Jen Osborn
Jen Osborn:
Head Coach
March of 2010 I was a personal trainer doing triathlons just to stay in shape. One day I tried out a CrossFit style bootcamp class I discovered how de-conditioned I really was! That next day my body was destroyed from a couple pushups and sit-ups and I was angry! How could a Division 1 Heptathlete become so weak? I WAS strong, I WAS fit!!!!!
That’s when I started training Crossfit.
Fast forward to the present and I’m stronger in every aspect possible. My body, my mind, and my future. It wasn’t an easy ride and still isn’t! I’ve fought and am still fighting many battles to get where I am today but I couldn’t be happier. I honestly believe good things don’t come easy and this for sure is the most challenging thing I have ever done but I’m a better person inside and out thanks to CrossFit!
Sharing this experience and educating others is a passion of mine. Watching our clients mature into amazing athletes is so priceless to me. I want everyone, no matter who they are, be it Mom, grandpa, ex-athlete, school teacher or marine, to find that fire that keeps them wanting to get better!
Seneca
Seneca Seley
CrossFit Level 1 Trainer
I am a former 3 sport HS athlete (football, wrestling, and track and field.) In Jan. 2011 I was the heaviest I had ever weighed, at 260 lbs. I knew something had to change. I joined CrossFit Cornerstone with the intent to lose some weight, but instead my whole life has changed. I’m eating healthier, training hard, setting goals and reaching them. I’m now down to 205lbs. And I am doing things I never could have imagined possible.
I am a license massage therapist and a former Asst. varsity wrestling coach at Middletown High school. As a CrossFit Coach I’m looking to find the athlete in everyone. I like seeing people succeed at anything and everything they do. When I see a Crossfitter hit a personal record, I feel like I have hit one too. I can say with confidence that I have found where I belong, in CrossFit and I will never go back to the way I was before.
Brandon Killin
Brandon Killin
CrossFit Level 1 Trainer, CrossFit Kettlebell Instructor, American Sports and Fitness certified, Nationally Ranked North America Strongman Competitor
My introduction in weight training was as most people’s, I was a competitive high school athlete in football, wrestling, and track and field. After high school I needed something to fill my time and feed my desire to compete. So I was introduced into the sport of strongman, I weighed in for my first contest at 198lbs and took third in the light weight division and this fueled a fire inside me to learn and grow in the sport of weightlifting. In 8 months I was now weighing in at 240lbs and competing in the light weight division at 231lbs. My knowledge of training had sky rocketed as well as the fire inside me to compete. I in 3 short years had become ranked 4th in the state of Michigan in the 231lb division and nationally ranked 3 years in a row. I lived for the rush of competition and fueled my body by lifting every heavy object I could get my hands on and eating almost anything you put in front of me. In a few more months I reached 250lbs and started to notice a difference in the way I felt day to day. Getting out a bed at 5am to go to the gym got tiresome, I felt sluggish all throughout the day, and I began to struggle a little with tasks like lifting my foot onto the bed to tie my shoes because bending over was getting difficult to do.
This is when I decided I needed to make a change to better myself.
I had already been a CrossFit coach for a year now and fully believed in the sport and what wonderful things it could do but didn’t think it was for me. I wanted to be HUGE I wanted to be able to pick up trucks. I “gave in” and started doing CrossFit workouts and eating healthier on a daily basis. I quickly became addicted to that post WOD feeling. I found myself not only losing weight and fast but maintaining my “oh so beloved strength”. How could this be? It could be because CrossFit changes lives, CrossFit is fitness, CrossFit is the future. I had lost 40 lbs in 4 months and now had a drive to help others achieve above and beyond anything I ever have.
I live for the moments when someone lifts one more pound than they did 3 months ago or gets there first pull-up. I live to see other achieve things they never before though possible, and through CrossFit they are. I am a proud member of the CrossFit Cornerstone family and I am even more proud to say I am a coach of a GIANT family of amazing individuals and together we are changing each other’s lives every day. It doesn’t matter if you’re a collegiate athlete or someone’s great grandmother CrossFit can and will change your life, and at CrossFit Cornerstone you will be doing more than “joining a gym”, you will be joining a family of people who share your goals and help each other achieve and build upon them.
Ashley Berlin
Ashley Berlin
Owner
I’ve been athletic my whole life, I played every sport I could sign up for throughout school and always considered myself and active person. After I graduated college and started working full-time at a desk, I entered a new phase of life, the 8 PM elliptical for 25 minutes followed by the use and misuse of both 10 lb free weights and weight machines. I wasn’t getting fatter. I’d been the same size since sophomore year of high school and I figured this was just it. I should probably settle for being an average size and not getting bigger.
Within a few years I got hip to good nutrition. Not the calorie-counting nonsense that girls are taught by magazines and TV. I dove into studying nutrient density of food, what your body really needs, what good sources were, why not GMO, how soy causes issues, the damage homogenization of milk causes, why you need to eat the whole egg, how bad grains and sugar are, how great certain fats are for you and the list goes on. After I combined that with really good workouts based in functional fitness, I was a whole new person, 3 sizes smaller than I thought i needed to settle for in the past and mentally in an amazing place.
CrossFit came as a natural fit into my world because, honestly, of how awesome it is. I owned a gym and was working in it as a personal trainer. When I wasn’t with clients myself and the people I worked with were diligently researching the best functional movements and spent quite a bit of time putting together programming for each client. We realized that instead of reinventing the wheel, there had to be a group of people out there that had great training systems, philosophy and real nutrition in place. And when CrossFit came into our lives, we were ready, and we embraced it.
The best part of walking into CrossFit Cornerstone everyday is the people. There is a tremendous bond formed between the people that walk in these doors. On a daily basis, 30, 60 or 80 people will have done the same workout at different times in the gym, and they might have used different weights or scaled the activity to their ability, but you can bet that each person was challenged significantly. There is a level of respect and feeling of accomplishment that comes with that and you can’t find it anywhere else.
“I welcome you to the community of people who have decided that easy will no longer suffice.” Mark Rippetoe
Frank Wray
Frank Wray
Originally from Nebraska, I was three-sport letter winner in football, basketball, and track back in the early 80s. I was a recruited walk on for football at the University of Nebraska where I played receiver. I transferred to a smaller college after my freshman year and garnered all-conference honors as a receiver my junior and senior year. Following college, I obtained my Masters in Zoology and then my Ph.D. in Ecology and Systematics from the University of Kansas. After two years of post-doctoral work at the University of Miami in Florida, I got a job teaching at the University of Cincinnati and have been here since 1995.
I have always been active during my lifetime. Staying fit has always been a priority. I participated in every recreational sport imaginable and played recreational basketball at least three to four times a week for 30 years along with working on the weight machines. I thought I was happy with my health and fitness until a chance happening in 2008. In the fall of 2008 I was able to teach abroad in Costa Rica for five months. However, in doing this I had to give up my basketball (basketball is not very popular in Costa Rica) and since I was in a smaller city, I had to join a local gym that had limited equipment. At that time, a good friend introduced me to crossfit. She would send me these things called “WODS” and I would attempt them on my own using the available equipment. Being initially skeptical, I kept doing the workouts and found that my fitness was slowly changing and I was improving my cardio and strength. By the time I arrived back in Cincinnati I was hooked and forged ahead doing crossfit on my own at the local YMCA along with continuing to play basketball on a regular basis.
I finally realized that my progress with crossfit had plateaued. I was still happy doing the workouts on my own but I knew I needed a change. A chance walk in into Crossfit Cornerstone completely changed things. It was like opening a door and saying, “I’m home!” After visiting the box I went home and told my wife I wanted to stop playing basketball and quit the YMCA and join this crossfit gym. My wife was floored that I would give up basketball to do this but I took the plunge. Starting out was hard. I spent the first several months correcting all the bad technique I developed while doing crossfit on my own. Here I was, 48 years old, and trying to keep up with people where most were half my age. However, I found a community that emits such positive energy that it becomes contagious. You strive to improve because people want you to be better…they want you to do the common, uncommonly well!
Finally, I found that my teaching abilities at the university were transferable to crossfit. I love encouraging others to do well, to improve, to reach that virtuosity that is a hallmark of the understanding of crossfit. As a result I, along with my wife, obtained my level one certification so I could pass that passion, that want to improve… to the clients of Crossfit Cornerstone.
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Megan York
In two months I went from never lifting a weight, to a fairly-knowledgeable trainer- at 122 pounds.
I was very satisfied with my progress, but was bored with the routine of a typical gym. Then I met CrossFit: an entirely new standard of health and fitness. Something about not making it through my first workout inspired an unstoppable intrigue. Any negative feelings during a workout are subsided by the overwhelming benefit of people cheering you on, as well as the mental and physical soundness that comes with the achievement of doing what was possible at that time, on that day.
For me, CrossFit has been the gateway to alleviating fears and trying new things. My confidence to tackle unknown obstacles has soared. Even three years of training later, every day asks more of me: can I do this? Can I keep pushing? Will I try something that scares me? Am I willing to learn what is necessary in order to teach it to others? My goal has always been to guide people through the journey of learning their potential. In conjunction with having done this myself, and a BS in Education, I find it a true blessing to have the platform to facilitate people changing the patterns of their lives.
