A real person and a real cat
Meet Grandad
Hi, I'm Chris. Coach Ginge is my tribute to Grandad, our ginger-and-white Persian cat. He was the least qualified but most dedicated personal trainer we've ever known, and we said goodbye to him on 21 March 2026.
The real Coach Ginge
Grandad earned his name honestly. He had the flat, unimpressed face of a cat who had seen it all and approved of very little. Underneath the grump he was always there, keeping an eye on things, rarely more than a few steps away before plonking himself down again to watch.
His favourite job, self-appointed, was workout companion. Whenever a mat hit the floor he'd appear: weaving between our legs, strolling under every pose with a cat-sized gap, then settling at the edge of the mat to supervise. He never once corrected our form, but you could feel the judgement.
When he got sick and we lost him, the house went very quiet. There was a Grandad-shaped gap at the edge of the mat. His whole thing was showing up and being there while you did the work, so we wondered: what if he could keep doing that for other people?
How Coach Ginge is made
Coach Ginge has Grandad's colouring and, we like to think, a bit of his expression. He started out leading little workouts for grown-ups, and now he and his friends Sugar and Fluffy make free brain breaks for children: short follow-along videos to get a class or a family moving.
I make every video myself. The cats are 3D characters made with the help of AI tools, and the moves, music, voices and worlds are built and checked by me, one by one, before anything goes out. The videos are marked made for kids on YouTube: no comments and no targeted ads, and this site sets no cookies and collects nothing.
The longer story, with more photos, is on my studio's blog: How Grandad became Coach Ginge.
Get in touch
I'd love to hear how Coach Ginge goes with your class or your family: what worked, what didn't, which moves land and what age it suits. Email me at chris@longden.net.