Risen Strength is a locally owned CrossFit affiliate gym on the north side of town. I spent some time with owner and coach David Tate to learn about his experience building and operating a business here in the Gainesville area.
What do you do at Risen Strength?
I’m the owner and one of the operators. My wife Sara handles a lot of the behind-the-scenes business stuff. The coaching and programming of the workouts is my primary role – figuring out how we’re going to lay out the week, what the training is going to look like, and how it progresses. Hopefully the programming reflects how people are improving in their fitness.
How long have you been in business?
This is our 10th year. We started in 2016.
What made you take the leap and start the business?
It’s a loaded question. I was in law enforcement for 14 years. The catalyst for being in law enforcement was just wanting to be a helper, a servant – I wanted to help people. While I was in law enforcement, there was a definite need for fitness to be part of my daily routine. I started training with the CrossFit methodology around 2009 or 2010 and really started to enjoy what it was doing to my body. It was literally transforming my life and how I was approaching challenges – not just fitness, but mental tasks and things like that.
I started helping others with CrossFit, training people while I was still in law enforcement. Seeing that change happens in other people, seeing them develop and grow, started to encourage me and showed me how I could really help people in a different way through coaching and training.
Long story short, around 2015 I was in a special division where I was getting kind of burned out. I basically told Sara that something needed to change. I either needed to get out of that unit and go back to patrol or quit the sheriff’s office and start personal training or coaching. She encouraged me to pursue the gym. We did everything we needed to do to become a CrossFit affiliate and started in my barn – just a little 600-square-foot space on my property with only friends and family as members. It just kept growing, and here we are in 2026 with about 70 to 75 members.
What does a win look like for you?
That question excites me, because it really goes to the heart of why I’m doing this. The most exciting thing for me is to meet a new member who doesn’t think they can do it – who
doesn’t think CrossFit is something within their wheelhouse – and then see them morph into an athlete. They start considering themselves as an athlete. They start seeing the benefits of training like an athlete, regardless of what they do in the real world.
The biggest wins are when I see and hear people talk about that metamorphosis – that transition from being a very non-athletic person, someone who doesn’t think this stuff applies to them, to seeing improvement not just in the gym but in their real life. Whether they’re at a desk job, a stay-at-home mom, or retired and playing with their grandkids – all of those things become better and easier because fitness has become a priority, and that amplifies everything else.
Do you hear feedback from your athletes that training they do at Risen Strength has benefits beyond the physical skills they’re developing?
Absolutely. So many have told me that when they’re faced with some overwhelming objective or project – at work or at home – they’ll attack it like a workout. Like, “All right, I’ve got to get through the first two rounds, then I’m in that third round where I can start to see the finish line.” Here in the gym, we talk about the gut check round – it’s almost your last round, and you don’t want it to be your worst round, so you push through and find that last bit of energy. Then you’re in your last round, and that’s your best round. Last round, best round.
People tell me they look at a project and see it broken up into rounds, like a 20-minute AMRAP (as many rounds as possible). How many rounds can I get in 20 minutes? They take the mental willpower attack strategy from the gym and apply it to whatever they’re doing at home or at work.
What’s something you’re particularly proud of that never shows up on a website or a social page?
To piggyback on what I said before – those wins where members come in thinking this isn’t for them – one thing CrossFit has uniquely done is create a vehicle for community. We’ve really tried to create a fun and engaging community.
We had a moment where, right before class, a group of members was sitting around talking, and I let it go a little longer because I could tell they hadn’t seen each other in a while. After a few minutes, I said, “All right, guys, let’s meet at the board and do some fitness.” They jokingly said, “Oh, I guess.” The point is they come here to be with their friends and their community, and working out is kind of just one of the things we do. The gym and the workout become almost an element, and the community becomes the bigger piece.
That’s this hidden, overarching benefit – you attach yourself to a really fun group of people, and they’re on your team. They’re in your corner. They want you to succeed. We’re friends; we hang out, have barbecues, go to each other’s houses. The fitness brought us here and binds us, but the community is the firmament – the big thing underneath it all that doesn’t always get talked about. And I think it’s actually a significant variable in moving the needle on that whole lifestyle: getting closer to well and fit and all those things we’re after.
What are some ways you’ve seen that community benefit folks outside the gym in their personal lives?
The community can become really close, and you start developing levels of care for one another that are just deeper and more profound. I can think of situations where an athlete is struggling – maybe not meeting fitness goals, not quite getting there – and that starts affecting their emotions, their self-esteem. And I’ve seen the gym come up behind that person and encourage them, raise them up. I’ve seen that happen with personal stuff too, things totally unrelated to working out. People helping with dog sitting, helping someone move, being there for someone going through a divorce or a breakup. Members just being there for each other and caring at a level that goes well beyond PRs (personal records).
How can readers connect with Risen Strength?
Visit our website at https://risenstrength.com, Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/risenstrength/, or drop by the gym at 2106 NW 67th Place, Suite 11 here in Gainesville. Phone number is 352-494-6704.
Know a local business owner whose story should be told? Email us at editor@mainstreetdailynews.com
Editor’s note: This is the latest in a series of monthly business columns called “352Builds.” The content is opinion provided by Nathaniel Wingfield.