Chris Wade wants to build a “community” at X4 Fitness in Lane Parke
CrossFit training has been popular since its inception in 2000.
According to NBC News, about 4 million people do CrossFit in about 13,000 affiliated gyms in 120 countries.
According to the American College of Sports Medicine and other online sources, high-intensity interval training (HIIT) has also grown in popularity in the United States in recent years.
All of this created an opportunity for fitness pro and entrepreneur Chris Wade.
In 2018, Wade started his own facility in West Homewood called Nexus Fitness.
“I was able to incorporate both,” he told Village Living, referring to CrossFit and HIIT.
Even better, Wade was able to create his own HIIT method called the X4.
X4 fitness
► WHERE: 900 Lane Parke Court, Suite C6
► TELEPHONE: 205-771-0256
► WEBSITE: X4mountainbrook.com
► HOURS: Monday-Friday, 5:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Saturday, 8-10: 30 a.m.; Sunday, 9-10: 30 a.m.
Due to the popularity of X4, Wade wanted to set up his own studio.
This led to Wade’s brand new business based in Mountain Brook called X4 Fitness.
His new X4 Fitness location opened on May 17th at the Lane Parke Mall in Mountain Brook Village.
The new space includes exercise equipment, a reception desk, retail area and changing rooms.
The boutique facility offers group fitness classes where members alternate between four training blocks to make X4 programming fun and challenging.
Mountain Brook was the perfect place to open the first standalone X4 room, said Wade.
“We just had to build the next home to build and replicate the community we found at Nexus,” he said.
Community is an important concept for Wade, who said he looks forward to building a community in the Mountain Brook area through X4.
Wade is from Newnan, Georgia and played soccer at Clemson University.
He graduated from college in 2008, got involved in the fitness industry and moved to Birmingham in 2011.
He helped found a CrossFit partner in 2015 and later worked two years at Orangetheory Fitness – a chain of HIIT studios – before founding Nexus Fitness.
When Wade developed X4, he wanted to create a way to attract new members.
“I wanted to diversify my membership base by offering high-intensity interval training,” he said.
HIIT workouts combine short, intense workouts with rest periods or lower-intensity exercises, and offer athletes a consistent variety of anaerobic and aerobic workouts, Wade said.
His goal is also to create a “close workout” that attracts people from all walks of life and fitness, said Wade.
The X4 method consists of four blocks or stations – TrueForm, TRX, Strength, and Capacity.
TrueForm is a self-propelled treadmill that offers a gentle run compared to your conventional treadmill.
“You are in power, so you control how fast or slow you go,” said Wade.
The TRX station uses suspension training to train different muscle groups and increase flexibility and endurance.
The multi-gym focuses on building muscle and overall strength.
The capacity station has equipment that can mimic drum bells and other traditional weights, exercising the various muscle groups in the body.
While these stations remain the same, the movements performed and the equipment used in each station vary on a daily basis to motivate and challenge members.
All training movements can be changed.
“It’s constantly changing, challenging our members, but still scalable to hit anyone, wherever they are on their fitness journey,” said Wade.
According to a press release from X4, the new facility will provide everyone with a place to train, improve, and build a community.
In fact, X4 is “community-based,” said Wade.
“We want everyone to invest in themselves and others when they walk into our gym,” he said. “We want X4 to be a place where people can relate to others and build friendships. That was my goal as a fitness trainer and owner from the start. “
X4 should be “your happy place” and a place where people can meet and develop “healthy relationships,” Wade said.
Following an important trend in the fitness industry, X4 has specialized in group rather than individual training.
“X4 is community built and we believe one of the best ways to invest in that community is to work together,” said Wade.
The members and coaches are there to encourage one another, he said.
Wade hopes more people are going to the gym amid the apparent decline in the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’re optimistic that when things open up, people will go back to the gym,” he said. “We’re already seeing people starting to return to the gym.”
The facility has followed all available information from the CDC, as well as state and local health officials, about the COVID-19 safety procedures they should be following, Wade said.
At the facility, coaches or participants no longer have to wear masks, Wade said, citing the state mask mandate being lifted.
However, he said they take extra precautions, such as letting staff spend countless hours thoroughly cleaning the entire facility on a regular basis.
In addition, members must use disinfectant wipes between stations to clean all equipment used during exercise.
COVID-19 has certainly had a huge impact on the fitness industry, with gym memberships stagnating across the country, Wade said.
The sector has “suffered a massive blow in the past 18 months,” he said.
It is difficult to predict the reality after COVID, said Wade.
“Last summer, many studies showed a reluctance to get back to the gym quickly, but we’re still learning what the national trends are as we come out on the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said.
Fitness facilities were doing extremely well before the pandemic, Wade said.
“We hope to see the same energy and enthusiasm for fitness soon,” he said.
Wae said he was “very” encouraged “by the response X4 has received since it opened.
“We got a lot of support from Lane Parke and the other tenants at the mall,” he said.
The Mountain Brook X4 location is part of a network of X4 Fitness stand-alone and affiliated gyms, Wade said.