prolific sportsman. He was a boxer and he was a wrestler and he played a whole bunch of sport.

I didn't like sport at all. I kind of got into the party crowd at an early age. Yeah, me too. Me too. I didn't do any sports age. Yeah, me too. Me too. I didn't do any sports either. I did nothing. I learned that I was physically capable when I went to the military. So even though my time in the military was at like a weird time in the history of the continent and of our country,

the lessons in the military served me really well and specifically, you know, the physical nature of it. So it was the first time you felt discomfort that like, Hey, sweating didn't mean to stop. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Interesting. Uh, I have a very, um, similar, uh, upbringing for me. It didn't happen until I was probably like 34 and it was through CrossFit. Oh, wow. Yeah. Um, and how did you end up in California? For me, it didn't happen until I was probably like 34 and it was through CrossFit.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And how did you end up in California after the military? So I was, when I left the military, triathlon was just starting up here. We kind of, it was the heyday of triathlon. And I started, I left the military with a good amount of fitness and then got into triathlon. There was an event out here that had a half marathon as a run. And I thought, well, I've been doing a lot of running in the military, so let me sign up for that.

And I played some water polo at school, so I was a reasonable swimmer. And then got into triathlon. And my first job after the military, I worked for a chiropractor, the only chiropractor in the country at the time. And he'd studied in Davenport in Iowa. So he convinced me that it'd be a good idea to become a chiropractor. And so I packed my bags, I packed my bike bag, and I left, I think, around March of 1989. And I traveled to Laguna Beach because he had friends that lived there. And they'd offered me a place to stay for a little while. And when I arrived there, I never made it to Davenport, Iowa.

I was so enamored with Pacific Coast Highway and the culture along the West Coast. So I stayed for a year. I worked as a painter, worked on a construction site, worked with a lot of Mexicans, really good people. major worked on a construction site um worked with a lot of mexicans really good people um to spend a year there and just kind of i did a lot of racing uh travel to to kona to go and see the iron man and kind of got around but spent a year almost a year in the states just uh kind of earning my earning my keep and and meeting people and having a good time that is one of the got to be one of the nicest places in the world. Uh,

Laguna beach, great weather, very safe, incredible architecture, shit loads of money. God, there's so much money there. You would,

when's, when's the last time you've been back there? Uh, went back in 94, uh, and haven't been back since. Yeah. You wouldn't believe it.

It is. You, you wouldn't believe it if you saw it. It is, it is something else. And then, so, so then you, so is 94 the last time you've been out of the country? No, no, I've traveled last time to the States. I have a German passport because of, by descent with my mom. So I've traveled to, I've traveled to Europe extensively. And then I was fortunate.

So apart from owning the affiliate, I own a bicycle shop. And I've been heavily involved in cycling in Namibia for 35 odd years. So I've traveled to, I was at the Beijing Olympics as a team mechanic. And I went to Australia for the Commonwealth games. So I've been really fortunate in that, that sport has given me some, you know, some cool travel opportunities. So for the Namibians cycling team for the Olympics, you were the mechanic. Yeah.

Wow. Do you have any crazy stuff where you needed there? Any crazy stuff happen there? It was just a wild experience. I mean, going to Beijing and kind of, it was almost, it was kind of reminiscent of lockdown in the last two years. You know, like I think they're a very heavily policed society and a very, very, what's the word I'm looking for? Yeah, policed and restricted society. So it was interesting, like the opulence of the games, you know, with lots of corporate sponsorship

with Visa and Coke and all the rest of it. And so lots of money, the Olympic Village, but lots of shitty stories about people like locals that had been displaced and kind of almost made homeless to make way for the Olympic Village, which the athletes occupied. And then all of these massive stadiums and sports venues, which were, I mean, unlike anything I'd ever seen. And then driving, the cycling event obviously went outside of Beijing, it took loops of the big wall, like a circuit of the big wall. And seeing Chinese soldiers standing

by the roadside, just like statues, you know, just like a very disciplined, very, very military regime, I guess. And, and, and not a lot of happy people by all accounts. I mean, that was my experience for the few times we managed to get out of the village. Yeah. How cool. And then how did, when did your paths cross with CrossFit? How many, how many affiliates are there in Namibia? Five. Five.

Wow. More than I thought. Yeah, five. So we've got, we've got two in Vintik. Us being the one and CrossFit sold out Vintik being the other. And then we have two at the coast, one in Walfish Bay, which is the harbor town. And then one in Swakopmund, which is like a seasideide resort it's kind of like our version of laguna beach i guess and then one up in the very far north near the etashapan where you guys saw on the map

so five well-established affiliates um but we're a tiny i mean we're a tiny tiny population and how did you do you remember the first time you heard about crossfit yeah we saw we we um we saw the games on espn in 2012 and you knew right away when you saw that yeah we knew right away i mean my so um watched the games on espn and i was coming off like a really long endurance racing stint. I was racing Xterra and doing a lot of off-road triathlon and a lot of trail running and stuff. So I just have like years and years of endurance sport behind me. My wife comes from a bodybuilding background and she was kind of, I wouldn't say she was between things, we we saw the games on espn and we were blown away and i think that

would have been around say june july or late july i think the games are pretty consistent the end of july early august so we saw the games in 2012 and then a kid who we didn't know at the time but he's now one of my best friends opened namibia's first affiliate on the 6th of January 2013. And we were his first members. Wow. So we saw the games. And then four months later, we had our first affiliate open. And Max and Pidi, they were the – so Max was the head coach.

He had his level one. He'd been working at an affiliate in South Africa as a student. And he opened the first affiliate here in, as I said, I think the 6th of January. And so CrossFit in Namibia is what? It's 10 years old. Yeah, pretty much. In fact, it's 10 years old in two or three days. And so you were the first members there.

And what did you think about your first workout? Did you like it right away? Yeah, because I think the first workout was, I forget what it was. It was box jumps. And I think it was some running with some tires and some rope climbs. So all that was kind of reminiscent of my time in the military. And it was hard. And it was completely different to anything I'd done.

And it was hard and it was completely different to anything I'd done. So to me, it was like a breath of fresh air after, I think, almost three decades of long cycling, running, riding, that kind of thing. And I'm guessing there was limited equipment. So that's why you did those types of things like tire flips and running and rope climbing. Yeah. So he'd been a student at a at a german school and they had a gymnasium so they had three or four ropes in the roof because they were there and then they had a cinder track like a like an athletic cinder track which was say uh 300 yards or something like that 250 meters um and a big lawn and then he built a whole bunch of plyo boxes him and his dad his dad

was a carpenter so so he helped him build plyo boxes. And I forget what else we had. We had a couple of med balls. And then as the affiliate grew, he bought more stuff. I mean, we didn't have Olympic bars. We had like these really shitty. We even had an easy curl bar in the program and some steel plates. And we had, what else did we have?

We had a pull-up bar. So like really basic stuff. So lots of burpees, lots of running, lots of air squats, lots of push-ups lots of calisthenics and basic gymnastics and then as the affiliate grew and he had income he was able to buy equipment so we got a rower, we got some barbells, we got a

the affiliate kind of grew and then by 2014 by 2014 we the second affiliate opened up. So there was like a bit of a breakaway faction from us. They wanted to do their own thing. And so the second affiliate opened up and then kind of it slowly sort of grew and it spread countrywide. I love hearing the fact that they opened an affiliate without barbells. Yeah, it had nothing. It's so doable. I love hearing the fact that they opened an affiliate without barbells.

It is so doable. It's completely doable. I remember watching a YouTube video about a guy. He's a veteran. And I forget the name of the – it's like a really powerful clip. But he came back from the war and he'd lost lots of friends. And I think his brother owned an affiliate and he was kind of in and out and he was drinking a lot and whatever, but he kind of gets his shit back together with CrossFit and then

eventually opens his own affiliate. And there's a picture and all he has is a garage and maybe a couple of tires. And maybe a sledgehammer or something else. And I remember him saying in the video that if he wasn't able to teach the methodology in the absence of like a whole bunch of equipment he was a shift coach yeah and it stuck with me yeah and you can still get world class fitness absolutely you know, it's been interesting. So I did my level three,

I wrote my level three exam about a month ago. Wow. Congratulations. Thank you. And, and, and, and so kind of going through all the literature and going through the

journal articles and going through the level one manual and the level two manual, all of the other incredible content that's out there um you you realize that the methodology is just that they keep referring to like the black box effect of the affiliate and the black box effect of the methodology and it's so cool you you don't need a bunch of equipment you don't need um in fact you don't even need to do good programming you know i think just by default the way the modalities are put together and the way the template works if you show up five times a week and you put the hammer down for the 60 minutes

that you're at the affiliate you are going to be very very very fit god you sound like a CrossFitter. I drank the Kool-Aid in 13. It's funny because I saw this picture of your coaches that all got their level two. And I made the assumption. I said, oh, Patrick's not in there. He must have been like, I'm not doing that. I'm the boss. I'm not going to do it.

But here you are with the level three. I made the boss. I'm not going to do it. But here you are with the level three. I made the complete wrong assumption. Did this level two, and that's your wife in the top left, right? That's my wife in the top left. Then below her is Kasten. She's my business partner. Then below is Magna. She's my box manager.

To the right of the black T-shirt is Vili. He's one of the new kids. He did his L2 the other day as well. Then there's Dion at the top.ion's like a super experienced coach he's been coaching for well i think he's got eight or nine years under his belt so he's been around for a while and then the other guys aren't in the picture so phil my other business partner's not in the pic uh there's a couple that are missing there but but the cool thing is with the exception of denver who is a who has a degree in sports science the rest of my coaches are all l2s which is we i think we're eight coaches um and i've just recently got my l3 and the rest of them all hold l2s so we we really i think we um we value the

the education that that hp makes available to the african continent. Where did they take that? Where do Namibians take their seminars? So South Africa has seminar staff. There's Chad who heads up the seminar crowd together with Chris Omen. They're kind of the OGs. And then Chad's wife, Candice, is also seminar staff. But their second baby girl's just been born, so I think she's less available.

But all the seminars traditionally have happened in South Africa. I did my L1 as well as my L2 in Cape Town. My wife and Kasten I think everybody pretty much did their L1s in Cape Town, and then for the L2 that they did, HQ

authorized the seminar at our premises. So Chad traveled from South Africa to us and we hosted a seminar, I think for seven or eight coaches here, which was really good because the, yeah, so the travel to South Africa is quite expensive. And the cost of the seminar at the exchange rate is very, very expensive.

So it was cool that people got to do it at home and were able to save on the travel costs. How did you do that? Did you reach out to HQ? You reach out to Nicole Carroll and the training team and said, hey, can we get an L2 in Namibia? Yeah, I reached out to the seminar department. What do we got there?

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Yeah, seven of them. So I told Chad that I'd like to host an L2. And Chad and I are in contact a lot. He's the new country manager for Southern Africa. And he's been my crossword mentor since I've gotten involved. But I reached out to Chad and he put me in touch with the ladies in the seminar department. And then they sent me a questionnaire and they did a brief interview and I showed them the facility. And there were a couple of things that I needed to comply with.

I needed an AED and I needed a couple of other bits and pieces. And then we were able to host the seminar at our affiliate, which is really cool. Is that the only seminar that's ever happened in the country? No, JP, JP, who's the head coach at Sold Out, they hosted an L1 a year ago. And they had, I think, maybe 12 or 15 signups for the L1. So it's the second seminar that's been hosted in the country. So they did the L1 a year ago. And then we hosted the L2 two months ago, whenever it was. I don't know if a lot of people know this, and I don't know if it's still like this,

but when I worked there, CrossFit was the only fitness organization that did accreditations in the United States and all over the world. They were the only one. And there was a reason for that. And I think Patrick explained it because the methodology is so powerful

and what you learn is so powerful that basically it can take anyone anywhere and make them super fit and healthy. And so obviously there was a demand for it and it went all over the world. That's why a lot of our competitors in the United States were so threatened, because all of a sudden we were doing more seminars in a weekend than they were doing in a year. And then we were going traveling outside the country all over the world. I would have never thought that there would have been one in uh namibia that is that is absolutely so cool yeah very very cool and that's a lot of work i i don't give a lot of love to hq but that's a but i do love that department that training department that's a lot of work

uh to do to organize something like that in namibia and it probably doesn't make them dick for money i I don't know. I mean, I don't. So we had seven signups at a thousand US signup. I don't know what it cost them to fly a chat out for the weekend, but there was definitely a kind of minimum number. And I think COVID in many ways has affected how HQ approaches the seminars and how many people they want on board.

I think HQ is also very cognizant of the fact that the South African Rand and the Namibian dollar, which is linked to that, are really, really weak currencies. And so we've seen a reduction in our affiliation fee last year. Wow. I didn't know that. That's crazy. Yeah. They dropped the affiliation fee for, I don't know whether it's for all of Africa, but certainly Southern Africa, we pay less than what we did two years ago. And it's a big deal. I mean, as we stand at the moment, the exchange rate is something like 17 or 18 South African Rand to one

US dollar. So it's lousy. But they were really cool. You know, they initially said they needed eight people to make the seminar go. And then at the end, we only had six because people, it was simply too expensive. And they let us go ahead with six.

And then they gave us a, what's the word for it? A scholarship as well. So one of my coaches was able to attend on the college scholarship spot so we we've got seven guys and that's a big deal you know for the for the local community to have seven new l2 coaches you know to have seven people that are serious about their coaching and and the time that they spend with members that's a really big deal for a

a community that probably doesn't have more than countrywide 700 members did any of the other affiliates send trainers there to take their l2 it doesn't sound like it yeah yeah oh they did yeah so we had uh the lasagna was from the the box up in the north and then reiki was from the other box in town and then the other five were mine um do you guys all get along, all the boxes there? Yeah, yeah. There was a time where it was, you know, like the early days where it was maybe a little bit wobbly, particularly when there were new affiliates forming and there was maybe, you know what it's like.

I mean, it's a new community and people are figuring things out. But at the moment, we like a really good collaboration, sense of collaboration between the boxes. We have an annual throwdown calendar. Each of the boxes hosts a throwdown, which we do for charity. And we all travel to each other's boxes and go and throw down together.

And we try and host seminars and we involve everybody and we try and sort of, we try and drive the educational side as well. I run a trainer directory, the same thing that HQ does on the main site. I run that as a WhatsApp group and all the trainers are on that. And we share information and we share resources. We're a tiny community, so if we don't stand together, there's very little impact.

Do all of your trainers there have other jobs too like you have a bike shop and you have the gym does everyone there have multiple vocations? Yeah I think there's really out of my trainers including myself everybody holds

down a day job which is why I have 8 coaches and I think for the majority of the trainers at the other boxes as well pardon me they also have day jobs i think there's i don't think there might be one i think jp who's the head coach at the other at the other affiliate i think he coaches full-time now but he had a day job um And I think everybody else is just, you know, they coach part-time. But for me, that changes in three months at the end of March.

I'm selling my share of the bike shop, and I'm going into full-time coaching on the 1st of April. Is a congratulations in order? Do you want to do that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is a congratulations in order? Do you want to do that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm pursuing a spot on the African seminar staff team.

And so the plan is to – I'm busy writing my CV. I've never written a CV in 55 years, so I'm busy writing a CV. And then I'm hoping to get a spot as an intern and then the idea would be ultimately to end up on seminar staff as well as so I'd really like to teach the methodology and then obviously also just run my affiliate and be free to run that the way you know running the bike shop so I coach in the morning I coach I generally coach a master's class at 6 a.m. And then I go to my retail store and I do retail till five in the afternoon. Then I go back to the affiliate. So it's kind of like I'm a little not torn between things, but I kind of feel I'm all over the place.

Is there room for growth in Africa? I know that there's very few affiliates there. But I also I know the economics on the continent are different than, you know, let's say the United States. Is there could could there be a day where there's 3000 affiliates on the African continent? I don't think that's impossible. I think I think economically, financially, it's the big barrier for affiliates. You know, the affiliation fee paid paid in the U.Ss is a tidy is a tidy summon so i think for for any fledging the the lady that you had on a couple of days ago is her name cat cat shares yeah yeah she went i listened to her part i listened to her episode today um and and she was talking about training

out of her garage because she simply couldn't afford to affiliate. And so I think that's the reality for lots of the – certainly in Southern Africa, the barrier is financial. But if I look at the CrossFit Africa page, there are regular posts of a new affiliate that has just opened. So, I mean, it's not like they're opening on a daily basis, but there's definitely, you know, there's definitely traction. And I think in terms of the curve globally, we're probably five or six years behind what the rest of the world is doing in the CrossFit space. But I think it's catching on. And I think the struggles that the world is facing in terms of obesity and diabetes and cardiovascular disease, we're not immune to that and we're not separated from that. We kind of face the same problems and I think the value of affiliates will continue to grow

in Southern Africa. The quote that Coach made so many years ago where he talked about the affiliates being lifeboats, I think that holds true more than ever. And I think in an African context, that's going to become more and more prominent in the next five or six years. Do you see that in Namibia? When I think of Namibia, all the places I were in Africa, there were no obese people.

Now, granted, I haven't been there in, I don't know, 15, 20 years, but I spent a lot of time over there and I saw zero obese people. It was like zero um where were you uh mostly in the in the sticks you know uh kenya mozambique um uganda but in places i was in villages you know i was with they had no objects there were no cars they didn't even there were no cell phones back then um you know, it was the, it was the starving class, the people, you know, walking to get water. Have you read the, have you read the comfort crisis by Michael Easter?

I did. I had him on the podcast. Yes. I had him on the podcast. He talks in the book about, you know, people, people that live in like a rural lifestyle, they're walking for water. Nobody gets fat, but in the city. And a woman carrying 40 pounds of water on her head with a baby on her back no shit i mean everywhere you've seen it so i i think those i think those populations are are immune to to kind of like the soft western living but in a place like vintook everybody has access to fast food everybody Everybody has access to junk.

School sports is being cut from lots of curriculums like it is being done in the rest of the world. It's just people are softer. And so you definitely see obesity. I don't think it's as prominent as it is elsewhere in the world. Again, I think we're behind the curve in that regard. But there are a lot of people.

I mean, last year when COVID was here, last year and the year before, there were lots and lots of middle-aged men that died, guys my age, because they were 30% body fat and they hadn't done the push-up in 10 years. And so to come back to your question about affiliates and the value of affiliates, I think people are getting sicker by and large. I don't think it's getting better. I think it's getting worse. And, and, and so the value of the value of affiliates, I think will, will continue to grow. Oh, you guys are on the metric system there. Yeah. Uh, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, uh, do you see, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm so culturally sensitive. Do you see anyone every day? Do you see someone who's 136.078 kilograms? That's 300 pounds in the United States.

go down and into the lighthouse and watch the big waves and stand in the rain and i and i live in a beach community that's super fit but i am gonna see someone who's 136.078 kilograms whereas 20 years ago i'd have never seen someone that big never ever do you see that like today will you see a 300 pound person um not today because we're on holiday so I haven't been down to town. I think generally, if I go to the grocery store, maybe not 136 point whatever, but maybe 120 or 110. I do a lot of people watching. I'm fascinated by how people treat themselves or don't treat themselves. I'm acutely aware, particularly of people that are carrying more weight. So, yeah, I definitely see a lot of people that are carrying a lot of excess weight.

And it's worrying. And more than that, I see a lot of kids that are carrying excess weight. God, man. There's this place we have here in the United States. It's called Disneyland. Yeah. And you will see, if you go there, you will see some stuff that will break your heart.

You'll see five-year-olds and 10-year-olds and 15-year-olds who are so obese that they're being pushed around in carts. And that amusement park should just be where your kids run free right i mean it's a massive place made for kids and these won't be isolated incidents you will see kids that are you know their bodies have already reached a point of obesity where it's been it will never be they'll never be normal meaning they've stretched out their skin or they've done something to you know really damage their their uh their vehicle that they're done something to, you know, really damage their, their, uh, their vehicle that they're here to traverse the planet. To me, that's criminal. Um, that, that, to me, that is, um,

that is neglect. That's gross neglect on, on the part of the parents. And, and, and maybe that's going to upset people when I say that, but I just, I think parents need to do better by their kids. And, and thankfully what you guys see is the norm maybe you're seeing say three out of ten people or five out of ten people that are out of shape and out of weight and are kind of you know that are moving to the to the wrong end of the fitness wellness continuum um for us that's less but it's not again we're not immune to it you know so so I see kids at school that have no athleticism we we have a school right next doors to us right next to our premises and um they they don't have a physical program so we did the physical program for them and and we were getting kids in so we had a girls and a boys group on a Tuesday and a Thursday, and my wife ran both of the groups.

And it's worrying that there are kids that have no concept of where their body is relative to something else. You know, like their vestibular system isn't well developed. They have shitty balance. They have shitty range of movement. They're carrying extra weight. They can't run 200 meters without having to sit down and that's not how i grew up that's not what i remember and to be fair you weren't even an athlete as a kid no i'm look i'm i think i'm just um i'm small i'm what am what am i i'm

i'm 176 1.76 meters. I'm probably 5'9". Oh, you're a midget. I'm a midget. You're a midget. I'm games material based on the show you did with Dave. I'm right in the sweet spot. Yes. Yeah.

And I'm probably, I think I'm 170 pounds. I'm a small guy. How did that, you're only 5'8", by the way. Still three inches taller than me. How did that program start at the school? Did you guys go over there? How does that happen? You guys saw and you guys went over there and offered your services?

It was kind of, it was a little bit of both. They, some of the kids showed an interest in the so when we started the affiliate we were right next doors to them we had this we got a narrow corridor between two big show halls like two bigger kind of almost conference venues and that would be that weren't being used so we got this corridor which we did the original box in when we opened the first when we opened the affiliates in 18 and they were right next doors when I say right next doors they were 50 meters away

and so some of the kids showed interest. And then one of the teachers walked over and then we got a conversation going. And that kind of went to they wanted everybody to do it. But then there were some parents that were resistant to the idea. And we didn't want kind of like a loosely defined thing where kids were kind of coming and going when they felt like it we we wanted some sort of commitment um but eventually that ended up with with uh these two groups uh like junior girls and senior girls and junior guys junior boys and and senior boys coming twice a week which wasn't nearly enough um and then when covid came and

the schools were closed down that fell by the wayside. And unfortunately, a lot of the parents didn't feel that that was a priority for their kids. So they stopped coming. Shame. Yeah. Have you ever walked up to, do you ever recruit people? Do you ever see someone, you're in line at the store and you see someone? Have you recruited anyone and been like, hey, I got something for you? No, I don't think so.

We have a, our community, which is, I think, around 240 people. I think we're about 240 people, 250 people. They own Damascus. They own Damascus. And when I say they own Damascus, they are so emotionally invested in the affiliate and in the box and in the community that they go out and canvas people. I don't think I've ever walked up to somebody and said, hey, I do CrossFit. In fact, people have come up to me. Again, we're a small town and I've lived here all my life. So I know lots of people and lots of people know me and the same applies to my business partners and my wife.

We're a small community. But the members that we have are the most effective advertising mechanism and kind of referral mechanism out there because they just drag people through the door. You have one third of the country's CrossFit members? Yeah. That's amazing. Yeah. So, I mean, the, the, the box, the other box in town, I don't know what they, nobody's numbers are public, but I see what, what up um on the open leader board

and at uh at throwdowns and stuff and so you know my my my my assessment of 600 people country-wide is that is an educated guess um but we're definitely the largest affiliate and then but the the other affiliate up in the north france across the tumor also very very strong community and then jp the other the other affiliate in town also north, Franschmarkt, CrossFit Tumor, also very, very strong community. And then JP, the other affiliate in town, also very, very strong community. So between the three boxes, we probably make up, I'd say, 80% of the membership. And then the two boxes at the coast are very, very small. I wouldn't venture a guess as to how many members they have, but they don't have the same kind of populations. And so I don't think they have the same kind of traction. I want to address this comment here.

Last night on 60 Minutes, there was a segment on obesity contributed in large part to genetics and said no amount of diet or exercise would fix it. That 60 Minutes has what a sad, sad state of affairs. has what a sad sad state of affairs they also did a piece on overpopulation where they said 70 percent of the planet is inhabited by humans i dare anyone to start googling around and see if they can find anything remotely close to that um there's already there's already a stat saying the entire world's population could fit in the state of alaska um's absolutely nuts, the propaganda that's coming out of our TV these days. They're also saying that, I don't know if you've seen recently, it's getting a lot of pushback, but they're saying exercise has its roots in white supremacy. That's also like saying cancer research also has its greatest roots in white supremacy. Hitler was probably

funded cancer research relative to money spent on cancer research more than anyone. And he was actually very close to it. And, you know, his scientists won two Nobel prizes. Does that mean we're going to kick away cancer research? I mean, just the insanity that that our media is doing is their point. They're pouring gasoline on a fire. It is so sad. And I'm sorry, stop watching 60 minutes. It means you're old.

Okay. Do you guys have 60 minutes over there? Did you, did your parents watch that when you were a kid? No, we don't, we don't have, uh,

apart from some channels, stuff like sporting. I mean, we have news channels. We have BBC 60 minutes is probably out there somewhere, but, um, I'm, I'm wary of media in general i don't read the papers um i don't read the news oh good um i talk to people you know i talk to people and then and then and uh but but i generally spend no time reading any

sort of any news because i just I think particularly um the stuff that's coming out of the United States and and out of Europe you you just never know what the agendas are and so I'm I'm very I'm very um cautious of what I take on board and and and and what I you know I think so many people just kind of take stuff at face value and they make a fact they just it's fact because somebody said it which I I don't subscribe to at all. I'm very critical of what I take on board. Yeah, good on you. Smart. And you know what? Some people would say, no, you need to know what's going out there. But I think some people are very naive to the fact that even those of us who are the most vigilant about asking questions, we can still easily be brainwashed.

All of us, all, no one is not susceptible to being manipulated. Nobody. You know, when, when, when, when I was 18 years old and we were conscripted, that means drafted, constructed, the same as the Vietnam draft, I guess. So, so we were conscripted or drafted. And the propaganda machine at the time, the apartheid regime, the apartheid government, was so good at brainwashing an entire population that the fight we were fighting was a noble fight, etc., etc., etc.

I agree with you. I don't think anybody's immune to being brainwashed. I think discernment is a big part of the conversation, what you lend your ears to and what you lend your eyes to. But by and large, I think the media in many ways is so devious that I prefer to kind of keep it at arm's length. Really good people have done really bad things. Yeah, for sure.

I spent like 30 minutes on an AI website yesterday. Artificial intelligence, AI? Yeah. It's basically, there are these websites now and I could type in, literally, I could type in how to sell CrossFit memberships to people. And please write me a script. And it will actually write you out

the most beautiful script. It is, you can ask it anything you can ask this ai anything and it will give you um solid answers but um but the answers are all surface level there's no there's absolutely no depth they just feel it's it's so highly manipulative and basically they're offering this service to people so that anyone can basically install an ai and it's it's open source so you could stall install an ai on the back of crossfit damascus that's your affiliate crossfit damascus you could install ai open source and anyone could go there and ask a question and it would answer it for you based on this AI.

And I, and I, and one of the things I asked it is I said how would you convince people to get a vaccine? And it gave an answer. And then I said, how would you convince someone not to get a vaccine? And the AI put a stop to it. It said we would never do that. Oh, wow. Yeah. And I was like, Holy shit. That's I mean mean talk about manipulation yes i'm glad i brainwash you i'm glad good allow me allow me to have a small corner of your mind allow me uh do you have hurricanes there patrick hurricanes no no okay does the west coast no we have uh we have nothing like that i mean there's some uh Hurricanes, no. Oh, okay. Does the West Coast have hurricanes? Does the West Coast?

No, we have nothing like that. I mean, there's some, on the East Coast, there's some tropical storms on the Indian Ocean side, but on the West Coast, the Atlantic, is all kind of like deep sea storms that drive big fronts and drive in big weather, but nothing like hurricanes and cyclones and things like that.

Okay. Getting weird. Apologize for my cultural ignorance here. You ever walk into the... weather but nothing like hurricanes and then and cyclones and things like that okay weird apologize for my uh cultural ignorance here um you ever walk into the you ever walk into the gym and there's like a a puff adder under a 45 pound plate or a lion's um two lions fucking in the corner or anything crazy like that or like ants i saw those ants when i was in um kenya and they would come out twice a day and they travel in that big fucking pack i've never seen anything like this and they make noise and they travel around like a black spot on the ground looking for shit and everyone's like move move move like telling me as ants are coming in a circle you seen that that? Does that stuff? No, I've seen it online.

Okay. But where we are, where I live though, at my house, there's snakes. I've got wild game roaming around here. There's some leopards on the property. So it's wild where I live,

but at the affiliate, which is in town, it's very civilized. It's kind of like you wouldn't, I I live, but at the affiliate, which is in town, it's all, it's very civilized. It's kind of like you wouldn't, I think if you walked into my affiliate, it would look like any other affiliate, uh, in the States, I guess. Yeah. Your gym is beautiful. How proud are you of your gym?

Very, very, very, uh, very proud. It's something we've worked hard and it's also something, I think the gym is a reflection of our culture, you know, so we run on time, things are clean, things are maintained, people are on time, and the members take huge pride in their surroundings, you know, so people pack shit away and they clean up after themselves. And when something's broken, it's not left, you know know until it falls to pieces and then and so i think that the space is just kind of reflective of the mindset and the culture of the people that come to damascus god look at that place are those go ahead what's that it's just

beautiful i'm looking at the wall balls i'm like they're perfect i'm looking at that floor you're doing a a nutrition seminar in there it's just crazy but i do notice that your roof is the standard um african roof uh the steel yeah so we have a we have a really really cool landlord we're in the center of town and um there's there's a it's called Winter Show Society. So they're an agricultural, it's an agricultural venue for livestock and farming shows and stuff like that. And we managed to secure a hall on the perimeter of that property. So we're literally, we are like smack bang in the center of town. And we have the facility is about 500 square meters i don't know what that is in square feet um but it's a big it's a big place we were able during covid you

can see there's gray there's gray tiles on the floor yeah um that's where everybody stands but before when covid was on you can actually still see the tape marks on the floor so we have enough space on the main floor for 20 athletes with enough space between for the coaches to kind of walk the lines um and nobody to drop and and it was all kind of compliant with with covid at the time but we're really fortunate in terms of the size of the place and then at the back like right in the back of the um the next to the warbles to the left of the warbles we've got a it's called the forge so we've got a whole bunch of bike ergs inside there and we do like functional cardio i guess

so we have a couple of people that that don't really want to do crossfit but they they want kind of a body weight workout and we've got some kettlebells and some sandbags in there and then a whole bunch of bike ergs so we run some some uh some separate classes in that but we we're very fortunate with the uh with the location and also the size of the space when when the when covid was going around um how strict how strict were they there i mean you're in the center of town so i guess all eyes are on you um did you ever have to close the doors did you close the doors for any amount of time? We closed voluntarily before the government mandated it because we didn't know what we were dealing with. And so my then partners, they've subsequently moved to Germany, but the four partners then had a look at what was going on.

And we made our own call before the government shut the country down. So we probably closed the affiliate maybe four days before it became law simply because we didn't know what we were dealing with and we didn't want to put anybody at risk. And then as the information kind of came out we reopened, got a whole bunch of sanitizing equipment in, et cetera, et cetera. But then things like masks were. I'm sorry, Patrick. I missed that.

How long before you reopened? How long were you closed? We were closed maybe for 14 days. And then we reopened. No. So we carried on going, but then we were forced closed. And we were closed for 78 days. Wow. Okay. layers of restrictions and the one that was most severe where we were where we had a curfew you

weren't allowed on the streets after 6 p.m and you weren't allowed so between 6 uh 8 p.m and 5 a.m you weren't allowed out of your house so we couldn't run the box at all but then when they relaxed that a little bit more we kind of closed the front gate and we let people into the back gate and we let smaller groups train and then at some point we we gave every member a piece of equipment so we gave out all the dumbbells all the kettlebells all the bumper plates and then we wrote like a really elaborate home program with daily videos and all kinds of other stuff which we filmed daily and sent that out by a whatsapp group so we kept everybody training, but it was difficult. You know, there were lots of challenges around that.

Did you ever get in trouble with the law there? No, I don't think we did. The police arrived one day, and we thought that somebody tipped them off, but they were looking for directions to something else. And even though we were supposed to be closed but we were open, there was no response. They kind of came to the front door asking for directions to something else. And even though we were supposed to be closed, but we were open, there was no response. They kind of came to the front door asking for directions. Everybody like ran and hit, let everybody out the back door.

And one of my coaches, Marna, who runs, who's my affiliate manager, she kind of said, thinking she'd be arrested. And they just said, hey, how do we get to this place or whatever? And she gave them directions and they left. So we never got into trouble. Oh, that's good. I saw that you had the Bergner strength banner up in your gym. And then I also saw a picture of Mike Bergner, you know, on your Instagram.

Did he actually come to your gym? No. So Chad, who runs, who's the country manager for for africa or for southern africa he's also on the um he is responsible for the bergner content i guess in africa so he's one of their coaches and um bow is it is it bow i think it's both yeah one of the fun um this was pre-covid they were going to come and do a weightlifting seminar several in south africa and one in namibia and in preparation for that we had the banner made and then about i think maybe two weeks before it was supposed to go down we didn't have enough signups and they had some change of plans so we've never had them

there but that's something we're looking forward to in the, you know, somewhere in the future. We're hoping to host them. You had the banner made? Yeah. That's cool. Yeah, just, we thought we'd welcome them with one of their banners, but then that didn't pan out,

but it's never been taken down. Hey, are you a metal worker? No. You didn't make those? You don't make knives and bottle openers? Oh, no, no. That's a good friend of mine, a guy called Ivan Smith. He owns Liquid Blades, and he makes all my knives.

Oh, yeah, that's the bottle openers. I gave those to a whole bunch of friends on Father's Day. Yeah, those are cool. Very, very cool. So he's a blacksmith, and he recycles materials. So he'll take leaf springs from cars and saw blades and stuff like that, because steel is quite expensive out there. And he repurposes all of that stuff and then makes these incredible knives

and cleavers that – oh, he made that for me. I walked – so last year after COVID, there were a lot of people in the community, you know, either members who had family members that died from COVID and other people we knew. We had a lot, like a big loss of life here. And so a friend of mine and I walked from Vintook to the coast,

which is 200 miles. And he made me the knife for the trip. That's where that knife comes from. So he found an old coil spring. That's like from a car, right? That's like the shock in the front. And he turned it into that knife? Yeah.

God, that's cool. That makes me want to. I don't have room for any more hobbies. But man, that sounds fun. Yeah, he's an incredible guy and also just an incredible knife maker. I don't have room for any more hobbies, but man, that sounds fun. Yeah, he's an incredible guy and also just an incredible knife maker. Why were people dying there? Did anyone in your box die?

Nobody from the box, but family members that died. And most of them had kind of comorbidities or had, you know, they had stuff that kind of predisposed them to getting their arses kicked. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's good. That's good you didn't lose any members. No, we didn't lose any members. We had, I think, maybe four members that lost direct family,

parents. And because we're such a small community, Namibians in general, and Vince, because I know 10, somewhere around 10 people personally that lost their lives to COVID. Guys my age. Yeah, yeah.

My brother-in-law's brother passed away from COVID um a bunch of guys that I was at school with passed away from COVID but they were all they all weren't not not not rocky ground but I think it's safe to say that they weren't in good health like probably type like type 2 diabetics yeah on medication not rocky ground, but I think it's safe to say that they weren't in good health. Like probably type 2 diabetics? Yeah.

On medication? On medication and just out of shape. So white males between the age of 45 and 55 here last year were like sitting ducks. Literally, I can count 10 names right now of guys that I knew personally that aren't here anymore. Incredible. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know a single person. And I live around and I live around a lot of obese people, but I think my County had 340 deaths total.

I think that's amazing that you know 10 yeah but again you know so i think countrywide we had a thousand or nationally yeah we had a thousand maybe a thousand two hundred i think that sounds about right but again because everybody knows everybody you know people and and so yeah 10 people i know that that aren't around but they weren't in good health to begin with. Yeah, crazy. Generally, generally. Get your membership at CrossFit Damascus today. I'm right.

Thanks for the plug. You're the only person on the continent listening. Sorry. That's okay. You obviously own an affiliate um you've you you obviously believe in the methodology all your trainers are you know the vast majority of your trainers are level two you're level three um which is just crazy because you are in such an isolated location and yet you've gone out of the way you have this box with 240 people you are about to become full-time you have a great desire to uh to become a seminar staff member

all that being said it's like it's like so obvious like you're about your wife's uh you know you and your wife work at the same place she's a a coach. All that being said, why do you continue to, now that you're established, you have the methodology. Why do you continue to pay the affiliate fees? Why not? Why not just, why not just be like, okay, I got what I need. And, um, I can do this on my own. So that's a really good question. I think there there's think there's probably layers to my answer. So, I was pretty astonished at the backlash or the outcry around Greg's comment whenever it was two years ago, which had a lot of people unaffiliate or disaffiliate

or whatever it's called. And everybody was vain for blood. Then during COVID, there was lots of conversations about what HQ was doing for affiliates. So some of us were forced closed and HQ was really good about either reducing affiliation fees or waiving them or freezing them, etc.

And so I think in recent years, I would say in the last three years or however long it's been, HQ has done lots of work to make resources available to affiliate owners, which some I use, but the vast majority I don't. I'm a firm believer in making my own way and taking responsibility for my circumstances and my situation. my circumstances and my situation and i never paid the first in fact i got an email just before i signed on with you guys from from hq as a reminder that my affiliation fee is due on the 1st of february um and i'll be so i we turn five in in march and not once in that time have i all my partners

in March and not once in that time have I or my partners felt we needed to look to HQ for guidance or direction or anything else for that matter I was happy to pay I knew what the barrier of entry was it was 3,000 US at the time it's now 2,250 for the African affiliate but at the time I knew that I wanted to be associated with this brand, with the methodology, with the brand, because it had been such a, it's given me so much. And I think this is kind of, this ties in maybe with why I'm on your show today, because you, and I rewatched the clip that you made about affiliates the other day, you know, about what they, about what they do and about how valuable they are. I was listening to the lady that was on the previous show, Kat, who was talking about dropping a huge six-figure income to become a coach out of her garage. And somewhere in the content that I studied for the L3, somebody relays, I think it's at one of the very, very early seminar staff kind of a symposium or a get-together, a conference.

I'm kind of – I'm not looking for context. I just – I can't repeat the – I can't repeat what Coach Glassman said verbatim. But essentially it came down to the only reason we're in this life is to serve other people. And I forget who says it. It's another coach. I think it's Ben Bergeron. In fact, one of the journal articles is Bergeron talking to coach and it's something that's in the context of what we're talking about. It's kind of like the affiliation for me is,

although it's a sizable amount of money, I think it's a small price to pay to get to do what we do daily as coaches. When you see the effect, I remember another quote, and I mean, he's made so many notable quotes, but I remember him saying, don't show me the affiliate that has sent somebody to the games. Show me the affiliate that has stripped 100 pounds of one of their members.

And I see that daily, like every day. I see, I have a girl at my box. She had a hugely traumatic incident just over a year ago. She lost her daughter in a car accident. She saw it happen. She was in the car behind the car that her kid was in. And she's been with us for a year and the community and the methodology has kept her of antidepressants for the last 12 months god that's a great story it's incredible i mean i'll dm you

the deep i'll say i'll send you the details i'd love to have her on the show i know it's only been a year but if she would come on the show i I'd love to hear that story. You know, and, and, and I'm using her as an example, but there's so many other people that come to the affiliate. And so I look at the affiliation fee and I just think we're in this, this incredible position to change people's lives. And there's a, there's a, um, there's a handle on, on Instagram called best hour of their day. It's like a coaching, it's a coaching platform. The phrase comes up so often in the methodology that we have this responsibility to entertain and make fit these people that come to us for 60 minutes. And it's a huge responsibility.

And so the affiliation fee doesn't even factor into our financial conversation. When we do our financial planning for the year, the affiliation money has been put aside and it's there. I'm going to pay it. I'll probably pay it next week. And it doesn't factor into our financial planning at all. Our considerations is how do we make this place an incredible place where people are safe and where they feel

cared for and where they're able to prioritize their health and their fitness and where they're able to make friends um and the only rule at the box is don't be an arsehole it literally is the only is don't if you come through the door and you can coexist with 240 other people then we're happy to have you but if you're an arsehole you need coexist with 240 other people, then we're happy to have you. But if you're an asshole, you need to go somewhere else. So the affiliation fee really doesn't factor into any of the conversation for us. Sorry, I went off on a tangent there. No, I really liked it.

Here's the thing. Here's why I love interrupting people, but here's why I didn't interrupt you. Because it's a question i ask every affiliate owner and they all their answers are basically like yours you okay you basically they don't have an answer and they end up saying the same thing that you know i heard this from greg and i think this is where you heard it too our only purpose our only value in life is the service we provide other people yeah that's exactly what I was referring to. And so that's why, you know, like if a guy's playing the violin on the corner, some of us give him a dollar because he's adding value.

If someone's serving hot dogs, we go buy a hot dog from him even if we don't want one because he's serving value. We want to support the things where people are adding value. You know, that's why we tip the kid who opens your wife's car door and says, hi, ma'am. Oh, you're pregnant here. Let me get your bags for you because he's offering value to you. He's taking care of your wife. And so you give him a five instead of a one, you know, like we, we want to vote that way. I mean, some of us, unfortunately, some of us don't understand that mechanism. Uh, but you said you wanted to be associated with the brand. Mm-hmm.

And what a crazy – I mean, that's how powerful this thing is, right? I mean, that's enough for you to pay the $22.50 a year is just to be associated with the brand. Because I believe it's life-changing. Sorry to interrupt. My comment to your video, which was, what, a month ago, the video about the affiliates, and I commented on that, and it was a lengthy comment because I felt so strongly about it. It's been a life changer for me.

And I see the change in people every day. So when I say I wanted to be associated with the brand, I wanted to be associated with this thing that gives so much to so many people. And yes, people pay me for the access to my box and for the affiliate, and I pay my coaches. But we're not getting rich from it. It's definitely not a great retirement plan. There's an argument that even if you don't go to a box, you should give money to it.

That was my point. That's how strong – that's how fucking strong the affiliate is. If you don't go to an affiliate and you donated $100 dollars to it. All of that is making your community better. So somewhere in that box is a little boy or a little girl who's watching their parents work out who your little boy or your little girls might marry someday. Those are the people that, um, when you have a flat tire, they stop on the side of the road and help you. Those are the people that help old ladies carry the groceries out to the car. These are the people who have the endorphin and dopamine rush. When they walk outside the gym, they smile to 100 people and say hi. I mean, it's all the fucking good people. It's all the good people. It's absolutely nuts. I can't emphasize it enough.

It's, and I see it more and more as I get older. I see it more and more as I get older. And I sort of have stepped a little farther away from it, from working at HQ. It's like, wow, these places are truly incredible. I was just talking to Greg about it the other day. I was telling him what I said. He's like, yeah, dipshit. I mean, he didn't say this, but I'm thinking, yeah, dipshit, I taught you all that.

You know what I mean? It's such an incredibly cool and rewarding thing to be a part of. And so it made sense. It continues to make sense. And yeah, I just, I'm grateful. I'm grateful that I get to be here. So what I would call it in some shows is a, what's that word where people pay money to the church? Tithing.

Yeah, tithe. Or like if you had a motorcycle club you belonged to, it's the money you would just pay into the motorcycle club so that the place can be kept open and people can go in there and drink a beer. Let me ask you this. You said something very strong where your clients there, the members of your gym, you refer to it as their box, CrossFit Damascus, and they love the box and that these 240 people in that equation, it becomes, I think in a cult. Yes, that's the word I'm looking for, cult. In that equation, it becomes even more of an imperative, I think, that the coaches care at least as much as the clients, if not more, which becomes so difficult. model that other businesses um uh don't have to worry about meaning like it doesn't matter if uh the guy at 7-eleven who the fuck it is yeah i don't know if you have 7-eleven there but it's just a store that sells sugar and alcohol right and so like if i run in there i get a bag of sunflower seeds and an energy drink and the i don't like if the guy's like high on meth it doesn't matter i just need the quick, slide my credit card in and leave.

You, you can't have that. And so finding coaches must just be like that. Your coaches are in a competition with the clients of who cares more for the gym. It's, it's, it's, uh, and I, and I, and I recently heard a coach, a gym owner, big gym owner on the East coast called me he goes dude my clients care about the gym more than my coaches i was like wow it's the same thing when you take your kids somewhere like you care more about that place than the coach which sucks because you're taking your kid there do you have trouble do you have trouble finding good coaches? No.

Okay. Not much for that. I think, well, no. So you brought this up when you and Kat were talking. It came up in the conversation. And I thought about that. And I can honestly say that I have the most incredible coaching staff because they are all, you know, bear in mind that none of them are making big money from coaching at Damascus. So they have their day jobs.

So it's not their primary thing. I'm very particular about who represents our brand, mine and my partners the the idea of damascus was mine uh the vision for damascus was mine but my my my partners being my wife and then phil and caston um have have i have full buy-in from them and so the coaching staff and i think it's kind of like it's a culture you portray i don't know how it works in other markets i don't know how it works in other communities i know i've um i've seen lots of stuff online about uh box owners that complain about coaches that are on their phones or, you know, they're kind of between other things and it's not a priority for them. But I can honestly say for the seven people that are under my umbrella, that they care as much as the members do.

And I think that that's what makes Damascus an incredibly powerful place is that the coaches actually give a shit. Um, and, and you can't, can you, I mean, that has to kind of be given from your, by your parents or something. Right. Yeah. So, so wherever it comes from, I look, I, I do, I do think you can teach it. I think it takes time. We run a really tight ship, you know, so we have a policy that the coaches are there 15 minutes before their class and 15 minutes after their class. They know all the members by name.

We do a good amount of coaches development during the year because I'm invested in them. I mean, they're effectively, they are the front of house for my business. They're the people, they see more of my members than I do. I only coach two classes. You know, so a lot of my members see more of my coaches than they see of me because we have this roster that's spread out all over the place. because we have this roster that's spread out all over the place. But I also do think, though, that like with members,

where the system is kind of – it's self-adjusting. You know, if somebody comes to the box and they're not a good footballer in the box, eventually they drift away. They move. And I think – so we have a very small coaching community. I mean, if we have 30 – I'd have to check on the trainer directory, but we might be, I think we're lucky if we're 30 coaches countrywide, 25, 30 coaches. They all know each other.

They all paid good money to do something that isn't really an investment in their future. It's definitely not a retirement plan. So they've invested in themselves and they're investing in the community. But I think we've had people come along who have moved away again because maybe there wasn't as much synergy as they needed it to be or what we needed. And so I think the system kind of regulates itself.

But I can certainly say, but, but I can certainly say for, for my crew, I can't speak for anybody else, but the seven guys that, that, that wear the Damascus, they have a coach, you know, we have coaches apparel that wear the Damascus emblem on their, on their shirts and that have coats at the back of it are very, very deeply invested in my community. Yeah. Um, does that, um, formula that I bring up make sense to you? Am I, do you think that I'm, I'm speaking, um, like, does that, does that resonate with you? Like, holy shit. Yeah. The, the coach, the members better not care more than the coaches. No, they, so, so when I say that, that my members are invested in the box,

they take ownership in the box. I think that's what the members get to do. But I think it's imperative that the coaches would always care more than the members do. You know, I think what the box offers members is one thing, but what we represent as the coaching staff always needs to be more than that. Because I think if, if that's out of balance, I think you have a problem. Yeah. Like, I guess in a simple way, say you don't want this client showing up at the door calling,

saying, where's the coach. You want the coach calling the clients being like, Hey, you haven't been here in two weeks. Is everything okay? Absolutely. Yeah.

Absolutely. And I, I, I, I, I, I, I,

I, for me, that I, that kind of thinking is, it's almost like isn't that logical yes it is but then maybe that's then there's jobs like 7-eleven where the vast majority of the business model what no i just think like crossfit affiliate 7-eleven and i think there's a lot of other there's a lot of other kind think there's a lot of other places out there, like jobs where people don't need to give a shit. They're punching the clock.

They're in and out. But this is very different. And I think – But you know what's interesting, though? Let me say this real quick. If you worked at 7-Eleven or I worked at 7-Eleven, we would bring the same thing there. Oh, sir, your circuit club is dripping as he was at the register. Let me get you a new one, even though it's not our fucking job.

Oh, hey, those hot dogs just came in. Give me 30 seconds. I'll get you a warm one. Oh, my God, we got these new cigarettes over here. Wait till you try these. I mean, we would be, we couldn't help it. But that, I mean, that speaks to, I think, largely largely that speaks to a culture of mediocrity you know people like there's a lot of people that just don't care anymore and why that is i don't

know i mean that's a that's a completely different rabbit hole but i i agree with you i think if you if you live your life with a spirit of excellence um and the things that you do like your podcast I mean I don't know what kind of time you've invested into today's episode but it's early morning with you guys you know it's late afternoon with me guys with with me you've done a sizable amount because it matters and and you care and it matters to you matters to both of you you know so I think if you approach life with a spirit of excellence and and and you're kind you, matters to both of you. You know, so I think if you approach life with a spirit of excellence and you're kind of always striving to push the bar, to raise the bar,

then, you know, the saying, how you do one thing is how you do everything, right? Yeah, yeah. So I try and apply that as far as I can. I don't get it right all the time, but it's kind of like my lens on life. I used to, i worked in this home for disabled adults and i had to wash this old dude who is in a wheelchair yeah and and i

had to wash him like once a week and i did that for years five years and you can only imagine the shit and all that stuff but i was i would always give myself the pep talk just imagine that this is like your bro i don't even have a brother but just imagine this is your brother like wash his like you would want to be washed yourself like just and you know what it was so beautiful and freeing and he so fucking appreciated me and uh yeah you get in these situations i mean i shit, if you're the guy who picks up trash at the park, like teach yourself to whistle at the same time. Right. I mean, there's a lot of attitudes. Yeah.

The you're going to be you're going to be you're the goal is to be full time there and to get on seminar staff. Getting on seminar staff is really hard. What do you think your chances are? I don't know. It's not something I'm, it's not something I kind of, I'm not building my, my future plans around it. I mean, this is something I'd aspire to do or in depth. Yeah, definitely aspire to do. I think in the African context, there's a window of opportunity there because there aren't many people that are seminar staff in Africa. So I think Africa in that sense… Oh, the bar's really low and you're going to slip under? That's pretty much the strategy.

No, so they've actually lowered the standard for seminar staff for Africa. They've dropped it down to L2 where everywhere else you need an L3 to even be considered. They've dropped that down to L2 for Africa. Hey, that's a good sign. That means that they're experiencing growth there. That's a good sign. Yeah. But it was kind of like this happened as I was studying for my exam.

kind of like a this happened as i was studying for my exam um there was an update on on the site about um about credentials for for seminar staff and potential applicants and i thought you know what so i could have just done the application then but i wanted to do the l3 i needed to know that i that i had what it takes to hold an l3 credential i didn't know what that looked like and i didn't know what would be asked of me but I'm glad that I did the exam and I'm glad that I hold a credential. So, you know, even if I, I mean, even if I get an intern slot and I don't make it to seminar stuff, because I think it's a really big deal to wear a red shirt, you know, if I get to, if I get to do a couple of seminars as an intern, I think there's massive value in that from personal growth and also from an

educational point of view. So, you know, it's something, it's a project I'm working on and it's something I'm going to pursue. And if it's meant to be, it'll happen. And beyond that, it's out of my hands. Did Chad, did someone tell you, Hey, you should try? Yeah, Chad did. Oh, that's a good sign. Yeah. That's really about a cultural fit I mean in I've been around a lot of seminar staff and you seem to be a great cultural fit you're so sober

you're still like so you know what I mean I don't mean sober in the in the in the traditional you feel grounded is all get out and you have a ton of great energy. Well, I mean, I think I have something to give. And I mean, I'm 55, you know, so it's pretty late in my life to be making this strong departure from a steady income to going coaching full-time. Whether I make seminar staff or not is irrelevant. You know, I'm definitely putting myself at risk by going to coaching full-time.

I need to build a new business from that. But there's other things, there's other irons I have in the fire. But as far as making seminar stuff goes, I just, I think there's so much power in the methodology. And if I was in a position to teach other people that, I think there's huge, for me, there's huge value in that. You know, I just, I believe in what we do.

Awesome. Is there anything that, um, I missed that when you thought you came on that we should talk about? No, I had, I had no idea how this was going to go. I mean, I've, I've, uh, I followed your, I've, I've, I've followed your content, you know, the early day, the early games days and stuff like that. Um, and I've, I've, uh, I followed the podcast, but I didn't know how this – it's the first time I've ever been on a podcast, so I really didn't know how this was going to go, which is why I went and listened to the previous one,

the one with Kat on, just to kind of get a feel for what we'd be talking about. I'm just grateful for the opportunity to talk about CrossFit in Africa and CrossFit in Namibia. And it's kind of cool to think that you guys, that the three of us are on separate continents and we get to have this awesome conversation around something that's given me, that has given me so much value.

Okay, then let me, I'll finish with one personal question. Nothing to do with CrossFit. How great is it to be 50 no not that but it is really great to be 50 god i'm so glad i found crossfit took care of myself but that's not the question um um oh you were talking about the price of real estate and namibia being expensive yeah is that a place like americans who are looking for a place to go like i hear portugal is amazing people are going to costa rica americans are going all over is namibia

one of those places or is it uh like to move to the coast there like is it a beautiful beach there i mean if i have uh five million dollars in the bank um should i move there and disappear off the face of the earth i think if you wanted to live in $1 million, should I do that? Yeah. I mean, you'd be styling with a million dollars. So I think if you want to live somewhere that's, that's pristine and that's remote and that that's sparsely populated, I think Namibia is a great place. I think if you, if you're, if kind of all you want to do is leave, let's say, you're in Santa Cruz.

Where are you? Yeah, I'm in Santa Cruz, California. Yeah, Santa Cruz. So you want to leave the West Coast, but you kind of wanted to have similar amenities, then this isn't the place for you. Can you grow anything there? Can you grow an apple tree there? Can you grow cherry trees, an apple tree?

Can you grow – apple tree there? Can you grow cherry trees and apple trees? Can you grow – can there be – So there's big rivers on both boundaries, on the northern and southern border. There's big rivers that flow, so there's access to water. There's people that grow grapes. There are people that grow olives. There are vegetables. Yeah, so you can grow stuff. But I think it's – to say it's backward isn't true.

I mean, in many, you know, I'm sitting on like great fiber internet with you guys. So in town, you have everything that you need. You have the first world. But a lot of Namibia is still very third world. And so, you know, if you were to move to the coast again, when we're done on the on on the podcast have a look at the skeleton coast which is essentially our coastline you know like

huge wrecks and and uh huge wrecks old wrecks shipwrecks and stuff like that um there's a there's an organization i work for called the desert lion project and they're on instagram so they do research on the desert adapted lions up in the wilderness area there. If that kind of thing is your thing, then I think Namibia would be great for you. But if it's not, if you want comfortable living, then I suppose Spain or Portugal

or somewhere like that would probably be better. I mean, your house looks nice. I mean, I'm looking and like, look, there's 90 degree angles in the corner i haven't seen any giant bugs fly by um you have glass you have internet i live in a great place i mean i was fortunate enough to to build this myself 11 years ago um so i built this between working and and uh, a friend of mine is a really good architect.

So he did the layout and it's a great piece of land and we have really good quality of life. So, I mean, I, I really, I want for nothing. It's a, it's a really cool property. Are there drug addicts in Namibia and homeless people like zombies walking around? There are. Yeah. Zombies, uh, homeless people.

Yeah. But, but, but, um, and, and so a lot of the, a lot of the homeless kids, a lot of the homeless like zombies walking around? Yeah. There are. There are zombies. Homeless people, yeah. And so a lot of the homeless kids, a lot of the homeless people use glue as they sniff glue. But there's drug addicts. I mean, there's the crack cocaine, our derivative of it, which is called TIP, has made its way here.

There are people that have, there's lots of addiction i mean there's alcohol there's this um okay i'll stay here i'll stay here maybe maybe more yeah i'll stay here i mean we have we have that here that's we have we have so much of that here it's just fucking crazy no i know i remember, I remember, I saw some footage the other day on one of your news channels of, of, of the, was it the trains in Los Angeles? Like, uh, forget it was like a, Oh, um, your, your big postal service, FedEx or, or, or U S postal or whatever. They were missing parcels. And there were a bunch of whole bunch of trains that had kind of been derailed and people were just, and there was litter everywhere.

And so I kind of get the sense that the homeless situation in the States is really big. I think in California, there's more, by the way, they're all, they're all drug addicts, by the way, don't let anyone tell you different. I mean, the, the, the mother that you see sleeping in her car with her kids is very far and few between. You won't see those, but the California has more of these homeless drug addicts than all of the other states combined and

it's obviously because of the weather i mean because the weather is good yeah because you can sleep outside and not freeze to death right and then of course and then the and then there has been an entire economy a billion billion-dollar economy, probably larger. We probably have a larger homeless economy. That's the people that are helping than the entire GDP. Namibia, I bet you. I bet you it's 10 times. It's just crazy.

I wouldn't lose a dime. Yeah. That's crazy. And so those people don't want to lose their jobs, so it becomes this this cycle that spiral yeah the cycle yeah yeah so i mean if you want to come visit we have a guest room you'd be welcome both of you oh that would be awesome caleb would like to go anywhere besides where he is do you he just wants some good food do you have any food do you Do you have any food? Any food at all? We've got great food, Caleb.

Yeah, no, it's definitely, it's a, it's a, it's a cool place to live in. It's definitely a cool place to live in. You are always, always welcome. If you come to Santa Cruz to stay with me also, Patrick, you're always welcome. I, I remember, I think we connected and you always had very nice things to say to me. Many years ago, we connected at least, right? Yeah, we talked about the boys and we talked about the, I had two boo-boos.

Have you still got a boo-boo? Oh, yes. We have the same dog. Yeah. I can't believe we have the same dog. What a great dog. Yeah, mine's great. Mine are both gone, unfortunately.

I think that was the first time you and i spoke was about the dogs yeah that's diesel yeah great dogs i i can't i i mean that's a brave lad right there uh if when i get mine riled up it is it is nuts i mean i have to tell my kids hey i mean she won't them, but she'll just run someone over. Yeah. I mean, they're big dogs, but such cool animals. Oh,

such cool animals. And then it looks like I replaced that with Astro. That's what my, that's what your lawn ends up looking like when you have a dog like that. I got that too. Right. That's cool dogs. Anyway. Thank you very much. Uh, you, you have a dog like that i got that too well that's cool dogs anyway thank you very much uh yeah you have my phone number takes me time stay in touch pleasure to meet you um tell your wife thanks for letting us borrow you for a couple hours and and thanks for the opportunity to chat and and more importantly thank you for what you do for uh

for all of us for the community we appreciate you i thank you thank you for what you do for all of us, for the community. We appreciate you. I appreciate you. Thank you. That means a lot. That way I don't have to jerk myself off in the beginning of every show. It's been awesome talking to you guys. Thank you very much. All right.

Ciao, brother. Take it easy. We have no idea, Africa. We have no idea. I started Googling what it would take to like move over there oh yeah what'd you find i know as soon as i talk to people like that i'm like i'm out of here it looks it looks pretty doable just gotta find a job what's the what's the uh you probably could take care of some drug addicts at home you you have the skills to do it skeleton probably and skeleton coast just just live in the middle of nowhere sounds great oh shit he's not joking about the

shipwrecks oh yeah it's legit oh so is this one of those places that you see where they um they just drive old oil tankers up against the coast maybe i don't know i've seen that before too i don't know if that's damibia look at this thing that's legit wow we actually have a giant giant boat uh off the coast here it's uh right up against the pier it's called shipwrecks in california i wonder if i can take that. It's right up against the pier. It's called Shipwrecks in California. I wonder if I can take that in. It's right by my house. I ran stairs there yesterday with my mom.

Shipwrecks Santa Cruz. Yeah, look at this giant ship. Just right off the, if there's a little picture of it. It's massive. It's basically this guy serving in front of it. That's wild.

You coming home soon? I don't know. I don't get my hopes up. You can never trust. You never trust. Like anything can change. Yeah. I mean, it's not like I'll be here forever, but I'm not going to put all my chips in one basket, eggs in one basket, eggs in one basket. 3.5 years and would always go to Nambia for the weekend.

Is it Nambia or? Namibia. Namibia. Namibia or namibia namibia namibia namibia um oh lived in the country north of namibia for three years does that country have a name angola angola so you have a date you're coming home but you don't want to get heartbroken if the date gets moved yeah it seems to be the uh you've seen that happen all the time yeah anytime i've they've been given me anytime i've been given a date in the four years that i've been in the military it's like never legit so have you seen other people where they're like okay i'm leaving

in a week and then like a week goes by and you're like you're still here and you're like yeah another six months yeah not like not like six months but like they could be here for like another week another week another week um the guy who will replace you will he come like a week before you go so you can like get him up to speed on like who has venereal diseases and yeah and where the mice hide out in the hospital and shit like that yep has that guy arrived yet i wonder if we'll see i wonder if i'll notice a notice a noticeable demeanor change in you when that guy arrives like hmm like you'll be like in your chair like this yeah maybe I don't know I don't think I'll be excited until like I'm on a plane leaving we're gonna have to and when you

fly home um will be a non-stop flight to the states no i'll make a stop and then i'll be there for a few days and then i'll and then i'll fly home and and do you stop there because that's just part of the protocol like someone has to like you have to take a physical or they have to make sure like you're mentally okay or you don't have to but i requested it because it sounded fun so are you regretting it you're like fuck i should have gone straight home i don't really want to go home honestly you don't no part of me is like this is too much fun are you serious yeah um could you bring your wife out there no you couldn't no has anyone brought their wife out

there no unless you're like a contractor if you're if you're a civilian working for the government then you probably i think you can but what if your wife flew out there could you get off some people have done that and then they get in trouble oh it's it's sketchy it's yeah i mean like it's totally feasible but frowned upon yeah what's what's the highest ranking is there a high ranking person where you're at is there a general near you i don't know so you don't see some you don't see someone like that every day? No. Daniel said something very interesting about – I think he said somewhere in the comments that Namibia was the first country in Africa that was able to take wastewater and recycle it into drinking water. I was like, I don't know if I should read that one. It's got,

I mean, it's, it's kind of an impressive technological feat, but if you believe it works, sure. My cousin and his wife have five kids. Oh, I spent a bunch of time in Malawi too.

I forgot about that. And they go back to the 17th to Malawi, go preach the gospel of Jesus. Of course, everyone's doing the, doing the Jesus card just so they can travel. I was on a mission trip. Yeah. I bet you were. I was banging cock and bang cock. I mean, preaching

the... I bet those sisters were fine. Yes. Here we go. Oh, in the world, direct potable reuse. Oh, meaning they just piss in a pan and then you boil it? What do you mean, direct potable? No idea.

Yeah. Beaver blink twice if you're right. I got to keep my eyes open, I guess. That's so good ryan uh they moved there four years ago going back for more yeah cool malawi's awesome africa's awesome it's uh especially i mean the fact that that guy has internet and uh a home like that i mean if you can get some good quality shelter and some internet and you have the things to keep you busy to uh you know practice your art which he does he has 240 clients that that's mind-boggling right in a town of 325 000 and the biggest town in your country

yeah that's nuts what's the aerial look like over that town can we like like a drone shot what was the town windhoek i was i was afraid to start saying words because i knew i was going to be saying them all wrong oh they got some like big buildings there yeah it looks like i think i saw some like skyscrapers and stuff and they got like it looks like they had like a famous town okay i saw an f45 on the map f45 yeah that's hilarious what is that that's the like um that's uh like a boot camp thing yeah it's crossfit without a soul it's mark walberg saying it's mark walberg saying yeah look it's even got german names ludwig storf yeah when he said his parents when he said his grandfather was in the german military boy i had a lot of questions then

i pushed those ones down are you tired of being alone please check out out our sponsor, 69mega.com. We'll help you. How has YouTube not figured out how to stop bots? I mean, ask Elon. Is Caleb chasing Sokol? Oh, great. Who's that?

We're about to see. S-O-K-O-L. Uh... that we're about to see that's okay uh says it's a gymnastics um let me put in news says it's a um no is that is that like some sort of terrorist i have idea. I don't know what that means. Blink three times. Oh, here we go. Here we go. Uh,

blink three times with your left eye. If you're staying with you, Evgeny, I cannot believe I haven't had you Evgenia on. I think he's out there. He's still, he's still coaching and everything. I need to,

I DM him. I sent him a WhatsApp saying, Hey, when are you going to come on he says anytime and then i always drop the ball i know that i think i've done that with a couple people we've been trying to get on to sorry i want to show i want to i do want to show you guys this though just before we leave look at this this is it's not a big deal this is uh so this is what his town looks like it's beautiful oh wow yeah it looks very german that's a cool that must be like the ultimate tourist destination you know when i was

at crossfit the reason one of the like there was always this talk should we lower affiliate fees um for affiliates that are in countries where the dollar is not strong and the thought was this at least one of the arguments was this if we lower the cost of affiliates uh the affiliate fee in brazil then the people in mississippi are going to complain they're going to be like fuck you life's here is harder than it is in fucking Rio. And so you open up this whole door. Holy shit. Robert Mugabe. Robert Mugabe

Avenue. Isn't that guy like a full-blown wasn't that a bad guy? Oh, that's cool. That's a statue? Or is that a real person? Can't tell if that's a bronze statue a real person he was the prime minister of zimbabwe yeah i think he did some really bad shit or at least we're supposed to believe that okay so this is what i think it looks like outside of his house. This is what I was picturing. Just African Bush?

Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. He's got like leopards and shit roaming around his backyard. Yeah. They got a railway. They use a third of the country's water to keep that grass green.

That's the parliament building. All right. It's very soon. I'm getting nervous. It's very soon. All sorts of shit's about to fucking come down the pipe on the show. Yay. I got something exciting for Wednesday, I think. Very, very, very, very very very exciting oh it looks like we have olivia kerstetter tomorrow morning oh that's cool okay

all right guys uh thank you thanks for the trip to namibia um yeah dictator right corrupt uh corrupt son of a bitch for the trip to Namibia. Yeah, dictator. Right. Corrupt son of a bitch. Can never go out with Chuck Taylors unless you want to run off course. Meaning they'll melt out there. Somebody was asking about minimalist shoes.

He said Chuck Taylors. Savon, did you see Daniel Brandon out there somebody was asking about minimalist shoes he said chuck taylor's sebon did you see daniel brandon going team with nistler and taylor is that for wadapalooza are you fucking kidding me that's true it is true let's get her on we should get all three on matt on. Matt, who do I? Oh, Danielle. Hey, Matt, can we get Danielle on tomorrow after Olivia? 745 a.m. And I put Danielle on Olivia, 7.45 a.m. And I put Danielle on this too. Can we get Danielle in?

No, not in, on. Okay. Okay. Just to say hi and stuff. Okay. She dropped off the team. Oh, nevermind. She canceled?

Yes. No, she was supposed to be on the team, but pulled out. God damn it. I already texted her. She'll say no anyway. Don't worry. Okay. Caleb and I, Caleb, that was fun today, right?

Yeah, it was good. I liked that. What we learned, I think after two hours of the show today, what we've learned is this Caleb doesn't want to come home for some reason um which is just weird but we will explore yeah we'll explore that in future shows um hi bye bye