Brandon Slaughter has officiated and coached basketball for years. He played basketball two decades ago for the Chargers of Briar Cliff University.
Wendy Slaughter was known at Wendy Hammen when she competed in basketball at Briar Cliff, where the couple met.
For years, Wendy Slaughter has done plyometrics and worked with clients in the personal training arena.
The Slaughters, together with daughters Payton and Teagan, and with the help of other family members and several friends, took their basketball and fitness passions several steps further this winter in renovating the old Central Bank site at 228 W. Main St., in Cherokee,
Iowa, breathing new life into an old building while opening Double Overtime Fitness & Event Center.
What once was a bank where deposits, loans and withdrawals were transacted daily is now a place where young and old alike can work on jump shots, batting strokes, spikes and miles.
People are also reading…
The front door opens to a 54-by-27-foot floor area with a 16-foot ceiling height. Three baskets are in place above the floor, giving hoopsters more than enough room to work on basketball fundamentals, a chief area of concern for Brandon Slaughter. He is a youth basketball coach with the Hoopla program who also serves as assistant girls' basketball coach at Washington High School in Cherokee.
"We're both doing one-on-one sessions for basketball (Wendy and Brandon) and volleyball (Wendy) as well as other sports," says Brandon Slaughter, a financial adviser with Cherokee State Bank.
"Wendy has done plyometrics and personal training in our home for over eight years," he adds.
Stepping up to what once was a bank of five to six teller windows, one can see a row of personal fitness devices upon which clients may walk, run, jog or stretch.
Between the two areas is a collection of tables at which parents, grandparents or siblings and friends may sit while waiting for workouts to conclude. The facility will also be available for graduation receptions, birthday parties, etc. Hence, the Event Center part of the name.
The Slaughters believe that having a facility downtown can help enhance the overall activity level in and around Cherokee. Brandon Slaughter says he's welcomed several passers-by who noticed the bouncing basketballs at Double Overtime and have ducked inside to inquire about their business.
The site may boast of the only vault in Northwest Iowa that has a 54-foot net in it, awaiting its turn as basketball transitions into the baseball/softball season.
The former office of the bank president is now one of two changing rooms.
"Our girls come up here to shoot and work out and they're hearing from friends who want to come, too," Brandon Slaughter says. "People stop all the time."
The more time young people are in places like this, the Slaughters concede, the more they are using their arms, their legs and their cardiovascular systems.
The Slaughter girls are following in their parents' footsteps by eating up all they can when it comes to basketball, volleyball, softball and track.
They've also grown to accept some of the responsibility that comes with having a family business.
"We also get to clean the floor," says Payton, an eighth-grader at Cherokee Middle School.
The name, Double Overtime, even has a strong family tie. Brandon says the four Slaughters debated a few business names before settling on this unique moniker.
