The Story of Awaken Athletics

Hey! My name is Katy Johnson, Owner, Founder & Head Coach of Awaken Athletics.

This gym has been a dream of mine for a really, really long time & now that it’s coming true, it all feels a little surreal. I wanted to give you some background on my journey to what brought me where I am today & my vision for Awaken Athletics.

Let’s rewind back all the way to high school days where I never really felt like I belonged in school sports and was never really seen as an athlete, yet I always knew that I had a passion for moving my body and prioritizing my health. I grew up doing gymnastics but stopped before middle school. After high school I mainly just focused on running to stay moving, lots and lots of running!! However, I never really felt that amazing or strong with high volumes of running nor could I attain the body composition I was really looking for.

In 2013 I was introduced to Crossfit & this is when my entire view on working out shifted. I loved Crossfit because it could be tailored to any fitness level and push anyone from where they were currently at, to be fitter. There was no end point, there was always a way to evolve and get better and I guess you could say, I became a little obsessed! I got certified in Crossfit Level 1, 2, Crossfit Gymnastics, Crossfit Olympic Lifting, USAW Olympic Lifting and my NASM Certification. I also got certified in Precision Nutrition level 1 & 2 as well as a Certified Nutrition coach through the Nutritional Coaching Institute. I went all in on becoming the best trainer and athlete that I could be, I definitely found my passion.

Over about the next 8 years I coached Crossfit at a local Crossfit gym and competed in Crossfit pretty heavily. This time taught me huge lessons in what hard work and dedication look like and a ton about what being a good coach means. Over the course of those years, I evolved as a coach and an athlete, slowly dialing in on what was really important to me and ultimately who I wanted to be as a coach and a human. Don’t get me wrong, this process is never-ending and of course, we should always be striving to grow and evolve, but I came to a point in my journey where I knew I needed to pivot and do something new.

The atmosphere of a Crossfit gym is amazing, don’t get me wrong. The excitement, the motivation, the push and the drive you can find there can be unmatched, but I was always searching for something more, I just didn’t quite know what that was yet. Fast forward a bit and enter the crazy year of 2020. The year that everything went virtual and we were required to pivot and really evaluate the way we were doing things.

This is when I started to spark a little dream of having my own gym. I had put in SO many years of coaching under another gym owner’s rules and ways of doing things, I felt ready to create something of my own. I had learned what I felt worked and didn’t work so well. I knew the kind of atmosphere I wanted to create and most of all, I knew that I wanted to focus on a space for only women.

Enter, Awaken Athletics.

Well, at first it wasn’t named that because it started out as me inviting a small group of women to come workout together. I knew there was a need for a space for women to be able to workout, feel safe, uplifted, motivated, educated & encouraged. One thing that I always struggled with before becoming a coach was knowing what the heck to do when I went in the gym, if I was even doing it right or being productive. Not to mention not feeling judged or uncomfortable while doing it! So I wanted to create a space where women didn’t have to worry about this, they could come in and know that they would be guided every step of the way and leave feeling uplifted and awesome.

Fast forward going on 4 years later and Awaken Athletics has grown into what feels like a dream to me. I get to spend my days with women from so many different walks of life, all coming to accomplish the same goal- do something for themselves that elevates and awakens their highest self. Movement truly is medicine- mentally and physically and it’s my life’s passion to coach and uplift other women to feel their absolute best through movement and nutrition. I want every woman that walks through the doors to feel confident in how to navigate a workout, to feel confident in their own skin, to feel strong and know they are capable of truly anything they set their mind to.

Awaken classes focus on functional bodybuilding- this is a style of lifting that focuses on building lean muscle mass. This is the style of lifting I have grown to love the most because it focuses on high quality movement that will build a strong body that allows you to feel amazing and do the things you love in your every day life! Most women, I have found just want to love the way the look and love the way they feel and this training style does both of those things when done consistently and paired with proper nutrition. I integrate various styles of Crossfit & HIIT workouts as well in order to train aerobic capacity and offer a good physical challenge in each class. Everything is modifiable and every workout is about what YOU can do and how you can push yourself, there’s no unhealthy competition or comparison. All good vibes and fun to be had (well some might argue what my version of fun is but everyone usually leaves with a smile:))!

Awaken Your Highest Self and come try a class, I promise you will thank yourself!