Brendan Ferreira, Seminar Coach

Coach Brendan Ferreira has a history of pushing himself and others past limits to find new greatness. At a young age he displayed great talent and athleticism in just about every sport he tried, but was most passionate for Motocross. He was one of the top local youth riders, winning both a New England and North East Championship, and would travel up and down the coast for races, even taking trips to race and practice in Florida during the snowy New England Winters. His fitness journey also began due to his love of racing. He ran Cross Country in High School, where he was a two time all star and an all scholastic runner. He was in school for Arborculture and was climbing for a tree crew before he even graduated High School. Alas, New England Winters would put a damper on his passion again, as most tree crews lay off due to lack of business in the winter, and so he decided to join the US Army.

He deployed twice, one 15 month tour during The Surge in Iraq and a would be 12 month Tour in Afghanistan. His time in the Military would also introduce him to CrossFit, going all the way back to 2007. On March 9, 2010, just a few months into his second tour, in an extremely hostile area of Mountains in Afghanistan, a member of The Afghan Border Patrol put on a suicide vest and detonated directly behind him and a few of his men. He lost his right arm below the elbow, shattered his right leg, took shrapnel through his left knee, completely severing the joint, broke every bone in his face, shrapnel in his right eye, blew out both ear drums, multiple broken ribs, burns of 2nd and 3rd degree and over 400 stitches and 100 staples to close the cuts from the blast.  He flat lined twice and received one of the largest quantities of blood ever given to a U.S. Soldier.  He would spend 2 years recovering at Walter Reed Army Hospital.

The once heavily muscled soldier and athlete was now 70lbs overweight, which added to his depression, and doctors had even told him to lower his expectations for his quality of life. Then he met his wife, Elise, and her son, Travis, and that was the push he needed. He got him self clean, got out of the wheelchair against doctor’s orders, and, with a little coaxing from his wife, got back into shape with CrossFit.

Six months after starting his fitness journey, Coach had dropped about 35lbs and went on to his Level 1 Certification. At the 2015 Working Wounded Games, he took on 63 other Adaptive Athletes and came out 1st overall.  He followed that up by crushing the SEALFIT 20X Challenge the following week and a 2nd place finish at The Wodapalooza Fitness Festival, despite taking a severe hip injury 2 weeks prior!

He is definitely a well rounded athlete, always looking to find tasks at the margins of his experience and exposing himself to them, if not mastering them.

He is the Co-Captain of The Yellow Ribbon Fund’s Veteran TUF Team (a team of wounded Vets that compete at fitness events to inspire other vets to stay in shape) an ambassador for Spike TV’s VOW (Veteran Operation Wellness) Campaign, and of course, a Seminar Coach for Crossroads.

When this very busy coach and athlete is not training or coaching, which is rare, you can catch him playing with his daughter, Isabelle, and her array of pink unicorns and baby dolls, most likely having fisher price breakfast or a tea party, or dragging his dog, which he rescued at 6 weeks old, around the house by one of his dirty gym socks.

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