Testimonials

With the kids all off to college and living their own lives, and no more senior citizens to care for, I really had no more excuses. I got into a routine of working out regularly and watching what I ate and dropped about 25lbs. in a year. I HATED every tedious, boring second of it and wasn’t even sure I was doing myself that much good.As I was working out, I watched all these crazy people doing crazy stuff at the gym. I wanted a change so I took a leap of faith and introduced myself to Justin… and Justin introduced me to CrossFit. I have never looked back. I personal trained with Justin for a year. I am pretty sure he thought I was good for a week at best. After a year of private training, I joined the group at CFES.Three years and 80lbs lighter, I have never ever been this strong, this fit, this fast or this satisfied with any workout. I have never in my life worked outside of my comfort zone and now I do it every day and love it! I can’t help wonder what a different person I would have been or life I would have had, not just physically but mentally and emotionally, if I had had CrossFit in my life 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago. I look forward to CrossFit every day and never even think of excuses not to go. This last year was a true test for finding an excuse with two weddings in five months, living in a trailer for four months while we did a major remodel, a college graduation, a law school graduation, a really bad case of the flu, and a couple of injuries, all would have been excuses for me. I still used food for comfort to a degree, but in the past six months I have even overcome that with the desire to really see all that muscle hiding in there. I found it!!

At nearly 58 years old, I am looking forward to increasing my 14” box jump, leaving the red band behind and doing some unassisted pull-ups, improving my 9:46 mile time, and saying goodbye to knee push-ups. Who does that? Crazy CrossFit people, that’s who!!

Thank you to Justin for taking me on, always knowing the right amount to push or scale and for the words of encouragement like the time you told me “you are an ATHLETE! (Really the little chubby girl who never played a sport in her life?) Travis, Chris and Brooke, I appreciate so much all of the excellent coaching, patience and encouragement and thank you to the entire CFES community for the compliments, acknowledgements and encouragement. Love you all.

-Carol Penney

And here is where my story begins… After I graduated college, I continued to train in hopes of making the 2000 Olympic Trials. This journey proved harder than I thought and with tears and a heavy heart I decide to hang up my suit. What I didn’t realize is how being a swimmer was woven so tightly into my identity and when I no longer swam, I had nothing feeding the passion for competition and fitness. I ran for a while, but wasn’t the same feeling as when I was swimming 20 hours a week so I stopped. A swimmers appetite and a sedentary lifestyle didn’t mix well. I gained 50 pounds in less than a year. (No, that is not a typo!)Over the next 6 years I attended two post grad programs, moved to and from the mid- west, and started my first 9 to 5 job. In that time I lost most of the weight through diet, then found it again plus a little extra. When I joined the coaching staff at Arden Hills Swimming, it didn’t take me long to remember how much I loved the water. I found my way back into the pool and onto a bike to lose most of it yet again. But with a crazy busy life and whatever else you can think of as an excuse it all crept back on.When I decided to start CrossFitting, I was as heavy as I had ever been and my self esteem was in the toilet. My first fundamentals session was a tear-fest (sorry Travis) and I felt like I was starting at rock bottom! I hated burpees. I used a green band for pull ups. I couldn’t run without back pain. I felt like I the mountain was insurmountable. BUT! I found something I was good at… I could lift heavy! There were two specific days that were my buy in. The first workout when I realized what my strength in CrossFit was (no pun intended) was a max push jerk day (my favorite lift). I was paired with Laura B. at the 4:00 class and she helped me grab my first big lift. (Thanks Laura!) The other workout was a max deadlift where I was paired with Brooke and I saw that I could hang with this badass girl who was super strong and near the top of our box. (You rock Brooke!) The confidence I gained by finding something I was good at was huge!

Over the next 9 months, I still struggled with anything cardio but that improved. I still found it hard to lift my body weight, but that got better too. I was getting stronger. I was feeling better. I found myself enjoying all of those things that I missed about swimming, the camaraderie, the coaching, the competitive spirit in the gym, the hard work, the achievement… all things that I never realized how much a part of me they were. And as hard as it was to find a way out of the valley I had started in, I was climbing out and loving it. I still had my occasional pity party (sorry everyone!) but CrossFit helped bring me back to life.

In the time that I had been CrossFitting, I was getting strong, but had not lost any weight nor had the size in my jeans gone down. In December, I decided that it was time to add in a nutrition component. I started eating better, tried the zone a bit, then found that if I focused on eating healthy and natural foods, while limiting the processed foods, it was pretty easy to eat well and the weight started coming off. I had set a goal of losing 30 pounds by the time regionals came around. It was a lofty goal but I succeeded. The support and encouragement I received from my teammates in our CFES box, as well as the others outside of CrossFit, was pivotal. Every complement, every ‘Come on Cort!”, every pat on the back still feels amazing. My deadlift is not as big as it was in 2009, but in July 2010 I can complete multiple sets of 10 pull-ups in the middle of a WOD without coming off the bar. And burpees… (don’t tell but they aren’t really that big of a deal any more!)… they still suck.

Ultimately, the changes on the outside are a reflection of the changes on the inside. Thank you to my CFES friends, and to the ones outside of the box, who have shown me nothing but love an encouragement in this journey to where I stand! I cannot wait to see where the road takes me, and I know there are so many great things to come. I can’t wait to live the ride.

-Cort Martellucci

Then we started CrossFit. We were exposed to elements of CrossFit a few months before CFES opened and then really got into it when Justin, Travis and Chris opened CFES last year. “Running Grace” was one of our first WOD’s together at CFES and over the next few months we often worked out with Loren before the 8am class was available. We sometimes reminisce about how we struggled to lift what we do today as warm up reps. After another few months we started going to the 8am class and were able to meet and work out with many of the other CFES members.What a difference CrossFit has made for us over the past year! Thanks to CFES and the Zone, I am now 130lbs and Brian is 185lbs. But as we have been taught (and still trying to get through our thick heads) it’s not all about the weight. I am now a size 4 and Brian a size 32. I have a six pack and occasionally have trouble with shirts being too tight around my arms. Brian is off his cholesterol medication and had to sell his XXL shirts and size 36 jeans at garage sales. We are 36 and 40 years old and in the best shape of our adult lives.But CrossFit has helped us in more ways than just our physical health and appearance. It is amazing what it has done for our “mental” health. Brian was a competitive swimmer and I was a competitive tennis player growing up. CrossFit has enabled us to bring that competitive nature back out and allow us to compete on a daily basis. We both thrive on trying to PR every day. I certainly have my days when I get down on myself for not meeting my goals and expectations but it’s great to feel passionate about something and crave success every day.

CrossFit has also impacted our marriage. Many CFES members ask how I put up with B yelling at me during WOD’s. I LOVE IT! There is nothing that brings us closer than sharing our joy from PRing and sadness from not meeting our expectations together. We even laugh about how we have similar strengths (any ass hole body weight WODs) and weaknesses (lifting heavy shit) and have a theory that it’s because we’ve been sleeping together for 14 years.

Even our kids love CrossFit. They randomly start doing burpees or squats in the middle of the parking lot or in an aisle at Target. Just from being at the box on Saturdays and hearing us talk about it ALL THE TIME, Kailee and Kaleo not only are starting to learn how to do squats and pull-ups, but more importantly are learning the importance of exercise, hard work and intensity.

CrossFit has also affected our social life. While B has always been a “social butterfly”, I am not as comfortable with groups of people and never felt like I was a part of the “in crowd.” Being around the CFES family has changed that. I feel better about myself and comfortable around CFES members. We enjoy suffering with CFES members during WODs and outside of the box for dinner, drinks and celebrations. We consider many of the CFES members our closest friends and continue to meet and make more relationships with new members.

So we have come a long way thanks to CrossFit. But hopefully we still have a long way to go in our CrossFit journey. If we continue to apply the main principles of CrossFit that Justin, Travis, Brooke and Chris have been teaching us I think we have a few more years worth of PRs until age gets the most of us and we go into maintenance mode.

Thank you Justin, Travis, Chris and Brooke for being such awesome coaches and for CFES members for your friendship throughout this incredible journey!
-Cherie Nabeta

CrossFit has been an incredible experience, one that has helped me grow physically and psychologically. In addition to losing 20lbs, I’m lifting more, moving faster, and can actually do pull ups! Not only has this box been a great outlet to release daily stress, it has also shown me that there is always more left in the tank…1 more rep, 1 more pound, 1 second faster.While the programming is great (or terrible depending on how you feel about burpees), the community is what makes East Sac unique. It is rare to see so many people from such differing backgrounds get together in support of one another. From tribute WODs to celebrating life events, one gets the feeling that they are apart of something greater. The camaraderie is further evidenced in the daily blog, the lighthearted joking, and the friendly competition on the leaderboard.Justin, Travis, Brooke, and Chris are amazing coaches and I am fortunate to have had the opportunity to learn from them. While I will continue at another affiliate in San Francisco, the level of coaching at CFES will be impossible to match. Thank you for everything, this has been a life changing experience!
-Kenso Kagawa

I am still regularly one of the slowest, weakest members in the CrossFit class, but I’ve gotten noticeably better at everything we do, and seen this reflected in things I do outside of class.A few times in the past I have tried regular exercise; in each case the routines were self directed and relatively static, repeating the same routine over and over. Each time I got in shape and lost weight, but I also got bored with repeating the same regimen and stopped, lost my conditioning and gained my weight back.When I first looked into CrossFit, I was disappointed that I had to participate in group classes. I’m socially uncomfortable doing something I’m no good at, so I was hoping to work out in isolation as I always have.  Before the first class I attended we watched the  previous class finish up, and a 0% body fat Type-A Amazon [Hi Anne] was hollering at someone on a rowing machine to Go! Go! Go!, and I thought yeah, if anyone ever yells at me like that I’m leaving for good.

As it turns out, the social aspect of class has been great for me, and has been a big factor in making it easy to keep going to class. It’s not just that the workout is constantly varied (thought that’s important), or that the movements are functional (it’s a LOT more fun to lift a barbell overhead than to push a lever on a weight machine); it’s also that someone is expecting me to go to class and notices when I’ve improved. I may not feel like going to class, or I may be sore and not perform well, but if I don’t even show up I’m letting down the people who have spent their time to help me get where I am. Yes I paid them to help me, but they clearly care about their students.

Which brings me to Justin and Travis. When I started class I was a physical wreck. I couldn’t complete even a scaled-back workout most of the time thanks to avoiding physical exertion my whole life. To Justin and Travis I must have looked unbearably pathetic, but I felt welcomed and encouraged from the start. I never expected CrossFit to be a warm social environment, but the respect with which Justin and Travis (and Chris and Brooke) treat each person has set the tone for everyone in the gym.

If you go to a CrossFit gym or watch CrossFit videos on the Internet you can get an impression that everyone there is a super-jock. You will find those people in the gym, but a non-competitive out-of-shape computer programmer like myself is equally welcome. And when you’re pushing yourself as hard as you can you have the support of everyone in the room regardless of how much weight you’re lifting. It’s a great feeling watching a grandmother lift more weight than she’d have thought possible, or seeing someone getting their first pull-up of their life.

As for the intensity of the workouts, there’s something very mind-clearing and pure about pushing yourself as hard as you can. There are discussions online about the merits of short intense workouts versus longer, less-intense workouts. For myself, I find the mental engagement of an intense workout to be much more satisfying than the long iPod-accompanied treadmill and weight-machine workouts I did at my old gym. Any worries I had on my mind at the start of class disappear soon enough, because there’s no room for outside concerns when I have a heavy weight over my head or when I’m gasping for air during an intense cardio workout. For a few minutes the rest of the world just isn’t important.

I don’t hate class anymore. I look forward to it and greatly enjoy it most of the time. Class is always hard, but for the first time in my life I’m enjoying regularly attacking difficult physical challenges both in and outside the gym, and that’s a wonderful thing.
-Pete HarIan

As I look back over the past year, I realize that not only did I finally begin to understand Olympic weightlifting, I began to understand just how strong and capable I am as woman and an athlete. I have never used the word “athlete” before and maybe that is still a stretch, but I do feel powerful and capable and accomplished when I think of where I came from and where I am today. I was always a cardio junkie at the gym and thought cardio was the only way to get and stay in shape. I would throw in a couple of arm curls every now and then for good measure and call it a day. Now when I drive by other gyms and see people on the elliptical or stationary bike I wonder how I ever put up with the tedium for so longI check the CFES website first thing in the morning whether I am working out or not. I look forward to seeing what kinds of creative torture Justin and Travis have come up with each day. I do still feel a little scared, depending upon the workout, but I know that it will be over soon and I will feel accomplished and proud that I completed it. Some days I am stronger and faster than others and that is OK. CrossFit is my THING! It is the one thing I do on a consistent basis just for me. Someone was asking me the other day what I do just for myself and when I told them it was my workouts at CFES, clearly, they just didn’t understand. That too is OK!So thank you Chris, for kicking me out of my comfy nest! Thank you Justin and Travis for your outstanding guidance, teaching and coaching of CrossFit. Thank you for your patience and for pushing me harder than I ever thought possible. Thank you for getting me to age 50 feeling like Super Woman!
-Ruth McLoughlin

I stuck with it and worked my butt off and within 5 months I was in some of the greatest shape of my life! I went from having no hops ever into having slam dunk contest hops. I gained “abs of steal” and I came ripped throughout my body (even though I am not very big) I had gained 15 pounds of muscle over the 5 months.I began to attend Rio Americano high and tried out for their basketball team. I was so worried on what the coach would think of me. After my first practice he pulled me aside and said I made the team just off pure physical ability alone. I was ecstatic!! I had just made the team because of CrossFit. I continued to train and work on my game and I am now on the starting team going into the season. I currently weigh around 175 to 180. straight muscle you best believe ;)I owe everything I have to CrossFit East Sac and the trainers there; Justin, Travis, Brooke and Lene as well as my grandparents. I am looking to go play in college and hopefully get scholarships. I am participating in a Cal Poly SLO (mission prep classic) dunk contest, where I will be going against some of the best high risers in California. Once again I owe this all to you guys at CFES! Thank you!

-Masson Prowse

I really didn’t think I could do the things my son Justin said were possible, but as we say at our house, “I drank the juice.”  After 7 months of blood sweat and tears I have turned the corner thanks to trainers at CFES and their never ending commitment to excellence.  All my blood work from the doctor is good.  My blood pressure and cholesterol are back to normal and I am medication free.

I Have lost 12 lbs and no longer suffer from back pain or headaches and for the first time in 30 years I am sleeping through the night. My energy level has increased and I feel a lot better about myself. At 50 years old, I know I could challenge any of my non-CrossFit friends to a physical challenge and kick their butts.I Love CrossFit and I’m so thankful for all of the encouragement from everyone. What a great group of people to be fit with. Keep on drinking the Juice.-Linda Gates, a.k.a. Justin’s mom

When I first started coming to Cross Fit East Sacramento in June, I was absurdly outside my comfort zone. I felt weak and uncoordinated. I joke that I run because I am too uncoordinated for anything else, but Justin and Travis have kicked, cajoled, and prodded me on to greater athletic achievement.Every workout is scary–in the best possible way. The size of the weight, the number of reps, or the complexity of the movement always leave me asking “Is this possible for me?” In one way or another the answer keeps coming back, “Yes.”The level of intensity of the workouts has allowed me to push past my habit of working out long and slow. The variety of movements CrossFit requires has allowed me to use more of my body while running and helped mitigate overuse problems. The strength training, especially in my core has allowed me to run stronger longer. The tremendous effort required with some of the exercises has helped me push past mental blocks I have had in committing to race goals. Through it all Justin and Travis have encouraged me and their other members to excel in whatever way they can. We compete against ourselves and each other in an environment that is rigorous but supportive. Watching the success of the athletes around me has been hugely inspiring and made me attempt weights and skills I never would have before.

And my running? Even though I did nowhere near the mileage I did before the Boston Marathon, even though the weather conditions were far more difficult that they were the previous year, on December 6 2009 I ran CIM in 3:40:12–nine minutes off of my previous time on that course. To put this in perspective, that nine minute reduction allows me to qualify for the Boston Marathon–even if I were ten years younger than I am.

-Jennifer Reynaga

In the summer of that same year, my friend Brendhan suggested that I check out CrossFit East Sacramento.  For the rest of 2009, I spent lots of time doing personal training sessions with Justin as the regular class times didn’t fit my schedule.  I participated in the FGB IV event on my birthday as well as a few other group workouts and realized how great the sense of community is at CFES.

At the beginning of 2010, I got my schedule sorted out and began attending normal classes. Unfortunately, I tore the superior labrum in my left shoulder at the end of 2009 and so starting out, I could only use 1 arm. No problem, the trainers were able to modify all the workouts for me. 2 months later, I got to using both arms again and within 2 weeks set a PR by almost 5 minutes on the 30 rep version of the Filthy Fifty. Wow! All those 1-armed workouts obviously worked!All that said, I never have to question my fitness prior to a race no matter the distance or temperature. We often race in 100+ degree temperatures. The ability to focus on the task at hand has greatly improved those hour long endurance race shifts. Loading and unloading the truck on race weekends is also greatly improved. Also, a lot of the nagging injuries have gone away.I think the most important item of note is that my outlook on fitness has changed. It used to be a grind that I had to get out of the way so I was fit enough to race. Now it’s often the highlight of my day!

-Jeff Frost

Since then, we’ve come to classes three to four times a week, religiously, and we’ve never been so enthusiastic about working out. It used to be hard to drag myself out of bed at 5:00 to go work out, but I did it out of a sense of duty thinking that I had to get it over with so I could get on with my day. It was one more obligation on my to-do list to check off. Now, although it’s still hard to get out of bed, it’s because I’m tired or sore from whatever we did here the previous day, but I get up because I can’t wait to find out what we’re doing next. And it’s now the best thing I do all day.We’ve both been able to accomplish things here that we never expected to do, or ever realized we wanted to do, but now we can’t imagine doing anything else. Before CrossFit, I couldn’t do “real” pull-ups, or pushups, and I had never done serious weightlifting. Now, I love heavy lift days, and I’m thrilled to be able to deadlift 1 ½ times my body weight, lift 120 pounds over my head and see progress in the number of “real” pull-ups and pushups I can do. Trey broke his kneecap into little pieces as a kid and was warned never to do deep knee squats and told he might not even be able to walk by the time he was 40. Now, at age 40, with proper instruction on form, he’s doing heavy squats with no problems, and his knees feel better than ever. Trey has also lost 25 pounds since May just by following the Zone diet and doing these workouts. I’ve lost about 5, since I’m not as strict about following it as he is (New Year’s resolution!), but I’ve still seen significant changes in my form that make me pretty happy.We’re both easily bored and very impatient with instructors who aren’t in better shape than us or who don’t push us beyond our comfort zone. No worries with that at CrossFit! Justin, Travis and Brooke strike the right balance of inspiration, motivation, instruction and education. Having been screamed at by riding, running and boxing coaches all my life, I’ve found there’s a very difficult balance to be struck between coddling and criticizing people to find what motivates them to be their best. Spare the criticism and people get complacent. Praise too little and criticize too much and people get discouraged and quit trying. Whatever the right balance is, the CFES coaches have found it, which is why we keep coming back for more.

When I was first checking out the CFES and other CrossFit sites, I noticed a lot of talk about how nobody needed to do anything but CrossFit to stay in shape for other sports. We already understood the value of cross-training and weight-lifting to excel in sports like running and biking, but didn’t really appreciate how well this program has prepared us for everything else until now. Trey’s still an avid mountain biker, and despite not getting to go out and ride as often as he would like, he’s able to blaze up steep trails with no trouble. I joined a relay team for the California International Marathon, and despite not having run more than 2 miles at one time since May, I was able to run 7 miles in December with no problem at a 9-minute pace, fast for me. So, yes, now we can agree that you really don’t need to spend hours and hours pounding the pavement, spinning to nowhere, climbing the stairmaster to god-knows-where, or lifting little plastic Barbie weights 600 times to get fit enough to tackle just about anything you want to do.

The fitness results alone would be enough to keep us coming back, but one of the reasons we l-o-v-e it here is the community of supportive, positive, and interesting people. From day one, the coaches and students treated us like we belonged here, regardless of the shape we were in when we started. The other reason is that we’ve finally found something we can do together, that we both enjoy, that we both excel at and can challenge ourselves in our own ways. We’ve spent a long time (20 years!) trying to find activities we could both like without much success until now. Trey suffered through a few 50K trail ultra-marathons to be able to spend time with me. I almost killed myself on a mountain bike to be with him. Here, we don’t have to “put up with” doing anything we don’t like just to spend time with each other. We plan on doing this together for at least another 20 years, so we offer CFES a special thanks for that.

-Sabrina and Trey Teller

I’m proud to be a part of this community and I feel blessed for the friendships that have developed because of all the people that Justin, Travis and Brooke have brought together. Each member that I have had the privilege to work out with inspires me to keep pushing myself to reach new levels each and every day. It is a pleasure to be surrounded by so many gifted athletes.You will never hear me use the word bored to describe how I feel about CrossFit. Excited, committed, passionate about getting stronger; that is how I feel about CrossFit. I can’t imagine ever going back to any of my old gyms, stepping onto a piece of exercise equipment that requires electricity and telling myself, “now that was a good WOD.” I am committed to CrossFit forever. So thank you to everyone who has helped me get there.-Joan Abate

CFES was a changing point for me, in terms of exercise and my life, as I knew it in Sacramento. After that “workout”, I woke up the next day sore as all hell, couldn’t move and wanting more – why I wanted more I will never know. SIGN ME UP!!! But I was locked in to some absurd amount of personal training sessions at 24Hour Fitness, so I altered my training schedule to 3 times a week so I would breeze through my training sessions so I could get into the box as soon as possible. Starting in December of 09, I became part of the gym but more importantly the CFES family. What I didn’t realize that when I joined that my passion for exercising would return, that exercising doesn’t have to feel like a chore – I had lost that passion after I quit playing lacrosse and competitive swimming – YES, black people can swim and play lacrosse!Essentially the rest is history! For the past several months I’ve been religiously going 3-4 times a week at 8 am, working out with the usual group of intimidating athletes – which proves to be a humbling experience every time I go. Who would of thought that I would be getting my butt handed to me on a daily basis by people 10 years my elder?? (Don’t get me wrong 8amers, you all are badasses and you all inspire me to know that physical fitness and elite athleticism has no age boundaries.) But through the tutelage of Brooke, Justin, Travis and the rest of the CFES family; you all have assisted me in reaching my potential and I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to expose me to CrossFit and travel this road towards elite fitness.Now on a more somber note: When I found out that I was returning back East, I was most saddened by the fact that I knew I would be leaving you all. I didn’t know how I would break the news to you all and I felt that I was abandoning something that became so near to me. I realized in visiting other CrossFit facilities that what I have experienced at CFES in this short few months is unique to this box in terms of the instruction and the community that has been formed. I can honestly say if it wasn’t for you all that I would have been miserable in Sacramento so I would like to thank you for helping facilitate this shift for me in my consciousness and my demeanor.

There are not enough words of gratitude that I can express to show how appreciative I am of everything you all have done for me (physically & mentally) and everyone else in this community. I have the utmost respect for you all as people and as fierce competitors and by me leaving I hope this will not be the last time I see or hear from you all. I wish you all the best in the future and if you ever make it to the RIGHT coast, feel free to look me up and I will do my best to show you all a great time and show you off at whatever box I am then attending. I plan on seeing you all at the top!!! Keep up the great work!!!

With the Utmost Love and Gratitude,
Bryant Harris

Fast forward to 2009. I had recently moved back to Sacramento from the North Bay and wanted to focus on myself for once. I was hell bent on peeling back all of the layers that had built up and made me resent myself. A coworker of mine had mentioned this gym called CrossFit Diablo where he worked out. The energy that he showed when talking about it was contagious. He talked about how awesome it was, how chicks routinely kick his ass, how he feels spent but full of energy later that same day. I was hooked – I had to check it out.When I got home that Friday night, I looked up CrossFit and the “boxes” (yeah, i was laughing) that are here in town. East Sac’s website had the gritty look of a no bullshit gym that I was looking for. Watching the videos of Travis and Justin were inspiring and amazing – how can this little dude bust out box jumps like a freakin’ kangaroo? I had to do this. I called on Saturday afternoon, and Justin had me in on Monday to do the introductory class. Rowing – no problem. Stretching, ok, I can do this. Leg swings, sure. Then we did an extremely easy WOD – air squats + lunges + pull-ups. I felt like i was going to puke all over his feet. I had explained my quasi-athletic background to Justin and I’ll never forget his last comment to me:As I’m sitting on the floor, slumped against the whiteboards…

Justin: “so, now that you’ve done that how ‘in shape’ do you think you are?” Me: “huh? hold on a sec. I feel really weird” Justin: “dude, you are in terrible shape. sit down, rest, don’t leave here for a while – you can’t drive right now”

After that single hour of hell – I’ve been hooked since.

I fell into a groove of going to the evening classes and have met some amazing people and athletes. John Michelmore inspires me every time we workout together – the dude is a machine! Pat Harty was one of the first people to walk up to me and introduce himself and everytime I see him workout, I get motivated. Justin, Travis and Chris have done an amazing job of creating the space, but the people are what makes this box tick – and it’s awesome.

Now, I’m almost in the best shape of my life. I’ve dropped over 25# since November and have more energy than I did in high school. My mental focus is intense, my body is capable of doing more than I knew it could (except pull ups – WTF?) and friends and family can’t stop making comments about how great and happy I look. I’ve recently started the Zone diet and am hoping for a summer of being fit, happy and feeling on fire. This place truly is the Fountain of Youth.
-Ryan Lippman