AB Show Keynoter Randy Hetrick Talks TRX Success

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It began by accident. Isolated from fitness equipment during a 1997 deployment, Navy SEAL Randy Hetrick rigged some martial arts belts he found packed with his gear into a makeshift workout tool — what would evolve over the following eight years, including a stint at Stanford Business School, into the suspension trainer at the core of fitness juggernaut TRX. AB senior editor Paul Steinbach asked Hetrick, who will deliver a keynote address titled "Lessons of a Frogman: Business Leadership I Learned as a SEAL" at AB Show 2018 this November in New Orleans, for a closer look at the surprises and successes that have turned his functional training equipment and education brand into a rapidly growing $60 million-a-year enterprise.

What is a frogman exactly?
Frogman is the term of endearment that is used inside the Naval special warware community to describe themselves. It harkens back to the World War II and Korea era in which the underwater demolition teams were formally attached to the Navy, and they were the guys who went in and did all the pre-invasion reconnaissance and a little bit of near-shore direct-action missions — along-the-coast radar installations, security outpost, that kind of thing.

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