Lionhearts Fitness invites public to grand opening
Sometimes an idea meets the right group of people at the right time. That seems to be the case with Lionhearts Fitness, located in Gateway Business Center in Fort Oglethorpe, near Costco.
What started under two years ago with eight children testing their limits and becoming stronger in body and heart has grown to 100 members, a new facility, a growing list of sponsors and a plan for greater and bigger things yet.
Lionhearts Fitness especially loves training people for OCR — obstacle course racing — but they offer services to suit a variety of fitness goals. There are weekly OCR and conditioning classes, a Woman 150# Club for women of generous proportions, Lionhearts Wellness and Spa, fitness camps, team conditioning, muscle therapy, personal training, a chess club to muscle up the brain, team racing, homeschool and after-school programs, and the Lionsroar program for adaptive athletes. Coming soon will be art, theater and music classes, some of which have already been incorporated into the group’s summer camps.
But a Lionheart, says founder Michelle Luccketta, is not just a person who trains and races — it’s a person who helps, who betters his or her community, who puts others before self.
It’s not unusual to see a Lionheart athlete stop to help another athlete struggling to conquer an obstacle during a race. At one recent race, Luccketta says the Lionhearts competitors recognized that an obstacle called the cargo ropes was too loose for athletes to navigate. Without any prompting from adults, the children formed a team to hold the rope taut for others to climb.
“I saw the kids being true Lionhearts that day,” says Luccketta.
And Lionhearts don’t help just one another. The group is a nonprofit organization supported by many businesses, individuals and other organizations, and it requires its members to give back by participating in monthly community service projects in both Catoosa County and Chattanooga, the main areas the program serves at this time (although anyone from anywhere is welcome to join). “We are supported by the community, for the community, giving back to the community,” reads Lionhearts literature.
Among its endorsers and supporters, Lionhearts Fitness lists Tracy Luccketta, Our House Studios, IBEW Local 175, Lowes, Chapman Development, Emerson Russell, Siskin Children’s Institute, Shower Toga, Power Systems/play Core, Spartan, Chattanooga Business Machines, Berserker Brew, Doris White, Jeff Adams (4 Brothers), the Byrd Family, Tommy Davidson and Maryanne Bruce, Kelly Burch and the DJ Robinson Family.