We are all eagerly awaiting the pull up rig reconfiguration that will open up more spaces in group classes whilst remaining COVID compliant.  Unfortunately, the parts that were scheduled to ship October 8th are still in the paint shop in Montreal so the likelihood of them arriving by this Saturday as planned, seems very small indeed.  As a result we’ve postponed our contractor until the required parts are here in hand.

It’s a disappointing and unwanted delay but the upshot is that this Saturday’s group classes will follow the regular weekend schedule and will take place indoors.  Sprite will be overseeing them as Shades, HeeHee, Jet, Mom and I are attending our Original Strength Pro Certification course Saturday and Sunday.

Apologies for any membership billing confusion.  In March and April we chose to close the gym doors in response to COVID concerns. Though we didn’t halt classes, transitioning without a  missed day to outdoor WODs and then Zoom WODs, the closure certainly did not allow us to provide the kind of service you had originally signed up for when you paid your membership dues.  We lent out all the equipment that could be carried out the door but not everyone got some and no one got everything they would have liked.

To your credit, you did not ask that we put your membership on hold.  And you did not ask for a membership refund.  In fact, many of you offered (we gratefully declined) to pay your annual dues early or to even pay several years membership in advance to help the gym through a challenging time.  We were so grateful for the show of support and grateful too that we did not have to take you up on it.  In fact, we were so grateful that we wanted to add two months to your membership in thanks for sticking by us when our doors were shut.

We know you did not ask for this, all the more reason that you deserve it.  We didn’t want to make a big deal about it because we knew some of you would protest but also because we don’t know what the future holds and we don’t want to set a precedent that creates future expectations.  We hope there will be no further closures but if there are, there is no way we can offer the same thing again.  We didn’t realize our unmentioned gift would create as much confusion as it has.  We just hoped to quietly add two months free to the end of your contract hoping you wouldn’t notice.  But you caught us.  And now we’re forced to explain.  Sorry for any confusion we have caused.  If your contract has not yet expired, the two months will be added when it does.

No, it’s not good business but it is what felt right to us.  Just this once.  We’ve watched so many other businesses forced to close over the past few months, your steadfast loyalty means so much to us.  Yes, 2020 has set the gym back hard erasing all the gains we made in 2019 and putting us back to where we started in 2018 with all our expansion debt.  But we worked our way out of that debt before and will do so again.  Leon and I are right now engaged in the process of restructuring the business to make it more profitable in hard times so that we can continue to serve you for many decades more.

Thanks again for standing by us through hard times!

Wednesday WOD
We will be able to provide rower and pull up bar access to 6 members and can accommodate an additional 4 attendees on the lifting platform.  We can also offer an outdoor dumbbell version of the workout if we have more than 10 registered attendees.

Equipment: Barbell or dumbbell, rower or airbike or ski erg or running route

Warm Up
1 min Cross Crawls
1 min Air Squats
1 min Ring Rows
1 min Reverse Samson Lunges
1 min Shoulder Press
1 min Row
1 min Squat & Press

Tech
Movements and alternatives:
Row this should be approximately 2 minutes of effort so equates to a 400m Run or 1200m on the Echo bike
Thrusters should be done at a light weight in one or two sets dumbbells can be used as an outdoor alternative
Pull Ups should be completed in 3 sets if you have pull ups but can’t do 15 in 3 sets, start with pull ups then switch to jumping pull ups.  Ring rows or bent over dumbbell rows can also be substituted.

WOD
3 Rounds
500m Row
25 Thrusters
15 Pull Ups

Cool Down
Lat Stretch
Forearm Stretch
Scap Rotations
Dragon/Pigeon Pose