Recovery, Faith and a new gym
- Carter Dooner
- 14 hours ago
- 4 min read
DICKINSON — Perched along District Way on the northwest side of Dickinson, Origin Performance owner Colby Wartman is in his second week breaking in his new gym in Dickinson.
On one side of the room, he finishes up a training session with a young boxer putting in the last reps of his workout. Moments later, he guides an older gentleman through his workout for the day. It’s a brief moment, but it captures what his vision and his new gym is all about.
“My thing is, everybody is an athlete. It's just varying degrees, right? Wartman said. “98% of people over the age of 30 will never sprint again in their lives. So we're trying to make people more athletic for life, so that they can be a better dad, better mom, better business owner, better whatever.”
For the last 10 years, Wartman has worked in the physical fitness space. In previous years, he was one of the leaders at Iron Chapel, another gym in Dickinson. A couple of years ago, he stepped into Origin Performance.
With his clientele shifting from around 40 athletes to the hundreds, an upgrade was necessary.
Stop in, and you'll find everything from cold plunges and saunas to red light therapy. For parents, a playroom for kids sits three doors in on the right.
There are kids working out year-round. Catch one of his athletes at their softball or baseball game, and there’s a good chance they were in the building earlier that morning training.
“Every single professional athlete trains during the season. Every single college athlete trains during the season. And in the landscape of youth athletics right now, if you aren't, you're behind the ball,” Wartman said.
One of the gym's top focuses is increasing speed. With the opening of the new gym, Wartman and his coaches can test athletes with a full setup to run the 40-yard dash. Along the back wall, signs mark milestones. If athletes hit a new PR in speed, they get to sign their name.
“So back in the day, it was about hitting the 1,000-pound club.’ We do mile-an-hour clubs, so when you hit a top speed, that's what you get to sign. It's honestly probably the biggest part of our culture,” Wartman said.
Finding faith
Wartman’s transition from standout Dickinson State University football player to the fitness world was anything but cut and dried. This year, he reached 10 years of sobriety as a recovering opiate addict.
What can sometimes be taboo, Wartman doesn’t shy away from. And if you look close enough, you’ll see a silver cross with black linking draped across his chest.
Faith has played a huge role in his life, and it’s what he credits as he looks around his new state-of-the-art building.
“Literally, it's the one thing that brought it together,” Wartman said of his faith. “Honestly, I wouldn't have made it without it. It was a super hard transition – four months of just the highest stress I've ever had in my life.”
Look up a few videos on his social media page, and he’s been open about the struggles of opening a gym. He’s poured his life into it. He's helped out by several other trainers, including Brianna Baker, the team's women's strength and conditioning coach, who runs the women's classes for the gym.
And walk around long enough, his dog, Sage, will follow you, dropping a ball at your feet, trying to rope you into a game of fetch – something the new space has plenty of room for. A few steps upstairs, you’ll find a chair and toys for his son when he stops by. His life is there.
“These last four months transitioning here have been two times harder than going through treatment, going through rehab, getting sober,” Wartman said. “Just the stress of growth, the stress of uncertainty, the stress as a dad providing for your family and doing something crazy big.”
And through it all, it’s that silver cross that takes center stage. Wartman says it’s not just about making his athletes better – it’s about making them better people. That motto is plastered at the bottom of nearly every one of Origin’s social media posts.
Since the start of his journey, more than 160 athletes he’s coached have gone on to receive scholarships to compete at the next level.
“You don't know until you're 10 years down the road and you see all these kids having families and doing big things, it’s kind of cool,” Wartman said.
And on the stress meter, Wartman’s seems to be on the downswing. His grand opening two weekends ago included a food truck and different fitness competitions. As it wound down, it was a proverbial – and probably real – weight lifted off the 10-year coach’s shoulders.
And when it comes down to it, the reason behind it all is simple.
“My little boy walks in here and just starts going wild, sprinting and running and jumping and doing whatever,” Wartman said. “That’s why I did it, man. So he can have a cool life and see all the cool things.”
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