PSTS Summer 2012 Re-Cap

 Post by Mark Ehnis

There are a few reasons for the lack of posting on here- if you were disappointed by this then you have my sincere apologies! We just wrapped up our second summer at PSTS and it was one for the books! We had a huge influx of awesome athletes come to us and my days were spent sweating it out in the gym chasing fast and lasting results! We are also revamping our website/blog as we speak- once this is finished with there will be more posting- I promise! In the meantime...here's a quick recap of the highlights of our summer at PowerStrength. 

•      I began the month in New Jersey attending the Underground Strength Conference hosted by Zach Evan-esh. It was awesome learning from the speakers (all very successful strength coaches) and interacting with fellow coaches and business owners. It made me realize how great our PSTS family is and the sky is the limit when you’re surrounded like the people we have in our gym. The trip was sweet and I can't wait to get back there soon. 

•     In June we celebrated the end of our first year with a cookout for our athletes, parents, and supporters. About 65 people strolled through. We recognized some of our athletes for their efforts with awards and had a lot of fun. Everyone there was very tough as they sat and listened to me ramble in a hot, stuffy gym on a 100-degree day! 

•    We had the pleasure of hosting and learning from renowned strength coach, Kurt Hester of D1 Athletic Performance. Kurt trained Jared for the NFL combine (he has trained 17 NFL combine classes!). He is extremely knowledgeable, humble, and one of the best guys to hangout with. We talked shop and learned a lot. Kurt took us through some lifting progressions, speed drills, warm-up and activation drills, combine test coaching tips, and provided a lot of positive feedback on the business. It was awesome to interact with him and learn from his vast experience! 

•    The Cornerstone Volleyball team (see last entry) trained with us for 8-weeks to prepare for their upcoming season. These girls made a ton of progress and were a lot of fun to be around. Female athletes need to train and train hard! These girls got stronger, lessened their chances of injury, became more explosive, and above all else- gained a huge boost in confidence in the gym! 

•    Our gym is based around a family atmosphere. We enjoy being around each other and hanging out whenever we can. We had two gym events in July. First,  we took 20+ of our athletes to the local ballpark for the West Michigan Whitecaps game. It was a brutally hot day but that didn't stop us. A week later 24 of us went and played paintball for 3-hours. This was one of the highlights of the summer for sure! When you have that many competitive meatheads running around with paintball guns...things are bound to get interesting! 

PSTS Whitecaps Game 2012

PSTS Paintball 2012

•    In the midst of all this we actually did find some time to train our athletes. Our group of college football players this summer were animals! They got after it every day and all made tremendous progress! Very close-knit group that knew how to get the best out of one another. Check out some of their training highlights below!

•    Getting athletes mentally and physically stronger and tougher is vital for any athlete of any sport. We train a lot of football players but also have many athletes of all different types of sports come to us to gain strength, muscle, confidence, explosiveness, speed, and toughness. It was a great summer watching all different athletes of different backgrounds make great progress using our system and adopting our mentality. Didn't matter if they just took their squat from 425lbs to 500lbs, or went from not being able to hold themselves up to cranking out 5 perfect push-ups- it was energizing to be a part of all levels of progress!

      It's hard to sum it all up but it was an AWESOME summer! We're very fortunate to work with great athletes and families that make sacrifices and dedicate themselves to getting better. They don't take for granted the privilege they have in front of them and we do our best to make sure they make the most of it!