In 2010, Tiffany Rothe owned a gym and worked as a fitness trainer in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, where travelers often took her classes on vacation. Many of them were intrigued by her bubbly personality and upbeat exercises and asked if the workouts could be accessed remotely. Rothe took the requests to heart and began uploading courses to YouTube over the next decade. With their mix of cardio, dance, martial arts and yoga movements, it garnered more than 920,000 subscribers. Now based in Austin, she decided to move her content from recorded video to livestream sessions during the pandemic, where attendees could interact with the instructor and each other. “I went live because I felt that what was missing in the world was a connection,” she says. “It was like having a gym there. [Viewers] had an outlet. I called their names; They felt like a team. ”
Its momentum has only increased since then. This January, the local fitness personality was recognized as one of 132 content creators worldwide with the YouTube Black Voices Fund, which will help her promote racial justice through her unified platform. “Some people are so isolated that they never really have a diverse experience with black people. They may only know what they see on TV, ”she says. “I take it very seriously that, as a black woman, I create and cultivate an experience of health, fitness, love and togetherness that actually closes the void of injustice.” Rothe will use the grant to expand their global subscriber base, purchase production equipment and develop their YouTube talk show Tiffany Talks. Follow her on youtube.com/tiffanyrotheworkouts.