by MEAGAN JOHNSON
PHOTOS BY JODIE BRIM CREATIVE
Located just a couple of miles from downtown Winston-Salem, minutes from Ardmore and nestled right next to West Salem, you’ll find Washington Park. In addition to beautiful 100+ year old historic homes, this neighborhood has so much to offer. A few of its highlights are a beer garden (Southside Beer Garden), neighborhood barber shop (Washington Park Barber), a convenience store that sells the best fried chicken (J&Js), a coffee shop (Coffee Shed), the perfect casual breakfast or lunch spot (Acadia Foods), a quaint neighborhood pub (Swaim’s), a vintage clothing store (Elevated Weirdo), an eclectic live music venue and bar (Monstercade) and the most recent addition? Washington Park CrossFit.
The building that is now home to Washington Park CrossFit, has been a host of other businesses over the years. What started as a pharmacy under various ownership, including the original Crown Drugs, became a laundromat and a furniture store just to name a few. After sitting vacant for several years, a gym was a welcome addition to the neighborhood. Scott Tyler, Brooke Eagle and Gavin Culler were excited to bring this dream to life. They all have a passion for bringing their community together through fitness.
Washington Park CrossFit is a diverse community of like-minded individuals. Members range in age from early 20s to mid 60s and all have vastly different skill levels and goals. The coaches at Washington Park CrossFit tailor each workout to meet your current skill and fitness level and aim to help you become a better athlete (and no, you don’t have to currently play sports to be considered an athlete). Whether that’s learning how to improve your form and mobility so you can properly squat or if it’s something more advanced like working towards a goal of power cleaning your body weight or mastering a bar muscle up, they can help you get there.
CrossFit is “functional fitness,” meaning each movement is rooted in improving an athlete’s daily life. Think: squats for getting up and down from a seated position, deadlifts for picking things up off the ground, etc. Establishing proper technique won’t only help you get stronger while minimizing risk of injury today, but continues to help you be proficient with these daily movements for as long as possible over the course of your life! Getting stronger (at any age) has incredible health benefits and does wonders for building confidence.
“The coaches are amazing and there is no need to have experience in CrossFit or Olympic lifts. They’ll teach you everything. Gavin’s coaching and classes have been a great asset to my fitness program.” -Christina B.
“I love the constant coaching and the community. Everyone gets a warm welcome!” – Nikki H.
The members at Washington Park CrossFit love fitness of course, but they love the community aspect of the gym. When you spend time with the same people three, four, five times a week, you build a relationship with them!
What can you expect during class? Classes last one hour and once you complete the warm up, you’ll move on to a gymnastics or weightlifting skill portion of class and end the class with a metabolic conditioning workout to get your heartrate up.
The best part about CrossFit? It’s constantly varied. Workouts are constantly switched up and you’ll never be bored. Members can track workouts through the available app and website so they can see progress over time.
Classes are offered in the mornings, lunchtime and evenings. FREE community WODs (“workout of the day” CrossFit terminology) are offered every Saturday at 10am and you can find the full class schedule on their website, washingtonparkcrossfit.com.
Washington Park CrossFit offers a one-week free trial! Come check it out for a few classes to see if it’s a good fit for you! Sign up for your free trial at washingtonparkcrossfit.com.
Washington Park CrossFit is located at 2020 Hollyrood Street in Winston-Salem. Follow them on Instagram, @washingtonparkcrossfit and check out membership options, the workouts for the week and the complete class schedule at washingtonparkcrossfit.com.
