The Indian Startup Show

Building Strength for Everyday People: Adarsh Gopalakrishnan founder of Move101 on Making Fitness Accessible.

Nov 10, 2024

Adarsh Gopalakrishnan, founder of Move101 in Chennai, shares his journey from a school dropout to owning a unique strength and conditioning gym. He discusses making fitness accessible, how word-of-mouth drives his business rather than ads, and the prevalent protein gaps in Indian diets. Adarsh highlights the challenges posed by social media pressures in fitness, while revealing how the pandemic spurred innovation in coaching methods. His insights encourage prioritizing health over unrealistic expectations in a world increasingly impacted by obesity.

45:40

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Episode guests

Adarsh Gopalakrishnan

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Episode notes

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Quick takeaways

Adarsh Gopalakrishnan transformed his fitness passion into a business by creating Move 101, a supportive gym tailored for everyday people.

Utilizing word-of-mouth marketing, Move 101 boasts an impressive 80-85% client retention rate, showcasing the benefits of community engagement.

The guest highlights the critical role of proper nutrition, particularly protein, in fitness, emphasizing the need for sustainable dietary habits in India.

Deep dives

Origin Story and Passion for Fitness

The guest shares a personal experience that sparked his interest in fitness during high school when he developed a crush on a girl who admired a television personality's physique. This motivation pushed him to lift weights and maintain fitness as a constant aspect of his life, even while pursuing varied career paths in financial analysis and journalism. Eventually, he decided to turn his passion for fitness into a business, founding Move 101, a gym dedicated to strength and conditioning. This desire for personal growth and attraction to fitness led him to create a supportive environment for clients looking to improve their health.

Intro

3min

From Dropout to Gym Owner

6min

Navigating Nutritional Gaps: Meal Maps and Protein Insights

7min

Yogurt, Fitness, and the Social Media Influence

11min

Cultural Insights on Food and Fitness Innovation During COVID

4min

The Coaching-Centric Gym Model

14min

The world is getting fatter! In this episode, we dive deep into fitness and nutrition with Adarsh Gopalakrishnan, founder of Move101 in Chennai. Move101 is a unique strength and conditioning gym tailored for regular folks with little to no training background, and it also offers online coaching.

Adarsh’s journey into fitness began in an unexpected way: he started working out to impress a girl who liked the biceps of a popular MTV VJ. He had no biceps and he wanted biceps and he started lifting weight and he got biceps! Thirteen years later, he’s trained hundreds of clients both in-person and online.

Here’s what you can expect in this episode:

Adarsh’s Journey: Being an unconventional, anti-institutional kid who dropped out of school.
Right Place, Right Time: Catching the CrossFit wave in 2008–2010 and building a unique, community-driven gym.
Word-of-Mouth Success: Why Adarsh spends zero on Google or Facebook ads and still has an 80% client retention rate—higher than most big box gyms.
The Protein Problem in India: Why Indians often lack protein in their diets, the supply chain issues around whey protein, and what alternatives you can eat.
Fitness in a Post-COVID World: How the pandemic actually boosted his business and his thoughts on the global obesity crisis.
Social Media Pressure: The unrealistic expectations to look “jacked” and the common mistakes people make in strength training (like too much volume and variety, and poor goal setting).
Adarsh shares insights on improving your communication skills
Training Myths & Realistic Goals: Why you don’t have to train like a beast, loving single-leg squats, and why a six-pack is hard. But a four-pack is good enough!
The Problem with Corporate Wellness Programs: Why Adarsh isn’t a fan and his thoughts on the most effective exercises.
Navigating Diet Fads and Fitness Trends: Adarsh’s advice on avoiding the hype around the latest diet crazes, fitness gadgets, and weight-loss drugs.
The Indian Fitness Market Today: His views on why he’s not interested in scaling his business and how his philosophy on fitness has evolved over the years.

And for a fun finish: we talk about how to handle those family gatherings where well-meaning aunties offer Pepsi and jalebi when you’re trying to stay on track!

Links

https://www.move101.net/

Hosted And Produced by Neil Patel

https://www.linkedin.com/today/author/neilpatel2

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