Meet Shane Farmer of Dark Horse Rowing in Talmadge

Today we’d like to introduce you to Shane Farmer.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I first came to San Diego via a move to Mexico in 2005 as a 19-year-old when my life was in transition, unsure of where I was going to school, and what was next for me.

Luckily, that fall I was accepted to the University of San Diego (as a waitlist student) but didn’t know anything or anyone in the area.

One of my first days on campus I was approached by a fellow student who had been recruited to row at USD and he suggested I give it a try due to my size so I obliged and gave it a shot. Within 6 months I had fallen in love with the sport of rowing and had moved my way into the Varsity Boat at USD and remained there for the next 3.5 years as we built our team up and made it to the IRA Collegiate National Championships for Rowing.

Post college, I didn’t have a big future in rowing, but I settled into a local CrossFit gym and quickly found the joy of competition again as I began competing in CrossFit in 2010. Thankfully I was with a good gym and we were able to go the CrossFit Games 4 years in a Row (2010-2013), a massive accomplishment.

During this time, I came to realize that there was a shortage of knowledge around rowing in the CrossFit Community so I began coaching my own seminars. Shortly after, Concept2, the company that manufactures rowing machines and leads the CrossFit Rowing seminars, saw what I was doing and asked me to come on as one of their lead Instructors. I held this position for 6 years.

During this time, I was coaching locally and developed a strong passion for helping change people’s lives through fitness, nutrition, and habit changing and rowing happened to be the focal point of all that I was doing. I realized though, that my ability to be in any one place at a time was limiting the number of lives I could impact and help change so I founded Dark Horse Rowing, an online company that took what I was doing in person, and helped people to do it from home anywhere in the world.

We took Dark Horse and built it into the second largest Rowing YouTube channel in the world, have now coached thousands of people from San Diego to China, we’ve founded a separate branch of our company that now trains coaches remotely to use the rowing machine for their athletes, again from anywhere in the world, and we’re beginning to work with Community Rowing San Diego, a local non-profit dedicated to bringing rowing to underserved youth as a way of making rowing accessible to ANYONE.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It has not been a smooth road, nor a clear one.

One of the hardest parts of starting a business is the uncertainty that comes with every decision you make. We had wrong turns, partners that didn’t work out, I’ve started a family…all things that couldn’t be predicted or planned for.

One of the things I’ve learned to be absolutely true is that no plan goes off perfectly. Even the successful ones have their missed steps and it’s your ability to pivot on those missed steps and turn them into a positive that can be the change maker in your success.

Every step has been an opportunity to learn, to grow, to better myself as a human being, and to try and enrich the lives of everyone around me.

Through all the failures, we’ve found incredible success and without them we wouldn’t be who we are or where we are today.

Please tell us about Dark Horse Rowing.
Dark Horse Rowing is one of the largest resources for indoor rowing workouts, education, and fitness in the world. We are the subject matter experts for the Concept2 rowing machine and have expanded to include other workout machines, online seminars for coaches, and have the second largest rowing channel in the world on YouTube which we’re particularly proud of.

What sets us apart is our willingness to tackle any topic of fitness and create content around it so it’s understandable by all. When we started we made a commitment to providing content that others weren’t willing to do and we’ve stood by that throughout our existence and it has paid off in our growth and success.

Specifically, what we provide is workouts for the rowing machine that can be done on people’s machines at home, we train coaches how to use rowing machines for their clients, and we lead the charge for understanding how rowing works for the fitness community.

If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
I would have created even more content… I’d have wasted less time worrying about which direction to go and I would have asked more questions of our customers to let them tell me what they wanted to see.

Pricing:

• Our monthly workout plan is $29/mos for 2 workouts/week
• Our online coaches academy is only $299, and released twice a year

Contact Info:

• Website: www.darkhorserowing.com
• Email: support@darkhorserowing.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/darkhorserowing/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/darkhorserowing/

Image Credit:
Caragh Camera
Preston Smith Photography

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