Fitness entrepreneur blends styles, creates a new workout

Chris Wade seeks to build ‘community’ at X4 Fitness in Lane Parke

CrossFit training has become wildly popular since it was created in 2000.

There are about 4 million people doing CrossFit at about 13,000 affiliated gyms in 120 countries, according to NBC News.

High intensity interval training (HIIT) has also soared in popularity in the United States in recent years, according to the American College of Sports Medicine and other online sources.

This all created an opportunity for fitness professional and entrepreneur Chris Wade.

In 2018, Wade started his own facility in West Homewood called Nexus Fitness.

“I was able to incorporate both,” he told Village Living, referring to CrossFit and HIIT.

Even better, Wade was able to create his own HIIT method, called X4.

X4 Fitness

► WHERE: 900 Lane Parke Court, Suite C6

► PHONE: 205-771-0256

► WEBSITE: X4mountainbrook.com

► HOURS: Monday-Friday, 5 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.; Saturday, 8-10:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9-10:30 a.m.

Because of the popularity of X4, Wade wanted to create a studio dedicated to it.

This led to Wade’s brand-new business located in Mountain Brook, called X4 Fitness.

His new X4 Fitness location opened in the Lane Parke shopping center in Mountain Brook Village on May 17.

The new space includes workout equipment, a front desk, retail area and locker rooms.

The boutique facility features group fitness classes where members rotate between four workout blocks as a way to keep the X4 programming fun and challenging.

Mountain Brook was the perfect place to open the first stand-alone X4 space, Wade said.

“We just needed to provide the next home to build and replicate the community we’d found at Nexus,” he said.

“Community” is an important concept for Wade, who said that he is looking forward to building a community in the Mountain Brook area through X4.

A native of Newnan, Georgia, Wade played football at Clemson University.

He graduated from college in 2008, became involved in the fitness industry and moved to Birmingham in 2011.

He helped launch a CrossFit affiliate in 2015 and later worked for two years at Orangetheory Fitness — a chain of HIIT studios — before starting Nexus Fitness.

When Wade developed X4, he wanted to create a way to attract new members.

“I wanted to diversify my membership base by offering high-intensity interval training,” he said.

HIIT workouts combine short bursts of intense exercise with periods of rest or lower-intensity exercise and provide athletes with a consistent variety of anaerobic and aerobic training, Wade said.

His goal was also to create an “approachable workout” that would draw people from all walks of life and fitness backgrounds, Wade said.

The X4 method involves four blocks or stations —TrueForm, TRX, Strength and Capacity.

TrueForm is a self-propelling treadmill that provides low-impact running compared to your traditional treadmill.

“You are the power, so you control how fast or slow you go,” Wade said.

The TRX station uses suspension training to work different muscle groups and to increase flexibility and endurance.

The strength station focuses on building muscle and overall strength.

The capacity station features gear that can mimic drum bells and other traditional weights and works the body’s different muscle groups.

While these stations stay the same, the movements performed and equipment used in each station varies daily in order to keep members engaged and challenged.

Any and all workout movements can be modified.

“It is constantly changing, challenging our members but still scalable to meet anyone wherever they are in their fitness journey,” Wade said.

According to an X4 news release, the new facility offers anyone a place to come and work out, get better and build community.

In fact, X4 is “founded on community,” Wade said.

“We want everyone to invest in themselves and others when they come into our gym,” he said, “We want X4 to be a place where people can foster relationships with others and build friendships. That’s been my goal with being a fitness instructor and owner from the start.”

X4 should be “your happy place” and a place where people can meet and develop “healthy relationships,” Wade said.

Following an important fitness-industry trend, X4 specializes in group, not individual, training.

“X4 is founded on community and we believe one of the best ways to invest in that community is by working out together,” Wade said.

The members and coaches are there to encourage each other, he said.

Wade hopes that more people will go to the gym given the apparent decline in the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We are optimistic about people rejoining us back in the gym as things begin to open back up more,” he said. “We are already seeing people begin to return to the gym.”

The facility has been following all available information from the CDC, as well as state and local health officials, regarding the COVID-19 safety procedures they should follow, Wade said.

The facility no longer requires coaches or participants to wear masks, said Wade, citing the lifting of the state mask mandate.

However, he said they are taking extra precautions, such as the staff spending countless hours deep cleaning the whole facility regularly.

In addition, members must use sanitizing wipes between stations to clean all equipment used during a workout.

COVID-19 has certainly had a major effect on the fitness industry, with gym memberships stagnant nationally, Wade said.

The sector “took a massive hit in the past 18 months,” he said.

It is difficult to forecast the post-COVID reality, Wade said.

“Last summer, many studies showed a hesitancy to return to the gym quickly, but we’re still learning what the national trends are as we come out on the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said.

Fitness facilities were doing extremely well before the pandemic, Wade said.

“We are hopeful to see that same energy and excitement for fitness soon,” he said.

Wae said that he has been very “encouraged” by the response X4 has received since opening.

“We have had a lot of support from Lane Parke and the other tenants in the shopping center,” he said.

The Mountain Brook X4 location is part of a network of X4 Fitness standalone and affiliate gyms, Wade said.