When former ABC10 News morning anchor Keba Arnold left Sacramento for the Bay Area, she thought she was continuing to pursue her dream.
“It was a tough transition,” Arnold said. “It never felt right. After a few months there, I just didn’t know what I was going to do.”
Arnold was under contract, as many television reporters and anchors are.
“Then circumstances change, things happen, and it gave me the opportunity to leave. And then I found this,” Arnold said.
“This” is 9Round, a fitness franchise that combines kickboxing exercises with circuit training. Arnold had started doing 9Round herself when she first moved to the Bay Area, and quickly got hooked on the 30-minute workouts.
“Not only did I do the workout, but I called another friend who lived in the Bay Area, and she tried it and signed up. By the end of it, I think four or five people at the station were signed up,” Arnold said.
Arnold signed a five-year lease on a gym space in Natomas, and went through 9Round’s training certification process. On the physical fitness side, Arnold had to prove she could jump rope for 10 minutes, do 30 push-ups in two minutes and complete 50 sit-ups in two minutes.
The fitness test was hard. And while it was also hard to walk away from a 12-year career in journalism, Arnold said the timing just felt right.
“The business has changed, and so, for me, the passion was no longer there,” she said.Considering that Arnold’s gym has been open for less than a day, she doesn’t yet have customer success stories to brag about. That will come. In the meantime, Arnold is living off the excitement and enthusiasm of her brand-new customers.
“I opened at 7 a.m. I got here … at 6:35. I had my first member here at 6:39 waiting to do the workout,” Arnold said. “So to see the excitement and knowing I’m not a saleswoman; I’m not selling you anything. I’m just giving you a path to get back into shape, to lose weight, whatever. I’m just providing that for you.”