As we conclude our gym’s time at 8820 W Russell to move into a bigger facility, there’s plenty to be thankful for from our time here. While the building itself perfectly met our needs (until we outgrew it), it was the development of our athletes and their accomplishments that marked our time here.
- In the last two years we’ve had 10 athletes sign Division 1 scholarships. For a private gym that caps its numbers at 30-35 athletes, we think that’s pretty impressive. The vast majority of that number were JV athletes when they started with us, not genetically talented kids that were already playing varsity as freshmen or sophomores.
- Our facility is majority baseball, and the success at the high school level of our kids was sharply apparent with last year’s baseball state champion Bishop Gorman. As a team BG hit 40 HR’s for the season; of those 40, 34 of those were hit by kids who had trained 2+ years with us.
- 6 of our athletes can now squat (vertical shin, hip joint below knee joint, technically sound) 405 or more, and a full 15 can bench (no bounce, butt on the bench) 275 or more. 8 can now run a sub 5 second (athlete hand on laser/laser start/laser finish, no cheating with a stopwatch) 40 yard dash.
- Most importantly, the weekly Monday night bible study held at the gym has grown from 2 kids to an average of 20. The reality is that only a tiny percentage of athletes ever get paid professionally to play their sport. Therefore, our athletes’ maturation as young men and women is even more important than their physical training, and the fact that so many voluntarily attend to learn and grow in their faith is a great sign.
While the size of our new facility will allow us to add some nice training features, namely a batting cage, good training is not about a building; it’s about people. It’s about people committed to intelligent, consistent hard work. And that’s a winning formula regardless of the size or contents of the 4 walls around them.
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