David Durante is a highly accomplished gymnast and dedicated coach, co-owner of Power Monkey Fitness, and a former member of the 2008 U.S. Olympic gymnastics team. His journey in gymnastics began at Stanford University, where he became an NCAA All-American. Over the years, he claimed multiple U.S. national titles and represented the country in two World Championships. Now based in Oregon, Dave is passionate about teaching handstands and skill development, advocating consistent training and mobility work. His role as an educator at Power Monkey Camp allows him to share his expertise with athletes of all levels, from beginners to elite competitors. Known for his love of gymnastics, Durante inspires others to embrace fitness with enthusiasm and consistency, ensuring they find joy in their fitness journeys.
Listen to this episode of The MOVEMENT Movement with David Durante about the mental challenges, pressure, competition, and responsibility athletes face.
Here are some of the beneficial topics covered on this week’s show:
– How gymnastics training requires adaptability and resilience in diverse conditions.
– Why financial literacy should be a priority for young athletes who receive significant payments from NIL deals.
– How engaging in various training activities like gymnastics, weightlifting, running, and yoga improves movement skills.
– How you can improve your fitness levels and learn from experts by attending Power Monkey Camp.
– How competitive strength challenges can expand gymnastics programs at colleges by attracting more participants.
Connect with David:
Guest Contact Info
Instagram
@powermonkeyfitness
@powermonkeycamp
Facebook
facebook.com/PowerMonkeyFitness
facebook.com/PowerMonkeyCamp
Links Mentioned:
powermonkeyfitness.com
Connect with Steven:
Website
Twitter
@XeroShoes
Instagram
@xeroshoes
Facebook
facebook.com/xeroshoes
Episode Transcript
Steven Sashen:
If you’re trying to get fit, a lot of people will put together a home gym, do something, find an actual gym to use. But maybe you need a kickstart. Maybe you need to go away and really commit. I don’t mean forever. I mean just have a little bit of time. And that’ll give you something you can use for the rest of your life, just that intent to do something. Well, we’re going to find out more about that, that’s an English sentence, on today’s episode of The MOVEMENT Movement, the podcast for people who want to know the truth about what it takes to have a happy, healthy, strong body, starting feet first, those things at the end of your legs that are your foundation. And we break down the propaganda, the mythology, sometimes just the flat out lies you’ve been told about what it takes to run, or walk, or hike, or do yoga, or CrossFit, or whatever it is that you want to do, and to do that effectively, and efficiently, and enjoyably.
And I’m highlighting enjoyably, because if you’re not having a good time, you’re not going to keep doing it anyway. So I’m Steven Sashen, co-founder of xeroshoes.com, and the host of the MOVEMENT Movement podcast. And we call it that, because we, that involves all of us, are creating a movement about natural movement, letting your body do what it’s made to do, not getting in the way with things that will actually cause problems. So the way that you are involved is really simple. Spread the word. Share, like, give us a thumbs up, give us a review, five stars, whatever. We can do that. Tell people about this.
In short, if you want to be part of the tribe, just subscribe. And if you want to find out more, go to www.jointhemovementmovement.com. There’s nothing you need to do to join. Just that’s where you’ll find previous episodes. All the other places, you can find us on social media. And if you want to find a different place to get the podcast, you’ll find other places there as well. Okay, let’s get started. David, tell people who the hell you are and what you’re doing here.
David Durante:
Thanks for having me on, Steven. Well, my name is Dave Durante. I was a former gymnast. Back in the day I grew up in New Jersey. I was fortunate enough to get a scholarship out to Stanford University, competed for Stanford after I graduated. I became part of Team USA. I was part of Team USA for six years. During that time I was on a few world championship teams. I was national champion a few times, and then was part of the team that went to Beijing in 2008 for the Olympic Games. After the Olympics, moved back to Stanford, and helped coach a team to a national championship in 2009.
And right around that time, I was ending my competitive career, wanted to figure out what I wanted to do next, and stumbled into the CrossFit space as someone that wanted to educate people on how to move better, and not just move faster. And so I started our current company, Power Monkey Fitness, with my partner who’s a stunt man, former gymnast, and now stunt man. And we’ve been doing educational seminars and such, which maybe we’ll get into around what we do now with Power Monkey. But essentially, we’re fitness educators now around our little niche sports, trying to help people move better and move for longer with good technique at top of mind.
Steven Sashen:
So it’s too bad that you didn’t have a successful athletic career. That’s really a shame. I don’t know. Someone must have told you. So I predate you by a long time. And sadly, my gymnastics era, there was no post collegiate opportunities, and I was two years in the wrong direction. So I was like, “Oh, well.” And I’m certainly not going to my All American stuff to everything.
David Durante:
No, I did. I heard that you had… That’s awesome. I actually wanted to chat with you about it. I don’t get to talk to many people that also had a collegiate gymnastics career. So I’m curious about yours a little bit, if you wouldn’t mind.
Steven Sashen:
Well, I’m going to skip ahead and I’m going to show you something that for those people who are only listening, they won’t see it, but I’ll show you this.
David Durante:
That’s a great tuck.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, it was a standing back flip, for people who didn’t see. That was on my 61st birthday, so not bad. Now I’m going to tell you something funny about this. I hadn’t done a standing back in about four or five years. And the last time I did one before that one that I just showed you, I only made it hands and knees. And I didn’t know why it was the first time I ever missed one. And I’d forgotten I had abdominal surgery three days earlier, so oops. But the interesting thing about doing that one now, when I set it, I know where I am, and then I literally black out until I see my feet heading towards the ground. It’s the weirdest experience in the world. It’s like time is gone, blackout. And then I called one of my old high school gymnast best friends, and he said, “How are your hands feeling?” I went, “I know.” I did like 15. My hands were on fire.
David Durante:
Yeah, it’s so bizarre. It’s so bizarre. You see stars again, all these little things, because your mind continues to think, “I can do this. My body understands the pattern,” but the body doesn’t catch up the way that it used to.
Steven Sashen:
No, it just isn’t doing the things that it used to do. But I had probably done, and this is going to sound hyperbolic, but I did some street performing. So I was doing 20, 30 standing backs a day then.
David Durante:
Sure.
Steven Sashen:
Then when I was just training, I was doing a hundred a day, just for the fun of it. And so I’ve probably done 20,000 of them in my career. And so yeah, the muscle memory is all there. Just the circulation gets all messed up.
David Durante:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Steven Sashen:
In a freaky, freaky way. So let’s dive into that for the fun of it. I’m going to give you a best and worst. What was the best thing about being at that level, and competing, and heading to the Olympics, and World Championships and all the rest? I’ll do three things. Best, worst, most surprising.
David Durante:
Yeah, sure. So best has always been the team component. I think everyone considers in things of gymnastics as an individual sport. I have never thought of gymnastics as an individual sport. I grew up in a boys program in New Jersey that emphasized and encouraged it being a team component. We were really lucky that we had a really big boys program, which is rare. So I grew up always wanting to say, “Okay, my performance contributes to a bigger goal.” And so going on to compete for Stanford and going on to compete for USA, it was always, “What can I do to contribute to the betterment of the team?”
And so what I miss the most, and what I get the most enjoyment out of thinking back to my memories of the sport, is what we collectively did as a team, and what the team did in Beijing, and what our collegiate teams did, and the moments where we surpass people’s expectations of what we are anticipated to do. And for me, the team aspect is absolutely the most important part of what I look back fondly around the sport. The most challenging part, this might need a podcast in and of itself, but the mental side of the sport was something that didn’t come easy for me. And it was something that I-
Steven Sashen:
Well, how are you thinking of the mental side?
David Durante:
Yeah, so around competing and performing the way that you practice. For years, I always had this separation, because I loved training. I was more of someone that was more of a gym rat. I loved being in the gym. I loved taking turns, and being in there first, and leaving last, and doing all the work that other people weren’t willing to do, because I wasn’t the most talented guy in the world. So I just appreciated the hard work that went into incrementally catching up on the others that were a little bit more talented. But then taking that, and transferring what you’re doing well in a training session, and then establishing that in a competitive setting was always really challenging for me.
And basically when the lights were turned on, I needed to learn how to perform what I knew that I could do. It didn’t come easily for me. And in fact, for years, I had trouble with this idea that if I didn’t perform my best, that I was letting everyone down. And this idea of everyone, your parents, your family, your coaches, your teammates are all on you. And if you don’t perform, you’re letting people down. And that’s not necessarily the case, but it’s the way that I went into competitions. And it was a big detriment to me being able to perform at the level that I knew I was capable of.
And so it took years and years for me to be able to understand how to mentally put myself in a place where I could treat a competition the way I did a training session. And I will tell you that it’s not easy. It’s not even easy to verbalize how to do it, because I think everyone’s journey towards finding that is slightly different in terms of what works for them. But it took for my last coach to help me figure that out for myself.
Steven Sashen:
Well, this is a small subset of this, but it might make sense. So once I got back into sprinting, it took me years to stay in my lane. It took me years not to care if there was someone right behind my shoulder or right in front of my shoulder. And in a similar vein, the thing that’s interesting about what you’re saying, especially starting with, if you think about it, the idea of gymnastics as a team sport is, you know as well as anyone else that there’s no one you’ve ever competed against in the world. Well, let me say it differently.
Anyone you’ve ever competed with or against, if they have six good routines, it’s a fluke. And even with that, it’s still hard, because when it’s not happening for you, it’s like, son of a bitch. And I don’t know about you, but part of that is what kept me going, is that reinforcement thing. And I joke again with sprinting. I finish a race and somebody says, “How’d you do?” And my answer is, “Can I give you the excuse? Or do you just want the number?” And it’s the same thing. The best floor routine I ever did, I took one small step, and that’s all I fucking remember.
David Durante:
Yeah. Sure. Absolutely. But gymnastics is about working toward perfection, but never achieving it, right?
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
David Durante:
And I think the best gymnasts in the world are the ones that are able to improvise the best, because there’s always going to be something that’s a little different about the apparatus, about the environment, about the temperature. These are things that go into performing that are slightly different everywhere you go around the world. And the gymnasts that are able to minimize those distractions or slight changes are the ones that normally end up at the top.
Steven Sashen:
And the irony with that is, the only way you get good at that is by doing it wrong over, and over, and over, and having to deal with it. So that goes back to what you’re doing just in training and the enjoyment of training. And of course this is something that non-gymnasts don’t understand, is if you watch a bunch of gymnasts practicing, training, you’ll see the craziest, most freaky wipe outs in the world. And then you’ll see everyone else in that gym laughing hysterically.
David Durante:
I know.
Steven Sashen:
It’s like, “That guy nearly broke his neck.” It’s like, “I know. Wasn’t that a riot?”
David Durante:
Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
David Durante:
I don’t know if we’re just crazy, the way that we think, or if we know if the person is okay or not. You always take a moment.
Steven Sashen:
Exactly.
David Durante:
Are they okay? And then the laughter starts, as soon as you know that they’re okay.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. Well, this is another thing you can spot a wipe out from way before it happens. This is one of those things when I would be watching gymnastics with my then girlfriend, and someone’s just about to take off and I go, “Oh, shit.” And she’s like, “What?” And then a split second later, it’s a massive wipe out, and you can spot it. So some of that is just, you’re anticipating, because you see it coming.
David Durante:
Absolutely.
Steven Sashen:
And it’s a joke with a punchline, fundamentally, but that’s the thing that people just do not understand at all.
David Durante:
Absolutely.
Steven Sashen:
And I don’t know if you went through one, and we will get back to taking a fitness vacation. I don’t know if you went through this, but certainly towards the end of high school, the sense of indestructibility and knowing what you can do with your body that no one else knows how to do, led everyone that I know to do really, really stupid shit. So my version was, we’d be driving on the highway at a hundred miles an hour, climb out one window, go across the roof, climb in another window. You can grab both sides of the car at the same time. Where’s the problem? It just seems so obvious.
David Durante:
I love it. Those stories, only gymnasts have those stories. We are daredevils in the most natural sense. We just take on risks. Most people have no idea. And we at least have a platform and an arena where we can actually show off those moves.
Steven Sashen:
Well, and that’s the thing that people don’t understand is, it changed during your era, and P.S., I used to watch you all the time. It changed during your era where they stopped giving points for, how close did you come to dying?
David Durante:
Was that the originality part of the ROVs?
Steven Sashen:
Literally, it was the risk part.
David Durante:
Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
Here, I’ll speak in code and then I’ll decipher. I was doing running 1 and 3s in 1979 on a wrestling mat. The year that I was doing that, three guys got paralyzed. And I said to my coach years later, “Why didn’t you tell me about that?” He goes, “Well, A, it would’ve freaked you out. And B, I knew you could do it.” My coach was like five time national, three time world tumbling champion, and one of the greatest gymnasts and gymnastics coaches ever. And I’d say to him things like, “Who else did you ever teach this move to?” And he went, “Nobody else. That’s the guy who could do it.” But yeah, the risk part was, you got bonus points for like, “Oh, shit.” A very, very stupid thing. So your partner is a stuntman. And this is funny, because when I was hanging out with stunt guys, we were asked to do something, and they’d map it out with a spreadsheet. And the gymnasts were like, “Let’s go do that.”
David Durante:
Yeah. Yeah.
Mindset.
David Durante:
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. He’s loving that world now. He’s a little older. He’s not the guy falling down the steps, or driving the crazy cars on fire anymore these days. He’s more on the coordination side, but it’s cool to hear, “What are you working on this week? What movie? What TV show?” He’s always doing something interesting.
Steven Sashen:
Well, and the sad part, we have one of our dear friends and someone who we help a lot is Jessie Graff, who in addition to being a Nina Warrior, Jesse’s a stunt person. And the sad thing is, she’s legally not allowed to talk about most of what she’s done, so the actors can pretend that they were doing it.
David Durante:
I know. You know what? I don’t think that stunt people get nearly enough recognition. There’s still no Oscar award for stunts, which is absurd. I watched on the plane out here, I’m in Tennessee right now. I just flew out yesterday. I watched some of that Fall Guy movie that just came out, that new Ryan Gosling movie. And that’s supposed to be showing off stunt people a little bit more, but they definitely need to get more love. What they do is absolutely insane.
Steven Sashen:
Keanu Reeves did a really great thing in an interview. Someone said, you do your own stunts? He said, I do my own action. Stuntmen do the stunts.
David Durante:
Yeah. Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
Which was very, very kind of him to say. So many people in Hollywood don’t want to admit the truth, like something like that, or yeah, I took steroids. I’m not saying any of those guys who are in their sixties who look like they’re ready to go to a bodybuilding competition have ever done anything performance enhancing. Clearly, it’s just chicken, and rice, and vegetables, and two-a-day workouts. What else could it possibly be?
David Durante:
Anybody can do it.
Steven Sashen:
That’s right. Just get the right chicken. So we had a best and worst. Do we have a surprising?
David Durante:
Surprising, let’s see. Probably a lot of surprising. Surprising now that I’m still able to do things at my age that I didn’t think I would be able to. And I think it’s kind of the path that I’ve taken to make fitness and movement such an important part of my life, that I’m still able to do things that most people who retire from the sport 16 years ago are not able to do. So surprising in the sense that I’m happy that I’m still able to do planches, and still do a underpress to handstands, and ring handstands. So for me, I’m surprised that my body is still capable of doing some of the things that I used to compete.
Steven Sashen:
I have shown my standing back flip to a number of former Olympians, some a little bit older than you, Steve McLean for example. And anytime I do, if they haven’t done what you’ve done, which is stay with it at a decent level, their response is always the same, which is, “Bite me, man.” Get out there and do it. It’s no big deal. I have the same conversation with runners or sprinters. They go, “Well, I used to sprint, but I haven’t done that for a while.” It’s like, master track and field. Just get back out there. Just go do it. What’s a big deal?
But it is an interesting point. If you really, not even don’t stop, but if you have an athletic mindset, that’s going to keep you going for a while. I’m going to do a not humblebrag along with a horrible admission. I used to have two claims to fame. One, that I’d never worn Crocs. And the other is I’d never played pickleball. And sadly, I broke the ladder this past weekend. I was at a friend’s birthday party, and everyone was playing and said, “Come out and play.” I said “All right. Whatever.” And I got a very sweet compliment from one of the coaches. He says, “Wait, let me see if I got this straight. That was the first time you’ve ever played pickleball?” I said, “I haven’t even touched a racket in 30 years.” He went, “Jesus, you should be doing this professionally.” That’s not going to happen. Jumbo ping pong? Not my thing.
David Durante:
Oh, man. We love it here. At our Power Monkey Camp, it’s become one of the hits of the off times. It becomes very competitive. We are just very competitive in everything that we do. And-
Steven Sashen:
You think?
David Durante:
Yeah. Yeah, it’s become a fun after training activity for a lot of people here.
Steven Sashen:
It is fun, but you nailed it though. It was fun, but everyone else is competitive. It’s like, oh, yeah. That’s not going to work. There’s no bonus points, no prize money, no sponsorship. I actually did watch a very funny video last night of a professional game where one of the players just got really mad, because the opposing team kept lobbing towards her, which doesn’t sound like a big deal, but what that meant was, the sun was in her eyes and she kept whiffing and missing the ball. And then she got so mad. She’s like, “You can’t keep doing that.” It’s like, this is a competition.
David Durante:
That’s part of the game.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, exactly.
David Durante:
It’s part the game. Absolutely.
Steven Sashen:
If you don’t like it, wait until you’re on this side of the court, and you’ll do it to me. What’s the big deal? All right. That was a trip down various lanes. Actually, wait, I’ve got one more for you.
David Durante:
Sure.
Steven Sashen:
It’s related to this. When I was at the Atlanta Olympics as a spectator, not a performer, I went to every sport that I knew nothing about, which was really fun. And my favorite thing that I went to was wrestling. And it was my favorite, because it was a very small venue that you were right up against the mats. The judges were right in front of you, and there’s no space between you and the wrestlers, which is great. And everybody in the audience was either a current, former or family member of a wrestler.
So it was this incredible familial thing no matter where you were from. They all knew each other. It was a very small world. And in fact, the best part was this one Polish wrestler who was having just a great competition. And so everyone became Polish. Whenever he was there, people were freaking out. No matter where they were from, no matter who, if their own kid was up against that guy, they were still all Pole. So it was great. What was the international feeling like for you? Because that’s varied over the years.
David Durante:
The international feeling at the Olympics?
Steven Sashen:
Just between people.
David Durante:
Or just in general?
Steven Sashen:
Both, actually.
David Durante:
So I was fortunate enough to compete 17 times for USA during the course of my USA career. So I traveled all over the place, was on two Pan American Games teams, a few world championships, competed in Ukraine a bunch of times, Paris, all over the place. So we got a sense of what the atmosphere was like in a variety of different places. Some places where gymnastics is the national sport, or something close to it. Competing in Japan where gymnastics is a highlighted sport, is very different than competing in Dominican Republic, where it’s just another sport.
Steven Sashen:
Or let’s be honest, in America.
David Durante:
Exactly, exactly. But I will say that most places, the Americans were not the favorite people in the world when we stepped on the court, the mats. And it was funny. I remember one Pan American Games, we were down in Brazil, we were in Rio, and the entire crowd was against us. So essentially, they wanted anyone to win or to hit a routine outside of an American. So there were 19,000 people in the stands, and I had never heard so many cheers for a mistake. So if we had a bent knee, or if we had a big step, or God forbid, a fall, they were going crazy. In fact, they would cheer more for an American fall or a mistake, than they would even for Brazilian hit routine.
So for us, that was crazy. And I remember our coach. And I was training, one of my Stanford coaches at the time, who was preparing us for these. “Hey, when you go compete in South America, you’ve got to be prepared for anything.” So I’m doing a pommel horse routine and getting ready. And I just see a shoe come by my head, and whizz by my ear. And I come down. I was like, “What was that?” He had thrown a shoe at me. I was like, “Why are you throwing a shoe at me?” He’s like, “Hey, you never know what’s going to happen down there. They might be throwing shoes.” I was like, “Nobody’s going to throw a shoe at me while I’m competing.” He’s like, “Hey, we’re preparing for anything. You never know.” And I didn’t get a shoe thrown at me, but the atmosphere was quite hostile.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. I can’t even imagine the feeling of that one. All right. One last one that I just thought of. This is kind of a commercial for gymnastics, since it isn’t hugely watched or as popular here as it is in other places. The best part about watching the Olympics or even World Championships, but especially the Olympics, is when people are just competing on individual events, when you’re getting the specialists who you almost never see. And those guys, for people who don’t know, if you ever get to go to the Olympics, and I highly encourage it, that’s the part you want to watch, because it’s guys who only focus on one or two things. They’re incredibly good, and they know that for them to win an individual medal, they’ve got to throw everything they’ve got. And they will be doing shit that nobody else would even think of doing, because it’s so risky, or so God knows what. And you see some of the most amazing things a human being has ever done.
David Durante:
Absolutely. I want to point out a couple of things there that I think are interesting. One, hopefully people watch gymnastics in Paris over the summer, and are still a little bit engaged from the amazingness that happened in Paris, especially on the men’s gymnastics side because the men did an incredible job, first medal in 16 years. And what came of it was an amazing story. Stephen Nedoroscik, pommel horse specialist. We’re talking about specialists. A pommel horse guy, as he’s known to the masses. And now he’s on Dancing with the Stars, and getting all the accolades and recognition that he deserves, which is awesome to see.
But I encourage exactly what you’re saying, because a lot of times in my world where we’re seeing people now being interested in handstands, and ring work, and bar work for the first time, they’re starting to work on very basic gymnastics movements, working on pullovers maybe, or some form of a kip. And in the gymnastics world, these are very low level movements, but still challenging for people as they’re learning, and especially later in life. And we’re creating this ability to create a form of comparison, which has always been lacking in the gymnastics world, where a back flip, a double back and a triple back were all the same. They were all equally difficult. Crazy, amazing. I’m in awe. I have no idea how more difficult a double is from a triple, so it all gets lost on someone.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
David Durante:
Now we’re able to create a little bit of a form of comparison, where I tried to get up on rings, I tried to do a muscle up and I can’t do it. And now I’m seeing someone do an iron cross. I have a form of comparison and a reference point, which is critical. But I would highly encourage, there were a few routines that really stood out to me at the Olympic Games that I would encourage people to go back and look. And there were two Chinese gymnasts, one that was on parallel bars that won the gold medal on parallel bars. His parallel bar routine is so far ahead of all of the other parallel bar routines, that it’s in a league of its own, kind of like a Simone Biles of the parallel bar world, where he’s doing a routine that shouldn’t really be possible, and executing it at a level that shouldn’t be possible.
So I would highly recommend going to watch that specific gold medal winning routine. It’s special. It’s something that stands out above the rest. And then additionally, the Chinese gymnast that won rings, his ring routine is also just powerful in terms of what he’s doing, the level, the expertise, the precision.
Steven Sashen:
It’s horrible, because he makes it look so easy, and he’s doing stuff that literally no one else even thought you could do.
David Durante:
It’s incredible. He looks like he’s in… We have an apparatus that we built within Power Monkey. It’s called a Ring Thing, which most former gymnasts would call it a dream machine, just a 50/50 device that we use as a training tool to be able to understand positions, where it takes away 50% of your body weight.
Steven Sashen:
Okay. Let me describe it, because it’s so much fun. It’s my favorite thing to play on. So basically, people can imagine the still rings. And instead of having the rings… Well, you’ve got the rings still, but what you set up is a pulley. So the pulley goes to your waist and basically your hands, so that you’re not really using rings, you’re using the other end of this pulley. And so what it does, and you can make it take over half your weight or even more. So basically, you can do all these strength moves that you can’t really do yet. So it’s a training device at best. At worst it’s like, “This is so much fun. I don’t care if I ever do this for real, because holy crap, now I can do it fake. And that’s good enough for me for now.”
David Durante:
Yeah, exactly.
Steven Sashen:
So yeah. If you can ever find one of these, you’ve got to go-
David Durante:
Yeah, we sell them. Power Monkey, we make-
Steven Sashen:
Oh, sweet.
David Durante:
Yeah, we make them. We call it the Ring Thing. And we’ve been selling it for over a decade now. It was actually the first piece of equipment that me and my partner made when we were living in New York to help the CrossFit world out, to help understand how to do strict movements correctly. And now we have them at the Olympic Training Center. We have them at all the collegiate universities. We have them everywhere. And they’re a pretty good training tool.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. Now that I know that, you know as soon as we’re done, I’m going to buy one, because I’ve got a space. We have a deck, and underneath the deck there’s just enough room. I’ve got a couple of sets of rings, but now I’m going to replace one of those.
David Durante:
Oh, perfect. Yeah. It’ll be a fun little thing to play around with. But one thing that’s interesting, and so just a way for people who are the casual observer to the gymnastics world, something to look out for, there’s something called a false grip in the gymnastics world when you’re on rings. And it’s basically creating a crease at your wrist, where you’re setting the ring in that crease between your forearm and the palm of your hand instead of in the mid-point of your palm. And you know this already, but just to explain to your viewers and listeners. And that distance change is only a few inches in terms of where the ring sits, but it creates a significant mechanical advantage. So most gymnasts will do what’s called a false grip, to be able to hold those crazy difficult positions for the full two seconds that’s required. Now in the gymnastics world, a false grip is a deduction. So you get points taken off for doing what almost everyone does.
The top of the top, and especially in the case of this Chinese gymnast, what they’re doing at the Olympics now is opening the palm of their hand up to show the judges that there’s no false grip, and that their sitting the ring in the palm of the hand. And the Chinese gymnast does this when he’s inverted, in his inverted cross. And it’s one of the most beautiful and bad-ass things you’ll ever see. So when you’re watching, don’t just be in awe, look for these little nuance things, to be able to separate yourself and say, okay, this is the guy that stands out.
Steven Sashen:
Well, and even better, look for the guys who are even cheating that, where they’re basically doing a false grip. So when their arm is fully outstretched, parallel to the ground, the ring is basically still on their wrist instead of on their hand. They open their hand, but the ring is on their wrist and they’re hoping no one’s going to notice, which is of course ridiculous. But the first time I saw that I went, “Oh, well played.” That’s good. So okay, let’s get back to where we started this whole thing. And by the way, this what happens to me almost every time I talk to anybody is, we know where we’re going to start, or we think we know where we’re going to start. We never get there. Talk to me about where you are right now and what you’re doing.
David Durante:
Sure. So I’m out in the woods of Tennessee, middle of nowhere. The town is called Crossville. We have been running an adult fitness camp for the last 11 plus years. Power Monkey is the name of my company. And we run Power Monkey Camp. And this facility is owned by two Olympic gymnasts who you may know. They’re still very relevant in the sport. John Macready was on the ’96 team. You were there in the stands, watching John. And then John Roethlisberger, who was on three Olympic Games, ’96 being one of them, ’92, and then 2000 was his last. And the two Johns own this facility, and run it as a kid’s gymnastics camp in the summers.
And we take over with Power Monkey in the fall and the spring, and we turn it into an adult fitness camp. And so we bring in a hundred participants from around the world. We have a staff of about 50 to 70, depending on the camp, who are all experts in a variety of different spaces, from gymnastics, to weightlifting, to jump rope training, to running, to kettle bells, to rowing. We do yoga in the mornings, we do contrast therapy, we do metabolic testing, we do nutrition seminars and mental training seminars. We do programming seminars, we do adaptive training, we do sleep seminars.
It’s pretty wide-ranging in terms of the expertise that we bring to people that are just gym owners, or coaches, or just athlete enthusiasts. And we give them an opportunity to not only learn from the great minds within the space, but also in an environment that you normally don’t get a chance to do anymore. And that’s basically a camp. And if you’ve ever gone to a kid’s camp when you were growing up, and it’s a fond memory, we’re able to recreate that as an adult. You sleep in cabins. We have a chef here that does amazing meals for us all week. You train during the day, and then we have beers and s’mores at a campfire at night. We get to hang out. We have a beautiful lake, 150 acre campus, 50,000 square foot of gym space across four gyms. It’s really, really a special environment.
Steven Sashen:
So what kind of people are typically showing up?
David Durante:
It’s very wide-ranging. We’ve had about 40 different countries represented over the years. We have kids from 16, is our youngest allowable camper. If they come with a chaperone before 18, they can come at 16. And we’ve had people come all the way up to mid-eighties that participate. We’ve had people that have won the CrossFit games, and Fabian Hambüchen is part of our team now, is going to be coming to do a demo. So we have Olympic champions that are here, but it’s really meant for the beginner and intermediate level athlete, that wants to just learn how to move better, and how to maybe teach things a little bit better if they’re a coach.
And so I think sometimes people will see our promotional materials, and get intimidated when they see some of the high level athletes doing things, but it’s really not meant for them. Those are guests or some of your coaches. It really is meant for the everyday athlete that’s just looking to get a little bit better for longevity purposes.
Steven Sashen:
So how long do people come for?
David Durante:
It’s a full week long. So we got here last night. Our coaches will get here on Saturday, which is in a couple of days. Campers arrive on a Sunday, and it’s a full week long, and they leave on the following Saturday.
Steven Sashen:
How many people typically?
David Durante:
Participants, we cap it at a hundred. We normally have between 180 and 100 participants. It’s normally about 150 people total per camp.
Steven Sashen:
That’s a great number to have for a lot of reasons. Obviously you have enough coaches, people are still getting all the personal attention they need, but that community is a really big deal. And I imagine just for everyone, seeing people at different levels is very helpful as well. The people who are very new to the whole idea, feeling whatever encouragement. If it was a smaller group, and you were a real beginner, and there’s a bunch of people who are a couple steps ahead of you, it would be really depressing. But you’ve got enough people that that gets mitigated. And I imagine the people who are more advanced have the opportunity to start mentoring those other people as well.
David Durante:
Without a doubt. We set it up as a great informational week, and that’s what my thought process was. 11 years ago when we did our first one, let’s try to get great experts into a space and see if we can get an awesome informational week. And it’s turned into an experience. It’s way more than what you learn in the stations. It’s the people you meet, the bonds that you create. Creating a situation where you can get away from your cell phones, and all the craziness that’s going on in the digital world, and be present with someone in person. We don’t have enough opportunities for things like that these days. And camp has allowed for it. And I absolutely adore it.
I have two little baby girls, and I always say that camp is my third kid. And my Power Monkey kid is 11 years old right now. And I’m just so fortunate and grateful to see what it’s turned into. And the campers, I feel the same way. We have campers that have come back five, six, 10. We have one camper that’s come back 15 times. And it’s not because the information drastically changes. It’s because she feels at home here. She feels like the campers and the coaches are part of her family in the same way that we do. So for us, camp has become so much more than the information. It really is a special experience.
Steven Sashen:
I’ve said this thing for a long time. I said it’s important to get comfortable being upside down, because it’s just one of those things, when you have that in your repertoire, it just changes way you think about almost anything. And it also feels really good too. There’s that. So that was a prelude in some weird way for if somebody has never… I’m trying to think of how to ask this even. If someone doesn’t think of themselves as particularly coordinated, or maybe all they’ve ever done is gone for a run, or gone for a swim or something, but they don’t think that even just the idea of moving better, now that we’ve been talking to gymnastics for half an hour, seems a little intimidating. If somebody comes in with no experience whatsoever, what are the kind of things they’re learning over that week? What do they walk away with?
David Durante:
It’s pretty wide-ranging. So gymnastics is just three of the stations. So there is a ring station, a bar station and a handstand station. I teach the handstand station. And we always have jabs at each other, at coaches, saying that each of our stations are the best, and that’s the one that you’re going to do. But I really feel like gymnastics is such a great foundation for anything else that you want to go on to do. And I think most gymnasts will feel that way. In fact, USA Gymnastics slogan of “Begin here, go anywhere,” is something that resonates really well with me. Because I don’t hope that anyone just goes to the Olympic Games. That shouldn’t be the intention for stepping into a gymnastics gym for the first time. It should be, how can I use this as a foundation for whatever it is I want to go on to do physically?
And so I’m always promoting body awareness, and what we call creation of body shapes as a good foundation. It should be a main takeaway of what camp should be for you. Can I get my body in the shape that I need for future skill development, or how I’m going to apply it? So one of the main things that I want people to get away from this week is, okay, do I have a strong core? Or what’s limiting my core? Because I think creating good shapes is based around two things. One, a strong core, and two, a more mobile body. So we do a lot of things around saying, “What are your limitations, mobility wise? What does your core engagement look like? Everything that encompasses your midline, not just your beach muscles, not just your abs and your hip flexors and what you can see in the mirror, but rotation and lateral work, obliques as well as posterior chain. Do I have a strong core? Do I have a mobile body? Can I create good shapes?” And then go ahead and apply it to whatever these other stations you want to go ahead and do.
Steven Sashen:
I imagine you hear from people after they’ve left camp, and the things that they’re then doing that maybe they hadn’t done before or didn’t think they could do before. What are some of those stories?
David Durante:
Oh, it’s endless. It’s really endless. I always get the handstand stories, because that’s the station that I teach. So I got my first handstand hold. I was able to hold it for a minute for the first time, or I was able to walk across a floor for the first time, or I got my first press to handstand. And so we get endless stories of people succeeding incrementally in all of the different spaces. “I PR’d my snatch, or my overhead squat or whatever. I am trying to do my marathon for the first time, and I’m using the running techniques that you guys taught me,” and the pacing, and the breathing techniques that come along with what we do at our running station. And so we’ve had so many success stories that it’s really hard to pinpoint one that’s worth highlighting, but really, every one of our stations has led to someone being able to achieve something a little bit better, because of the expertise here.
Steven Sashen:
I just realized that the first time I walked into a CrossFit box, maybe just out of sheer curiosity, I don’t remember why. Their whole pitch was, “We’re going to make you a better athlete.” And I was saying, “I’m not trying to be a better athlete. I’m a sprinter. I’m trying to get that much faster. I just need tenths of a second, and that’ll change my life.” They said, “No, we’re going to make you a better at.” “I don’t think you understand. I don’t need that.” But the irony is that I would argue that what you’re doing is more foundational and valuable in terms of creating a better athlete, at whatever level you think that means for you than walking into a CrossFit box, where they’re throwing you into situations that most people aren’t ready for, in my opinion.
David Durante:
Yeah. Yeah, and I think that’s one of the things that we’re trying to alleviate within the CrossFit space, because one, there’s so many CrossFit gyms. And some of them are doing things really well, and others are doing things very poorly. And I think that that’s the crapshoot of the gym that you walk into. And also, CrossFit is meant to become fairly good at a lot of things. You’re looking to become an expert in one vertical, become a sprinter, to become incrementally better in that particular space. CrossFit isn’t really meant for that.
CrossFit is, can I lift a lot of weight? Can I become good on my hands, and do gymnastics work? And can I become an athlete that has an engine for days, and become moderately good across the board so that I can attack any type of physical environment relatively well? But again, it comes down to whose coaching you, how they’re approaching things, and you never know what you’re going to get. And so we’ve always been like, “Hey, this is amazing that millions of people around the world are now interested in our little niche sports.” Instead of saying, “Hey, you’re doing it poorly,” let’s figure out a way to help.
So we’ve always looked at it as an opportunity to say, “Hey, we want to get you guys better so that you become better at CrossFit workout. You can become better, if this is something that you really want to dive more deeply into it.” So CrossFit has been something that I’ve always gravitated towards, because the passion that I have for teaching and showing people what a cool sport gymnastics can be, and also the founder of CrossFit was a gymnast. And I know that he always envisioned gymnastics being a bigger part of people’s physical endeavors. For me, it’s just a way to help build the sport of gymnastics and men’s gymnastics, and teach people that it can be part of your longevity fitness journey. It can be something that you can do much later into life, even though you probably think now that it’s not possible.
Steven Sashen:
It is interesting that were it not for CrossFit, there wouldn’t be as many people interested in muscle-ups. And if it weren’t for when I was between 18 and 20, I did this for a while. Anyway, my first time in New York City, I moved up there for a summer to be a street performer, and would go to Central Park and find a handful of kids who were tumbling. And it was mostly kids from the boroughs, or from Harlem. It was people who were not trained gymnasts, but came out and figured it out. And we would just be doing crazy, crazy stuff in the park. It was really, really fun. And that in many ways evolved over…
My God, that was a long time ago, that was 40 something years ago. That evolved into this whole calisthenics movement as well, which also has done this interesting give and take with gymnastics, where they’re doing some insane stuff. And again, introducing people to movements and activities that you would never think about doing, because you go out to literally your local playground, and you’ve got an entire gym there. And simultaneously, they started doing moves the gymnasts started adopting that have actually made it into the code of… I can’t think right now. My brain is crushed.
David Durante:
Code of points. Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
Points. That was the word I couldn’t find. I don’t know why I couldn’t find the word, points. I got code of. I was so close. But regardless, that’s another thing where, there’s more people doing planches right now. And if people don’t know what a planche is, imagine doing a push-up, and then just lifting your feet off the ground. Easiest way to describe it. So your body’s parallel to the ground supported by your hands, which just seems insane. My God, dude, when I was doing gymnastics at 19, up until ’84, the number of people who could do a planche on rings, you could count them one hand. And now if you can’t do that in high school, you’re nothing. It’s insane how those things have evolved. So it’s kind of funny that there is this crossover, this mainstream specialist crossover, but it hasn’t really, have you seen that it’s brought more people into a gymnastics gym? Or it’s just that it’s more interesting around the more mainstream fitness-y world, or just people’s awareness and consciousness?
David Durante:
Unfortunately, I haven’t seen the effects in terms of boys entering the men’s gymnastics world quite yet. It’s something I always keep an eye on. Fortunately, the good news there is that what happened in Paris has had a positive impact in terms of-
Steven Sashen:
Always the case-
David Durante:
Signing up. It always is I think this particular year, because we’re getting a little bit of an extended push, an extended, Nedoroscik being on TV, the pommel horse guy as he’s known, getting some headlines. Post-Paris has been helpful for signing up of men’s gymnastics. And women’s gymnastics does very well, and there are no shortage of girls wanting to grow up to be the next Simone Biles. But we don’t have as many boys programs that are capable of creating high-level gymnasts. And they take up a lot of gym space. It’s expensive. The coaching is difficult. And so we’re seeing a lot of boys programs go by the wayside. And also, the NCAA side is a conversation in and of itself.
There’s only 12 programs left. If we lose one more, NCAA will probably drop men’s gymnastics altogether, which is such a shame, but I’m trying very hard to use this platform that we have within the functional fitness space to be able to say, “Hey, gymnastics is something that maybe you want to put your kid into. Go to a collegiate meet, go watch Stanford, Oklahoma, Penn State, Michigan, whoever these top teams are. If you’re in that town, go watch them compete, support them, show the NCAA that men’s gymnastics is something that actually can continue to grow.”
Steven Sashen:
It’s interesting. So we support the Olympic artistic swimming team. And one of the things I said to them, we started talking with them right before Covid actually. And in fact, during Covid, I gave them some ideas for making artistic swimming, formerly synchronized swimming, more popular. I said, “You’ve got to make it more accessible in some way. When the women are in the water, no one knows who’s who. You all basically look the same.” There’s not a there there. And it is kind of an odd sport in general. So it’s like, do something to make it so that people just want to hang out with you guys. So I gave them two ideas. I said, “One is, do a synchronized swimming thing, but it’s everybody at home in their own homes, in their bathtubs, and just do something there. Or when you can get out, do routines as you’re going down a slip and slide. And more, find one or two women on the team who just happen to be the ones who they’re the life of the party or whatever it is, where people are going to relate to them, personally.”
And women’s gymnastics has had the great gift of Simone Biles. Because beyond being one of the greatest gymnasts of all time, she has that personality. She was able to take that on. I don’t know how much of that is natural, versus just her willingness to go there. In track and field, it was Usain Bolt. It was Carl Lewis before him, and nothing in between. And men’s gymnastics, it’s funny that the person who’s bringing the most attention to gymnastics is doing the most difficult event you could possibly do, which no one’s going to show up and go, “Hey, I want to do Pommel horse.” And if they do, they’re insane, but good on him for being willing to go there and bring some attention to the sport.
And you always need someone to relate to. My God, look, when I started Xero Shoes, I explicitly didn’t want my face on camera, because I’m thinking, if we’re going to sell the company at some point, I don’t want to be attached to it. And what happened, I’d make a video. It’s like, “Hey, I’m Steven Sashen. Let me show you how to make a pair of sandals.” And then it’s 10 minutes of people looking at my feet, making a pair of sandals, which by the way, still leads to some very interesting phone calls that we get.
David Durante:
I can imagine
Steven Sashen:
“Can we get some more videos of Steven’s feet, please?” So a bunch of that happens, and I’ve only made a fortune doing that. So that’s the thing that gymnastics was lacking. It was Kurt Thomas in the day. It was really Bart. It was Kurt. That was it. So that’s one of the fundamental problems. If you’re not living in a place where wherever you’re living supports the sport in general, then you need a standout personality, even more than a standout performer. And ironically, I’m ranting just because you made me think of this, men’s gymnastics has the other problem that fundamentally every event, you have to be pretty stoic until you stick a landing. And that’s a whole new phenomenon, of celebrating the moment your feet hit the ground. So it’s an attempt to make things a little less robotic, if you will. Not really.
David Durante:
Yeah, I think you’re right. It’s not the easiest thing in the world to be able to show personality and still perform at a high level. But these athletes today are doing the best they can to elevate their personal brands, and showcase their sport in new ways, and be able to cross-perform with calisthenics and with all of these other niche sports that have a bit of a presence. I will say, I just want to mention, because I think it’s worth people understanding that maybe there is a way to help grow the sport. There are some new colleges that have been starting to incorporate men’s and women’s programs. As an example, Simpson College just a couple of years ago, started a men’s and women’s program for the first time, which we’ve been slowly chipping away at these programs.
And NCA ADs have been just saying it’s not a worthwhile budget piece to implement. So they’re just getting rid of it rather than adding. But we’ve been recognizing that there’s certain colleges in the country that are enrollment driven. And enrollment driven colleges are in a place where if we can show, if a gymnastics coach can come on board and say, “We can bring 20 kids to this school that are willing to pay to come to the school, to have an opportunity to do gymnastics,” that means that gymnastics has filled 20 seats, and has brought in tuition of 20 potential students. So this is an incredible new avenue that enrollment driven universities and colleges have been interested to bring on gymnastics programs, because there is the possibility of filling out their student roster that way. And so we’ve been in discussions with some of these schools to do something interesting next year, and to do a little bit of what you’ve been talking about, try to create this form of comparison.
So I’ve encouraged, I’ve tried to put together, it’s still in the very initial stages, but this idea of putting together a strength challenge, where instead of competing and doing pommel horse routines, these athletes against each other, colleges, will do strength challenges, and do handstand holds for time, or do max handstand pushups. Things that the everyday calisthenic athlete or CrossFit athlete are doing in their own gym, so they can see what a gymnast is able to do at the same time. So they can say, “Oh, my God. I can’t believe a gymnast held a handstand that long. I know what I’m trying to do.” And now we’re seeing them do it at a competitive level and actually compete against each other. So this is, again, an initial phase of saying, “Is there a way that we can use these collegiate gymnasts and their competitiveness, in a way that’s a little bit more attractive to someone that’s not understanding what the Code of Points is putting out there.”
Steven Sashen:
I’m going to say something that started out as an economic thought, and into something much more comical. It’s like, I think whoring out gymnastics is a great idea.
David Durante:
Whatever’s going to help grow the sport, I’m into it.
Steven Sashen:
But where the initial thought was, I think that’s a brilliant idea to present this as an economic benefit to people, rather than some moral high ground, whatever, of the importance of athletics or whatever.
David Durante:
Unfortunately, economics dictates everything.
Steven Sashen:
That’s what drives it. Yeah. That’s what drives it, so I think that’s really brilliant. And it’s something that’s somewhat ironic, thinking about, again, like my high school career, if you will. They killed the men’s gymnastics programs in the entire county that I was living in soon after I left, because they hadn’t figured out a way to monetize it. And we were taking up a lot of space, and a lot of time that other sports that have more attention, and would bring in people who are willing to pay to see that, for example. So yeah, it’s always about the cash. Look, even I went to Duke, and I didn’t compete in college. You and I talked about that, but I still worked out with the team. They had a women’s team, and I worked out with them.
And they had a losing football team for my entire four years there, and for many years before and after, but that was still the money driver, or one of the two, basketball obviously being the biggest. But football still drove revenue, even though they had never won a game, practically. So to make gymnastics something that could be a revenue driver, even at a small scale, as long as it’s you cash flow positive, that’s totally brilliant. Good luck with that.
David Durante:
Oh, yeah. Good luck is the only thing that we really have in our favor right now, because…
Steven Sashen:
And I don’t that sarcastically. I mean-
David Durante:
No, I understand.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
David Durante:
It’s very challenging, and in fact you brought up basketball and football. Those are really the only two revenue generating sports in the NCAA at all right now. With NIL part of the equation now, it’s upending everything. I think we’re kind of a wild west right now in terms of what’s happening, athletes being paid as employees. I don’t know if you saw this. This week, something interesting happening. University of Tennessee is starting to add in on their ticket prices for their season tickets for football. I don’t remember the wording of it, but essentially there’s a 10% increase. That’s to pay for talent. So there’s an increase that the fans of the team have to pay, to now pay for the talent, to pay for the NIL contracts for these athletes. So it’s getting put onto the viewers and the fans, because the athletic departments can’t pay what these guys are asking for anymore. So I have no idea what’s going to happen. It’s totally a wild west right now with NIL.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, no. We’ve had some high school kids say, “I want to get 10 grand a year.” It’s like, what?
David Durante:
Yeah. Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
That’s not a thing. I can point you to some Olympians who didn’t get paid 10 grand a year from… So-
David Durante:
Amateurism is officially dead.
Steven Sashen:
Well, obviously good news, bad news about that. It is important to recognize if you are putting in the work. Congratulations, I got a qualification that I’m never going to use, and I probably didn’t even go to most classes. I’m not saying this is true for all college athletes, of course, but there are some who are definitely there on a…
It’s funny, I went back to my 40th college reunion, and was talking to my cognitive psych mentor who I’ve stayed in touch with all these years. And she had a student who was a basketball player, very, very good player, who basically was trying to decide if he was even going to stay for his senior year, because was offered so much money to go to the NBA. And he just was sitting there in class and did nothing, didn’t even lift up his hoodie. And she finally just pulled him aside and said, “What’s up?” And he goes, “Well, I’m just here to get the credit, and I don’t really get it.” And I don’t remember how she said it, but she basically spent an hour just explaining how cool what they were doing in that class was. And he just hadn’t noticed, because he wasn’t paying attention, and it lit him up.
And he stayed for his senior year, went to the NBA, was thinking, “I think when I’m done with this, I’m going to go back and get a master’s degree.” So it also takes the right person on the other end of that equation to engage athletes and have them want to be there, independent of the fact that they’re getting a free ride, or they’re getting a stipend, or whatever their NIL deal is. There’s a guy here at the University of Colorado who’s making $2 million a year already, and that’s just not right.
David Durante:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Colorado is… In Boulder? Is that where you’re at?
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
David Durante:
Yeah. It’s one of the marquee place right now with the Sanders Family, and obviously Dion. It is one of the main plays right now where we’re seeing the numbers. LSU with Livvy Dunne down on the gymnastics side, and some of the other, Arch Manning down in Tennessee, or in Texas. So there’s a few that are just the powerhouses right now, that are able to make seven, in some cases, eight figures, which is crazy to think about. But if it’s allowing these athletes to be able to become financially sound, and it’s something that’s allowable, then you can’t fault them for wanting to pursue those.
Steven Sashen:
No, no, no. And look, let’s be honest, for many of these sports, you’ve got a limited lifetime.
David Durante:
Yeah, it’s a window like this. It’s tiny.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. And the only thing, actually what bugs me about the NIL stuff, and sorry for people who don’t know, it’s Name, Image, Likeness. So that means amateur athletes are getting paid so that their name, image and likeness can’t be used without compensation, or at least their permission. And the thing that makes me anxious about this, is simply that these are people who are, most of them, so young that their ability to understand the limited time window that they have, and what they need to do financially to take advantage of that in a way that they are possibly set for their life. That rarely happens, even when someone gets out of college and is starting playing professionally at 21, 22, we see it all the time. People who just don’t know what to do with all that cash, and then end up broke. This is an opportunity to do something really valuable, that I haven’t seen people really considering that in a thoughtful way, which is just a shame, because if all you’re going to do is blow it on a new Lamborghini, who gives a crap?
David Durante:
Yeah, financial literacy is definitely a component of it all. And I would just say that this conversation is one that’s important to have, but in reality, growing the sport should be the main goal. Giving more opportunities to athletes, so the next generation still has the same opportunities that this current one has, and that we had when we were coming up and competing at the collegiate level, I think that’s really important. So anything that we can do to make sure that those doors are still open, scholarship-wise or non-scholarship-wise, just having the opportunity to continue to compete, I think is important.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, I agree. So backing up to Power Monkey and backing up to people coming to camp, if people want to find out more about doing that… And sorry, you run, we talked about a week-long program. I lost track of, are you doing multiple weeks back to back? Or is it-
David Durante:
Yes.
Steven Sashen:
Got it.
David Durante:
So just to give a quick understanding of the other things that we do. Camp is basically like our Hallmark event. We do two a year, one in the fall, one in the spring. We host other events. So we’re traveling around the world, going to gyms, and doing weekend courses, about 25 to 30 weeks a year otherwise. And then we host a couple of higher end fit vacation retreats in Europe. We’re doing actually one in South Africa for the first time this year.
Steven Sashen:
Oh, wow.
David Durante:
We’re in Crete, Greece. We we’re in Sicily, Italy last year. And so we do the higher end, smaller group type fit vacations as well, plus our digital component. We have an app where we highly recommend people checking out the Power Monkey training app. It’s in the iOS and Android store. And it’s a great way if you come to an event, as a way to supplement your training. What’s next? How do I continue working with you guys post camp retreat or course? And so those are all the pillars of what’s going on within the Power Monkey network.
Steven Sashen:
Brilliant. And not surprisingly, you’ll be found at? Give the URL.
David Durante:
powermonkeyfitness.com. And then camp itself has its own URL, powermonkeycamp.com.
Steven Sashen:
Anything else people should know about finding out more about what you’re up to? Or more importantly, what they can do with what you’re doing? Because this is interesting now that I think of it. What you’re providing, a lot of people that I’ve talked to, they’ll have a course, or they’ll have something, but it’s kind of… I’m trying to think of how to describe this. What you’ve laid out is really a change in what someone thinks they can do for their rest of their life. Maybe I’m just being a little biased. What the hell? Probably. But regardless, this is a big thing.
That’s where I’m going. Where we started, this idea of discovering the fundamentals of what your body can do, and what you can do with it is everything. And many people that I end up talking to are, let’s say one step removed from that. Even if they think they’re doing fundamentals, I would argue that it’s not often as complete as the program that you’ve described. So I hope people check it out, obviously. And I want to hear from people when they do, because this is a wonderful thing. Actually, wait. I’m going to go full circle. How did you even decide to do this?
David Durante:
Yeah. So I’ve been coming to this facility for over 20 years. I have been a special guest in the summers, helping out the kids during the kids’ gymnastics camp for years and years. And I always loved coming here. John and John are very close friends of mine, so I always enjoyed being at this location. And I used to go to a gymnastics camp when I was growing up. I used to go to the one that’s been around, probably the longest International Gymnastics Camp, IGC out in Strasburg, Pennsylvania. And so I knew how impactful going to a camp was, a week long camp, and the memories that I created, and how incredible that was when I was a kid. And I said, “Why can’t we try and do that with adults? Don’t adults want to act like kids all the time?” And create some more adult type activities and same type of atmosphere.
So I had the idea to put this on. And we took a huge swing back in 2014 to say, “Hey, does this make sense?” Or it was 2013. I can’t even remember at this point. And we put our first camp on, and there were 30 participants and 30 coaches. And nobody wanted to tell anyone around it, because they were like, “We got one-on-one attention the entire time. It’s incredible.” And so we were like, “No, please go and tell people.” And they were like, “No, we’re the only ones that can ever come back to this thing.” And it slowly grew from there. We didn’t make any money the first year, and we were like, “This could be something that’s really worth pursuing.” And it went from 30 campers, to 40, to 50, to 90, to 100, and we’ve been in a pretty good place since. So yeah, it was just because I’ve come to this location so many times over the years, and thought it could be fun for other people to experience it as well.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, that’s great. I actually got hired to perform at a place that thought of itself as like Club Med in the Poconos. And the idea was, it was like camp for adults, but it was really just the biggest pickup spot I’ve ever seen in my life, and I was bummed.
David Durante:
That ends up happening. You get that are all fit in one location for a while, some of this stuff does happen. But if you have any of your listeners that are into fitness, which I’m sure they are and want to escape, they want to go to a location where fitness is highlighted with great people, we’re all like-minded, campus at the top of the list. It really is a special place.
Steven Sashen:
Sounds great. Well, I do hope people go. This has been an absolute, absolute pleasure, Dave. So for everyone else, just a quick reminder, when you get a chance, head over obviously to Power Monkey Fitness and powermonkeycamp.com, and also to www.jointhemovementmovement.com. Again, there’s no sign-up fees, there’s no secret handshake, there’s no song or dance that we do every morning, although that would be very entertaining. It’s just a place to find previous of which there are a couple hundred. And there are different ways you can find us on social media and other places where you can get the podcast, if you want to get it somewhere else. And if you have any requests, or comments, or feedback, complaints, if you think I’ve got a case of cranial rectal reorientation syndrome, I’m open to hearing about that. Drop me an email, [email protected]. But most importantly, until whatever’s next, go out, have fun and live life feet first.