Steve's Club Camden

Happy Thanksgiving!

What's a Tabata? 

20 seconds of work (as many reps as possible) followed by 10 seconds of rest. 6 rounds. 1 minute rest in between exercises.

Tabata Ring Rows

Tabata  Push Press

Tabata Box Jumps

Tabata Burpees

More about the  popular Tabata training protocol HERE.

Anthony shown getting some air!

Julian a basketball player, had little problem getting height and using his hips to jump off the floor.

Consistency is beginning to paying off for Jackie as she continues to master the movements.

 

Chase performance and have fun and cool things happen.

We can always find something to be thankful for, and there may be reasons why we ought to be thankful for even those dispensations which appear dark and frowning.  ~Albert Barnes

gratitude.

3 Rounds

30 Walls Ball

30 Overhead Squats

“Develop an attitude of gratitude, and give thanks for everything that happens to you, knowing that every step forward is a step toward achieving something bigger and better than your current situation.”
–Brian Tracy

Nation's most dangerous city: Camden tops the list again.

7 Rounds

10 Goblet Squats

12 Broad Jumps

14 Touch the Sky (side planks...reach up and touch the sky)

SQUAT!!!

JUMP!!!!

Touch the Sky!!!

Camden again ranks worst on the crime list

"City Council President Angel Fuentes noted that the city has received crime-fighting support from the Attorney General's Office and also is set to receive 25 new squad cars and 75 more officers in the coming year.

"It seems like we're always in the top five, no matter how they do it," said Fuentes, who won the 5th District Assembly race this month. "In 2009, we're going to do better."

Only if the solution was this simple. Perhaps we can take a page from Daniel Quinn's (author of Ishmael) essay and apply it here.

"Obviously in the few minutes I have here I can't give you a blueprint for saving the world. But I can give you a couple of fundamental notions that I think you can follow with complete confidence. The first of these might be called Quinn's First Law. It won't surprise you. It may even strike you as obvious. Here it is. No undesirable behavior has ever been eliminated by passing a law against it.

The second is Buckminster Fuller's Law, which is this: You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. Most of the time when people write to me to ask what they should be doing to save the world, there is in the back of their minds two general notions of how change takes place. One is the notion that passing laws makes things change. The other is that fighting makes things change. We're trained to think that you really are DOING something if you're out there fighting and getting laws passed. But if you heed these two laws, you may think differently about this. Once again they are Quinn's First Law, No undesirable behavior has ever been eliminated by passing a law against it, and Fuller's Law, You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. Here is Quinn's Second Law: What people think is what they do. And its corollary: To change what people do, change what they think. Now what can we do about this vision? We can't legislate it away or vote it away or organize it away or even shoot it away. We can only teach it away. If the world is saved, it will be saved by people with changed minds, people with a new vision. It will not be saved by old minds with new programs.

WE NEED YOUR VOTE!  PLEASE CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING LINK TO HELP US WIN A DONATION FROM CHASE COMMUNITY GIVING (ON FACEBOOK) FOR OUR CLUB.

THANKS!!!!!!

Chasing Greatness.

"Half Angie"

For time:
50 Pull-ups (substitute ring rows as needed)
50 Push-ups (scale on a box or band if necessary)
50 Thigh touches
50 Squats

A little friendly competition between Derek, Ralph and Jose.

 

Lily and Jackie, showing their Girl Power today on Angie.

"Before you finish this paragraph, you have the power to change everything that's to come. And you can do that by asking yourself (and your colleagues) the one question that every organization and every individual needs to ask today: Why not be great?"  -Seth Godin

5 Rounds

100 meter SPRINT!

10 DB Shoulder Presses

10 Box Jumps

What I know:

1.) I know CrossFit works to improve and change the lives of many young kids for the better.

2.) I know there are few, if any opportunities for kids in urban areas to access reasonably-priced health, fitness, and nutrition programs.

3.) I know working with youth especially (kids, teenagers) of these populations may have the greatest potential for positive impact.

4.) I know people can change if they are willing and change happens one person at a time, one community at a time.

5.) I know our members benefit in so many ways from increased health: More energy, increased self-confidence, longer (and higher quality) lives, overflow into other areas of life – family, relationships, career, etc.

6.) I know if you believe in kids and they believe in themselves, they are destined to one day become productive citizens to society.

7.) I know nothing is impossible unless you tell yourself it is. Most kids are they're minds worst enemy. 

8.) I know every young person needs a positive role model in their life to help guide and influence their decisions in a positive way.

9.) I know more youth from cities all over America will one day have an opportunity to join one of the fastest growing fitness communities in the world and be a part of something bigger than themselves.

10.) I know we are running out of time as a country to empower our youth to take personal responsibility to lead a more positive and healthy lifestyle.

"It's not the surface flash, the five digit license plate, the brand of car, the cut of the suit or the seat at the table. It's in how we follow through. It's in the actions we take and the way we listen. It's in keeping our promises and doing exactly what we say we're going to do."  -Seth Godin

In this workout you move from each of four stations after a minute. This is a five-minute round from which a one-minute break is allowed before repeating. The stations are:

Sandbag Shouldering (pick up 25 lb sandbag from ground to shoulder)

Box Jumps

Burpees

Thrusters

The clock does not reset or stop between exercises. On call of "rotate", the athlete/s must move to next station immediately for good score. One point is given for each rep, except on the rower where each calorie is one point.

“I respect my limitations, but I don't use them as an excuse.”
-Stephen R. Donaldson

How Giving Changes Everything

Skill work: 

Snatch progressions, skills and drills (taught by USA Weightlifting Coach Mike Burgener of Mike's Gym).

WOD:

Complete as many rounds in 12 minutes as you can of:
DB/KB Power snatch, 12 reps (each side)
10 Push-ups

Worry only about the things under your control, the things that can be influenced and changed by your actions, not about the things that are beyond your capacity to direct or alter. ~Charles E. Hummel

Luck.

For time:
25 Box jump, 24 inch box
25 Jumping pull-ups
25 Kettlebell swings, 1 pood
Walking Lunge, 50 steps
25 Knees to elbows
25 Push press, 45 pounds
25 Back Extensions
25 Wall ball shots, 20 pound ball
25 Burpees
25 Double unders

Esha (pictured above) doesn't get nearly as much credit as she deserves. She is everything an employer and a coach can ask for. Esha works for Steve's Club during the day to help with the Paleokits. She does various tasks from packaging boxes to labeling bags to ordering supplies. She comes in early and on time everyday. She never complains. On the days that we are slow waiting by for orders to come in, she aways takes initiative on her own to clean the gym or the bathrooms or whatever else needs to be done.

Esha is by no means your typical 20 year old from Camden. Her work ethics and sef-responsilibity is a real pleasure to see in a person her age, and frankly something we ask every member of Steve's Club to model themselves after.

After a full day at Steve's Club working doing Paleokit stuff and then working out, she leaves at around 5:30pm every night to go to her second job at Taco Bell. She puts in about 40 hours a week at Taco Bell working night shift just to make ends meet. 

I'm confident her hard work will pay off. Athough it doesn't always work that way, I think most of the time it does. Ahh you might say..."people work like that all the time...whats so special about Esha?"  Are you saying, she deserves something special because she's such a hard worker?

No I'm not saying that!  But look back to your own life and to the many people you know and grew up around. How much luck was involved in helping them get to where they were at.

I'll use myself as an example. Yes I worked hard in high school to get decent grades with the hope of getting into a decent college (of course I wasn't sure what I wanted to do in college but it was the thing to do!).

Then, I went to my local community college to pursue my associates degree as I worked full-time to pay my through.

The next step is where the luck comes in. Up until this point, I worked pretty hard at the school thing as it never really came easy to me. School just wasn't my thing. But since most of my friends went off to 4 year universities and I didn't have a clue to what I wanted to do at the time, I did what most kids in this situation do....and that is stay in school.

So I transferred to a 4 year out of state public university without a clue as to what I wanted to do when I graduated. But I figured once a took a few courses I had somewhat of an interest in, I could easily decide what I enjoyed doing and what I wanted to spend the rest of my life doing.

Poor logic, I know. Sadly, I was not the only one in this situation as millions of kids a year go off to college without a clue as to knowing what they want to do with their life.

Sorry I'm going off on a tangent. The point I'm trying to make is despite working hard to get into college, I had the good fortune to go to a 4 year public university with the help of parents (and thank god they don't read this blog and hear me say how much of a waste of money it was).

Let's be honest. Luck came my way by having parents that could afford to send me to a public university (just your typical blue collar family...dad owns a pest control business and mom works at an eye doctors office).

But this is just one instance of many that despite how hard I worked I also had much luck come along with it. This isn't the case for everyone. Make any argument you want, but some people don't have a chose where they are born or the parents they are raised by and don't get the same number of breaks others get.

The fact is we are all given a hand of cards to play with. Some may get better cards than others. But what distinguishes the winners from the losers is how we play the cards we are dealt. And just because you are dealt a bad hand, doesn't always mean the game is over. 

Leap Academy moving a bunch of stuff for time! from steve liberati on Vimeo.

Be a leader.

“Fran”

21-15-9

Thrusters

Pullups (sub: ring rows)

So Charlie (SC trainer) turned 19 on Wednesday. Seems like it was just yesterday that he strutted into Steve's Club ready to take on the world. Regardless of the workout I'd throw at him, Charlie was up for the challenge. This was three years ago. In that time, Charlie has matured quite a bit and taken on many responsibilities around the gym, most notably leader and role model to the younger kids that workout at Steve's Club.

So I took Charlie and a few others out to California Pizza Kitchen to celebrate his b-day and thank everyone for their hard work. Somehow we got on the topic of joining gangs. Without going into detail, we started talking about the recruiting efforts of these ruthless gangs, the inititations new members must go through to join and then some of the rules of the game. And if you happen to grow up in Camden, its a very good chance you'll get recruited to join one. It's the thing to do - not only to be cool, but to survive (protect yourself) and of course to make money hustling on the corner. Growing up in a less than desirable situation, its a very alluring temptation and an offer not easy for some young and vulnerable person to turn down.

Fortunately many of the kids that come to Steve's Club aren't involved in gangs although most if not all, know someone who is. It's just the world they live in. But sitting there listening to these stories and the brutal acts of violence these gangs go to protect there reputation, it gave me a great feeling to know that the kids at the table have a place to go to everyday where they can develop the strength and confidence to "do their own thing" and develop into successful and mature young people with big dreams and goals to rise above their peers.

Maybe, just maybe what we're doing continues to catch on.

Good advice

   

Strength work:

Shouldering - #25-50lb sandbags from floor to shoulder.

WOD:

12 min AMRAP

20 Walking Lunges with Weight Overhead

10 Supermans

10 Abmat Situps

Bishop building superpower lower back strength!

 

Although Buster's showing fatigue he's not ready to quit anytime soon.

 

Let's see who can hold the longest Invisible chair... always a  great way to end class!