Meet the man who danced his way to $10,000 from Planet Fitness

Spencer Collier has always had an outgoing and carefree kind of personality. It’s what he says about himself and what he said most people he knows would probably say about him.

And now, everyone in the orbit of Planet Fitness is going to know it, too, after Collier decided to take part in — and ultimately win — the “Get Down With Your Judgement Free Self” dance contest through Planet Fitness.

But the video, and the cash prize, almost didn’t happen.

“They sent out an email to everyone that was a member,” Collier said. “I kind of thought about it and I looked at the rules and I kept putting it off.”

The $10,000 prize finally convinced the Chestatee High School graduate to take part and record a video of himself based on the theme.

“I got another email on the last day that said the submissions were due at the end of the day, so I was like, ‘Why not?’” Collier said.

In a friend’s living room, he set his phone on a piece of furniture and pressed record. Standing in front of a Christmas tree wearing a gray T-shirt, khaki shorts and white socks, Collier began a dance he and some friends had come up with over the summer, but added a handstand, backflip and split at the end to make it more impressive.

“I did it in two takes and then I submitted it,” Collier said. “I thought it was a good concept. They push the whole judgement-free zone thing, so I took the theme to be like, dance like no one’s watching, which is what I do anyway, so I just recorded it.”

He spends most of his days doing dances like the one that won him the $10,000 prize. Collier was on the competition cheer team at Chestatee and went on to the University of West Georgia, where he won five national titles as a part of its cheer team. Now, he’s in his third year with the USA National cheer team and works with the Atlanta Stunt Team which performs at Atlanta Hawks basketball games.

All that to say, Collier felt like he had a good chance at winning. He was selected along with a few other finalists for the contest and the video with the most votes at the end of the voting period would take home the money.

“I feel like I put in good content going into it, so I had a good feeling about it,” Collier said. “Once I was a finalist, I was pretty sure I could get a lot of votes, so I was definitely ecstatic.”

He said he bothered his co-workers every day, making sure they voted.

“You kind of have to hassle people,” Collier said. “But there were a lot of people who were super excited about me being in it so they were voting every day anyway and telling all their friends.”

For something that was a last-minute decision, Collier was happy with the outcome. He said he’s going to be putting all the money toward his student loans.

“My parents definitely encouraged me to do that,” Collier said, laughing.