WORDS FOR THOUGHT

Back in October (07), a couple of months before opening the gym, Garrin and I sat down and talked about exactly what type of gym we wanted to be.  Do we want televisions, treadmills, and a row of benches for people to build up their pecs?  Should we line the walls with mirrors so everyone can see their awesome physique?  What’s going to be our gimmick?  “You’ll lose 20 pounds in 20 days”, “Turn fat into muscle”, or maybe “20 minutes a day will kill the fat away”… 

Truthfully, none of those topics even came up as a part of our conversation.  We knew what type of gym we wanted to be and have a very clear idea of exactly what that is.  It’s so clear that it’s hard to explain.  The thing with F3 Fitness is that you won’t ever get the same workout twice.  It’s clear that every time you come in, something different is happening.  It’s interesting because people come up to me all the time and say “What kind of a gym is it” or “what are your workouts like”?  The only thing I can really tell them is either to come and check it out, or go to the website. 

The bottom line is I don’t expect the average person to know what a Turkish Get-up is or a Tabata class or Warrior Protocol Training.  Furthermore, even some of the more gym savvy folk that I talk to look at me like I’m speaking in tongues when I talk about our training.  It’s because of this that some people cry foul.  Albeit none of these people have actually been in the gym but they have an opinion none-the-less.  I believe these people grew up with the basic philosophy of; Monday chest, Tuesday cardio, Wednesday arms/back, Thursday rest, Friday legs, Saturday chest, Sunday rest, AND THEN REPEAT for however long they plan on working out for, whether it be a month or six months.  There’s nothing wrong with that, but I am a strong believer that repetition is what makes people bored.  BORED OF ANYTHING!  Working out, cooking, listening to the same song, etc…  If every time you went to work you knew something was going to be different wouldn’t it be a little more interesting?  I think that’s a no-brainer! 

That’s what F3 is all about.  F3 is about getting people excited about working out, and getting results that last.  You are going to get a unique full-body workout every time you walk into F3.  This is great because in a traditional workout regimen if you have to miss a day, lets just say its “chest day”, the rest of your week is screwed up.  The order in which you train has been completely thrown off.  However, at F3 there are no “chest days” or “tri’s and bi’s days” or “leg days”.  Don’t get me wrong though, some days certain areas are targeted more than others, but you’re still going to get a full body workout.  So if something does come up and you must miss a day of training it’s no big deal.  You’ll be able to pick right back up without a hitch the next day you’re in.  Furthermore, by surprising your body every time you come in, your muscles are basically shocked and torn apart differently every time.  Thus, the hypertrophy process (rebuilding of muscle) is much more efficient because it often occurs within a different area of the muscle than which it last occurred.  This also helps to combat the effects of overtraining.  This is important because even when you decide to stop working out for a while you’ve increased your LMM (lean muscle mass).  What this results in is a much more efficient metabolism both during and after your workout cycle, which helps in combating weight gain if/when you decide to take a month or two off at some point.   Those are some of the big reasons we train the way that we train.

We are now approaching the one year anniversary, and I believe we have succeeded in running a good gym and NOT a social club.  A big part of this is the clients.  Let’s face it, F3 has a very rough edge to it.  You see the tire (not inviting)!  You see the kettlebells (what the heck are those?)!  You see the big pull-up bar (oooh those are hard)!  These are the little things that we use to weed out the good and the bad clients.  We want the people that see a challenge and jump in.  We don’t want the people that are concerned with how many treadmills we have and what channels they can watch.  We want the people that understand that in order to get great rewards you MUST do great work.  We want great people!  We want winners!  All of our clients are winners.  Ask them, they’ll tell you “I’m a winner”.  They’ll say “I know I’m a winner, because I’ve been through hell and back, and I’m going back to hell on Monday to get some more”.  They’re all winners!

In closing I would just like to say that I love what we’ve become, and I love and appreciate the hardworking clients that have come to us.  I’m excited to see what we will do this next year and am anxious to see further results from the work that will ensue. 

Brian