From My Place to Yours

A Letter To Our Friends and Fans

Procrastination…yes, I’m guilty! I’ve been meaning to write a recap of 2016 for months now. Here we are starting the 4th month of 2017 and I’m finally sending this out. There’s no excuse other than procrastination on my part, but I feel good now that it’s completed 🙂

From my place to yours, I want to share some of the highlights of our Renov8 Fitness family over 2016! We started last year with the rebranding of our company. After 8 years, we said goodbye to the Full of Life Fitness brand and launched Renov8 Fitness™. We do exactly what our name implies – we renov8 the body!

At Renov8 Fitness, you won’t just walk into the gym by yourself and wonder what to do. Instead, you’ll train every time with a coach and other hard-working, like-minded individuals. No crash diets. No expensive fads. No playing soldiers. Just scientifically-backed, high-quality coaching with your best interests at heart. We are a private fitness coaching center where you make some of the best friendships of your life as you sweat alongside others who are just as dedicated to health and wellness as you are.

In the first quarter of 2016 we increased the number of group fitness coaching sessions on our schedule to better accommodate our members’ needs. I focused the first half of the year really dialing in the new brand, re-evaluating our Core Values, and defining who (and what) we are to our valued members and clients.

In the second quarter, we added Spartan training to our programs to further help get people off the couch and into a lifestyle involving more movement daily. We also decided to give back more to our local community by hosting free monthly seminars on topics such as improving performance, injury prevention, juicing and detoxes/cleanses, mentally preparing for a new fitness routine, the science and secrets of self-myofascial release (SMR), improving running form/technique, enhancing quality of life, and diabetes and how it relates to fitness and nutrition. Renov8 Fitness Core Value #8: Community consciousness. You should join us for this month’s seminar: ‘Home Workouts for the Couch Potato’ on April 19th at 6:30pm!

A half-way point of the year we challenged our members to our annual 100 Workout Challenge and more people than ever took that challenge! We then kicked-off our annual Shed 2 Sizes Challenge where participants commit to the 6-week program to shed 2 sizes. They transformed themselves over the 6 weeks creating new habits and gaining confidence!

In the latter half of 2016 we grew! We added to our team Marcus Carter and Jenn DeMartino to help coach and motivate our members in each and every session! Both Marcus and Jenn came to learn, grow and improve in more ways than one to bring even more to our members and to continue leading as a company. As Renov8 Apprentices they both learned over a 2 to 5-month period the ins-and-outs of Renov8 Fitness, our culture, our members, our training style, and most importantly our methods of coaching our members to achieve success!

They both successfully passed all phases of our Apprenticeship and have officially been a part of our coaching staff for a handful of months now. Renov8 Fitness Core Value #1: Passion for fitness and healthy lifestyles.

One of the biggest improvements we made at Renov8 Fitness in 2016 was the addition of our heart rate-based training system. As you already know, we take fitness seriously. So, for about 6 months we tested various heart rate-based training systems and heart rate monitors and finally found the ones we love. Our members have seen how each system tracks heart rate, heart rate percentages, heart rate zones, heart rate recovery and training points. They even receive an email after each session with their workout summary and, at the end of each month, they receive a detailed monthly summary as well — all real-time proof of maximizing your workouts. Listening to your body is one thing, but understanding what its telling you is a completely different scenario. Renov8’s heart rate-based training system allows you to do just that – UNDERSTAND WHAT YOUR BODY IS TELLING YOU!

Next at the 1-year point of being in our current location, we hosted a Grand Opening/Open House. As I mentioned, we settled in, increased our staff, and developed new programs. Our local sponsors Runnergy, Spartan SGX, Mi Ranchito Authentic Mexican Food, Juice Budz, Fabletics, SBJ Sport Psychology, Som’s Skin Care, House of Vitamins, Park Lane Jewelry and The Color Lounge all set-up tables, offered samples and demonstrations, and shared valuable information with all attendees. It was a great opportunity for our members and friends to get together and meet new people, and for our guests to meet us, other fitness and nutrition enthusiasts, and like-minded individuals.

Halloween was another fun theme this year with our team dressing-up for the occasion. Lots of laughs and good times. Renov8 Fitness Core Value #5: Smiles, fun and liveliness; “Work Hard, Play Hard!”. To finish up the year we had ‘Team Renov8’ (Karla Moore, Mario Espinoza, Jumana Jiries, Maureen Gray, Steven Binns, Jr. and myself) complete the SoCal Spartan Sprint #2 race in Castaic after 8 weeks of intense training. Our team conquered the very difficult 5-mile hilly course including 20 challenging obstacles to all bring home medals after jumping over fire at the finish line. And to top it all off, Maureen Gray placed 9th in the Elite Women’s heat. Very remarkable!

And that leads me to 2017! We’ve already had several accomplishments and improvements for us and our members:

• Additional Renov8 members completed their first of many Spartan races at Lake Elsinore in January.
• Our New Year, New You Body Transformation Contest winners (Alfredo Rodriguez and Jenn DeMartino) worked very hard for 6 weeks on improving their nutrition, upping their fitness game, and focusing on the goal of losing lots of body fat and gaining lots of muscle mass in only 6 weeks.
• We hosted our Annabelle Moon Charity Workout Day in February to raise funds for little Annabelle Moon who was born on October 18, 2016 with Down Syndrome and a congenital heart condition. She required 2 more heart surgeries to give her a fighting chance to love, live and grow.
• We had a fun group of us run the Los Angeles Chinatown Firecracker 10K race. Can’t wait to do it again next year!
• Myself and Renov8 Fitness member, Sara du Bouchet, trained for the LA Marathon Charity Relay and raised funds for Angel City Pit Bulls. Together we completed the marathon on March 19th along with other Renov8 members, Mario Espinoza and Steven Binns, Jr., who both completed the full marathon distance (26.2 miles).
• I recently took the StrongFirst Certification course and am currently applying the meticulous StrongFirst principles of Kettlebell training into our programming. Renov8 Fitness Core Value #6: Continuous pursuit of education.
• Last weekend I had the pleasure of running with Renov8 member, Laurie Kahn, who ran her first trail race in many years and placed 3rd in her age group (women 60-69) for the Pasadena 5-Mile Trail Running Challenge series.
• Recently I was featured in VoyageLA Magazine. Increasing exposure is important as a gym owner and it was a pleasant surprise being asked for an interview. Check it out HERE.

We’re only 4 months into 2017 and we are already on fire! As we continue our adventure into the rest of the year, our focus is on continuously improving our methods so we stay on-top of the fitness ladder, and on growing our membership base so we successfully improve more people’s lives through education, motivation, and improved health & wellness. Our goal is to help all those who come through our door to find their athlete within!

Now what’s to come? I’m very excited about our Spartan SGX workout this Saturday at 10:00am. It’s free and open to the public (join us!). Our first-ever Renov8 Fitness video shoot is coming-up in a few weeks along with our member-only Push/Pull Challenge. Then, the official announcement of our new online nutrition coaching program is on the horizon along with our member-only 30-Day Summer Shred and our upcoming Spartan Stadium Sprint training program! There’s a lot happening in the Renov8 pipeline just in the next few months! 🙂

We really want 2017 to be our best year yet, and we would love to have you be a part of it! We want to see our members reach new goals and accomplish more than they ever thought possible while looking and feeling their absolute best!

Thank you to every single one of you for trusting us and letting us play a small part in your journey to ongoing health & fitness. We are honored you chose us! Bring on the rest of 2017 as we are here to slay!

Yours In Fitness,

Heather Binns
– Founder/Head Fitness Coach
Renov8 Fitness, LLC