At a leadership retreat in Arizona of 2019, I announced on stage in front of 100 strangers that
my purpose (in life!!!) was to “discover & empower my community through sweat, energy &
mastery.” While I’m still trying to figure out what the heck that means (and why I volunteered
to hold the microphone) I do know that it led me to set long-term goals in entrepreneurship:
one day, opening + operating a space that helps others through functional movement and, in
the short term, getting certified to coach CrossFit…
In the months following, I started to take a more disciplined approach to my training &
nutrition, competed in a CrossFit comp & taught myself how to handstand walk! Getting my
first few steps upside down ended up being an unexpectedly defining moment in my life. It
reinforced the important lesson “what you put into something is what you get out of it,” taught
me that it’s possible to break the real and perceived boundaries that I place on myself & it
served as an intriguing metaphor in an interview for the new job I landed, which moved me
from Waterloo to Peterborough to here in Toronto! Four years fitter, stronger & wiser, I’m
honoured to be part of this inspiring 6S community, as your newest coach.
Well before declaring my purpose on stage, I developed a fondness for functional movement
(and burpees ��) through five years of martial arts. By thirteen I earned a Brown belt in Goju-
Ryu, Karate and tough skin. I’ll always remember my dad forcing me to run to the dojo, 1.5km
each way, biking beside me with my gym bag tossed over his shoulders before hours of
sparring, push-ups, sit-ups & burpees. Looking back, I might have accidentally logged my first
CrossFit workout in the 90’s with my Slovak father programming a 1500m buy-in & cash-out!
I met my first ever CrossFit box in 2016 while completing my undergrad in Comp Sci & Biology
at Queens U. I was coming off of 10 years of racing track & cross-country. From competing in
800m races on the oval to 5000m on the grass, my track club taught me how to methodically
increase aerobic capacity, how to develop speed, and how to devote oneself to training. After a
few varsity races, I hung up my spikes to focus on school. On my own schedule, I would
independently train endurance, dabbling in triathlons & road races a l o n e. A few years of solo
sessions made me long for that feeling of old-school track practice: gathering with your
community of people, working in training groups, pushing each other to your threshold &
chasing split times… sound familiar? After one hero workout at Queen Street Fitness I knew I
had found what I was looking for & so. much. more! I couldn’t climb a rope or kick up on the
wall after 10 years of being an “athlete”- how could a person master all these skills in one
lifetime?
It took me some time trying & failing hard to realize that it’s not about mastering every skill or
every workout, but the endless pursuit of mastery that makes what we do every day in the gym
so worth it. Finding a supportive community of humans who see a possibility for you that you
don’t yet see for yourself is the first step to embarking on this pursuit & how lucky are we to
have that supportive community right here at 6S! So proud to be a part of it & can’t wait to be
on this pursuit with y’all.
P.S. When I’m not at the gym thinking about the endless pursuit of mastery, you can find me
crying at a Harry Styles concert, chilling, literally, in the ice tub at Othership (always accepting
sauna/ice-bath friends so hit me up if you wanna go), or in the depths of the lululemon fitting
rooms, where I continue to live out my dream of wearing exclusively black stretchy pants in the
workplace! Come visit
