‘225’: Claim Your Journey founder aims to get people all over La. moving

When he was little, Brandon Williams could be spotted running around the playground at Wildwood Elementary School in cowboy boots, not Nikes. Then he played BREC basketball. The coach said to his mother, Patricia Williams, “Do you see how Brandon gets to the other end of the court? Brandon should be running [track].” “It was always, ‘Brandon should be running,’ ” Patricia Williams recalls. And he did run. But now, Brandon Williams’ passion is squarely dialed into getting other people to run. They don’t even have to go fast, he insists. Just get the feet above the ground. His toughest convert? Mom. But he’s eternally positive. He keeps on trying. “That lady is stubborn,” he says. “I don’t think my body can handle all that pounding in running,” she protests. And yet, she is exercising, she adds. She’s doing Zumba—and boot camp, too. She works out way more than she might be if her son wasn’t the unofficial mayor of running in Louisiana. Read the full feature by Amy Alexander in the new issue of 225 magazine here.