Category: General

Come out tonight (Wednesday) at 7:30pm for a Muscle Up Clinic!  Only $10 at the door for CFD members!

Hey CrossFit Dubuquers!

I wanted to take a quick moment to feed off of Phil’s excitement for the month of April just to let you know how lucky I feel to have become a part of such an awesome community!

Eight months ago I moved here from Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania. It’s a super small town in the north east part of the state. I worked an early morning shift at a locally owned fitness center as a personal trainer. It was the kind of place “where everybody knows your nameeee…. and they’re always glad you cameee”. Seriously. The morning crowd who came in to work out there were all friends, including the people who worked there. They would come in, workout, then hang out with each other for two hours afterwards while drinking coffee and shooting the shit. My clients were awesome and my co-workers were great friends. It really was the best place to work and I loved my job every day.

The closest CrossFit Box was a 40 minute drive. Too far for me, but I ended up getting connected to a guy who was a Level 1 Coach who held classes out of his garage. He was just 20 minutes away. After working out there for a year, I had to tell him I was moving. He responded with a little disappointment because he was about to ask me to start coaching with him. Needless to say I was upset as well. Training at the gym was fun because of the people, but CrossFitting was my passion. I thought I had missed my chance on ever becoming a level 1 coach.

When I first looked for CrossFit Boxes in Dubuque, there were none listed (This was 6 months before CFD opened). But I was persistent, stalking the affiliate finder map every month. And then one day there it was, CrossFit Dubuque. The first day i met Phil and Mike, I was visiting the area and I dropped in for an afternoon class. I WAS THE ONLY ONE THERE. It’s funny to think about now because everyone knows not to be the only athlete in class, for fear the workout would be much harder. What was the workout they had me do you ask? Oh, well after a bunch of facing the wall squats and some GHD sit-ups, they had me do 7. MINUTES. OF. BURPEES. A$$holes. Ha ha.

That was just over a year ago.

It may sound like I’m rambling, but here is my point: One year ago, I thought I was leaving the best job I could ever ask for. I thought I would never find a group of people to work with or work out with that could measure up with the people I was leaving.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. Since my first step into CFD I have been shown nothing but respect, enthusiasm, and encouragement. The camaraderie and friendships I continue to build with other athletes at CFD have proven me wrong again and again to which I am incredibly thankful for. And to top it off, I was finally able to achieve my Level 1 CrossFit Certificate and start coaching at an affiliate. Life is good.

Thank you all for letting me be a part of it. Long live CFD!

–Coach Vanessa

Learn Muscle Ups from a pro this Wednesday at 7:30pm from Coach John!  Only $10 at the door…RSVP on WODhopper!

April CFD Newsletter

April is going to be an exciting, busy month for us, which will hopefully result in things getting better for everyone at CFD!  There’s a lot on the horizon and it’s borderline overwhelming, but that’s the kind of workload that motivates me.  Here’s what’s happening:

–The TRI-STATE THROWDOWN is only a month away!  May 4^th will be the Dubuque area’s first Garage Games CrossFit competition hosted at Loras College.  We have scaled and unscaled male and female divisions, so if you’re interested in doing a little friendly competition after the CrossFit Open gets over with, I have the event for you!  To register or find more information on the event, click the link and navigate to the Garage Games site.   Not only do we need competitors, but we could also use volunteers!  Help judge the event or man the door to collect a small spectator fee from anyone who might want to watch and support.  If you’re interested in doing any of this, or know of any potential sponsors, please register as a volunteer on the site and/or let me know via emai:  phil@crossfitdubuque.com

–The CrossFit Open will be coming to a close the first week of April.  This has already been an exciting year to put ourselves up against the worldwide measuring stick and see how we fare.  I’m very proud of all the athletes here for coming in and giving it their all.  Now’s the time to start considering a group trip to watch Regionals, so we can cheer on our fellow CrossFit athletes we have in the North Central region!

–I will be taking a business trip the last full week of the month to do some fairly extensive training in Arizona.  I’m REALLY excited (and nervous) about this undertaking, and I’m confident that the business will benefit from the knowledge I hope to soak up.  This will be the beginning of a fairly long process, but I’m hitting it hard and will do my absolute best to represent CFD.  I’m wanting to take not only our regular class programming to a new level, but also start looking into offering individualized programming for some athletes who would benefit from more extensive training.  As CrossFit Dubuque evolves as a business and community, our training styles and day-to-day operations must also take steps to accommodate.  This training will plug us into that ever-growing knowledge base as we continue to strive for that highest standard.  After all, not all gyms are created equal, and we will continually strive to be at the head of the pack!

As always, keep making us proud, push past your comfort zone, and continue to make progress.  The trainers here at CFD are all available for private sessions, nutrition consults, and specialty clinics, and I’m more than willing to consider adding or shifting class times if it means pleasing the masses.  PLEASE do not hesitate to offer constructive criticism!  I really don’t get it as much as I’d like to, and I know we’re not perfect.  Criticism is always heard and considered, whether it be about how we do business, conduct a class, or whatever the issue may be.  I would much rather hear about something that should be fixed rather than continue doing business and be ignorant of the fact that maybe something isn’t going as smoothly as it should.  Trust me when I say you’re doing me a favor by bringing things to my attention!

I seem to always end with something cheesy, but I can’t say it enough—the athletes at CFD never cease to make me proud of the community we’ve built together and grateful to have the job I do.  I want to continue making us better tomorrow than we are today.  Remember that word of mouth has been the best advertisement for CFD to date, and your continued representation of what we produce is better than any advertisement I could pay for.  Keep plugging us to your friends, bragging about your WODs on Facebook, and tag CrossFit Dubuque as often as you’d like.  It really does help!

Thanks for taking the time to read this…let’s keep this momentum going through April!

–Coach Phil

RLTW <1>

Hello CrossFit Dubuque –

In late February was approached by a few of our athletes about a nutrition challenge, so I decided to find a program that would help anyone involved make some life-long changes.  This is NOT a diet.  The focus of this challenge is to EAT REAL FOOD and to kick our cravings for sugar and other foods that make us unhealthy.  Everyone in this challenge may have different goals and different results.  My hope is that it helps everyone develop a healthier relationship with their food and start to see how important good nutrition is to our health.

I “test drove” this challenge for 10 days and let me tell you, it is not going to be easy – but it will be worth it.  After just the few days I ate clean, I felt amazing.  Use the Whole9 resources to your advantage, rely on your CFD Community, and set your mind on 30 days to better yourself.  

Here is the information for “April’s Nutrition/Paleo Challenge.”  Everything that you need should be here, and from the link you can view or print off any of the information you’d like.  Start with the “CrossFit Dubuque Challenge Rules” which will explain how to use the rest of the documents!  Sign up is at CFD will start tonight and go through Monday evening.

https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B_mLKnHFUL0ENDg4TGJCWU9FRjQ/edit?usp=sharing

I will be at the box on Saturday morning if anyone has questions, or you can contact me at april@crossfitdubuque.com.

Good luck!

–April

If anyone needs to come in on Sunday to test for 13.3, I will be opening up at 1 to start running heats!

See you then!

–Coach Phil

Hey everyone, we are cancelling the afternoon and evening classes today. The roads are bad and not getting better. Stay home and be safe. We’ll see everyone tomorrow!

Open WOD Testing!

This week starts the first week of the CrossFit Open!  If you’re registered for the Open and would like an affiliate to do your WODs, here is the schedule for when you can drop-in and knock them out!

Thursdays at 10:30am or 6:30pm we will dedicate to testing the Open WODs.  If you are a member, this doesn’t cost you anything, but if you’re not a CFD member, standard drop-in rates will apply.

Saturday morning WODs will also be the Open WODs.  Class times as usual:  9 or 10am, and drop-in rates apply to non-members.

We hope to see you all there!!!  RLTW <1> <2>

Hello CFD! It’s almost March and we’re all officially sick of the Midwest weather. Once this weather starts to break, you can count on being outside more often! Run mechanic clinics will get started up once it’s nice out, so if you’re looking for an opportunity to fix your jacked-up running, that’ll be a good opportunity to do so!

Here’s what’s coming up in the near future:

–The WOD will now be posted in a separate blog that can be found along the main menu. Simply click ‘WOD,’ and you can check all the workouts we’ve done. It’s pretty simple and I think it cleaned up my home screen a lot!

–We have a new slideshow on the main menu! Here we can add cool pictures of us doing awesome stuff at the box rather than the stock photo we’ve had up for a while.

–THE CrossFit OPEN STARTS MARCH 6TH! If you’re not registered for the Open, do it right now!

–We’ll have a little St. Patty’s Day celebration at CFD on the 16th, but it’s not going to be nearly as out of control as last year! Make sure to wear something green to the WOD. Since it’s competition season, you probably won’t see quite as much partying by the athletes who aspire to be competitive. Respect that choice they have made and don’t be that peer-pressure a$$hole that tries to force shots down everyone’s throat!

–May 4th is the Tri-State Throwdown, which is Dubuque’s first Garage Games sanctioned CrossFit competition! This is open to male and female competitors, and we are holding Rx’d and scaled divisions. For more information, check out the link leading to the Garage Games website!

One piece of advice I’d like to pass along: Invest in a gym bag. It doesn’t have to be fancy, but have something you put all your crap in. All the things that go along with what you might want to and from your CFD visits, to include shoes (not the ones you use to track snow and ice in, but a dedicated pair!), wrist wraps, jump rope, lacrosse balls, your water bottle, hand tape, post-workout nutrition, some spare clothes and socks, maybe even a meal-to-go, hand care stuff…you name it, you should have all that stuff consolidated in one bag! Leaving your stuff at the box is cluttery and it ends up not being well taken care of. Personally, I don’t want anyone else sweating into my wrist wraps or wearing my shoes. Keep all that stuff together so that you never forget your rope on a double under day, or not have that long sock when rope climbs come up! I’m telling you, you’ll take your training more seriously when you pack a bag.

That’s all for now, any questions, concerns, or feedback are always welcome! RLTW!

–Coach Phil

Can’t find the WOD? We moved it! Click the WOD tab on the menu to view all WODs from now on.