In this video I take you down memory lane and explain exactly why Ultimate Fitness Birmingham even exists. I’ve had Ultimate Fitness for 11 years now, and before that I was running the world-famous Temple Gym (Dorian Yates’ place) from 2007 to 2012. People always ask why I left—truth is, it wasn’t just me deciding to walk away. I was kind of kicked out, and that’s a whole story on its own, but it was also the point where I knew I needed a new path. Temple was iconic, but it was literally a dark basement in the city centre. We used to joke it was “Templus” because you’d be down there 10–15 hours a day with no sunlight, and after a few years it properly got to me—I was getting depressed and couldn’t see a way out. That’s when I realised Birmingham had room for another proper independent gym. I found the original Ultimate Fitness spot (it used to be a record shop), knew instantly it was the one, negotiated, and five weeks later we opened. I also talk about why we outgrew the first location fast—around 400 members in a small gym, BodyPower season bringing everyone in, and equipment limitations where buying one thing meant selling another. Moving to the current place was about levelling up, but even now I’m thinking bigger again.