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With a goal of being the best 30 minutes of someone’s day, Contra Loma Bootcamp aims to help people reach a livable lifestyle.
The journey for Marcy Kendall hasn’t been easy over the years but she pursued what she said was “what God wanted her to do,” and went from being a social worker, helping at-risk youth, to owning her own gym, Contra Loma Bootcamp—helping people both physically and mentally improve their lives.
Kendall said that for most of her life, she was 255 pounds and during that time, she was someone who would go to “big box gyms” to workout, with no knowledge on what she should be doing.
“I would get on the cardio machines, but I would feel embarrassed because I wasn’t able to run,” Kendall said. “I wasn’t able to do anything.”
Because of this, she hired a personal trainer that she said didn’t know how to work with her body.
“They would just push, push, push, but it’s like hey, I can’t do that right now. I’m really overweight, I don’t know how to do that,” Kendall said. “This doesn’t feel fun or exciting for me, it feels like I’m being punished.”
After attempting to get in shape with her personal trainer and some group classes, she took matters into her own hands. While working in San Francisco, CA at a juvenile hall in Twin Peaks, Kendall said that during her lunch breaks, she would walk for an hour and a half.
“I kept doing it. I was consistent Monday through Friday. And eventually, what used to take me almost an hour and a half to walk, I was able to run it in like 26 minutes, nice,” Kendall said. “So from there, I signed up to run a half-marathon.”
After running her first half-marathon, Kendall said that in 2012, she set a goal to run a half-marathon every month and a full marathon at the end of the year, until she found out she was pregnant in March. Kendall ended up running two half-marathons while pregnant and 10Ks up until she was 36 weeks pregnant.
Eventually, Kendall and her family moved to Antioch, CA, where she met a friend who was into running as much as she was, and introduced her to Fit Body Bootcamp that was, at the time, located in Concord, CA.
After attending her first Fit Body Bootcamp class, Kendall said that she loved it and was able to reach all of her fitness goals, resulting in her quitting her job in San Francisco, CA and becoming a coach at Fit Body Bootcamp.
“I remember I would walk out, and I would say, oh my god, I would do this for free, that’s how much joy it brought me,” Kendall said.
While coaching, Kendall also worked as a supervisor for a nonprofit organization for at-risk youth, where she said she didn’t do well because she didn’t like telling people how to do their jobs. After this, she said that she went home and told her husband that she wants to quit her job and open her own Fit Body Bootcamp.
“I went home and I said ‘I’m gonna quit my job and I’m gonna open up a fit body. I think this is what God wants me to do,’” Kendall said. “And he’s [her husband] said ‘Okay, well, let me pray on it, and hopefully I get the same message from God, and then we can do it.’ And we did, we prayed on it, and one door after the other opened, and here I am, seven years later.”
Kendall said that after going into her business with no knowledge of how to run a business, and surviving the pandemic, that she knows she is walking in her purpose and doing what she was created to do.
During the first seven years of business, her gym was contracted through the Fit Body Bootcamp franchise, where she said she had to follow the rules and models for her classes. In February 2025, her contract ended with Fit Body Bootcamp and her gym transitioned into what is now Contra Loma Bootcamp.
After the transition, Kendall said that she kept some of the models the same while making her own changes, following a functional fitness workout plan.
“It’s a lot of functional fitness, working the muscles that we’re using for the rest of our lives, sitting up, getting out of bed, getting in bed, going upstairs, going downstairs,” Kendall said. “You know, we need a good, strong core for everything else to work good.”
Kendall said that one of the biggest lessons she’s learned as a gym-owner is that you can’t be “cookie cutter” in this field.
“Everyone has their own journey. Everyone has their own story. And you really have to take the time and find it within you to have the empathy, to deal with every person as an individual,” she said.
Kendall said that although it is a gym, she feels that it is more of a community in a shell of a gym.
“One thing I do pride myself in is that my members say ‘I finally feel like I belong somewhere. I don’t feel judged here because I’m not able to do the movement like everyone else. I don’t feel like people are looking at me because I’m not able to get up and off the ground or because I don’t know how to do a sit up yet,’” Kendall said. “And that, to me, is what’s more important, because that’s what’s gonna keep people on their health and fitness journey, because they feel like they belong and they have a sense of community support behind them.”
Kendall said that her long-term goal is to continue growing as a community and have a full gym of people who are not just focused on the superficial parts of fitness, but to see exercise as a part of everyday life.
“My number one thing I say is I want to be the best 30 minutes of your day. So no matter what it is, whether you don’t start your day until you work out or you don’t end your day until you work out, I think that if you come and work out, you’re doing something for yourself,” Kendall said. “No matter how crappy home life is or work life is, you come here, you leave it on the mat, you walk out of these doors a better woman or a better man. That’s the lifestyle that I want for people here.”
Contra Loma Bootcamp (3100 Contra Loma Blvd #3150, Antioch, CA) offers 30-minute classes throughout the day and are open on weekdays from 5:00 am to 7:00 am, 9:00 am to 9:30 am and 5:00 pm to 7:30 pm. They are also open on Saturday from 7:30 am to 9:00 am. For more information, call (925) 240-3603.
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