The Coach Video games, introduced by iFIT, has taken seasoned athletes and promising newcomers within the discipline of endurance sports activities, and pitted them in opposition to one another within the run as much as the fever pitch last on February 5, the place a $250,000 money prize and a chance to affix the iFIT teaching crew awaits the winner.
On this spoiler-free interview, M&F caught up with contestant and Olympic heptathlete, Chari Hawkins, to seek out out what she discovered most tough, and why irrespective of the self-discipline, it’s completely okay to return final, simply as long as you attempt your finest.
Who Is Chari Hawkins? The Olympic Heptathlete Constructed for Endurance
Chari Hawkins didn’t simply make an Olympic sport her chosen vocation, she just about selected to do all the Olympics as a substitute. As a result of, as a heptathlete, this insanely match feminine from Idaho is required to smash seven completely different competitions over two days. For these retaining rely, day one entails the hurdles, excessive soar, shot put, and a 200-meter run, then day two rounds out with a protracted soar, javelin throw, and an 800-meter run. It’s a course of that calls for velocity, power, and stamina, and luckily, Hawkins has all these qualities in abundance.
In 2011, whereas a freshman at Utah State, this tenacious monitor and fielder received the Western Convention Outside Championship. In 2018, she took gold within the England Athletics Mixed Occasions Championships, and in 2022 received the Heptathlon Gold within the mixed occasions in Spain. Nonetheless, nothing might have ready her for the challenges that lay forward in The Coach Video games, now streaming on Prime Video, the place Hawkins could be required to navigate unfamiliar territory to achieve checkpoints, abseil unstable cliff faces, and even wade via seaweed.
Olympian Chari Hawkins Shares Endurance Secrets and techniques from ‘The Coach Video games’
“The factor that’s loopy is, I don’t spend a lot time at sea,” shared Hawkins of being outdoors her consolation zone on the present. “That they had us swim two miles, on a paddle board, out and again. I acquired caught in a rip present, and I used to be caught for such a very long time that any individual got here as much as me on a ship and it’s like, ‘By the way in which, you haven’t moved in an hour!” Hawkins grew to become accustomed to iFIT as a pupil in Utah. “I’ve been actually conscious of them for a very long time,” she defined, noting that the prospect to grow to be a coach on the digital health platform could be an ideal match, since she already has her personal on-line teaching enterprise. What she wasn’t conscious of previous to filming, nonetheless, was the prospect to seize a hefty money prize. “They advised us that on day one within the intro,” explains the athlete of the $260K jackpot. “Say what!?”
Throughout The Coach Video games, Hawkins could be compelled to dig deep, enduring immense fatigue and bodily stresses, at one level struggling extreme pores and skin abrasions and knee ache that left her unable to stroll. Nonetheless, getting proper again up after falling is tried and examined territory for this gutsy woman.
Psychological Toughness Meets Excessive Health in The Coach Video games Finale
In 2024, throughout her Olympic debut in Paris, Hawkins’ desires have been crushed when she didn’t clear her first excessive soar goal of 1.71 meters within the second occasion of the Heptathlon, placing her out of competition for a podium place. Whereas the devastated athlete was conscious that she might bow out early, this inspiration as a substitute accomplished all the occasion. “There’s that a part of you that simply desires to go house,” Hawkins tells M&F. “I used to be so unhappy, and I used to be so shocked and disillusioned and embarrassed.”
Relatively than minimize and run, Hawkins created an unimaginable chapter within the story of her profession to date. “I sort of needed to ask myself, ‘what do I must do proper now?’ and ‘who am I doing this for?’ And the reply that I got here up with first was that I’m doing it for the 2016 and 2021 me, who labored simply as exhausting as 2024 Chari, however didn’t make the crew.”
Together with her family and friends within the crowd, Hawkins took a second of immense disappointment and turned it right into a celebration of each unhappy and completely happy tears in Paris, as she accomplished the heptathlon, and did herself proud. “Now I get to speak about this with a lot happiness and pleasure, as a substitute of a lot embarrassment and disgrace,” she explains.
Whether or not it’s through her tough Olympic check in 2024, or her most up-to-date challenges in The Coach Video games, Hawkins has an essential message for many who lack the arrogance to crush their targets. “I feel the good factor for me, that I’ve realized via my complete life, however one thing that the Coach Video games actually taught me, was each single factor you attempt, you’ll at all times shock your self in case you do it along with your complete coronary heart. I actually like to push myself in issues that deliver me pleasure.”
The Coach Video games is on the market to stream on Prime Video, with the finale scheduled for February 5, 2026. For extra data click on right here.
To comply with Chari Hawkins on Instagram, click on right here.