Marino is a friend of mine from CrossFit Vancouver.  He was often my training partner there and used to train with Leon and I at our old Dunbar Street location too.  He is also the owner of Simpatico, my favourite Greek restaurant.  He has been a boxer his whole life and is the current reigning light heavyweight champion of the restaurant boxing league – yes, it turns out this is actually a real thing!

We were recently having drinks with him at his restaurant to celebrate his birthday when we cooked up an interesting idea.  COVID, he explained to me, has resulted in a change of operations so that Simpatico serves only dinner and is closed for lunch as they now rent out their kitchen in the daytime to a culinary school.  It has served the business well but has left Marino rather bored in the daytime and looking for something fun to do.  With his years of experience and passion for boxing it wasn’t hard to think of a way to keep him entertained while bringing some value to Empower members.

Starting this month Marino will be offering private and semi-private boxing lessons at CrossFit Empower for people interested in discovering the intricacies of a new sport.  If you want to spice up your fitness routine and bring some variety and fun into your training, a little boxing might be just the thing for you!

You’ll likely meet Marino in the gym over the next few days but meanwhile here’s a few words about him:

Marino started CrossFit when the first gym opened in Vancouver. His main sport however is boxing. He has had several charity fights and has started a youth training program at the Hellenic Community Centre of Vancouver. Boxing is the toughest sport and requires mental, psychological and tactical abilities on top of fitness and technique. Marino trains his students in all aspects of the sport to keep them sharp under duress. At Crossfit Empower he can teach you the technical as well as the mental and physical skills to perform and keep you confident in life as well as in amazing shape!

Your boxing lessons at Empower will focus on technical practice with focus mitts, shadow boxing and boxing conditioning workouts.  There will be no sparring.  Suitable for all fitness levels, no previous boxing experience required.  Sessions are available day times and billed at $100 per hour payable to CrossFit Empower through Zen Planner.

Contact [email protected] to get started.

Saturday WOD
Speaking of fighting, today you have a showdown with benchmark workout Cindy.

Warm Up
1 min Breathing
1 min Head Nods/Rotations
1 min Cross Touch Dead Bugs
1 min Windshield Wipers
1 min Egg Rolls
1 min Rocking Chair
1 min Cross Touch Bird Dogs
1 min Judo Push Up Rocks
1 min Crawl
1 min Get Ups
1 min Samson Lunges
1 min Lat Pull Ups

Tech
Movement Standards: Pull Up, Push Up, Squat

WOD: Cindy
20 min AMRAP
5 pull ups
10 push ups
15 squats

Cool Down
Post Stretch
Scap Rotations
Quad Stretch