Success Gave One of CrossFit’s Fittest Women a Sense of Stability | Invesloan.com

• Danielle Brandon is a top CrossFit athlete and one of the sport’s fittest women.
• She spoke exclusively to BI about how her unstable childhood shaped her.
• Brandon said she used sport as an escape and an outlet for her addictive tendencies.

When Danielle Brandon’s school friends asked about her family, she would lie and say her mom was dead.

Until her late 20s, Brandon, who was born in a small city in Idaho, kept the details of her chaotic upbringing — punctuated by her mother going in and out of prison — a secret, fearing pity.

But the 29-year-old told Business Insider she believes these challenges made her more resilient, independent, and determined to succeed. Her survival tactic of losing herself in gymnastics became a lifeline.

“It’s really hard for me to trust or lean on other people,” she said. “I kind of default to being alone, being independent in that sense of not wanting help.”

Now, she is one of the biggest stars of CrossFit, having competed at every CrossFit Games since 2019. In 2022, she finished 4th, her all-time best position, making her one of the sport’s fittest women on earth.

“I have to be successful in what I do because with that comes a sense of stability,” she said.

“It feels so normal to me that I don’t look at it as this inspiring story,” she added.

Brandon says she is an ‘addictive person’

Brandon moved from her grandparents’ basement, where she lived with her mom and brother as a young child, to a trailer park in Washington in 2002, then to her aunt and uncle’s after her mom went to prison for drug possession in 2004.

With four of their own kids, Brandon’s aunt and uncle struggled, she said. To keep Brandon busy, her grandparents suggested she try gymnastics. She thrived on the discipline and structure, and found she had an innate desire to push herself.

Brandon describes herself as an “addictive person,” a trait she thinks she got from her mom and absent dad, who have both struggled with addiction. Perhaps it was this tendency that saw her mom excel at swimming in her 20s, narrowly missing out on the Olympics, and bodybuilding competitively in her 30s, Brandon wonders.

“Once I’m really into something, I’m all into that,” Brandon said.

Brandon excelled at all sports

After her mom got out of prison in 2008, Brandon and her brother went back to live with her in the trailer in Washington. She encouraged her daughter to hone her gymnastics skills by doing handstand walks across the floor.

But as her talent blossomed, life didn’t get any easier: in 2009, one of her mom’s partners hung himself in their bathroom, and Brandon often threw away her mom’s drugs in the hope that she would spend more time with them. But police raided her home in eighth grade, and her mom went back to prison.

“It wasn’t normal, but it was routine for us,” Brandon said.

To avoid being at her crowded aunt and uncle’s place where she slept in a closet, Brandon spent as much time as possible at gymnastics training.

By the time she was in high school, Brandon’s skills — unusual for her age — were getting noticed.

“Sometime in my junior or senior year I went to a gym,” Brandon said. “They were like, ‘Try a muscle-up,’ and I did a strict ring muscle-up. Everyone was like, ‘What the heck?'”

Brandon took up track, pole vault, swimming, and diving alongside gymnastics. She was a natural, but her determination made her excel.

“It was hard not to be competitive,” she said.

Speaking on a documentary about Brandon’s life produced by her clothing sponsor RAD, her now agent, Cooper Marsh, said, “When others might crumble during chaos, Danielle thrives.”

Her coaches encouraged her to go to college

By the time college application season came around in 2013, schools were writing to Brandon, urging her to apply for sports scholarships.

At first, having never considered college, Brandon “just blew it off,” but ultimately accepted a scholarship to California State University, Sacramento with some encouragement from her coaches.

“It was really cool because I felt like I was creating my own life,” she said. Brandon, whose earliest memories are of taking care of her brother and mom, was finally in a position where she only had to look after herself.

Her mom was released from prison and got clean in Brandon’s first year of college, and she stayed with her mom that summer.

“It was like meeting up with a stranger,” she said. “We didn’t really know where we fit into each other’s lives.”

Over time, the pair rebuilt their relationship, and Brandon’s mom is hugely supportive of her, she said.

Handstand walks got Brandon noticed

During university, Brandon started going to a CrossFit gym and got hooked. But it wasn’t until she graduated in 2019 that she was able to fulfill her ambition of competing in the CrossFit Open, which is the first step towards competing at the CrossFit Games.

Pole vault and the 400 meters were her official sports at college, and CrossFit and college athletics competitions were always on the same date.

Brandon, who juggled training with two to three other jobs, made it to the CrossFit Games the first year she was able to try.

A relative unknown, Brandon caught the attention of the CrossFit world with her impressive handstand walks, now her signature move, and won the second event.

After the 2019 Games, brands became interested in her, and she got an agent and a coach. “I didn’t know how to handle it,” she said. “I’d never thought it could be a career. It all happened so quickly.”

Never forgetting where she came from

While Brandon’s star has risen in the CrossFit world, her focus is simple: train hard and love her friends. “It attracts good things, I guess,” she said.

She knows she won’t be an athlete forever and a big priority is giving back: She wants to help kids who, like her, didn’t have the easiest upbringings.

Brandon is most proud of staying connected to her past while continually growing. “I truly don’t think I’ll ever forget where I came from,” she said.