Mike Warkentin (00:02):
Injuries to members. No gym owner ever wants something bad to happen, but the reality is that stuff is unavoidable. Every so often, someone is going to get injured even though fitness training is incredibly safe. The best plan: Be prepared. In fact, be overprepared so that you can manage any situation. It’s Worst-Case Scenario Week on “Run a Profitable Gym,” and I’m Mike Warkentin. Please hit “subscribe” wherever you’re watching or listening. Today, my guest is going to explain how he managed an incredibly stressful event at his gym like a pro, with the help of his staff and members. It’s going to be a great story for you guys to listen to. Erik Zeyher. He runs Warlock Athletics in New York, and in mid-August, a member had a heart attack. This is just a tough one for everyone to think about right now, but here’s the good part. I’ll give you the skip to the ending. The member’s wife, a nurse, later said if it had happened anywhere else, he would’ve died. So, there’s good news at the end of this story. Erik’s here to tell the tale and help you be at your best if the worst ever happens at your gym. Erik, welcome. How are you doing today?
Erik Zeyher (00:57):
Mike, I’m great, man. Thanks for having me on, and it’s good to see you again since the Summit.
Mike Warkentin (01:01):
Yeah, I’m super pumped about this because the CrossFit and fitness community is hurting a little bit right now, so we’re going to give them some good news. First, tell it—I mean, stressful situation—but the good news is that you saved somebody’s life at your gym. Tell me the whole story. What happened? How’d you guys do this?
Erik Zeyher (01:15):
Yeah, let’s kind of start from the beginning. So I was actually at home. It was like 4 p.m., a little after. And, you know, class normally does their warm-up, does normal things. And I got a phone call from my head coach, and I missed the first phone call, and within 30 seconds, the phone rang again. And knowing that she was calling me twice in a row, I’m like, “Something is wrong.” I picked up, she goes, “Hey, so-and-so was on the floor, AED is attached to him.” And I said, “Put the phone down. I’ll be there in five minutes.” And I lived probably about 10 minutes from the gym.
Mike Warkentin (01:45):
How fast were you going? Do you remember?
Erik Zeyher (01:47):
I was probably going about 70 in a 35, like 30—double the speed limit at that point.
Mike Warkentin (01:53):
Life is at risk. Yeah.
Erik Zeyher (01:54):
Yeah. And just to be there, like, that’s the instinctive reaction, right? And without getting in a car accident myself, we had a member going into cardiac arrest, whole house on a Monday. You got 10 people in classes. You’ve got a semi-private going on. You’ve got a PT going on. You’ve got parents, kids in the building. I mean, like, you have a full house with three—and I lucked out where like, these are—two out of three coaches that were on right there are my full-time staff members. So, they luckily knew exactly what to do. One called 911, one of our members is actually—as lucky as this may sound—is a PA. He’s a cardiac PA and knows the member’s dad very, very well. Guy hit the floor within 15 to 20 seconds. Our members—one is also a nurse, hands on chest with CPR.
Erik Zeyher (02:42):
One of our coaches grabbed the AED, sprinted right over, within 60 seconds this guy was hooked up to the AED, cleared for shock, shocked, and then brought back to life and continued with CPR. And this is all within two minutes for which them seemed like an eternity. And we’re also very fortunate the firehouse EMT is 400 yards up the road, and it still felt like an eternity before they got there. Our member came back from a 40-meter warm-up run. It wasn’t like we were working out in the middle of a crazy workout. We were actually doing a memorial walk for Lazar Dukic. So, you know, you’re trying to do everything right, and then this catastrophic event happens, and a guy hits the floor, foaming at the mouth—not the phone call that I want to get as an owner.
Erik Zeyher (03:25):
Paramedics came, brought him to the hospital, the whole nine. Luckily, where it—when we got to the hospital, I met his wife there. I followed along, you know, she literally said point-blank, “If this happened anywhere else, on the golf course where he was driving, while we were shopping today, he’d be dead.” It happened that he was 60 feet from an AED in our facility, which I’m, again, very fortunate my business partner is a career paramedic and EMT and firefighter. So, he’s always harped on it over and over again. And obviously, you try not to roll your eyes because you hear it so many times that we need to practice this thing, but we’ll never roll our eyes ever again. And this thing saved time—one of our members’ life.
Mike Warkentin (04:03):
Yeah. And that’s—what a story. And I can’t imagine how stressful that would be, obviously for you as the owner, but also for the people that were there right at ground zero when this happened. And this is what I was getting at in the intro, like, 40-meter warm-up run for a member of your gym. That’s not preventable. Like, that’s just a thing that happens. There’s nothing you could do on that one. All you have to do is manage the situation. Now I’ve got to ask you this. The response time and the reaction was so fast—like you said—you know, within seconds, people are on him. You’ve got—yeah. And you’ve got like an AED hooked up, and everything is just moving at warp speed. That doesn’t just happen, right? You can’t do that if you haven’t planned. How did you guys make this happen? What did you rehearse in the past, or what are your procedures and plans?
Erik Zeyher (04:45):
Yeah, so we actually have a full plan and go through regular training and semi-annual training for the AED. So, all the coaches on board know how to handle it, know what it sounds like, know where it’s located. It lives in the same spot. The—it’s funny—we had the protocol for exactly what goes on. What we didn’t prepare for was how to respond to it afterwards. Ah, right. Like, as in communicating with the members. What does class continue? Does it not continue? Like, do you move everybody outside? Do you keep them inside? Like, there’s just a lot of things, and it happens really fast.
Mike Warkentin (05:16):
I’m going to ask you about that part. But yeah, finish off the first part about how you prepare, and then let’s get into how you manage the aftereffects.
Erik Zeyher (05:23):
Yeah. So, we—I mean, we go through regular training with the AED. We go through the CPR course. We make sure that our coaches are prepped so they know exactly what goes on and how to use that. The great part is the AED, once it’s hooked up, is super simple to use. But again, even in a dire situation, it seems—seconds seem like minutes. And we’ve even had some of our coaches who are trained to be like, “Man, I couldn’t act fast enough.” And they know what goes on with this thing. They’ve seen it before; they’ve pulled it out. But it’s much different in a game-time situation, where they need reps. Because there’s no real-life pressure. You practice like I see it. Yeah, you can’t. And even just try to create some sort of fresher point for the members to be—or the coaches to be able to actually practice with a little bit of a penalty. Probably a better idea in retrospect.
Mike Warkentin (06:09):
But you still can’t, you can’t recreate that. You just can’t, you know, no matter what you do, that stress of this person that you care about on the ground, like you can’t plan for that. So …
Erik Zeyher (06:17):
Yeah. And even the PA said, he’s like, “Listen, like I do this for a living, and it was stressful for me because I know that member.” He’s like, “That gave me major anxiety.” And even, and like, this is the guy who’s a trained professional who does it for a living.
Mike Warkentin (06:30):
Well, I mean, listeners—just a quick lesson here. Obviously, if you haven’t practiced this stuff at all, you should start practicing this stuff because it’s going to be way more stressful. Like the AED seems just like, “Oh, it’s talking to us, this box and that whole thing.” When it’s real, that practice is going to come in handy. Because you’re going to remember stuff. So, how often did you drill your plan?
Erik Zeyher (06:50):
Yeah, I mean, every time someone came on board, they went through that piece and usually one of our coaches actually taught it to the member. We have a fully written SOP, a full document for it. And again, like even, it gets checked and inspected monthly. So, this way like the—we still know that the battery is still operating, the pads are up to date. It’s funny, but like, when we actually opened our gym, we didn’t have enough funds to even buy an AED, right? So, like we’re kind of—and it’s not required by New York state to have an AED within a gym. You actually need to have 500 members in your gym in order to be required to have an AED.
Mike Warkentin (07:20):
That’s interesting.
Erik Zeyher (07:21):
It’s crazy. It’s absurd, actually, when you think about it. And I was really fortunate, one of our members said, “Hey listen. I’m going to cut you a check for 500 bucks. Put that towards the AED.” And that helped us significantly. So, within 18 months of opening, we were able to purchase an AED. Not only that, but again, having a paramedic and firefighter that owns the business, like, “Hey, like, this is a top priority for us.” So, it’s literally sat in a box on a wall for 8 ½ years. Other than, like, being tested and being checked monthly, it’s literally sat there seeming like, “Man, I hope we never have to use this thing.”
Mike Warkentin (07:55):
And then when you did, the pads were current, the battery was working, your staff was trained, and you mentioned a word that I always highlight on the show: You said SOPs. No successful gym owner that I’ve ever spoken to does not have SOPs and standard operating procedures, rules and tasks, everything laid out. If you want to be a successful gym owner, this is essential. And in this case, it was lifesaving. So, you know, kudos to you for doing that and having this prepared. And then for having, you know, your staff and people manage the situation when it happened. Because like you said, game day is not the same as practice, and there is just no way to simulate this kind of thing happening. So, talk to me now, like, your staff responded. Two minutes, the whole thing goes down. Then what? Obviously, you’ve got a fire hauler, you said 400 meters away, right? Or 40 yards away. People show up, and well, what about the rest of the people at this point? You had a gym with about 20 people in it.
Erik Zeyher (08:43):
And again, like systems, right? So, like, we actually—because we check everybody in—we use Mindbody. We check everybody in. We know exactly who’s in the building, right? And like, so those attendance records to make sure, like, follow up. Is everyone OK? Like, did anyone need to leave? We have all that stuff. But in terms of what happened afterwards, it feels like a whirlwind. And I couldn’t imagine if I had to coach afterwards and I couldn’t actually be able to help the member and help its family, and like, I could literally clear—I had everything cleared off my plate because I don’t coach any classes. I don’t do any PTs where I could literally be like, “Cool guys, this is how we handle this thing.” I could take care of my staff. You know, if this was before I started with you guys, when I was working 80 hours a week, it would’ve not only—even though it was a great turnout—it might not have turned out that way.
Erik Zeyher (09:34):
It could have seriously affected the relationship with members and people afterwards because they don’t feel like they’re taken care of. But because I literally could put all of my effort into, “Cool, let’s debrief tonight with the staff. Let’s debrief with the members that were in the building in our own Zoom meeting. Let’s make sure that I follow up with the member and actually be there in the hospital for him to visit.” Right? Like these things, if you’re coaching all the time, you can’t do. And because we’re set up for success from the likes of you guys, of what we did for the past three years, man, was I able to really help everyone across the board. But in terms of what went down afterwards, again, it felt like a whirlwind. If it seems like it’s a little bit harder to describe right now, that’s because it’s exactly what it felt like. And I’ve shared that with a bunch of people now. I know that afterwards, basically we went to the hospital, my coaching staff continued coaching. Talking about it afterwards, if we had to—when somebody goes into cardiac arrest, I would’ve just had our staff clear the entire gym and just have them go outside this way. Like whatever’s going on, they don’t have to witness that piece. And we’ve had both sides of it in terms of, like, we’ve had professionals in terms of Dutchess County, like stress relief that—but like they said, “Hey, it would’ve been better if you did this.” Firefighters saying, “Hey, it’s good that you kept everybody in there,” so they could actually see what goes on in case it does happen again. They know how to save somebody’s life.
Mike Warkentin (10:54):
That’s interesting. I wouldn’t have thought that.
Erik Zeyher (10:56):
So, like, we’ve had both ends of the spectrum, and then even for the staff being like, “Man, like I need to go back to coaching right now.” Like, are they OK to coach right now? Like they just witnessed a member go down. Cardiac arrest, foaming from the mouth, be shocked back to life. And my staff wasn’t OK. Like, it took us probably at least 10 days to kind of get back to it, and like, it was like random crying sessions throughout the week. Feelings hit in the middle of a workout, you know. And these are top level coaches, like an L2 and L3 and another L2 who have been doing this for five, 10 years who are seasoned veterans at this. One of them was in the Air Force, right? Like really struggle with this part. So, like, us debriefing as a team that night before we even put anything out to the rest of the community? Massively important.
Erik Zeyher (11:44):
Obviously, the member is still in the hospital. I left for a little bit—actually dropped his car back off at his house because he obviously couldn’t drive it. Debriefed with my team that night for about 45 minutes to an hour as long as they needed to kind of get stuff out. And then my business partner and I created basically just some information as to what was going on to our members. We left the name out of the member. We stated just the facts, but we wanted to make sure that our members knew what went on so they didn’t hear it through the grapevine, and provided some really clear information so there was no rumor mill. Right? It also allowed us to address and let our members know, “Hey, listen, tomorrow night we’re going to actually have a debrief for anyone that was in the facility when it happened, so that this way we can kind of break down, we can share some stories about it, make sure that you guys are OK.”
Erik Zeyher (12:28):
We also chatted with—there’s like a Dutchess County. I’ve got to remember the exact acronym, but basically like an incident stress debrief team. And we reached out to them, they gave us some really great resources that we could share with our community, and I shared within the Tinker group. And then from there, we basically sat down with our members and another debrief two days later with our team. Again, checking in daily with these guys to make sure they’re good to go. Remember, meantime, he’s still in the hospital for the next four or five days, gets an AED put in, make sure he gets the deluxe version of that. But again, still checking into him to make sure that he’s doing OK in there. It was a lot. I mean, I’m used to kind of being thrown into the fire, and as a gym owner, and even as a person, this was hard. It was really, really hard. And like, I’m fairly removed from my gym, where I don’t have to do a ton of work in the gym. So, I couldn’t imagine having this happen and being a gym owner who is in the mix of coaching everything. I wouldn’t be able to handle it.
Mike Warkentin (13:24):
Yeah. So, you mentioned our Tinker program—and listeners, what that is, it’s our program for our top-level gym owners. And Erik is in that. And what that essentially means is he’s making more than $100,000 a year from his business. He doesn’t have to work on the business—or sorry, in the business—pardon me. He can work on the business. So, he’s a little bit freed up from stuff. He has freedom of time; he has freedom of money. He can choose which roles he wants to take in the gym, and it can be—he can coach if he wants to, but he doesn’t need to or want to. So, he’s doing something else. And what that does is give you the freedom of time, which then, an instant like this happens, and he can behave like a CEO would. Step in and absolutely manage the situation with his partner to take care of his member, to take care of his staff, to take care of the other members who are outside who maybe weren’t involved in the incident, but are still affected by it.
Mike Warkentin (14:08):
That’s why we want you to be a great gym owner because if you are wearing every single hat in your business, and something like this happens, you are going to coach the class, you’re going to do the AED, you’re going to have to manage all the flow all by yourself. It’s chaotic. And we want you to have that freedom so that if something happens, or if something doesn’t happen, you just want to work on your business, you can do it. So, that’s what the Tinker program is. And mentorship can help you get that freedom of time. Now did you say that you didn’t cancel classes or you kept things going after the member was taken out?
Erik Zeyher (14:37):
We kept things going. I think if it was a different result where he wasn’t shocked back to life, it would’ve been a very different situation at that point. We would’ve shut down classes for the remainder of the day. But seeing like he was, you know, back to life, didn’t really know exactly how he got there, but given a thumbs-up on the way out to everyone, you know, it—the crazy part is that one of our members who actually provided CPR, as soon as she was done, got up and just jumped right in ready to start the workout, started kettlebell swings, didn’t even bat an eye. Right? But, again, a true professional and what she does, and what he does, to be able to handle those things.
Mike Warkentin (15:11):
Would you—going back, if something this would happen again—would you continue the classes after that? Even if it was a successful revival?
Erik Zeyher (15:18):
Yes, I would have in that situation. The only thing that we probably would’ve done differently is if he went down, like I said before, moved the rest of the class outside just to kind of like give that a little bit of space.
Mike Warkentin (15:29):
That makes sense. But it’s interesting that the firefighters even said that having people view something like that—as traumatic as it can be—can actually save lives down the road. Like that’s an interesting kind of takeaway that I wouldn’t have thought of. It’s obviously stressful for them, but if they’re like, “I’ve seen this before, and I know that I need to do this and grab this and do that,” that’s actually a really good skill to kind of have. So, that’s an interesting one that I hadn’t considered. Had you ever thought of that?
Erik Zeyher (15:51):
No, I never thought of that before. And it’s one of those things where like these guys are around it all the time. Right? Like, they live and breathe it. So, again, like I’m like, “Alright, that kind of makes sense. I get that piece.” And at the same time, you’re like, “Man, I still want to protect my people and my community from seeing what goes on with that.” Because it can be very traumatic. I think the other part is that I think people—at least I didn’t realize—was that our response to that was what it was, again, we lucked out where it was really fortunate. We could have done everything right, and it could have ended the other way, right? But at the same point, the fact of how we responded with checking in our members, debriefing, giving them resources, it showed that we were a professional business.
Erik Zeyher (16:30):
And the members that might imagine themselves in that situation were able to see, like, “Man, like I’m in really good hands.” So, it allowed us to—at least in my mind—allowed us to double down the buy-in from our members. Because we’re like, “Listen, you guys did everything you’re supposed to do. You communicated with us. You made sure that we were debriefed, you gave us resources. You made sure that the staff was OK. You’re doing everything you’re supposed to do, and we feel really good about that.” If I was coaching again, I would’ve missed a lot of these steps. I probably wouldn’t have been as good of a communicator as I would have if I didn’t have the time for it. But I was able to sit there, and craft a post, make sure that we made sure that everything was communicated the right way. I was able to have free time the next day just to be at the gym from 5:30 a.m. until 9, when I’m not normally there, just to hang out with members and maybe answer a few questions, and let them just like vent to me a little bit, just to be there versus if you’re in classes and coaching all the time, like, you don’t have that opportunity. So, I think that me having that bandwidth for my members in that respect was an absolute game-changer.
Mike Warkentin (17:32):
Yeah. And I love the stuff that you did where you cared for your staff, you had some meetings with those guys and said, “Hey, this was stressful. What can we do to acknowledge what’s going on?” You did the same thing for members. And so, you’re having these—you’re out, you’re reaching out and caring for people who are affected by this even though they weren’t the person in, directly in the incident. They’re still suffering through it. And you said, you know, you’ve experienced people with tears and stuff. I love that you did that. Chris Cooper’s talked a lot about the CALM model of leadership. I’m going to put a link in the show notes, just a resource that’s going to be very helpful for you listeners at your gym. But what I want to highlight here is that you communicated, and that’s super important because one of the things I can’t stand as a media guy is watching rumors spin up.
Mike Warkentin (18:08):
And you know, you mentioned it, the rumor mill goes. All of a sudden, this happened, that happened, it was four people, and this and that. And it’s like, you need to get out front of things in a professional manner and say, “Here’s what happened, here’s what we’re doing,” and be a leader. If you let things go wild by themselves, you get rumors and stuff gets really bad. It’s especially important with injuries and things like that because people are worried, you know, you’ve got to reach out. Obviously, you reached out. Was his wife at the gym by chance, or was she somewhere else?
Erik Zeyher (18:35):
No. So, it’s actually really funny. So, she actually somehow tracked down the ambulance on the drive there, and like, literally merged right behind it. And he’s sitting up, and he can see everything going on behind. He was like, “I thought you were going to rear end us about three times at least.” And yeah. It was so—yeah, she found her way there. I’m so grateful too that Chris shared the CALM resource earlier that week. Because I actually used that for when we posted about Lazar Dukic. So, it was super helpful. So, I actually already had a reference. Right? So, I made the post in my community about that piece, and I was like, “Oh my gosh, I already know how to do this thing,” because Chris already gave me the system for it. We need to use it again. So, all of a sudden, one rep, probably not as good. Two reps, I’ve done 100% more work. So, now it allowed me to be a little bit better at it. So, again, kudos to you guys.
Mike Warkentin (19:26):
Well, that’s—I didn’t realize the timelines there. That’s very interesting. Because yeah, Chris did share that resource. We did a special podcast with Bonnie Skinner as well, talking about managing, you know, traumatic situations in relation to the CrossFit Games and any, it could be applied anywhere, obviously. I forgot that we had done that right around the time of this. So, it’s crazy that you saw that in advance and had that top of mind.
Erik Zeyher (19:45):
The other crazy part about this, we—I forgot to mention—was that this was during a memorial walk for Lazar Dukic, like, this was the Monday after the CrossFit Games, and like, it just happened. I’m like, so we just got hit with that as a CrossFit community. We now have our member that just, with the cardiac arrest, I was like, “Man, talk about being thrown to the wolves.” It literally felt like I was thrown like a dryer and just being tumbled around. It was a tough week.
Mike Warkentin (20:09):
But you still manage it like a pro, and the response was so amazing and that—you got the best possible result in something like this, were able to show your community what a, you know, group of fitness professionals you are. Are you making any changes to your emergency plans based on this incident? And the reason I’m asking this is because other people who haven’t gone through it might be able to see some places where they can update their plans.
Erik Zeyher (20:30):
Yeah. So, in terms of the response of what we have with our current plans, not going to change anything other than like if an incident does happen, we’re going to end up moving people outside.
Mike Warkentin (20:40):
But that was battle tested. You tested that, like, it worked.
Erik Zeyher (20:43):
Yeah. What we are going to change is some of our responses afterwards because a lot of that stuff we created on the spot, and we’re still kind of evaluating that between like the communication with the members, the debriefing of the staff, and again, it’s incident-to-incident. We’re trying to create a general framework for how to respond to that. If it is like say members are outside and someone gets struck by lightning, right? Like you try to create like a general framework, but some of these things you just can’t possibly imagine until it actually happens. But in terms of the process afterwards, we’re probably not going to change too much. Just how we respond and communicate to the members afterwards. That was our—kind of like the first runaway, unfortunately.
Mike Warkentin (21:20):
No, that makes sense because everyone looks at an emergency action plan, and you have your steps of like, “You will call the hospital at this number, you will go stand on the side of the road and wave down the ambulance, and you will do this, and you’ll do CPR.” But then it kind of stops there. Most emergency action plans that I’ve seen just stop and that’s it. And there’s no, like what happens afterwards when, you know, the gurney goes out and the sirens go to the hospital, and the rest of us are kind of just standing around, and you realize—and found out how to live through it—that there needs to be something else there. So, I guess, if listeners, if you’re out there, if you have an emergency action plan, at least put some, like, a little bit of railway tracks in place to say, “What happens next?”
Mike Warkentin (21:59):
“How are we dealing with it? How are we communicating with everyone who doesn’t know but is part of the community? How are we managing the people who had to deal with the incident? How are we managing the people who maybe didn’t have to deal with it but saw it and are affected by it? How are we managing the people who weren’t even there but are still very affected by it?” Maybe this guy’s best buddies are in a different class or something like that. You probably can’t lay all that out because as you said, Erik, everything is so different. These incidents are so specific, but just a general plan. We are going to communicate, and we are going to do this for the staff, and we’re going to do this for the members. Just like a three-part thing might be a good idea. Would you think that would be wise, Erik? Or would you add anything to that?
Erik Zeyher (22:33):
Yeah, so I mean, the other thing too—and this is again brought up by our staff—he’s like, “I didn’t know whether to start class right away, or like, kind of get back to it.” And again, they’re about to start the workout in like five minutes, and everyone’s just been frozen out of everything for 15 minutes, right? And giving everybody like, “Hey listen, warm up for five minutes. Grab a drink, use the bathroom.” Yeah, bring it back together and even just have a conversation of like, “Hey, if you’re not OK to work out right now, like it’s OK. Pack it up. If you need to sit on the sofa and hang out for a little bit before you even decide those things, totally cool. If you’re ready to rock and roll, you want to work out, that’s here.” Because we had some members literally like pack up and leave because it was that traumatic for them. And like, we’re trying to keep tabs—I’m really fortunate, like I’m in the hospital with the member who went down. I have my staff members, my coaches following up with the members who had to leave because it was so traumatic. Like, “Hey, I called so-and-so just so you know, we had a really tough time with this. You should probably reach out.” I’m like, “Perfect.” But again, if you don’t have a good staff in place and you don’t have some of these people that are at least aware of who’s going in and out, and there’s no documentation of who’s in the building at the time, it’s really hard to back trace some of that stuff. And like everyone, when they work out in class, they are trapped. There’s no open gym for us. There’s no free roaming around. If you’re in the building, we pretty much know that you’re in there.
Mike Warkentin (23:50):
Yeah. And like, we’re not going to make this a business decision. But at the same time, you can imagine that if someone saw this, left the gym very rattled and no one reached out, that member may not come back. It might be just a really negative experience. And like, again, we’re not about dollars and cents here. We’re about caring for people. How much better is it if you reach out to them and say, “Hey, I know you were in that class, and you know, what can we do? How can we help you work through this?” That shows a huge professional level of care. And you can’t do that without systems. Like you said, you can check your attendance report. These people are here. They’ll be contacted. We’re going to contact them a second time. We’re going to have a little Zoom call for them or whatever. Anything that makes things better. And that all falls back on systems. Erik, as we—remember you said you were going to bring something up later on? Did you think of what it was?
Erik Zeyher (24:34):
Yeah, so there’s a bunch of stuff. So, one of the things that most people don’t realize is that for the first 72 hours, at least for traumatic events like that, it’s very much—there’s still a lot of ups and downs. So, we know with our staff that like, “Hey, listen, you guys are experiencing ups and downs.” Even though we debriefed, it still might be really difficult. Basically, it takes like 10 days for you to kind of get back to norm with that stuff. And so, after 10 days, we held another debrief to basically go, “Hey listen, if you’re still struggling with this, let’s talk about it and show up.” It also gave us a really good indication as to if we needed to help people get additional help and resources outside of just doing a debrief and talking with our team and sharing what they saw and how they felt. Because it raised a little bit more of—not like a red flag, but like a pink flag.
Erik Zeyher (25:19):
Like, “Hey, I’m really struggling and need some additional help.” Because like you said, all of our members are people who are part of this community. We want to make sure that they feel safe, they feel like they’re OK, not something that they need to carry with them and that’s a burden that they need to hold onto, right? So, we wanted to provide a safe space for our members to do those things. The other really great part that goes with this is that our, AED is from a company called HeartSine. They’re like a fairly big company. They actually donate an AED of the recipient’s life who it saved. So, our member actually gets to pick an organization that they get to donate an AED to. Because I didn’t even realize too how much information is in the AED. The police department—or no, the fire department came back over, they had to export the data that was there so they could give it to the heart doctor. There’s like—they ran like a full report off of this so you can see exactly what’s going on before, you can see what’s going on after, as they get shocked. I didn’t realize that.
Mike Warkentin (26:17):
Sure. Because it’s analyzing heart rhythm to determine whether it can even shock. I didn’t realize that it tracked that it could be downloaded. That’s incredible.
Erik Zeyher (26:23):
Yeah. So then they give that to the hospital, so they can then understand exactly what went on.
Mike Warkentin (26:27):
How long was this going on? What was going on? Yeah, that’s critical stuff.
Erik Zeyher (26:32):
We were also set up—some of our members expressed like, “Hey listen, like, not that I had to give CPR, but like I felt helpless.” So, we actually, working with the American Heart Association and some other local companies, are going to host a CPR course for our members. Like one of those things you always kind of kick the can down the road a little bit, and you’re like, “Yeah, yeah, we’ll do it. We’ll do it.” And my business partner used to host and run the course, and he’s now in Florida, like he doesn’t live in New York anymore. So now we’re bringing somebody in to do that again.
Mike Warkentin (27:02):
Going to dust off Rescue Randy.
Erik Zeyher (27:04):
Yeah, we did, we did. We’re going to do—we did separate training for our staff again just to make sure everyone feels comfortable with it because some of our staff, they’ve been through the training, but they might not have focused on it 100%. They check the box, but then they go, “Oh wow, it’s actually like a real situation and need to be prepared for this thing.” The other really awesome stuff is that between Dutchess County, the Arlington Fire and the Grange Fire Department, the American Heart Association, they’re actually recognizing our members with awards who saved our member’s’ life. So like, it goes from this really hard, difficult piece—and it’s still hard to kind of talk about—to being a really nice recognition for people who went above and beyond to save someone’s life with CPR and hooking up the AED in the blink of a second. So like, super excited about that for our members and our staff.
Mike Warkentin (27:52):
I’m imagining it must be just hugely emotional to see your dude in the hospital recovering and his wife and just, like, he’s still there.
Erik Zeyher (28:00):
Yeah. I mean, I’m not a very huggy person, and she’s like, “I got my quota for like the next five years of hugs from you after today.” It’s one of those things where, again, you’re grateful that it happened within 60 feet of the AED because it could have happened 200 meters out on a run, right? It could happen on the golf course; it could happen anywhere for this guy. But it just happened that we had a cardiac PA, a nurse, whole staff in there and an AED 60 feet away. Like, you should go play the lotto.
Mike Warkentin (28:26):
Let’s close this out. I’ll give you a couple things, listeners. Check with your insurer and your local jurisdictions to find out what you are required to do. Because some places require you to have an AED and if it’s not over 500 members, it’s just—you must have one as a fitness facility or whatever. Check those local regulations. Be sure you do that. I would also recommend—make sure that you have your coaches CPR certified. Make sure that’s current. Erik, let’s go a little bit further based on your experiences here. What are some other key takeaways, simple stuff people can do right now today to make themselves more prepared for something that could be very, well, would be very stressful?
Erik Zeyher (29:00):
Yeah, you know, it’s funny. I actually wrote about this and shared a post. I’m going to just pull it up real quick.
Mike Warkentin (29:04):
Yeah, tell us exactly.
Erik Zeyher (29:06):
I think it’s more important to be specific with it than me kind of reading off the cuff. One of the other things—and I’m going to share this because I don’t think people sometimes realize the benefit that goes with mentorship all the time—is that financially, we wouldn’t be able to be in the position that we’re in if we weren’t mentored by you guys and Anastasia and Ashley and Chris and everything goes into this thing. The other really cool part is because we’re in such a good position, we also want to pay it forward and buy another AED for a gym that’s either starting off or can’t afford it. So like, to be able to do that for another community, whether they use it or not—like hopefully at some point they never have to use it—but if they are, they’re prepared. You know, I’d rather have that be there. So, we’re really fortunate because of what you guys do with us. To be able to help another gym out with that. So, it’s really cool to be able to do that.
Mike Warkentin (29:57):
Oh, you know, and they’ll just say that’s one of the reasons—that’s kind of the foundation of Two-Brain—is Chris has always said he wants gym owners to be wealthy because they’re some of the most generous caring people in the world, and they’re going to use their success to help others. And Erik, I think that’s living proof of it. So, what an incredible story. And whatever gym gets that AED, I hope they never have to use it, but I’m glad they’re going to have it. Give me what’s on your list.
Erik Zeyher (30:17):
So, number 1, obviously, is have an AED. Number 2, overtrain your staff until they borderline hate you. Again, you can’t be overprepared for what goes on with this piece. Staff who are professionally trained on this and or full-time staff that know exactly what’s going on, they’re in the building more hours, makes a really big difference. Two of those coaches are there 40 hours a week. The other one spends about, like, probably 20 hours a week in there. So, he is borderline full-time. Working—being able to have some sort of capacity and have a team being able to divide and conquer and knowing those roles? Massively important. Right? Like, the coaches knew that they needed to follow up with certain members. I was in charge of assigning people jobs. We were able to divide and conquer, and if I’m in the fire and doing everything, it doesn’t work out very well.
Erik Zeyher (31:06):
Emergency systems. You’ve got to have SOPs, fire drills and practice at game speed. You know, we’re going to implement more practices at game speed. Whether there is, like you said before, Mike, it’s really hard to simulate a real-life situation. But unfortunately, I can put a burpee penalty to it that’ll make it really uncomfortable. Or in a … Like you can create some sort of pressure externally. And we used to do this in soccer for PKs, but you can create something to make people a little bit more focused. And maybe that’s just reflecting back on what goes on.
Mike Warkentin (31:36):
Well, you could even just have them sprint out. Say the member went down on your 200-meter turnaround on your warmup run. Hits down there, sprint out with the AED, you know, even something like that, you better believe they’d be running hard.
Erik Zeyher (31:47):
Yeah, a staff debriefing especially if something traumatic happens. I didn’t realize the importance of that until talking with other professionals, and that wasn’t something that we planned for. So, if something does happen that’s traumatic, that staff debriefing is super important. Attendance tracking: Make sure that everyone is down in the building, that you know who’s in there. And then also, the member debrief within 36 hours of the event. I think that’s super important. And even the communication with your members. Again, we made sure that it was vague enough where they knew somebody went down. Because not everyone knows we have 200 members. Not everyone knows that. So-and-so went down, and we don’t want to sit there and share his medical information. However, we do want to let you know—because you’re going to probably hear it through a grapevine—that some sort of thing went down. So just—we tried to air all this out of caution with that while still communicating really effectively.
Mike Warkentin (32:35):
Yeah, privacy concerns. But obviously, you want the rumor mill to not spin up and people to think it was, you know, it was my husband at home if they hear something weird. Right?
Erik Zeyher (32:45):
Yeah. And then—last but not least—but one of the hardest parts that I struggle with is like, how do I thank a guy and gal who just saved somebody’s life in our gym? Right? Like, I feel like I can’t do enough. So, trying to—whether that’s like, yeah, obviously we send a fruit basket home to our member and some stuff like that while he is recovering. But like, I can’t even begin to fathom how to say other than like, “Thank you,” and give them the shirt off my back for those members. But like, “Dude, you stepped up in a time where we most need you. I know it’s your profession,” and even if it’s not. But like, I don’t know how to thank somebody for that when it’s that much of a game changer.
Mike Warkentin (33:19):
I think it’s just right in the eyes. Thank you. And a firm handshake, and “I love you.” You know, I don’t know what you can—
Erik Zeyher (33:25):
No, “I appreciate it.” Maybe a few hugs too.
Mike Warkentin (33:28):
That too. I know you’re not a huggy guy, but you know as many as you can handle. And I’m going to guess you probably have to file an insurance—a report with your insurer. Is that correct?
Erik Zeyher (33:36):
Yeah, we filed it with the insurance. We reach out to the American Heart Association as well so they know what’s going on. Even, like, HeartSine, the company that does our AED actually gives us new pads since we used them and saved a life. I don’t know if they do that the other way around. I hope they would. And the other really cool part—and it depends on your insurance company—we use CrossFit RRG. They actually cover up to $25,000 in expenses for that member that’s in the hospital. So, again, he doesn’t have to pay for anything out of pocket in terms of that. So, it was nice to be able to call and be like, “Hey, listen, just so you know, anything up to that point we get to cover for you through the insurance company.” Again, another level of professionalism that goes with that that we were, again, super pleased about. But if I don’t have the time to—and Chris doesn’t have the time—to make those phone calls to follow up, some gym owners might miss that piece. And that could be really big for someone who struggles with finances to have something like that happen.
Mike Warkentin (34:33):
I didn’t know that was available, and I guarantee a lot of other people don’t know that was available. So, that’s an interesting insurance clause to look into. Erik, thank you so much. You know, congratulations, high fives to your staff and community for taking care of something. Thank you so much for sharing this, and—not just sharing the incident—but giving us a concise action plan to take out of it. Listeners, if you’re out there, follow those steps. Erik just laid out all the stuff that you would need to do to respond just like his community did. Erik, I really appreciate your time and your story.
Erik Zeyher (34:59):
Yeah, Mike, I can’t thank you enough. And if people want to reach out at all, they can. Again, some of that seems a little bit overwhelming with some of this AED stuff, even just to get it in place. Happy to help if you want to reach out, at least like point you in the direction or assist with that. Because in New York, we need medical oversight. We need a doctor to sign off on this stuff. But thank you again, and you know, if anyone needs help out there with this stuff, happy to pioneer that and help them along.
Mike Warkentin (35:24):
Where can they find you If they want to reach out?
Erik Zeyher (35:26)
Warlock Athletics on Instagram. Great way to find us. You can also reach out to me personally. It’s @growwitherik on Instagram as well. Or just shoot me an email. It’s on the website warlockathletics.com.
Mike Warkentin (35:36):
If you’re out there, take advantage of it. Upper-level professional gym owner. His gym saved a life. If you need some help, talk to him. Reach out that way. Erik, again, thank you so much. We’ll have you back on the show at some point. I think, probably related to some of your Tinker level escapades. I’m Mike Warkentin, and this is “Run a Profitable Gym.” Thank you so much for watching and listening. Please subscribe on your way out wherever you are. And now here’s Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper with a final message.
Chris Cooper (36:00):
Hey, it’s Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper with a quick note. We created the Gym Owners United Facebook group to help you run a profitable gym. Thousands of gym owners, just like you, have already joined. In the group, we share sound advice about the business of fitness every day. I answer questions, I run free webinars, and I give away all kinds of great resources to help you grow your gym. I’d love to have you in that group. It’s Gym Owners United on Facebook, or go to gymownersunited.com to join. Do it today.
