Sevan Matossian (00:02):
Hey Caleb. Good morning.
Caleb Beaver (00:06):
Hey, good morning.
Sevan Matossian (00:07):
I know I started four minutes early.
Caleb Beaver (00:10):
It’s okay.
Sevan Matossian (00:12):
I went to Super Cuts yesterday.
Caleb Beaver (00:17):
Why would you do that? Oh, you got your own haircut?
Sevan Matossian (00:23):
And I walked in there and there was no one in there, just the receptionist and a haircut lady. And she didn’t have any customers. And she said, and the receptionist was this young girl with a mask on, I don’t know, 20 years old. She goes, She just looks at me, she goes, You’re not gonna shave your head, are you? I go, I am gonna shave my head. She goes, And number four, all the way around, I go, I don’t know. I was thinking about a number three on top and a one or two on the sides. She goes, You can’t do that. I’m like, Oh shit. Did my wife call ahead? What is going on here?
(00:58):
I said, What do you mean? She goes, You have such beautiful hair. I said, Oh, thank you. I go, I don’t want to be one of those old guys with really long hair that just looks like a douche. She goes, You’re not old. I go, I’m pretty old. She goes, You don’t look old. I’m like, That’s cool. Thank you. Then the lady who cuts the hair, she’s, she’s probably like 65 long hair and she talks really slow. She goes, One of those people who just, every word just comes out really slow. You’re talking to a cartoon character that’s like a snail. She’s like, I think you should just maybe cut the sides and leave the top long.
Caleb Beaver (01:47):
Okay.
Sevan Matossian (01:49):
So it was weird. So I went in there and she just gave me the haircut she wanted and it’s like, I think it’s the fucking best haircut I’ve ever had in my life.
Caleb Beaver (01:58):
Really? And that was at Super Cuts.
Sevan Matossian (02:00):
It was at Super Cuts. I can’t believe it. I went in there to just have my head shaved. I mean, don’t you think it looks pretty fucking amazing. Look at it.
Caleb Beaver (02:07):
Yeah. I’m honestly impressed.
Sevan Matossian (02:15):
I look like a normal person.
Caleb Beaver (02:18):
Yeah, they cleaned you up pretty good.
Sevan Matossian (02:20):
Hold on, I can’t hear you. What?
Caleb Beaver (02:23):
They clean, They cleaned you up pretty
Sevan Matossian (02:24):
Good. Yeah.
Caleb Beaver (02:26):
It’s not even like uneven.
Sevan Matossian (02:28):
No.
Caleb Beaver (02:29):
That’s my biggest issue when I go to Super Cuts is that they jack it up.
Sevan Matossian (02:32):
I think I look like a A model. I look like one of those old men models.
Caleb Beaver (02:37):
Yeah, you look great. You could be a little Vuitton model
Sevan Matossian (02:40):
Or something. I had to beg for that. It’s too late. You could have said that before. I said I look like a model. You didn’t say shit. You didn’t say shit. Yeah, you
Caleb Beaver (02:47):
Actually pitch it. So
Sevan Matossian (02:49):
Sorry. But I was like, Holy cow, I look, she made me, this is like, And then the whole time she kept telling me how handsome I look and I was just like, maybe that’s what happened. She has a spell on me. She told me more times in that haircut that I look handsome than I’ve heard it in my entire life combined.
Caleb Beaver (03:09):
That’s weird.
Sevan Matossian (03:10):
Look at Austin. I only look, even Austin wants a piece.
Caleb Beaver (03:14):
I only hear that from gay guys or old black women
Sevan Matossian (03:19):
Is the old white woman.
Caleb Beaver (03:20):
That’s the only time. It is The only time anybody says that I’m handsome. It’s kinda disappointing.
Sevan Matossian (03:24):
Yeah. Gay guys. I get a lot of handsome from gay guys. The thing is, is they’re just not afraid to say it. They’re free.
Coty Bradburn (03:31):
Can you guys hear me?
Sevan Matossian (03:33):
Hi. Yes.
Coty Bradburn (03:35):
I can not hear you. Shit.
Sevan Matossian (03:37):
Cody’s really handsome. That sucks. That’s gonna fuck up. Everything’s relative.
Caleb Beaver (03:43):
Just jaw.
Coty Bradburn (03:45):
Look at that thing. Look at, I can hear you now.
Sevan Matossian (03:49):
Did we have a go from Cody? No, it’s good. Yeah.
(03:55):
Yeah. Getting a good haircut. And what’s crazy, she was in there. I was like, How long you been cutting hair? And she’s like, I don’t know. I forget what she said. Since 1979 or something. I was seven then. What? And I said, I said, she goes, I really love my job. She goes, I making people feel good. And I was like, Oh, that’s really cool. Kinda like Cody. And then she said the guy came in to get his haircut and she goes, Oh, I’m so sorry. I have to go pick my daughter up from somewhere from work and I don’t have any more time for haircuts today. And then when he walked out, she said, Oh, I feel so bad. He really needed a haircut. I was like, What is going on? I’m like, Had the angel of haircuts cut my hair yesterday
Caleb Beaver (04:38):
At a super cut every time I’ve been there, it’s just the douchebag.
Sevan Matossian (04:42):
Her name is Lola and she’s at the Super Cuts in Capitol. Anyway, Cody, what’s up?
Coty Bradburn (04:50):
Not much man. Nice haircut.
Sevan Matossian (04:52):
<laugh>
Caleb Beaver (04:54):
With
Sevan Matossian (04:55):
This. Oh, this guy. This guy’s a podcasting genius. Just coming in.
Caleb Beaver (05:01):
Unbelievable.
Sevan Matossian (05:02):
Hey, is that, are you at the gym?
Coty Bradburn (05:05):
Yes.
Sevan Matossian (05:06):
What room is that?
Coty Bradburn (05:07):
This is my office.
Sevan Matossian (05:09):
Oh, that’s nice.
Coty Bradburn (05:11):
Do the staff.
Sevan Matossian (05:12):
Yeah. Do the staff have access to that?
Coty Bradburn (05:14):
Yeah. Yeah, we do our staff meetings in here.
Sevan Matossian (05:16):
Oh, that’s cool. You Oh. Oh that’s really cool. And then you got a coffee maker in there and a microwave. The essentials.
Coty Bradburn (05:30):
Yep. There’s a fridge too.
Sevan Matossian (05:33):
Cody is not up for super Cuts Talk. Maybe let, let’s I’m gonna say, can we start a poll, Caleb, and we’ll check it at the end of the show and we’ll ask the poll, Does Cody get haircuts or does he cut his own hair? And we’ll ask Cody for the answer at the end and you can vote. So he also has a nice, large mic, was very observant of you. And this morning we were shot out of the cannon.
Coty Bradburn (06:03):
Thanks, Jeff.
Sevan Matossian (06:05):
<laugh>. Oh Cody, thanks for coming on. This has been one of my favorite and easiest and most fulfilling kind of things I’ve tackled is doing these kind of affiliate shows where I’m trying once a week to interview an affiliate. And I’m trying to do affiliates that I’ve never heard of before. Cuz I feel like there’s these 20 or 30 affiliates that always get all the attention to no fault of their own, but they’re the guys for some reason that, you know, always see on the site or that they’re always being interviewed or always get the meetings with the ceo. So
Coty Bradburn (06:36):
Yeah, man. Absolutely. Cheers. She’s
Sevan Matossian (06:38):
On. Cheers. You’re in, Where is your gym?
Coty Bradburn (06:43):
It’s Charlotte, North Carolina.
Sevan Matossian (06:47):
And is that is Charlotte coastal town?
Coty Bradburn (06:50):
No, no. We’re about three hours from the coast.
Sevan Matossian (06:53):
Okay. And what’s the name of your gym?
Coty Bradburn (06:58):
CrossFit Mountain Island.
Sevan Matossian (07:00):
Mountain Island.
Coty Bradburn (07:02):
Mountain Island. Yeah. It’s misleading.
Sevan Matossian (07:05):
Seon. Don’t you do your research. Why didn’t you know all that before? Hey Jack asses. I’m asking so you can know. I don’t wanna hear any dumb shit in the comments. Work out, get fit, be happy. How old are you?
Coty Bradburn (07:24):
29,
Sevan Matossian (07:26):
Man, you’re doing it. And you’re married and have a baby in the oven.
Coty Bradburn (07:32):
That’s it, man. Well, my wife does, but yeah.
Sevan Matossian (07:34):
Right, right, right. Important distinction. Well, congratulations. That’s all pretty awesome. I stumbled upon the Instagram account conservative, hippie.
Coty Bradburn (07:46):
Oh yeah, that’s
Sevan Matossian (07:48):
My nice. Yeah, so I don’t normally use this word because I don’t mean it in any condescending way. The way Dave used to use it to me, I’m so proud of your wife. I’m so freaking proud of your wife.
Coty Bradburn (08:04):
She’s stoked
Sevan Matossian (08:05):
To hear that. Yeah, I went through her Instagram account and she is the best version of herself. She is like, God, and congratulations. She seems so beautiful and so down to earth and someone who really wants to work on herself. And I was just like, holy crap this. He scored. What a cool chick. Yeah. Yeah.
Coty Bradburn (08:24):
I’m outta my league for sure.
Sevan Matossian (08:25):
She is so cool. Brave as shit.
Coty Bradburn (08:28):
Yeah. You’re not kidding. Yeah, she’s the bravest person I know.
Sevan Matossian (08:32):
Does And she works at the gym too.
Coty Bradburn (08:35):
Yeah, we both run it together.
Sevan Matossian (08:38):
There’s a ton to unpack with Cody because he’s got tons of wisdom and advice and knowledge and know-how and experience on running a CrossFit gym. And yet also, he himself has been on a remarkable journey from being a young man to when he described himself as a kid, reminded me of me and we’ll get into that. Didn’t play any sports chunky and just CrossFit was kind of the first thing that kind of late in life. Well, most people maybe were turning in their sporting mindset. He found something that, Oh, maybe I can be an athlete. Maybe I can do something competitive. And so it’s a pretty cool journey. And then on top of that, there’s a constant theme in all of his posts and presentations that he really wants to help people that that’s like his calling. He likes to work with people, likes to make them happy, likes to introduce ’em to things to make their life better. Fair assessment. Fair assessment. Yeah.
Coty Bradburn (09:36):
Well, yeah, you’re making a
Sevan Matossian (09:37):
Blush. Oh good. That’s good. That’s my job. By the way Caleb was eating, that’s why his jaw’s moving, that he has not got addicted to meth. Well, <laugh>, not me too. Sure. Cody let’s go back to the beginning. Are you born and raised in North Carolina?
Coty Bradburn (10:02):
South Carolina. So where I live in Charlotte’s on the border of the States, North and South Carolina. So I grew up in a town called Indian Land. South Carolina is just south of Valentine which is a kind of affluent part of Charlotte. So I grew up in South Carolina for the most part, and then spent most of my time between either North or South Carolina. All my family’s in South Carolina, but then I was the first one to move in North Carolina when I bought my first house six years ago.
Sevan Matossian (10:30):
Oh, congrats. Holy shit. Congrats. No accent. No
Coty Bradburn (10:36):
Carolina. I’m
Sevan Matossian (10:36):
Sorry. No accent.
Coty Bradburn (10:39):
Yeah, no man. I’ve got I don’t have the southern draw. My dad’s got it and most of my family does, but I don’t know what it is. I didn’t get it.
Sevan Matossian (10:47):
You didn’t try to not have it, you just didn’t get it?
Coty Bradburn (10:49):
No, it wasn’t intentional. Even from a kid. I, I’ve always had a really more of a northern language. I talk pretty fast. So coaching’s helped me kind of dial that back a little bit. But even as a kid, my grandpa would tell me to slow down <laugh> being in South Carolina. But yeah, no southern drill. But it wasn’t intentional.
Sevan Matossian (11:09):
And you grew up just both, You grew up with both your parents’ siblings?
Coty Bradburn (11:16):
Yeah, I’ve got one brother, he’s 21. He’ll be 22 in a couple months. I know it was the two of us and my parents.
Sevan Matossian (11:25):
And there was that photo of you, You weren’t just chunky, You were a fat kid.
Coty Bradburn (11:31):
I was a fat kid. Yeah.
Sevan Matossian (11:33):
Yeah. You weighed I don’t know when it was, but I saw somewhere you weighed up to 260 pounds.
Coty Bradburn (11:38):
Yeah, I remember that was kind of a pivotal moment in my life. I remember stepping on the scale at the doctor’s office. It was late in the day. It was around dusk at a medical plaza in Fort Mill and I so that scale and the woman kept tapping the scale over, tapping it over, tapping it over. I was probably 16, maybe 17 at the time. And it went past two 50. And that was the first, I was like, Holy shit. And she kept tapping it. Kept tapping it. And I think it was up to 2 58. God. Yeah. That’s crazy. Yeah. So on the left, that was me on a dock at my grandma’s house. And believe it or not, there’s a girl on both sides of me holding my hand.
Sevan Matossian (12:21):
Oh yeah,
Coty Bradburn (12:22):
Girls. Yeah. No, but they were just friends.
Sevan Matossian (12:25):
<laugh> charity picture.
Coty Bradburn (12:28):
Yeah, yeah. Charity picture.
Sevan Matossian (12:31):
How does that happen? How do you get to 16 years old? What’s the lifestyle that you live from being born to 16, you
Coty Bradburn (12:42):
Feel like? 2 58. Two 60?
Sevan Matossian (12:44):
Yeah. Tell me typical days for you growing up, watching cartoons and eating boxes of Ritz crackers or
Coty Bradburn (12:50):
Dude. Yeah, I mean, pretty much, man, it was a lot of, I like most people that are in that position, it’s at that age is ignorance. So I remember as long as I can go back, having friends that were skinny thin, they weren’t overweight, but we did the same things. I had this friend aj, we’d sit in this his parents had a little warehouse by their house and they owned a printing company. So we’d sit in their offices and play room scape and video games all night and drink Mountain Dew for 12 hours straight and just eat whatever we wanted to. But he was thin and I was the fat kid. And I, that never really made sense to me. But to answer your original question, yeah. I mean, most of my time, if I wasn’t in school I was playing call duty four, playing video games, watching tv, watching movies, just eating ramen noodles. My parents had this little island in the kitchen that had a bunch of just snacks and treats on it, grab and go type stuff. And I was just addicted to food, addicted to feeling good that
Caleb Beaver (13:54):
Did you get the new call duty?
Coty Bradburn (13:56):
I don’t, man, cuz <laugh>, I’ve gotta control my environment or I’ll get addicted pretty fast. <laugh> it good.
Caleb Beaver (14:03):
I haven’t tried it yet. I’ve been stuck outside of the us
Sevan Matossian (14:07):
Hey, you can’t play that there, Caleb. From there
Caleb Beaver (14:10):
The internet keeps cutting out every time we try to download.
Sevan Matossian (14:14):
Oh,
Coty Bradburn (14:14):
Sounds like Big Brother.
Sevan Matossian (14:18):
Is your brother in the military? Cody?
Coty Bradburn (14:21):
Mine? No. No. So that sounds like Big Brother. They’re not letting him play.
Sevan Matossian (14:24):
Oh, oh, Big brother. Okay. Did that island, did you drink Capri sons and box juices and er, elves, crackers, and lots of
Coty Bradburn (14:35):
A, If you have a box, I probably ate or drank it. Yeah, I mean, sweet tea. I mean, I remember Mike looking back, so to the south, sweet tea is a big thing. I remember watching my parents, they’d make a gallon of tea once every day and a half and cause we’d drink it. And I mean, I would watch my mom put cups of sugar, cups of sugar and sweet tea. Probably two, three cups at a time, just for one gallon. And I mean, we could go through one of those in a day.
Sevan Matossian (15:01):
Was there any talk about healthy eating in your house growing up?
Coty Bradburn (15:06):
Yeah, we’d go through seasons of it where it would be everyone else. We’d make a good effort. And then I remember doing the South Beach diet with a mom for a while. I remember eating peanut butter before bed as a healthy snack. And then, I mean, it wasn’t that my parents were not making an effort to be healthy. My mom’s a nurse, she works in the hospital. My parents aren’t obese or cigarette, anything. It was just kind of a cultural thing, I guess so. And it was also not really knowing what to do. I mean, I think there’s just a lot of ignorance around what is healthy eating. So sometimes would be pork chops and vegetables. And the other nights would be lasagna and pizza. I mean, it’s just the standard American diet. But the thing that comes to mind is the deviation from normal was a healthy meal. And that was the problem was we’d have a meat and a vegetable, but that was a deviation from normal where Norma was just random.
Sevan Matossian (16:14):
Yeah, it’s interesting because I think my mom was trying to keep us really healthy, but like you said, no one, No one in a lot of ways they just believe what the TV set said. Right. Yeah.
Coty Bradburn (16:27):
Healthier, seven to 14 servings of grains a day. Right.
Sevan Matossian (16:33):
Non-fat milk Low fat er cookies. Yeah, exactly. Healthy whole grain Ritz crackers. I mean, you know what I mean? Just all this shit that was written on there. Cereal, breakfast
Coty Bradburn (16:45):
For sure.
Sevan Matossian (16:46):
Yeah. Tons of cereal for breakfast. Tons of my house. Always had orange juice in it. Always <affirmative>. Yeah. Fresh and that. Fresh and natural.
Caleb Beaver (16:53):
Yeah. I think that was the only thing my dad actually pour natural serving size of for us was orange juice. I always get so mad that he didn’t fill it all the way to the top of the glass. He would fill half a glass.
Coty Bradburn (17:04):
I was like ounce.
Caleb Beaver (17:07):
Yeah. Everything else was a full bowl of cereal. And
Sevan Matossian (17:10):
All my kids glasses are four ounce glasses.
Coty Bradburn (17:14):
That’s a good idea.
Sevan Matossian (17:15):
Just for you just get a four ounce glass and you just repo. But I don’t give my kids, My kids have never had juice.
Coty Bradburn (17:23):
Yeah,
Sevan Matossian (17:24):
No juice. No. So in hindsight, it’s, even when I think about it, I’m sure I had it too, we weren’t allowed to have soda in the house, but I can’t even imagine giving caffeine to kids now in my current mindset. But back then, if you were drinking Sweet Tea and Mountain Dew, and I’ve seen those videos where they show moms putting Mountain Dew in baby’s bottles.
Coty Bradburn (17:45):
Oh wow. Haven’t seen that.
Sevan Matossian (17:48):
Yeah. Have you ever heard of the thing called Mountain Dew mouth?
Coty Bradburn (17:51):
No.
Sevan Matossian (17:52):
Oh man. Oh man. It’s basically, they give kids Mountain Dew just from a young age from when they’re babies. And then by the time they’re like 10 years old, their whole entire fucking gum line and teeth line is just completely rotted out.
Caleb Beaver (18:07):
Geez. Another reference for that word is Appalachia <laugh>. So that’s an indicator of what goes on over there.
Sevan Matossian (18:16):
And you’re, You’re right. It’s because they don’t know. Yeah, because they don’t know.
Coty Bradburn (18:22):
It’s sad, man. It’s just walking around Walmart makes me sad.
Sevan Matossian (18:26):
Very. Right. So you’re 16 and you get to the, And are you playing any sports at this time? Are you doing any activity? Do you avoid class as a kid?
Coty Bradburn (18:38):
Man, we could spend the whole show on my childhood in school. It was just crazy shit. No, I mean I wasn’t avoiding, I didn’t play sports, so I played baseball for a few years. Coaches picks was probably the longest sport I played as an adolescent. But that was before high school. A lot of my weight came on. I would probably say if I had to roughly sixth grade to maybe 11th grade. So there was a span there where I got outta baseball. I didn’t play any sports. I skateboarded. That was the extent of my activity was skateboarding. I skateboarding for six or seven years. But as active as that is, you’re still riding on a piece of wood. So there’s not a lot of exercise happening there.
Sevan Matossian (19:22):
And with kids, that culture too is kind of like, Hey, let’s skate to seven 11, get a bag of Doritos in a Mountain Dew. Right?
Coty Bradburn (19:28):
Oh, for sure. Arizona Sweet Teas. You wanna Taco Bell trying to win as much free as we came off those little quarter spining things and then go skate for four or six hours on the weekends.
Sevan Matossian (19:41):
I did Taco Bell too. That’s fascinating. You did Taco Bell. I would get the 12 pack of soft tacos and eat them all to myself.
Coty Bradburn (19:50):
Impressive.
Sevan Matossian (19:51):
Yeah. Did you used to do that?
Coty Bradburn (19:53):
I went more for crunch, like crunch wraps. I didn’t like the soft tacos, the Taco Bell, so not the ground beef and the taco. It didn’t sit right. The crunchiness made me ignore what the beef probably was. I think
Sevan Matossian (20:04):
12 tacos, 12 packets of hot sauce.
Caleb Beaver (20:07):
Oh my God. Yeah.
Coty Bradburn (20:08):
Hot sauce.
Caleb Beaver (20:09):
Just shitting fire.
Sevan Matossian (20:11):
I didn’t even care. I was a trash compactor. And even though I was the smallest kid amongst my friends, I would always eat the most. And I would always tell them if they ordered one omelet, I would order two <laugh>.
Coty Bradburn (20:25):
Sean Principle,
Sevan Matossian (20:28):
They were amused by how much I could eat. And I was, If I could get attention doing that, I probably just did. It would be my thought. In hindsight,
Caleb Beaver (20:36):
Yeah. In the Midwest we have Taco Johns and they sell a thing called a, what is it? A 12 pack and a pound. So it’s 12 hard shell tacos. And then a pound of potato lays is basically hash browns mini hash browns seasoned. So that was our thing with the football team is like, Oh, in your preseason you gotta fuel up. So you go get a 12 pack up pound in between your two a days
Sevan Matossian (20:59):
And dip them into high fructose corn syrup. That’s called ketchup.
Caleb Beaver (21:03):
Yeah. Sour cream and all that
Coty Bradburn (21:05):
Shit. The essentials.
Sevan Matossian (21:07):
Did any of the kids, did you ever start kids make fun of you or start pointing out to you that you were heavy? People start talking about your weight, your friends all
Coty Bradburn (21:15):
Yeah, they were really good at it.
Sevan Matossian (21:18):
<laugh>, they were professionals,
Coty Bradburn (21:21):
<laugh>,
Sevan Matossian (21:22):
What would they say?
Coty Bradburn (21:24):
Oh man. There’s a few very vivid memories that stick out. I remember this one time I was probably 11 or 12 maybe. I had just gotten a cell phone. I remember this kid calling me. It was a kid and a friend of mine, well friend’s, a strong word in retrospect, but they called me probably two or 3:00 AM and they pray and called me to tell me how fat I was. So they woke me up to tell me how fat I was. Yeah. So that happened.
Sevan Matossian (21:55):
Wow.
Coty Bradburn (21:55):
Yeah, <laugh>, I remember that. I’ll never forget that. But just kids would, They’d call me the fat kid. They’d walk up and try to scoop my man boobs. That was a thing for a long time. So then I wore hoodies and walked with this really tic Ford position so the kids couldn’t see my man boobs. I remember that. That was a big part of high school. Getting bullied in the bus, riding home. It was interesting, man. It was like my friends liked me cuz I was a good person. But all these kids that didn’t know me, they would just assume that I was, I don’t know, lacking value.
Sevan Matossian (22:40):
How did you take it in the moment? How did you take it? Would you take it a champ or would you hide the fact you were offended or?
Coty Bradburn (22:49):
No, I wasn’t a kid that would laugh along. I mean, I would just introvert and ignore it and walk away or just avoid eye contact.
Sevan Matossian (22:58):
Just take that shit and push it down. I’ll deal with that in my thirties. <laugh>.
Coty Bradburn (23:03):
Yeah. Lock it away. Exactly.
Sevan Matossian (23:07):
At that point, did you have any aspirations as that starts pouring in? Do you catch yourself doing weird shit in your room at night before you go to bed? Do a fucking hundred sit ups or start trying to do pushups or avoid situations of ever taking your shirt off? If you went to a pool party, how did they get that picture of you right there with your shirt off? What were you doing with your shirt off? You have been so embarrassed at that age. I swear with the shirt on
Coty Bradburn (23:33):
Most of the time I would avoid situations taking my shirt off. I remember spending 20, 30 minutes in the mornings before school trying to find clothes that I wasn’t embarrassed to wear. I would avoid going to pool parties or taking my myself at the beach. I used to avoid all situations that I may have to be shirtless. And then I didn’t really lean into the exercise thing. I wasn’t doing pushups for a bed. I would make efforts. My mom was really cool and she got me this. It was one of those flat benches that’s upright on this steel contraption that you could hang on and do dips and leg lifts on. I had that in my bedroom for a while, but that was a wasted effort. It was like someone buying a treadmill and then using it for a coat rack. It was good intention, but to follow through. But goes back to ignorance. I don’t know what I should be doing with this freaking machine in my bedroom and I’m not going gonna do enough leg lists to To outperform or to overcome all of the
Sevan Matossian (24:40):
Talk.
Coty Bradburn (24:41):
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. One of those essentially
Sevan Matossian (24:45):
Can’t, Oh no shit.
Coty Bradburn (24:47):
<laugh>.
Sevan Matossian (24:47):
Wow.
Coty Bradburn (24:48):
Yeah.
Sevan Matossian (24:48):
That’s really cool that she bought you that.
Coty Bradburn (24:51):
It was, Yeah. So she was really, really supportive and she always has been. And in retrospect, I know she really wanted to help me. I just, most people, I just don’t think she knew how, Most parents don’t know how to help their kids not be fat.
Sevan Matossian (25:06):
It’s interesting you say that. I never thought about that. My mom knew that I was really insecure about my weight or I think she did, but she was so busy working. But in hindsight, maybe she should have insisted. She should have insisted that I joined a track team or some shit. Just push me through some hardship, let me get made fun of and then make me so I could get to the other side.
Coty Bradburn (25:26):
I mean, there’s some value to kids bullying me. I mean, it worked out. And in retrospect, I’m glad they did. It sucked back then. But I mean if they hadn’t, I would’ve just gone through life thinking that I was, It was okay.
Sevan Matossian (25:39):
Right. Which
Coty Bradburn (25:40):
Would’ve been way worse.
Sevan Matossian (25:41):
Right? Way worse.
Coty Bradburn (25:43):
Way worse.
Sevan Matossian (25:44):
Way worse. I don’t know if you saw the episode we did with a affiliate owner last week named Matt Shindel Decker. Yeah.
Coty Bradburn (25:52):
Yeah. He’s doing the program with the at risk youth. Yeah. Kids.
Sevan Matossian (25:57):
And his mom got on a school bus and killed the bus driver in front of him.
Coty Bradburn (26:01):
He was the last one on the bus. Right. He changed schools.
Sevan Matossian (26:03):
And if that wouldn’t have happened, horrible incident. But if that wouldn’t have happened 28 years later, he wouldn’t have the experience. That didn’t happen in vain because now he uses that experience to help all of these kids.
Coty Bradburn (26:19):
Yeah. Well we’re all responsible for what we do with her life experience. Right.
Sevan Matossian (26:27):
Was there a rock bottom for you with your weight? Was there a moment in just your whole identity that, did you remember the moment that you’re like, Okay, I’m gonna take control of this shit.
Coty Bradburn (26:39):
The rock bottom that I can point to was that time in the doctor’s office? And it’s interesting cuz the reason I was in that situation to begin with is cause we were moving, my family and I, we were moving down to Garden City, which is just south of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. So I actually graduated high school a year early and I was going down there to begin prerequisite classes for nursing. So I was getting some just basically a checkup done before we left with our family medicine doctor. And that was my rock bottom. But it worked out because I had this gap this summer where I was moving somewhere that I, I’d never been before. I didn’t know anybody. And that was a catalyst for me. That led to me just starting to learn about, okay, how do I control this? How do I lose this weight? What do I do? Because I was going somewhere that no one had this preconceived notion that I was the fat kid. So that was a chance to start over.
Sevan Matossian (27:36):
So you walk out of that office and what was the plan? What was your next step?
Coty Bradburn (27:46):
There was a lot of shame and just frustration. Cause I didn’t know what to do. The first thing do, I just started running, man. I knew that the kids that at school that ran, they weren’t fat. So I’d start there. I think I did that and I’d pick up a 10 Nation magazine and I asked my mom to help me learn how to cook. So my mom taught me how to broil chicken breasts, which tastes like shit. She taught me how to cook some vegetables in the oven. And then I had a friend of mine Robert Windover, in high school. He’d actually lost about 80 to a hundred pounds over the course of a year from his junior to senior year. And I remember asked him, What did you do? How did you do this? And one of the things he said was that he stopped drinking soda and started drinking diet lip and green tea. So I think I bought 4 24 packs of that, put in my bedroom,
Sevan Matossian (28:37):
<laugh> and
Coty Bradburn (28:38):
Running every day. Started baking and broiling chicken and vegetables. And I just stop eating trash. Stopped eating fast food stopped drinking soda, stopped drinking sweet tea, started drinking diet liping green tea. It was a cure for cancer. And then I ran every day and I started off just, I’d run out the front porch and I would try to get to the end of the street running towards the beach, which was maybe a mile away. And then every night I eventually found a loop that was about three miles. And every night I would just set another target. Okay, tonight I’m gonna run to the end of the road. All right, tomorrow I’m gonna run to this next mailbox. Okay, now I’m gonna get to the light post. And then after a couple months I was getting that runner’s eye. And then I was getting daily positive reinforcing, cause I was making it further. And then eventually I ran the whole three miles loop without stopping. And that was a huge deal.
Sevan Matossian (29:32):
Were you ever embarrassed about going running? I can remember even when I first found CrossFit, I wanted to start running. And I lived in Berkeley at the time and I was just embarrassed that I didn’t know how to run. What are people gonna think? But I would just have to block that out and just go out running anyway. But for some reason Oh, is that why you did that? You ran at night so no one would see you? I, yeah. Oh wow. Wow. I always thought I was gonna get lost and I thought somebody would.
The above transcript is generated using AI technology and therefore may contain errors.
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