In a year packed full of unprecedented challenges for small businesses, one Middle Tennessee company is eyeing growth with optimism and determination.

Ruby Ramdhan, the owner of Nashville’s Marathon Pilates, has grown a healthy business with years of professional experience in the health care industry, and a passion for wellness.

Ramdhan had been a certified Pilates instructor for years before purchasing Marathon Pilates in 2019, but then, the calendar rolled over to 2020.

The March tornado seriously damaged the company’s East Nashville location, which remains closed. Soon after, the COVID-19 pandemic put the world on lockdown, with gyms and fitness studios of all kinds forced to close.

Ramdhan and her team learned to pivot quickly, offering virtual classes with a high level of production professionalism. Complying with rapidly changing regulations step-by-step, Marathon Pilates offers private sessions at its Green Hills location and group classes at its 12 South location.

Now, Ramdhan has completed her plan to expand the 12 South studio, more than doubling the physical size from 900 to 2100 sf, and adding programs and services.

“I want this to be a place of healing,” Ramdhan says. “Pilates is just the beginning.”

The 1200 sf expansion allows for larger group classes and will plan to include other guest trainers to showcase yoga, barre, nutrition counseling, and more. Specialty gift items, juice and snacks have been added to the menu, with a focus on supporting other small business, especially woman-owned. The expansion allows clients who prefer a private session their own space as well.

“It’s important for us to support local business and products,” Ramdhan says.

An area in the expanded studio will accommodate video and streaming events, wellness workshops and education. A flex space will allow multi-use wellness programs such as Assisted Lymphatic Therapy (ALT), therapeutic massage, and physical therapy with special programs for pelvic floor issues (pre- and post-natal, trauma, etc.).

Ramdhan and her team of certified and master trainers share a vision of healing that expands beyond Marathon’s growing walls. Future plans include creating school programs, pop-up events, collaboration and partnerships with other wellness-focused companies.

“I want to send out a message that Pilates is for everyone,” Ramdhan says. “I truly believe everyone belongs. Pilates improves and enhances all other workouts. This is a community for all to find welcome, wellness and healing.”

On July 6th, The New Beginnings Center (TNBC) announced a new partnership with Agrin Health. This partnership will provide clients of TNBC access to Agrin Health’s Health eBiography® web-based health record application. The pilot program saw 35 women participate.

“What gets measured gets managed, and we are excited to see the positive impact Health eBiography® has on our clients’ outcomes,” said Tash Weddle, founder and CEO of The New Beginnings Center. “The Health eBiography® provides an easy, effective tool for our clients to track nutrition and healthy behaviors like drinking water, hours of sleep, self-care activities and movement.”

“We know that the highest-performing care teams successfully manage the cycle of understanding what’s going on with their patients or clients and engage them in the actions needed to make progress,” said Karen Thomas, founder and CEO of Agrin Health. “We also know that a collaborative flow of information is necessary to facilitate this cycle.”

“The team at The New Beginnings Center has already achieved amazing results for the women of the Nashville community, and we are honored to facilitate the improved information exchange that supports their efforts to help more women achieve and sustain a healthier lifestyle, especially as the stress and disruption to our daily routines caused by the COVID pandemic threatens our ability to adopt and sustain healthy behaviors.”

One of their clients, Camilla, stated, “The Agrin Health app is very user friendly and I love that I can use the app in the moment right after I complete a New Beginnings workout.”

Another, Misty, says the “New Beginnings [Center] has worked very hard to not let social distancing and stress get me off track even though I’m working from home and also homeschooling two kids.”

The benefits of this new partnership include:

A streamlined approach to tracking healthy behaviors that will improve a client’s overall compliance and success

Ease of providing data on client compliance and progress to TNBC’s coaching staff

Better health outcomes for clients and improved efficiencies in data collection

TNBC clients retain the Health eBiography® for life and can use it for their family as well as with other care team members

The New Beginnings Center has been serving economically disadvantaged women in the Nashville area since 2011 by providing them with world-class nutrition, lifestyle and fitness coaching. Through the nonprofit’s programs, clients attend classes free of charge, or for a small fee based on a sliding scale dependent on income, for 12 weeks and have access to exercise classes for as long as they would like after they complete the program. Since the nonprofit started, more than 3,000 Nashville women have participated in its programs, and have had successful outcomes that include weight loss, increased daily physical activity and reduced blood pressure. Learn more about The New Beginnings Center’s online and in-person programs by visiting www.thenewbeginningscenter.org.

Agrin Health is a next-gen health tech company focused on facilitating collaboration between Health+Wellness consumers and their care teams, and on enabling consumers to participate fully in achieving better health outcomes. The Health eBiography® application makes it easy for providers and their patients/clients to maintain a relationship between visits, inform their decisions with social determinant and other illusive data, and remove barriers to care plan adherence. For more information, visit www.AgrinHealth.com.

by Ryan Freebing

F3 stands for Fitness, Fellowship and Faith and traces its roots to a free, participant-led boot camp workout held on Saturday mornings. The leaders of F3 launched their first Saturday workout on January 1st, 2011 on the campus of A.G. Middle School in Charlotte, North Carolina. F3 Nashville started on September 13, 2014, and it has been growing steadily ever since.

The mission of F3 is to plant, grow, and serve small workout groups for the invigoration of male community leadership.

Their workouts are free of charge and open to all men, eighteen years and older. All of the workouts are held outdoors, rain or shine, hot or cold, and the men who participate also lead the workout in a rotating fashion, with no training or certification necessary. This allows each of them to be placed in a leadership role, instructing, teaching and holding themselves accountable to their peers.

While the classic F3 workout requires no equipment other than workout clothes, gravity and the great outdoors, their growth has allowed regional leaders to introduce specialized workouts, including bike rides, gear-focused workouts that include kettlebells and other heavy metal, track workouts for runners and trail runs.

The workouts take place at publicly accessible venues, including parks, school campuses, churches and even in parking lots. All of the workouts end with a Circle of Trust.

In the Circle of Trust (CoT), “every guy gives his birth name, his F3 nickname and his age. Even if you’re brand-new, we’ll slap you with an F3 nickname so we can remember who you are the next time you come,” says F3 Nashville leader Joe Fogarty.

“All you have to do is show up. It really is free. It’s open to all men and all shapes and sizes, and you don’t have to be in shape necessarily. Yes, we do meet early, but don’t let your excuses remove you from opportunity,” Joe says. To find out more and join a workout visit at https://f3nashville.com.

by Ryan Freebing

Running a gym during the pandemic has been no simple task. Over the past couple of months, many small businesses have been changing the way they operate in order to obey new city guidelines while still maintaining a steady revenue stream as they pay regular rent, equipment and utility fees.

Currently, Nashville and Davidson County are in a modified Phase 2 environment of Mayor Cooper’s Reopen Plan which means gyms are allowed to operate at half capacity.

Even though keeping their members safe and healthy has always remained to be most gym’s #1 priority, regular cleaning and sanitizing have also increased and become a major part of everyone’s daily routine.

At Fit Factory Nashville, every member is doing their part to keep the gym clean during this time. “We ask all of our members to wipe down their equipment after class so that the next class coming in can start with fresh, clean equipment. We also have designated ‘boxes’ where individuals will workout and face regulations as you enter and exit the gym.”

With a half capacity rule in place, gym owners must ensure they are maximizing each class period throughout any given day.

“No gym owner likes to charge their members a ‘no show’ or late cancellation fee. We understand life happens and our schedules can change quickly, especially during this time. But the reality is when you don’t show up to a class you’ve signed up for, you are taking away an opportunity for someone else to workout. When we developed our ‘no show’ policy, we thought it would be a great idea to donate the collected fees to charity, instead of profiting from the scenario. It’s been really well received in the gym.”

“We started out charging $20 for ‘no show’ fees, but have recently dropped it down to $5. Our window to cancel a class is 12 hours and we do have a waitlist, so we feel as though there is plenty of room to make an adjustment should something come up and you have a last minute schedule change. We know the system isn’t perfect, but we are doing everything we can to foster a family-like environment that is helpful for everyone.”

“Overall, we have been able to donate $1,640 to Gideon’s Army and $3,240 to Love146 and we hope to continue to do so as long as we can.”