Bryan Babbitt: Invictus Member with a Cause
Written by Cat Blatner
Meet Invictus member Bryan Babbitt. Not only is Bryan an awesome competitor, but he is a big part of the community that we have here at CrossFit Invictus. I got a chance to ask Bryan a few questions so that we can all get to know him a bit better and hear about some of the awesome projects that he has going on outside of the gym.
Cat: How long have you been at Invictus?
Bryan: I joined Invictus in July 2012. I called to schedule my fundamentals session as I was driving from Texas to California. When I arrived in San Diego, I made one stop to drop off my luggage and my dad and I drove straight to Invictus to join.
Cat: What got you into CrossFit?
Bryan: In January 2012 a college friend, who was also a neighbor, introduced me to it. We started doing CrossFit style workouts on Fridays in my front yard. I fell in love during our first metcon on the grass.
Cat: What is your favorite part of CrossFit?
Bryan: The community of CrossFit is amazing. Everyone wants to compete and beat everyone else, but as bad as we want to win, there is the equal amount of joy when our competitors win or set a personal record. Your biggest competition in CrossFit is also your biggest supporter. Olympic lifting is pretty awesome too!
Cat: What do you do with your time outside of the gym?
Bryan: I’m a full-time test engineer at Northrop Grumman and a part-time graduate student earning a Systems Engineering Master’s Degree at USC. I am the father-to-be to a beautiful Rottweiler puppy (I get him at the end of May). I enjoy hanging out with my roommate and best friend, fellow Invictus member Ricky Tyler Moore (a.k.a. “Lil’ Ricky”), and I recently started an apparel company in my Mom’s honor called “Auggie Apparel”.
Cat: Tell me more about Auggie Apparel. I know that this brand is very dear to you. Explain your motivation for starting the company.
Bryan: My mother, Margaret “Auggie” Babbitt, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in March 2011 at the age of 51. Her diagnosis came as a huge shock to our family as she was already in Stage III (where the cancer spreads beyond the pelvis and into the abdomen) with no clear warning signs at all. For the next year she underwent chemo treatments and a roller coaster of good and bad health. My mother, unfortunately, passed on April 10th, 2012 at 52 years young. Since her passing, I have always wanted to do something to honor her and combat ovarian cancer, but I never knew exactly what I could do to fight the disease until the idea of Auggie Apparel was formed. I wanted to name the company after my mother in some way and since we were selling exercise gear as our main product, Auggie Apparel was an easy, catchy name we decided upon.
Cat: What prompted you to focus on exercise gear as your main product?
Bryan: The decision to focus on exercise gear was derived from observing the athletic community both inside the gym and outside. Obviously inside the gym everyone wears comfortable, trendy attire that won’t inhibit performance, but outside the gym, I was noticing, especially in San Diego, that the same or very similar style workout attire was being worn as casual comfortable clothes in public. Since I spend a lot of my time in the gym or gym attire in public, exercise gear is something that I know very well and is a great medium for branding, logos and growing public interest in our company and cause, especially within the CrossFit community.
Cat: What is the mission behind Auggie?
Bryan: Our mission is to save lives from ovarian cancer by spreading awareness through great athletic apparel.
The symptoms for ovarian cancer are subtle and not prominent. Our goal is to raise awareness for women to not ignore the ovarian cancer symptoms and to check often with their doctor to avoid this horrific disease. Auggie Apparel is dedicated to giving back 20% of our profits – 15% going to research to help the fight against ovarian cancer and 5% to go to families struggling financially due to ovarian cancer related medical bills.
Cat: Where can people go to check out Auggie Apparel?
Bryan: You can purchase Auggie Apparel, as well as learn more about ovarian cancer and the symptoms on our website Auggie Apparel and also check us out on Facebook and Instagram.
We will also be a vendor at all the Proving Grounds Competitions this year (Team Fit, Stars and Bars, SoCal Fitness Classic and Reindeer Games) as well as the Shades of Pink California Racing for the Pink 5k on May 2nd here in San Diego.
