WS Chronicle

For young athletes in the Triad area, if you’re in need of training or a facility to help you to improve your skills, the Grindhouse Sportsplex, 2738 Farmall St., Winston-Salem, might be the place for you.

The Grindhouse Sportsplex provides training for young athletes looking to enhance their skills in football, basketball, track and field, soccer, baseball and more. They have top-of-the-line trainers and a facility with all of the necessary equipment and a turf field, to turn a good player into a great one. They work with both young boys and girls.

The Grindhouse is the brainchild of Blair Boyz Enterprises (BBE) and Get Better Everyday (GBE). The two companies combined their resources to make the Grindhouse a reality.

“I wanted to get to this place where we are right now and still grow some more,” said Jay Blair of BBE. “Linking up with my business partners was not a coincidence. One of the business owners of GBE was one of my coaches that I hired when I was the head coach at North Forsyth High School, and that is Chris Carter.

“Chris Carter is a hall of famer at Elizabeth City State University. He went in the hall of fame this year and he is a certified fitness trainer and it just matched. When I reached out to a long-time mentor of mine, Rob Russo, that owns New Generation Barber Shop and the facility we are in now, he thought it was a great idea and the rest is history.”

Blair said the goal for the complex was to make it an all-encompassing facility that would attract all types of athletes. They have had their “soft opening” but still have some work to do to the building in preparation for their grand opening early next year.

With the soft opening, Grindhouse offers individual training sessions, as well as large and small group sessions. They work with athletes ages four and up.  

“Of course, with Blair Boyz Enterprises and In the Trenches, we are targeting the offensive and defensive lineman,” said Blair. “To get a place where the O-line and D-line can come and get better.  

“With the addition of GBE, and the skill set they bring, we have opened it up to wide receivers, defensive backs and linebackers. We are concentrating on all sports. We have a basketball trainer; we have a soccer trainer, and we also have a baseball trainer. We want to be the end-all, be-all for all athletes for Winston-Salem and surrounding areas; that’s why it’s called the Grindhouse Sportsplex. We don’t just focus on football; we focus on the athlete and what sport they play and how we can help them get better every day.”

Since opening, Blair and his partners at the Grindhouse have been busy. The turnout from just word of mouth has been great, he said. 

“It has vastly exceeded our expectations,” Blair said about the turnout thus far from local athletes. “We knew through chatter that Winston-Salem wanted us to open up. We knew through chatter that they couldn’t wait until we opened the doors.

“Day one, we were thinking that we would have 10 or 15 people show up for the group session and it was 28 young athletes that showed up for the group session. We had so many come that Monday and that following Wednesday, we have to do two group sessions on Mondays and Wednesdays. Tuesdays and Thursdays are our small group sessions, as well as appointments. Saturdays and Sundays are appointments as well.

Blair stated that they also rent out the turf field to teams to work out on for a small fee, if the elements are too bad to practice outdoors.

Blair feels the Winston-Salem area is in dire need of a facility such as theirs. He says most big cities have facilities like this and it was time for Winston to have theirs.

“When you look at the major metropolitan cities in North Carolina, they have a facility that does that,” he said. “They have a facility that is there with indoor fields, outdoor fields, training equipment, and it was missing in Winston-Salem. The difference between us and them is we actually have guys that have not only played the sport, but excelled at the sport or sports they are training the young athletes in.”

Blair stated they worked “day and night” to get their facility up and running. He says it was three months and two weeks of work to get the place ready for the soft opening. From moving walls, moving equipment, and painting, it was a laborious process. He says that’s how they came up with the name, by all the “grinding” they did getting the building ready to open.

Blair says the Blair Boyz and GBE are committed to the community. The next step for them is to have a mentoring phase to their facility because they know that school is more important than athletics and you can’t be a student athlete if you aren’t a student first.

For more information about the Grindhouse Sportsplex, please visit www.blairboyzenterprises.com, the GBE Fitness LLC Facebook page and the Grindhouse Sportsplex Facebook page.