Kat Suchet always prided herself on being an athlete in her younger years, but she was looking for a new challenge as she entered her early 30s. Turns out, CrossFit was exactly what she needed, so she jumped headfirst into this new world of functional fitness.
- “I was working as a physiotherapist and taking CrossFit quite seriously at the time, competing in the amateur field,” Suchet told the Morning Chalk Up. “I made it to the European Championships, but I wanted to get to Regionals, and I think I was a bit late. I was 32 and everyone there was so much bigger and better than me, so it was so hard to catch up.”
Suchet quickly developed an interest in women’s health during this time, mainly due to personal issues she was facing. During her time competing, Suchet experienced amenorrhea, which is when you lose your period. It was a scary time, but more than that, it was a hard issue to wrap her head around.
- “I just couldn’t believe that something like training, which is meant to be a healthy thing that is so good for your body, could do this to me,” Suchet said.
Through losing her period, Suchet realized how much overtraining was affecting her metabolism, her fertility, and her ability to recover. She soon found herself pregnant with her first child, which only added to her desire to learn more about women’s health.
A New Mission
Suchet saw it as a responsibility to teach other women about their bodies and what was happening during every stage of life. Around this time, she started blogging about her pregnancy because she felt she had no one to consult.
“I couldn’t find much info online, I felt alone, and I felt like I’d hit a brick wall,” Suchet said. “I had a lot of symptoms in my pregnancy that I wasn’t expecting. I was looking online, and I saw all of these women who were smashing it in their pregnancy, and that wasn’t me.”
She became discouraged. Information online said that if you had been exercising before your pregnancy, you could continue while pregnant, but Suchet was hesitant. As a high-level CrossFit competitor, she wanted answers for athletes.
Suchet asked all the questions:
- “At what point does this become dangerous?
- Does it ever get dangerous?
- I just didn’t know what I was doing at all. Am I doing a disservice to my pelvic floor?
- Am I going to do myself a disservice to my abdominal wall?
- What’s safe and what’s not safe?”
Blogging about her research, Suchet received a lot of interest from other women quickly, and by that point, she was almost ready to deliver. She decided that instead of searching for answers to her questions, she would create them herself and write her own postpartum programming.
- “This is my responsibility,” Suchet said. “I need to create something world-class here that does away with all of these myths and fear-mongering and the unknown areas for pregnancy and postpartum categorically around the world.”
It was then that she conceived the idea of Hatch, a healthcare-led, evidence-based platform and community run by athletes, coaches, and healthcare professionals.
Like any small business, Suchet initially did most of the work herself.
- “For many years, it was me pulling from conversations I had with some of the best in the industry and putting that together with the program that you see in the pregnancy and postpartum section,” she said. “I would then send it to these physios, general doctors, and sports doctors and ask for feedback.”
Growing Pains
At first, Hatch was just pregnancy and postpartum programming that Suchet handled, but she hit a brick wall by the middle of 2024. Still working as a physio and CrossFit coach while trying to run Hatch, she knew she needed to expand the team and her offerings.
She felt that Hatch was incomplete because women would leave after completing their postpartum training program. Suchet felt a responsibility to those women to offer them more throughout all stages of life.
After much sweat and tears, Hatch is finally releasing three new products this year.
- “We have the onwards women’s programming performance and the menopause programming for 40-plus perimenopausal and postmenopausal ladies,” she said. “And then in August, we have the coaching certification, which gives you CPD points all around the world and is endorsed by the big certification bodies.”
Hatch’s coaching certification will give students 35 hours worth of CPD points. The program launches on August 1.
Suchet was also able to expand the team.
Giddy while discussing it, Suchet listed the new team members:
- “I brought on a GP and a sports science doctor. We are also contracting a nutritionist, a psychotherapist, a baby loss expert, and a pessaries expert to help me create content for the course,” she said. “We have this multi-disciplinary team run by Aby Tobin, who is a women’s health physio who works with athletes.”
Hitting Their Groove
Suchet continues to oversee the syllabus, but it takes a village to create the vast amount of information that women need. It is nowhere near as simple as “This is the workout you do while pregnant; this is what you scale,” and boom, you are ready to go six to eight weeks after you give birth.
- “It is amazing how much specialist stuff you need,” Suchet said. “You need people who understand the physical, the psychological, and the mental health – you can’t just be a PT.”
One of the most essential things to Suchet is to arm women with the knowledge to understand themselves and why they are doing what they are doing in the programming.
- “Our women’s program comes with education; three weeks of lectures about the body, your cycle, what overtraining looks like, how to stop it, how to perform better, and how to fuel,” she said. “Following just an online program is so passive. And I don’t think that would empower women in any way. I think it’s just spoon feeding.”
Hatch prides itself on helping its clients understand their body, so that when things change, they know what is happening and can make it work for them, not against them. Community is another integral part of the organization. First, starting with a large Facebook group, the programs now run on an app and have their own integrated program communities.
With all the growth that her company has experienced over the past few years, where does Suchet look to take Hatch in the future?
- “We’re releasing Hatch Coach this year, and we will finish the trifecta for the coaching certifications, with our menopause and women’s performance coaching programs. I want to see Hatch as the go-to women’s functional fitness platform,” she says.
If you would like to learn more about Hatch and how Suchet is striving to support all performance-driven women and their coaches around the world, head here to view their training programs, coaching courses, and other resources for women.
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Credit: Tadas Gasiunas and George Powell
