Unless you’ve been living under a rock –

and maybe even then – you know that New York state recently lifted virtually all COVID restrictions for the vaccinated. Considering that the state-wide vax rate is now over 70% and climbing, this means that the vast majority of us can return to pre-pandemic normal, mask-free, and without social distancing.

For Fitness Incentive, the impact of this change has been profound.

Since mid-may, when the restrictions were first relaxed, literally hundreds of our members have returned to the gym. Long separated gym friends have been reunited, and there’s a general feeling bordering on euphoria among those that have come back. It’s been exciting, emotional, and a huge relief.

What It Means

Fitness Incentive has been busy restoring our services to pre-pandemic levels. In some cases, this has taken longer than we would have hoped, primarily because of a shortage of employees. We’re far from alone in this problem. Many businesses have been impacted by this shortage of labor, and we hope to see it abate by the fall. In the meantime, here’s what we’ve already done and are doing to get back to normal:

More People and Equipment

Capacity is back to 100%. (Yay!) Masks are no longer required for vaccinated members. (Woohoo!) Neither is social distancing. (Yipee!) That has allowed us to bring all of our cardio equipment back online, increasing the amount of equipment available for your use. We’re also bringing back some of the weight equipment we removed to comply with social distancing requirements.

More Hours

We’re back to 95% of our pre-pandemic hours, including weekday evenings and weekend afternoons. We anticipate being back to 100% soon.

More Classes at Greater Capacity

We’ve added classes, including the evening classes that many of you have requested (Our summer schedule starts June 28^th). We’ve also increased the capacity for all our classes, indoors and out, in all our classrooms. We’re still requiring class reservations, but with the addition of more classes and higher capacities, it’s become much easier to get into a class you’d like to attend. Reserving your spot also guarantees you’ll get into the class and that it won’t be overcrowded.

More Services

Our Locker rooms, saunas, and showers are open and fully available.

Our Nursery has reopened with weekday and Saturday morning hours, and we’re working hard to soon add afternoons and evenings. Childcare is now $5 per child, but on June 28^th, we will be implementing a childcare monthly subscription option for $50 per month, unlimited. And, best of all, Miss Linda is back as our primary caregiver!

The Café has had a sort of soft reopening, offering Coffee, Tea, and, best of all, Cor’s Homemade baked goods for now. We’ll be adding back more of your favorite products and expanding Cafe hours as we restaff.

The Bottom Line

FI has come back a long way in a very short time. We’re about 90% back to our pre-pandemic service levels, and the way things are going, it won’t be long before that’s 100%. If you’re on the fence about returning, give it a shot. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!

Thanks To You!

Our sincere thanks go out to all of you who have supported us throughout this very challenging year. We owe our continued existence to you who stuck with us and have now returned to the little fitness family we all enjoy here at FI. If you have fitness friends that haven’t come back yet, give them a little nudge, a little encouragement, and help get them back in the fold. We all miss and need them more than ever!

Speaking Of Friends…

We’re making an exceptional offer to all active members: You can gift a Free Month Membership to your non-member friends.

You read that right – a full month, free. You’ll be receiving an email from us with the details, but all you’ll need to do is forward the email to your friend – or friends – and all they’ll need to do is come to the gym and show it to us. We’ll activate them, and they’ll enjoy an entire month for free at your favorite gym.  Simple, easy-peasy, and a pretty darn nice gift, if we do say so ourselves. Share it with anyone you think deserves it, with our deep appreciation for your support.

The Most Dynamic Challenge Ever

With social distancing and restrictions on capacity, we ran a variation of our usual Fantastic Four challenge this spring, the Dynamic Duo. As you probably have guessed, it was teams of two instead of four, but the basic premise was still the same. The teams competed to remake their body composition – lose body fat and gain, or at a minimum, retain lean muscle mass. Sounds easy, but it’s not. Adding lean mass while losing fat means getting outside the usual approach to weight loss. The good thing about this approach is that it’s healthier and more sustainable than just dropping random pounds.

I’m thrilled to report that our challengers embraced this goal, and many of them killed it. They turned in outstanding results – just what many were hoping for after the pandemic and the notorious “Covid 15.” You can see the full results here, but I wanted to give some of our top finishers a special shout out here:

(See photos below, top 3 teams followed by top 3 individuals, respectively)

Winning Teams

Self-dubbed “Team TP” Tom Migliorisi and Patty Snider took First Place (see cover and article by Patty in this issue). Tom was also the second-highest individual scorer in the contest. Their team score of 72.37 was nearly 15 points higher than the next best team.

Second Place went to Christina Thayer (who placed 4^th individually) and Kelly Rapoport under Liz Keller’s Training.

Their score of 57.93 just nipped the 3^rd Place team of Ela Swicord and Lisa Caldero, who came in at 57.59.

Theresa Christensen’s team of Beth Wilson and Dawn Lucci put in a very respectable 4^th place at 56.88. Quite a battle for the top spots!

On the individual side…

Irene Roche, the individual winner in the Fall 2019 Fantastic Four, managed a very rare repeat victory, taking home the top prize with a score of 43.79!

As noted above, Tom Migliorisi, in addition to taking home the top team prize, grabbed 2^nd individually at 40.63.

Pina Prianito, who trained with TJ Lynch, grabbed 3^rd with a score of 38.22. Pina’s result (see interview in this issue) was especially notable as she managed to score the greatest gain in lean mass in the challenge – over 6 lbs!

Overall, this was one of the most successful and satisfying contests we ever held, and we’ve been running every year since 2009.

We’re planning to have another this fall, so stay tuned for details!

New Personal Trainers

We’re really excited to be adding new trainers to our fantastic staff. They bring a wide range of experience and backgrounds. Some are new to FI, and others are well known to you. They are (picture below, L-R):

Liz Keller, Theresa Christensen, Jackie Niciforo, Chelsea Sorahan, Daniel Zona and Tina Scala
(click on their image to learn more)

Have a Great Summer – See You At The Gym!

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