Hi and welcome to another week,
Thanks to everyone who got along to the gym last week – some pretty awesome classes throughout the week…it really did feel like a bit of a cardio focus when I was doing the sessions although I can tell you that wasn’t supposed to be the intention when I planned it all out. Certainly the Tuesday partners class and the 5-minute rounds that ran on Friday just seemed to be one cardio station after another (or maybe that is just where my conditioning is at right now??). In any case – lots of fun and I am sure I am better now than I was this time last week….right???
Personally I am battling my way through our latest ‘THE ONE’ challenge and have been finding getting the classes done (3 each week) is no problem at all…but putting on my ‘big boy pants’ and committing to do 3x extra sessions of ‘conditioning’ has been a real struggle. The physical side of it is tough (I guess) but honestly once I get started I am usually OK – it is just the mental battle and procrastination that goes on before getting started that is really wearing me down. I know, I know – it should be simple. The program is there, three times each week I just need to carve out a 30-minute slice of time and DO IT but somehow knowing it and saying it are both WAY (way, way) easier than doing it.
That said, if you want to get better at something – which is the idea of this challenge – then there isn’t really much that you can’t overcome if you dedicate enough energy/effort towards it over a long period of time. If you FOCUS when you PRACTISE you get better! Like the Bible says (Proverbs 24:16) “For a just man, falleth seven times and riseth up again”.
OK. So now I have quoted the Bible which has got to be a first for me (in any part of my life!) but whether you have taken on a new skill or are working towards a medium to long-term goal (losing x-kilos, gaining muscle are the most typical gym examples here) I guess I see so many people have a go for a while – then give up and stop – then start-up and have another try – then give up again only to start AGAIN 6-months later. I see the same thing at footy where players aren’t getting a game and ‘persist’ for a time before pulling the pin…as anyone in a coaching role will tell you, in most cases their opportunity would have been ‘right there’ pretty soon after they had decided to call time had they simply stuck at it!
Improvement and results come only from persistence – and this is true whether you are chasing a skill acquisition target (though in the case of me trying to learn guitar I am on a VERY SLOW improvement curve!) or a long term goal the only thing that is certain is that there a million paths to follow that will get you results – and one sure way to failure (it’s called giving up).
That’s it from me for the day – see you in the gym,
Michael.
p.s. Don’t forget, we are meeting at the Merriwell (Crown complex) this SATURDAY for a beer and whatever else at 3pm. We would love to see you there…if you can’t make 3pm, don’t stress too much because I wont get there till 5:30pm or so and will be looking for someone to buy a beer for around that time!
p.p.s. Struggling with the speedball – be sure to check out our link of the week!
As per last week’s note, we do have some price changes coming on July 1st. As per last weeks note as well, if you are an existing member you will be able to stay on your current pricing as long as your membership remains valid – if you are on a contract and it expires in a few months time, you will still be able to access your current pricing rate when the renewal time comes – so you don’t need to ‘panic’ into renewing now…I am told by pretty much everyone I ask that this is stupid from a business perspective but do feel it is important to support our clients who have been supporting us for such a long time.
I had a comment from someone as well saying it sounds like prices are about to ‘skyrocket’. Well – I don’t think that is right but there is no doubt that what we are about to do with pricing represents the biggest change in pricing at the gym since we opened the doors back in 2010. We are making these changes because we are determined to keep the doors to the gym open moving forward (unfortunately busy classes does not necessarily reflect enormous profit margins though it would be nice if it did) and as all of our peripheral costs continue to rise we do need to make some changes to our base level pricing.
In addition to the pricing changes, we will also be changing a couple of the terms and conditions around memberships and these WILL impact on everyone as we move forward. The main change here is that we will NOT be providing bags/gloves/wraps/towels with each new 12-month membership/membership renewals. The reason for this is pretty simple really – given the PERKVILLE rewards scheme gives everyone the opportunity to get all of their gear at what is less than cost price anyway, providing the rewards scheme AND the packs is just getting to be a bit too much…basically, one of them had to go. We have elected to maintain the PERKVILLE program rather than the packs because it is available to all clients and can be used for a wide variety of items…hoodies, gloves, Personal Training, Protein, Body Scans etc which seems a little more democratic than only providing the packs and only then to a subset of members.
Three weeks down, two to go. Most challenges are 4-weeks long but this one has (sneakily) been extended out to five…which right now does not seem like such a great idea to me. As per my comments last week (and at the top of the blog), I am getting the classes completed ‘no problem’ but the extra conditioning work is seriously close to killing me. If I do it before a class – the class seems impossible. Getting motivated to do it AFTER a class is proving a bridge too far – but I don’t like doing it as a ‘stand-alone’ session really…so when to do it?
The simple answer to this riddle is more and more becoming ‘whenever I have a spare 45 minutes’ (30 minutes plus a bit of a warm-up/cool down) because that is the only way I am getting my sessions done…
Good luck everyone – stick at it and lets make sure we ALL get to the end achieving awesome results.
In the next couple of weeks there are going to be some new cabinets/storage arrangements in the reception area as part of the work we started a few months ago with the move of all of the power/internet services etc. These moves are primarily for storage – but also to enable us to keep expanding our range of products…people with keen eyes would have noticed all of the Rock Tape products, gym chalk, expanded protein line, skipping ropes (well, speed ropes really) and a number of other items we have added to the shop lately. As always, we are trying make sure the prices we offer are AT LEAST as good as those you can find on shelves at other shops in the local area (try and buy Boomers at a Health Food store for $50 if you don’t believe me!).
If you do need something, please ask at the gym to see if we have it – if we do, you can pretty much guarantee it will be a good product that does the job it was designed too AND that it is being sold at a pretty fair price…if either of these things aren’t true, be sure to let me know!
We have a new order of the Large and XL MMA-style gloves on the way and I hope they are on the shelves by the end of the month. These continue our recently updated design with the ‘open’ thumb which is an awesome solution for anyone who just ‘hates’ taking their gloves off in classes. These mitts really do support ‘grappling’ activities so you can be sure that you can keep them on for all of your barbell, kettlebell and dumbbell work.
There are still a few hoodies left on the shelves and I have made some tentative enquiries about stocking some more. The likelihood is that the next ‘lot’ will jump up from $45 to $60 each. That doesn’t sound fair/right I hear everyone say, but the reality is that the hoodies actually cost us (base) $40 each to get in…and when you deduct the $4.50 GST off the sale price of each one it gives us a grand total of 50cents profit per unit…then you take into account the impact of our rewards program and it is quite easy to see how challenging it is to provide products to you guys.
If our next order is LESS than 100 units (which is what our first order was) then our base cost goes up even further…hence my reluctance when people have been asking for ‘more’ to get any more in. It is a bit of a catch-22 in a lot of ways because we definitely want to provide you guys with an awesome range of products but when the cost is puts us at risk of being unable to pay the rent….
As per my note from last week, if you are still keen on a hoody, please let me know (I know a few people already have) and I will firm up the quotes and look to restock (I am thinking the new ones will be RED/Burgundy rather than black).
We have had SEVEN people tip all six winners this weekend – so congratulations and well done to each of them…particularly to Peter Brear who not only won the competition but won lunch off me when his Cats defeated my Dogs.
Kristy, Alex and Aaron all remain up the top of the overall leaderboard on 85 points…they are 5 points behind ‘someone’ but it would be immodest of me to say who has built such a huge lead!
Dream Team is on a bye for a few weeks – whilst the scores you get still count for your percentage, there are no wins/losses over the next 3x weeks.
After watching a few people struggle with the ‘3-bounce’ speedball requirements last week, I remembered we did a video on this a couple of years ago. It is actually pretty good despite the dud presenter! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wT08PQxlEbE
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