American Ninja Warrior competitor
Stone Cold Steve Austin's Broken Skull Challenge competitor
2x SISU Iron finisher
2x Barkley Fall Classic 50K finisher
CrossFit Games Regionals competitor, South Central 2012
Top 50 Spartan Racer worldwide, 2012–2013
2003 World Champion Wild Hog Catcher
USAW Masters National Qualifier
CrossFit Level 3 Trainer
Healthy Steps Nutrition Coach
USA Weightlifting Sports Performance Coach
Certified Mississippi Educator
Former High School Head Cross Country Coach
At 16, I broke the Mississippi high school state record in the indoor mile. A few months later I took second at the state meet. I was so crushed by my perceived failure, I quit running. I regretted that decision for years. CrossFit is where I learned to stop quitting. When I walked into my first CrossFit gym in 2010, I couldn't do a single push-up. Since then I've been hurt, missed cuts by a few points, and come up short in races I trained a year for. Every time, I went back to work. I'm the owner and head coach of Bandit CrossFit in Woolmarket. We've served Biloxi, Gulfport, D'Iberville and the Mississippi Gulf Coast since 2013.
Bandit didn't start with a business plan. It started in 2008 at West Wortham Middle School, where I ran "Biggest Loser" competitions and an after-school boot camp. In 2010, after I earned my CrossFit Level 1, I started a boot camp in my backyard. When we outgrew the yard, we moved to a public park. In 2013, we affiliated with CrossFit and moved into a storage unit with no running water and a port-a-potty out back. People still showed up before sunrise. Today we train in a 6,000-square-foot facility. I never knew how we'd get from one step to the next. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. Some days I wanted to throw in the towel, and I've doubted myself plenty. But somewhere out there, somebody is looking for what I was looking for: a place where they're seen, heard, and pushed to get better. I want this place to be open when they find it.
I was living in Texas, a wife, and young mother of two small children when I found CrossFit in 2005. I taught myself the hard way, with thousands of hours of videos, articles and seminars. Most people don't have time for that, and they shouldn't have to. Seven years later, I quit my teaching career, cashed out my retirement, and opened a gym. We say our job is making people hard to kill. That means being strong enough to show up for your family, your friends and your community, and to keep the promises you make to yourself. Nobody is coming to save any of us. The good news is you don't have to do it alone. Watching our members and coaches grow, in the gym and out of it, is what gets me up every morning.
