All posts by rnagy

Meal of the Week (burn your turkey edition)

Clean Eating, Diet, Fitness, Life Health, Nutrition, Training

This week for our Meal of the Week we are going to change things up just a bit. We are now 8 days out from Thanksgiving. We all know that this is the ultimate “cheat day.” Here at Union Fitness we truly believe in helping each and every one of our members in and out of the gym. You may spend 1-10 hours a week in Union Fitness and we hope to empower you during that time to be your best self and live your best life. Too often as strength and fitness professionals we all lose sight of the end game, a better life. So with this in mind we are preparing to stuff ourselves on Thanksgiving day with friends and family and invite you to do the same and feel no guilt about enjoying your day.

The other thing we want to do is take care of yourself and others. On Thursday November 28th we invite you (and friends, member or non-member) to come down to Union Fitness and join us in our biggest class. We have named this class the Turkey Burn. If you are using our discount and running the Turkey Trot with our friends at the YMCA we will let you slide on this one. If you are free come down and join in the superclass. All we ask of you is three things:

  1. Bring a canned good so that we may donate to those less fortunate than us. Don’t worry there will be coffee for after the workout.
  2. Bring your Positive Mental Attitude (PMA) and maybe some friends or family to raise their holiday spirits too.
  3. Sign up for the class online so we know how much coffee to bring. We have already added more spots to this class three times so let’s burn some turkeys.

The workout will consist of some cardio class, some lifting as well as a special Powerful with CJ workout. We will have the entire gym to ourselves so should be a great day of training. The workout will begin at 9 AM and wrap up at 10 AM, just in time to check your burnt turkey at home.

If you have any questions please ask any of our staff members. Now let’s empower each other for greatness.

Meet the staff Monday

Life Health, Training


Happy Monday to all of you and let’s get this week started right with a Meet the staff Monday. We are doing our best at making sure our staff knows all of you and you know our staff. We appreciate you coming to Union Fitness and we also realize that we are what you make us. So with that said we are going to introduce you to our staff. Please feel free to speak to our staff with anything you need. Even if we are training we are still here to serve each and everyone of you. Now Catlyn will take the mic. 

Hey folks, 

Welcome to this week’s edition of Meet the Staff Monday! My name is Catlyn Brooke and you can catch me in the Strength Lab Monday/Friday for 6:30a #powerful and Tuesday/Thursday for 6:30a Bootcamp.  

I started at Union Fitness 2 years ago as a training client with Lindsey, at the times I was 6 months post hernia repair. I had a foundation in strength training from CrossFit (not how I got the hernia), and I wanted to learn how to squat “right” before lifting heavy again. After training for a few months with Lindsey and getting some women’s #powerful classes under my belt (you get it?), I decided Union Fitness was the place to continue my fitness and coaching journey. 

I have met so many amazing, hardworking, bad-ass people here who are my IRL #fitspo. The members who have come into my life in the past few months and have broken me out of my lifting slump. I was pretty much indifferent to training, not sure if I ever wanted to do it seriously or compete again. BUT! I have been convinced (aka hyped up) to do a meet in March with them. So now, instead of just seeing me teach classes or greeting your lovely faces at the desk, you will also see me lying on the floor after a set of 20 belt squats programmed by none other than our new General Manager and all-star beard grower, Todd Hamer.

What do I do when I’m not at UF? I spend the majority of my time at ASCEND Pittsburgh as the Events Director and a personal trainer. I also spend a lot of time singing annoying songs to my cats, baking, and reading. 

Come see me in the morning if you want to hear more about my cats (no, I won’t sing their songs to you) or if you would like to request a certain baked good(s). If morning isn’t your thing, you can find me at ASCEND in the afternoon, probably lying on the floor there too after slipping off a climbing hold.  

See you soon! 

Catlyn 

PS – ((Warning: Shameless self-promotion.)) I post about my cats a lot on Instagram. @catlyn_

 

Guest Training Log, Simone Morin

Fitness, Training

You will notice that we are going to start having some guests on the blog. One of the things we at Union Fitness want to bring to you is not just what we know, we also want you to learn from others that we learn from. This week Simone Morin is writing our guest post. Full disclosure, Simone was one of my assistant strength coaches when I was director of strength and conditioning at the George Washington University.

Simone has spent time at many schools training athletes, she worked at Kansas, GW, Springfield College as well as UConn and Quinnipiac. Enough from me here is Simone’s workout log.

Todd Hamer

Quick little background – I was introduced to strength training as a college softball player. Through my collegiate career I had never back squatted or benched with a normal barbell. Post-college I started teaching myself new movements I had not experienced in college (with the exception of back squat). About a year ago I finally decided it was time to learn and train back squat and regular bench press. Over this past summer Hamer brought me to the dark side and introduced me to conjugateU so here is a look into a dynamic effort upper body focused day designed to work on my weaknesses.
Dynamic Effort Upper Day
Goals: Work on control and owning the bottom range of motion on bench, while moving the bar as fast as possible on the concentric portion of the movement.
A1. Speed Bench Triphasic Clusters (2 eccentric reps, 10s rest, 2 isometric reps, 10s rest, 2 normal concentric reps). Every rep the concentric portion should be at a speed of about 7m/s. 3 total sets at 95lbs
B1. 1 and 1/4 rep bench (own the bottom range of motion)
5×3 (95, 105, 110, 115, 120lbs)
C1. SA Lat Pulldown with Isometric Band Hold 4x8e
C2. SA DB Row 4x10e
Armfarm:
D1. Surf the rack biceps
D2. Surf the rack OH Tricep Extension
D3. Manual Forearm rotations

 

Lindsey’s November Food Log

Uncategorized

I’m about 10 days out from my meet and marathon. I’m exhausted, finishing up training, and hungry all the time. I let that hunger get the better of me over the weekend – I was traveling to support our friends lifting in Ohio, handled another one of our own at a meet in Bridgeville, and by the time I got home Sunday, pretty much just fell asleep. In between, my diet consisted mostly of bites of pizza, fast food, donuts, and some of the best pancakes I’ve ever had.

 

That’s all well and good, but I do have a general weight goal for next week and eating “junk food” makes me feel pretty crappy, so I’m cleaning things up this week. That meant taking a little bit of time off on Monday to buy groceries and meal prep. Since none of it is really special, I figured I’d lay it all out here.

 

Supplies:

Butcher Box 

  • salmon filet, steak filets, chicken thighs, pork shoulder (had on hand), bacon

Misfit Box (a cool CSA type service for produce that looks ugly but tastes good)

  • eggplant, carrots, apples, potatoes, kabocha squash

Giant Eagle Run

  • tomatoes, mushrooms, green beans, kale, eggs, fancy juice, sauerkraut

Stuff I always have on hand

  • jasmine rice, butter, avocado and olive oils, salt, pepper, basic spices

 

What I made:

  1. Pulled Pork Shoulder
    • I have no secret, I use the crockpot. Rub it down with salt, any spices you want (I’ve been having some issues with even the most basic spices, so I’m going salt only), add apple cider vinegar, some honey, liquid smoke. Cook for 12 hours, no less, pull immediately.
  1. Roasted Green Beans and Kabocha Squash
    • In a huge bowl, coat the green beans in olive oil, salt, pepper. Spread on a baking sheet.
    • In another bowl, add peeled and chopped kabocha squash, olive oil, salt, pepper (shocker). Would have been good with a touch of cinnamon. Lay out on backing sheet.
    • Stick both in the oven, preheated to 375 degrees. Green beans took about 20 minutes, squash took about 35.
  1. Pan Roasted Veggies
    • Chop the eggplant and mushrooms. Keep the cherry tomatoes nearby. Preheat a large pan, add some avocado oil. Add eggplant first, salt it, throw a lid on and let it sear. About 5 minutes later, add the mushrooms and tomatoes. More salt. Throw the lid back on and let the juices from the mushrooms and tomatoes leak out and make the eggplant delicious. I let it cook down for about 15 minutes and it was perfect.

 

That makes up my lunches. I do about 4oz of cooked pork and a big scoop of either green beans or the roasted eggplant and tomato. That made 8 meals that I’ll pair with jasmine rice.

 

For breakfasts, I almost always have either 2 scrambled eggs and rice (if within 3 hours of a training session) OR I spend a little extra time making a hash with honey gold potatoes, bacon, and kale, topped with two eggs. 

 

For an extra meal, I’ll go to the roasted kabocha with steak or salmon. I have apples and lots of almonds and walnuts for snacks. Ready to go.

 

By the end of this week I’ll hopefully feel back to my normal self and be pretty much ready to go for next weekend’s adventure.

Meet the Staff Monday

Life Health

This Monday we introduce you to another one of our staff members. This week we bring you one of our personal trainers as well as our finest musician on staff, Mr. Ethan Raese. Ethan is one of the early trainers here at Union, he has been here for a few years now. Speak to any of his clients and you will see that he is as committed to seeing improvement in each and every person Ethan meets.

Here is a short list of some of what Ethan has done in his life.

9 years working in collegiate strength and conditioning.

7 years teaching olympic style lifting.

6 years working with Carnegie Mellon University.

Degrees in Psychology/Anthropology, Temple and Exercise Science, Pitt.

CSCS and USAW Certification.

Now let’s delve into the fun, Ethan has over 20 years as a touring drummer. Ethan began his first tour at the age of 15. Ethan has toured the world as a drummer for numerous bands. If you want to see him on tour search for one of his current bands Steel Nation. Why do I care so much about this? I want all of you who are reading this realize that we are more than what we see in the gym. Our goals here at Union Fitness is to empower you everyday to be your best and with someone like Ethan your can see that your best may occur inside the gym or outside the gym either way we are here for you.

To close this blog let me say Happy Veterans Day to all of our veterans!

 

Ham’s Training Log

Fitness, Training

Some background before you begin reading this training log.

I began working as a strength coach in 1999 at University of Pittsburgh, at the time Buddy Morris was the strength coach at Pitt and he introduced me to Louie Simmons and the Westside Barbell style of training. Recently people have begun referring to this style of training as conjugate model of training. I can debate what it should be called yet I don’t want to bore anyone with these details. What I will do is break down how it is generally programmed.

Training in this style means that one day you train your big movement explosively (dynamic effort day), one day you train your big moment heavy (maximal effort day). All you do from here is rotate upper and lower dominate days. An example would look like this.

Sunday

Explosive Press, followed by accessories.

Monday

Heavy Lower, followed by accessories.

Wed

Heavy Press, followed by accessories.

Friday

Explosive Lower, followed by accessories.

Tues and Thur are recovery days. Drag a sled, throw a med ball or anything with little to no eccentric load.

This type of programming has led to many great lifts and I have followed similar patterns during most of my lifting career. So here is a sample day for me. This is Tuesdays lift which is my Max Effort Lower day.

Warm up 100 jump rope without messing up.

Blackburns 2×10

Band Rows 100 reps

1a Box Jumps 3×3 1b Med Ball Slams 3×8

Sumo Deadlifts 135 2×5, 225×3, 275×1,315×1,365×1,405×1, 405×1 +1chain,405×1+2chains, 405×1 +3chains, 405×1 +4 chains, 425 x1 +4chains.

RDL 3×5 315

Pit Shark Squats 5×10 a bunch of plates

100 reps 45 degree hyper

Finished with some abs.

This was just a small example of a heavier deadlift day. I have recently returned to sumo deadlifts and am now just getting some weight in my hands. With my Max Effort days my goal is to strain without missing any reps. So it is a tough balance I do not want to be soft yet I do not want technique to go out the window and I do not want to miss. So this is where I ended my pulls. At times I may add some singles or doubles at 80% of my best rep for that day.

 

 

 

 

CJ’s Spicy Salsa

Clean Eating, Diet, Meal Prep, Nutrition

It’s Wednesday so that means it’s time for meal of the week. We at Union Fitness love a good spice and nothing says spicy food like a cold day, so with winter creeping upon us we give you this recipe from Charles Jasper (CeJ, CJ, CG).

If you’re looking for some quality spice in your life, I suggest you try out this tasty salsa recipe. After my buddy Anthony B tried it out, he gave me his high five of approval. I’m not a guy that follows recipes to a tee but here is the baseline of ingredients .

CeJ’s Salsa Party
1-14.5oz can diced tomatoes
1-10oz can diced tomatoes w green chili
3- cloves of garlic
1/2-onion of your choice
2- jalapeños
Couple squeezes of honey( I used hot honey)
1/2- Cup of cilantro
A Bump of Salt
Lime Juice
Toss all these into the blender, pulse it up and enjoy!
Stay Spicy my friends,
CeJ

Meet the Staff Monday

Uncategorized

Editors note

We will be running a meet the staff Monday for the next few weeks. Here at Union Fitness we have an awesome staff of trainers, massage, therapists, class instructors and many others that are here to help you improve. We are hoping to create an environment in which everyone is comfortable working with everyone else. For this first edition of meet the staff Monday we are going to have new CJ introduce himself. Having two CJ’s on staff can be confusing so feel free to use nicknames, new CJ is CJ old CJ is CG. 

Thanks 

Todd Hamer

Hello Everyone,

My name is CJ Campbell, and I am one of the new coaches here at Union Fitness. I am from Butler, PA and attended Slippery Rock University, where I graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Physical and Health Education last May. Although I am fresh out of school, I have been working in the fitness industry for the past five years, whether it be personal training or strength and conditioning. Leading up to graduation (and shortly after), I have worked with Fox Chapel High School, Butler High School Varsity Hockey, and Slippery Rock University Ice Hockey. My deep background in sports has helped me develop my coaching and personal training skills, making it easier for me to transition away from being a competitive athlete.

I first heard about Union Fitness from current trainer Cayt Neff, who is one of my peers from Slippery Rock university. At first I was skeptical, but once I visited the gym and talked with the staff, I knew it would be a great place to utilize my skills, and learn from some great minds with experience in personal training, sports performance, and power lifting. My passion for this industry is constantly growing, and I believe Union Fitness is the best environment possible to meet new individuals, along with helping them accomplish whatever goals they set for themselves! 

I look forward to meeting some of you at the gym, and possibly having the chance to train or coach you in the near future! 

Have a Great Day,

CJ

CJ is ready to compete…will you join him?

Life Health, Training

Hello to all my Bumpy friends, 

For those of you who don’t know me, I am CJ and I teach #Powerful w/CeJ on Tuesdays & Thursdays from 5-8pm. I have been a college strength coach for 7 years and a Union Fitness coach for over 2 years. I’ve worked with the New York Mets, Ohio State Football, various universities (Slippery Rock, Robert Morris, Morehead State and Youngstown State) as well as youth athletes and weekend warriors. I have a passion for educating others and myself while motivating people to achieve their health and life goals! 

I am currently 1 week out from a powerlifting meet in Canton Ohio that 11 other Union Fitness Crue members will be competing in (come out and show some love). This will be my second powerlifting meet and I am excited to crush my Squat, Bench and Deadlift personal records and make the UF Crue proud. Since I am 1 week out I will be reloading (we don’t deload, we reload) and working on recovering and prepping my body for the meet. I plan to do some light Squat, Bench and Deadlift work and then lighter bodybuilding movements just to get new blood flow to my muscles and work out any aches, pains and kinks I have in the old body. Heck, I might even get a massage from one of our great massage therapists at UF and I definitely will do some mobility. 

My excitement is building as we creep closer to “show time” (Beetlejuice voice). The motivation and training environment at UF with the Crue have been amazing for months now and we’re about to show Canton Ohio all the work we put in. I will say I am more confident and stronger than before and I can contribute that to all my training partners. November 9th is soon approaching and then it’s time to Get Bumpy. 

Stay Strong My Friends, 

Saturday Squat Training:

1a. Dynamic Warmup-Mobility-Band Glute Activation

2a. Speed Squats 3×3 Work on Technique

3a. Fatbell Reverse Lunges 2x8e 3b. Fatbell Single Leg RDL 2x8e

4a. GHRs 2×10 4b. Hanging Leg Raise 2×10

5a. Band Ankle & Lower Body Stretch 5b. Donnie Thompson Hip Series 5c. Body Tempering

6a. Recovery Shake & a solid meal

CJ

 

 

Cayt’s Meal Of the Week

Clean Eating, Diet, Life Health, Meal Prep, Nutrition

For those that may not know, powerlifting is a weight class sport and in hope to maintain the theme of the upcoming meet, I am going to talk about my mindset going into weigh-ins this meet.  This may be my first full power meet that I don’t try and cut weight to make a weight class.  The thought alone messes with my head a little for a few reasons, but I am trying to find peace with it being an option.  I am slightly above weight so once we reach 7 days out I will decide if it is something I can and want to manage.  

For someone with a past of eating disorders, I am very aware of my own triggers.  I am still learning how to entirely combat those feelings, but I am also learning to accept that it will be a process of good and bad days and even better and worse moments.  Leading into this meet, I am acknowledging that a few of my personal triggers are developing and when this happens I have to prioritize those that I can control and cannot control.  

With that said, for the time being, my goal is to eat enough to regain energy, to train and recover as necessary, and to COMPETE well.  

I made a big pot of chili over the weekend for one of my meals.  I rarely use measurements and tend to use my eyes as a judgment call for recipes like this.  However, these are all of the ingredients: 

93/7 ground turkey 

90/10 ground beef 

Black beans

Light red kidney beans

Dark red kidney beans

Carrots

Celery 

Onion

Green, yellow, and red pepper

Tomato sauce 

Diced tomatoes

Chicken broth