trainermerle's blog

Hey all. So, after not spending much time on the ropes lately, we decided it was time to work them back in. We used some time this morning working some rope climbs and reviewing progressions. You can be sure that they will be popping up a little more in WOD's!!!

Cool news for Labor Day, Monday September 6th. Both Crossfit USA and Crossfit Relentless will be closed, however, we will be holding one WOD at 9am on Labor Day in a local park for both clubs!!! This should be alot of fun and we hope to get as many of our members out for this one as possible. More details to follow.

Unfortuantely, this Saturday's kids class is cancelled due to a coaching clinic that I am required to attend. We apologize and appreciate your understanding. All other classes are normal schedule.

We continue to grow here at CFR. We added another new member yesterday,welcome to the CFR family Joe. Joe came to us from a local globo gym with much the same story we have heard from so many others....bored with the same old routine he was turned on to Crossfit by a friend. For the past couple of months he would follow the mainsite WOD's and do them as best he could within his globo gym. He could see the benefits and quickly realized that he needed a Crossfit facility!! Joe has done 2 WOD's with us so far(one of them being Fran!!!) and he has put up some good times.Imagine where he will be in a few months now that he has found the right place to be...a good Crossfit box that cares about you and your fitness goals,not some globo gym where you are just a number!! Be sure to introduce yourself and welcome Joe to the CFR family the way we know you always do!! Here are a few pics of Joe and the am class.

What a great weekend. Besides having a great time at my daughters birthday party and enjoying family time, I was able to attend one of our members Rugby Tournaments on Saturday. My son Jack and I went to Colt Park in Hartford to watch Karim play rugby. We spent a couple of hours there watching several games,what a great time! We got to catch the tail end of Karim's first game and then hung out with him and watched his entire second game. We always talk to our members about how Crossfit will benefit them in their sports,careers and life in general and we often hear their success stories as it relates to it, but we do not always get to see them in action!! I really enjoyed watching Karim's game and I can see how his training here at Crossfit translates to his sport. The play is pretty much non stop,alot of running and definitely some big hitting going on!!! Can you say strength,power,speed,endurance,agility,etc. Thanks for the invite to come see you in action Karim,we are definitely looking forward to coming to see you play again soon!! Here are a few pics from the game.

I was thinking this morning after my wod that the value of any service/object or endeavor can be measured in part by the outcome or success of whatever the "thing " is. For example the success of the Ipod can be measured by it's sales and customer reviews. The success of a sports team can be measured simply by it's win/loss record. In the gym world success can measured numerous ways as well...in part by weight lossed if that is your goal or by personal records achieved in training. So,from the top of my head and without the data in front of me I wanted to share some of our members achievements. If you are mentioned in this blog forgive me if I'm not 100% current on your records but it should be very close. Here goes...

Brenda Glidden...lost over 70 lbs ,went form a size 16 to a size 4.  Max dead lift  235lbs and has completed workouts that have 100 unassisted pull ups in them...wow!

Greg Glidden..down over 40 lbs (forgive me Greg but I 'm not sure of your weights/scores but your achievements are nonetheless  still impressive

Gary Riccini ..lost over 50 lbs  deadlifts well over 400 lbs and routinely finishes in the top half of the class in his wods..nice work Gary!

Thomas Rocco...lost over 20lbs

Renee Cortland...lost over 20lbs,size 2 ! and deadlifts around 200lbs and has full pullups and push ups

Judy Hemphiill....has lost over 20 lbs, have vastly improved her health...deadlifts over 200 lbs ...you amaze me Judy

Anne Sargent..lost over 12 lbs...weighs  pretty much what she weighed when she got married and  her deadlift is 220lbs I believe,crushes wods with 100 pull ups in the wods  scares us all with her victories in the gym. Anne...you are CrossFit!

Bob Emhoff...lost around 20 lbs..deadlifts around 350lbs?  has completed a mini triathlon

Dave Mangold...has lost 20 lbs..deadlifts well over 400 lbs and has completed a min triathlon

Remy Schwarts...at a bodyweight of about 102 lbs can deadlift 185 lbs..has done 26 pull ups in a row without coming off the bar! Nice work Remy!

Marri Fairbanks...has lost about 12 lbs..deadlifts over 200 lbs can do over 15 pull ups in a row! Marri kicks ass!

There are many more I could list if I had the time but I think you get the point. For those of you who are not on the list I am sorry you were left out...next time I do this you will be mentioned. You are all amazing and you are the reason we get out of bed eager to come to work everyday! Thank you for all that you do to inspire us!

With such a beautiful day we designed our adult and kid WOD's so that we could get outside and enjoy the weather....while everyone got their butts kicked !!!! For our CFR kids class today we headed outside and worked on our Angry Gorilla's(deadlifts) and then for our metcon we did some running,wallball and ball slams and then finished off with the fish game on the C2 rower. Our adult class worked up to a 1 rep max on the Strict Press for strength today and then took it outside for 4 rounds of: run 400m/50 air squats. Good times as always here at CFR!! Coach Doug was over from Crossfit USA to coach today and did an excellent job!!! And yes,Marri was in and got her B-Day burpess from the other day !!!! Here are a few pics from today.

Coach Doug In The House !!!!!!