Most fitness brands are born in boardrooms. Throwdown was born in a cage.
When Ted Joiner founded Throwdown in 2003 in Southern California, he wasn't thinking about cardio floors or group fitness classes. He was thinking about the world's most demanding athletes and what they needed to train, perform, and compete at the highest level. His first customers weren't gym members — they were UFC fighters. And the equipment he built for them had to survive conditions that would destroy anything less than exceptional.
What happened next is the story of how the toughest equipment in the fight game became the standard for commercial functional training in facilities around the world. From the UFC Octagon to Crunch, from MMA camps to hotel gyms, Throwdown took what it learned building for champions and brought it to every floor that needed to be more than a row of treadmills.
In 2003, mixed martial arts was at an inflection point. The UFC had been bought out of near-bankruptcy two years earlier by the Fertitta brothers and Dana White for $2 million, and was beginning the long push toward legitimacy that would eventually make it one of the largest sports organizations in the world. (ESPN, "The Bloody Life of a UFC Octagon," 2025) The sport was growing fast — and so was the demand for equipment worthy of the athletes competing in it.
Ted Joiner saw that gap and built directly into it. Throwdown started, as the brand puts it, "at the mat with an Octagon that supported the toughest UFC battles." (Physical Activity Facilities, "Throwdown Pushing Boundaries into the Future with HIIT") The commitment was simple and uncompromising: build what elite athletes actually need, not what looks good in a catalog. That standard, established on day one, is the reason the Throwdown name still carries weight in rooms where serious training happens.
The proof came in the form of the fighters themselves. Some of the biggest names in UFC history — Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture, Ronda Rousey, Quinton "Rampage" Jackson, the Diaz brothers — chose Throwdown gear because it worked. (Throwdown Industries, "About Us") Not because of a marketing deal. Because when you're preparing for the Octagon, equipment failure is not an option, and the athletes knew the difference.
Building equipment for elite fighters creates an unusual problem: the standards are too high for the product to stay niche. When you've engineered rigs, bags, sleds, and free weights to handle the training demands of professional MMA athletes, it turns out that recreational gym members, personal trainers, and commercial facility operators want the same thing.
Through the mid-2000s and into the next decade, Throwdown steadily expanded its product line and its commercial footprint. The brand grew to serve more than 20 countries, becoming a one-stop supplier of MMA equipment, impact sports accessories, and broader commercial functional training solutions to the fitness industry. (AccessNewswire, "XFit Brands and Throwdown Partner With We Love MMA," 2016)
At the same time, the fitness industry was undergoing its own transformation. The age of the isolated machine, one exercise, one movement, one muscle group, was giving way to functional training: compound movements, multi-planar loading, the kind of full-body conditioning that athletes had always trained with but gyms had never fully embraced. Throwdown had been building for exactly this type of training since day one. The market was finally catching up.
Throwdown's XTC rig system, modular, configurable, engineered for heavy commercial use, became a centerpiece of the emerging functional training zone. Where gyms had once allocated floor space to rows of fixed machines, forward-thinking operators were carving out HIIT zones anchored by Throwdown rigs that could support dozens of exercises, multiple simultaneous users, and programming formats that kept members coming back for something different every session.
By the mid-2010s, High-Intensity Interval Training had gone from a niche performance methodology to the dominant programming format in commercial fitness. Health clubs that had built their identity around cardio machines and selectorized strength equipment found themselves competing with boutique studios that offered 45-minute group workouts built on functional movements, partner exercises, and the kind of energy that only a well-designed commercial HIIT zone can produce.
Throwdown was already there. As David Parkinson, Director of Products at Throwdown, put it: "The popularity of the functional training space comes as no surprise; the proven health benefits and the fun of the workout make Impact Sports the most popular segment in the Throwdown brand." (Physical Activity Facilities, "Throwdown Pushing Boundaries into the Future with HIIT")
Throwdown's approach to commercial HIIT equipment was rooted in what it had always known from the fight world: the best training spaces are the ones that demand something of you. Modular rigs that support simultaneous multi-user workouts. Bag racks that keep impact training accessible without consuming an entire room. HIIT Ski machines, HIIT Ropes, sleds, slam balls, kettlebells, a full ecosystem of tools that let instructors program sessions with almost infinite variety, and let members experience something different every time they walk in. (Core Health & Fitness, "Future of HIIT: How Throwdown Fuels Member Growth & Cuts Costs")
The business case was equally clear: in a facility where every square foot has to earn its place, a Throwdown HIIT zone generates more programming versatility, more member engagement, and more revenue per square foot than any equivalent fixed-machine footprint. It was the right product at the right moment and the right partner was about to arrive.
In March 2019, Core Health & Fitness, already home to Schwinn, StairMaster, Star Trac, and Nautilus, announced it had licensed Throwdown's functional fitness business, including weights, plates, dumbbells, racks, and rigs distribution. (Health & Fitness Association, "Core Health & Fitness Expands into Functional Fitness Arena," March 2019)
"This move is a natural addition to our product lines and brands as we continue to execute on our 4-corner strategy," said Michael Bruno, Core's owner and CEO. "Functional fitness has been growing for the last few years and we see this as a strategic addition to our line of best-in-class strength and HIIT brands and equipment. Additionally, our global footprint of manufacturing and distribution creates a unique opportunity for our customers and distributors that others can't provide." (Health & Fitness Association, "Core Health & Fitness Expands into Functional Fitness Arena," March 2019)
For Ted Joiner, the partnership wasn't an exit, it was an acceleration. "We are excited to continue the expansion of Throwdown's functional products and brand now under the umbrella of Core's global footprint," Joiner said at the time. "We'll be able to scale up with our great tradition of quality and service aligning nicely with Core's culture and value creation strategy." (Athletic Business, "Core Health & Fitness Expands into the Growing Functional Fitness Arena," March 2019)
Joiner himself made the move to Core as part of the integration and continues today as Throwdown Brand Ambassador and Vice President of Strategic Accounts for Core Health & Fitness, ensuring that the brand's founding DNA, its standards, its relationships, and its grit, remain intact as it scales. (ZoomInfo, Core Health & Fitness)
By October 2020, the integration had proven so successful that Core expanded the Throwdown portfolio further, adding medicine balls, bands, kettlebells, and bags to complete the commercial functional training ecosystem. (Core Health & Fitness, "Core Health & Fitness Adds to Their Functional Fitness Category," October 2020)
For Throwdown, the UFC relationship was never just a founding story. It was an ongoing partnership that has deepened as both organizations have grown.
As UFC expanded its own fitness footprint, through UFC GYM franchises, UFC FIT facilities, and the UFC Performance Institute, Throwdown's commercial functional training equipment has been part of equipping those spaces. (Throwdown Industries, UFC Gym Collection) The connection runs deeper than a licensing deal: it is a shared philosophy about what serious training looks like and what the facilities that support it need to deliver.
When UFC members walk into a UFC FIT location and find a Throwdown-equipped HIIT zone, they're experiencing a through-line that runs back to 2003, the same commitment to equipment that performs under the most demanding conditions, now accessible in every format the UFC brand operates. The cage became the blueprint. The commercial gym floor became the canvas.
One of the most telling measures of a commercial fitness brand's credibility is whether major chains trust it to define their signature training experience, not just supply equipment, but shape a format.
Throwdown has earned exactly that trust with Crunch Fitness. Working closely with Crunch on custom rig configurations and HIIT format development, Throwdown has helped the fast-growing franchise build functional training zones that serve as a differentiating draw for members. (Throwdown Industries, Crunch Fitness Collection; Health Club Management, Core Health & Fitness Company Profile, 2026) The custom-rig program reflects what Throwdown has always done best: start with the needs of the specific facility, the specific format, and the specific member, and build backward to a solution that earns its floor space every class.
Crunch joins a growing roster of major commercial operators, including Equinox, LA Fitness, Anytime Fitness, UFC GYM, Holmes Place, Fitness First, and TRIB3, where Throwdown rigs are the centerpiece of the commercial HIIT zone. (Health Club Management, Core Health & Fitness Company Profile, 2026) Each of those installations is a proof of concept: that equipment born in the world's toughest training environments translates directly and powerfully to the commercial floor.
More than two decades after Ted Joiner built his first Octagon mat, Throwdown is the leader in what the brand calls Functional Impact Training (FIT), a blend of commercial HIIT equipment, impact training (boxing, martial arts, MMA), and functional fitness that no competitor can replicate from scratch. (Throwdown, LinkedIn)
The current commercial lineup reflects every lesson learned from the cage to the gym floor:
XTC Rig Systems (Standard, Compact, Alpha) — modular, configurable rigs that anchor the commercial functional training zone and support everything from pull-ups to bag work to group circuits
HIIT Ski and HIIT Rower: total-body conditioning machines purpose-built for high-intensity intervals and HYROX-inspired programming
HIIT Rope: mountable on any XTC rig, scaling from beginner to elite
Impact gear: heavy bags, bag racks, GlideBoxx active training systems, boxing and MMA equipment that bring the fight-sport energy to any floor
Free weights and accessories: kettlebells, slam balls, sandbags, sleds, medicine balls, and battle ropes completing the full functional training zone ecosystem
But Throwdown doesn't stand alone. Under Core Health & Fitness, it is one piece of the most complete commercial fitness ecosystem available from a single partner and for facility operators, that matters as much as the equipment itself. Whether a club needs cardio, cycling, strength, HIIT, or functional training, every category is covered by a brand that was built specifically for the commercial environment:
Schwinn: the gold standard in commercial indoor cycling, from group studio bikes to the new Aetherion series
StairMaster: vertical conditioning that no other machine replicates, from the 8Gx to the 10G with OverDrive
Star Trac: commercial cardio engineered for sustained, high-volume club use across treadmills, ellipticals, and upright bikes
Nautilus: 50+ years of commercial strength innovation, with selectorized and plate-loaded equipment built on biomechanics that complement natural human movement
Wexer: a global digital training platform that extends the fitness floor into on-demand, virtual, and instructor-led programming for members wherever they train
Gym Rax:
Together, these brands give facility operators something rare: one relationship, one standard of quality, every modality covered. As Throwdown puts it, the training zone should be a community "born right in the Throwdown training zone" and Core ensures that community has everything it needs to train, compete, and come back tomorrow. (Physical Activity Facilities, "Throwdown Pushing Boundaries into the Future with HIIT")
The fitness industry in 2025 is rewarding operators who give members a reason to show up that no at-home workout can replicate. The answer isn't more treadmills, it's a floor that demands something. An environment with energy, with challenge, with the feeling that you're training alongside people who are pushing just as hard as you are.
That's what Throwdown has always built for. The standards set in the UFC training camps of the early 2000s, equipment that performs when athletes depend on it, formats that push people beyond what they thought they could do, and exactly what the modern commercial fitness operator needs. Under Core Health & Fitness, with Ted Joiner still driving the brand's strategic vision, Throwdown is carrying that mission into every health club, every franchise location, every hotel gym, and every HIIT zone that wants to deliver something more than a workout.
From the cage to the commercial floor: the equipment hasn't changed. The address has.
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