Asst. Coach Gregg “Swoles”
Gregg Cerasuolo
At 25 I felt strong for the the very first time in my life. Now, I’m not talking about Golds Gym strong, I’m talking about strong as in “I’ve always wanted to try that……now lets get it done”. See, I didn’t always feel this way; I was the guy who was afraid to do something new. I talked about doing different things, I was going rock climbing and I was going skydiving but those things never seemed to find space in my life. I loved to think I was going to try something new, but fear and laziness would stop me in my tracks. So, whats with the change in the attitude Gregg? I discovered a side of me that I was hiding for a long time. There was this thing called confidence that I had buried in me and never trusted it enough to follow its advice. I found this crazy thing called Crossfit where people actually believed in my abilities and encouraged me to do lifts and weights that I never thought my string bean arms could pick up. The expectations and confidence that others had in me became a motivator to become a do-er and not a viewer.
Now I want you all to understand I did not come to Crossfit as the “stud” everyone knows me as today (just kidding). I was a runner and had no muscle on me at all. Literally I was skin and bones with a pretty damn good haircut. I was the guy that the “beefcakes” kick sand on at the beach……….scrawny. But in Crossfit my size and ability did not matter. I started slow, the workouts were scaled, and I began to see the best in myself every time I walked through those bay doors. A turning point in my life (and let me emphasizes life) was during the affiliate tryouts at Crossfit ACT in early November of 2010. I walked into the gym nervous as always and saw the first workout being set up. Row 1000 meters followed by 30 squat cleans at 135 pounds finishing up with another 1000 meter row. My stomach dropped, I had never cleaned 135 pounds before and now I had to do it thirty times……..NO WAY! What can I do other than suck it up, give it a shot, and if I fail then I fail…there is nothing I could do. I began the workout and the 1000 meters went smooth…..I walked up to the 135lb bar and looked at it in fear…..I set myself up and BIG PULL…….fail….the bar hit the ground with a hard thud. Okay lets try it again…..I set up…grabbed the bar….BIG PULL….fail…..”Thats it for me” I thought…this is to heavy. I gave it another shot and failed again. Then something happened…….people who I never met before began to coach me through the clean…they had confidence in me and they never even met me. I thought to myself ”lets do this…if they think I can, then I need to make it happen” …..BIG PULL….I caught it! I did my full front squat and that was one rep. Then it happened again….and again….and again. At fifteen I though coach Bill was going to stop the workout because it was going on for such a long time but to my surprise he didn’t. The entire gym wanted to see this little scrawny kid finish a workout that he thought he would never be able to accomplish. And that is when I realized I can do so much more than I have ever allowed myself to attempt.
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