Business & Tech

'American Ninja Warrior' Brings CrossFit to Lilburn

Dr. Robert Pruni, a contestant on the NBC show, recently opened a gym off Lawrenceville Highway.

Also known as "America's Fittest Doctor," Dr. Robert Pruni is all about fitness. He's been a contestant on the NBC competition show, "American Ninja Warrior;" written three books on fitness; and been doctor and personal trainer for nearly 30 years. 

He's had a chiropractic business in the Lilburn area for seven years, and just a few weeks ago, he opened up FlexFit, a 14,000-square-foot gym right off Lawrenceville Highway that uses CrossFit. 

Patch spoke with the Snellville father of four about the new business, what it means to be fit and what it was like being on the television show.

Patch: So what exactly is CrossFit? 

Robert Pruni:
The different between a CrossFit gym and a regular gym is, instead of going into a gym and performing isolation movements that are boring, we do what's called functional training. CrossFit is constantly varied, so not boring, training performed at high intensity. Typical people think CrossFit is for crazy people when it's not; it's really for everyone, because you can scale it to whatever level. If someone comes in here with a limitation, we'll assess whatever their limitation is, and scale a workout just for them. 

Patch: So are the exercises mostly strength, cardio or weights?

Pruni: I actually talked about it at Lilburn's National Night Out. I posed the question to the crowd, "Would you agree that someone who runs a marathon, someone who can do 26.2 miles, is that person fit?" Most people would. What about the power lifter who can dead-lift a thousand pounds? Would you say they're fit? 

They're actually two different types of fitness. Now, neither one of those people is fit because fitness is not just about endurance or strength. If you take that marathon runner and have him pick up a heavy basket of laundry and carry it up the stairs, they will actually be winded. So how can that runner be fit? And conversely, if you have the power lifter run across the street 25 yards, they're winded. 

I discovered this early on in my life [from] a good friend of mine who's a state champion in cross country and went on to do Olympic trials. We were home for college and as young men, we were wrestling. I threw him to the ground and I discovered that he couldn't breathe. I thought, "How can this man run 26 miles and be winded when he's recruiting some of his muscle fiber in a wrestling match for 30 seconds?" And it's because he didn't have the type of fitness that was required.

[CrossFit founder Greg] Glassman defines "fitness" as having good cardiorespiratory and cardiovascular endurance, strength, stamina, speed, power, flexibility, accuracy, coordination and balance. So that's what's CrossFit does. At FlexFit CrossFit, we combine all those aspects to make the most perfectly sound fit person, so we're not just developing one aspect of fitness. 

Patch: What are some of your most popular exercises that you do in CrossFit?

Pruni: As far as exercises, we have what we call a WOD: a work out of the day. Sometimes you can pull that right off the CrossFit website, or we can make them up.

I have a specialized workout that I created, and we call it the PMS BAPS: P for pushups, M for mountain climbers, S for sit-ups, B for burpees, A for air squats, P for press squats where we use a band, and then side planks for S. In CrossFit, once you learn certain movements, there's an infinite number of combinations that you can apply to create a unique workout. That's why it's constantly varied and functional. How often in life will you sit at a machine and push your arms back and forth? Is there anything in life where you would do that? In CrossFit-style training, we perform function movements: bending, squatting, lunging.

There's some equipment involved with CrossFit. CrossFit combines cardiovascular endurance, so there can be sprinting, there can be jump rope, you'll use Olympic lifts... Say you can't do a pull-up. You've never been on a pull-up bar, you're 65 years old, it's something that's intimidating. We have bands to scale a pull-up. I'll actually stand near you, put in a band and that'll give you an assist to allow you to do a pull-up. As you get stronger, we'll decrease the assistance with the band until eventually you're doing the pull-up on your own. You can progress with strength throughout your lifetime no matter when you start. 

Patch: Why did you choose Lilburn for FlexFit?

Pruni: I've had my other business, Lilburn Sports and Family Wellness, here for seven years. I'm a chiropractic doctor, a diplomate in physical medicine and a sports physician.

Patch: How long have you been interested in fitness?

Pruni: I've been a personal trainer and a doctor for 26 years, so I've been trying to incorporate personal training in the books I've written on diet, exercise and supplementation, into my practice. I wrote three books on how to eat, how to exercise based on your body type, and then nutrients and supplements to take to try to enhance your overall health and get your metabolism to activate. 

Patch: What are your rates at FlexFit?

Pruni: If you do unlimited CrossFit training for the month, we charge $150, and that includes classes and personal trainers. One of our special niches here is that we're an American Ninja Warrior training facility. We have three real American Ninja Warrior obstacles, and we have another one we'll have ready Saturday (Aug. 17) [for our American Ninja Warrior event]. We hope to build about three obstacles every four months. They are the actual size of the real [obstacles]. 

Patch: How was your time competing on the television show?

Pruni: That was the most awesome experience of my life. At age 48, I figured I'm too old to do this, but I watched the show [when it was only in Japan] and I've wanted to do this for the last five years. Last year, NBC brought Ninja Warrior to this country ... and I thought, OK, it's time. I sent in a submission workout video, I was accepted, and they let me do the qualifying run in Miami. I actually did pretty well. ... I made it to the fourth obstacle on the slider jump. In fact, we are building the slider jump here. It's a bar that drops down eight inches, then another eight inches to another bar, and then you jump onto a cargo net. So we're building one of those just in case I run into that next year because I'm trying out again.

FlexFit is located at 4153 Lawrenceville Hwy. in Lilburn, in the Beaver Ruin Village shopping center behind Kroger. The center is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m., and Saturday from 8 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The gym is closed Sundays. For more information, visit www.lilburnflexfitgym.com.

(Editor's Note: Although FlexFit uses CrossFit training and exercises, its official CrossFit affiliation is pending, according to the FlexFit website. Lilburn has another gym, DFC CrossFit, that is affiliated with CrossFit.)

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