Members of North Brother CrossFit among best at Masters League Games

Dale Carr, Jon Sargaison and Penny Poulton from North Brother CrossFit have recently returned from the Masters League Games, a championship-style event held in Rotorua, New Zealand.

The games attract a who's who in elite fitness and the trio more than held their own, gaining a first, second and top ten finish.

Competitors enter in January in one of three categories; Soldier (beginner), Warrior (intermediate) or Hero (advanced) depending on ability.

Carr (Warrior) won the 43-49 years team event with Shane Farrington, while Sargaison (Soldier) finished second in the 45-50 years and Poulton (Soldier) finished eighth in the 50-54 years.

After working their way through the preliminary rounds the athletes were among the top two selected to represent NSW.

Other athletes from Mid North Coast gyms in competition were Farrington, Kurt Doherty, Marty Haynes, Justin Lorie, Luke Tansey, Kristian Murphy, Chris Young and Steve Bellamy.

North Brother owner Vivian Bean said the competition is gruelling especially once reaching the finals in New Zealand where they complete six workouts across two days.

"It's quite a huge ordeal to do that all in two days," she said. "So what will happen is they'll turn up in the morning and they'll do two to three workouts and then they'll come back so from 6am until about four or five in the afternoon.

"It's elite fitness and it's an incredible achievement at their age to be able to say they are at the top of their field for NSW."

CrossFit is a high-intensity interval training program which has been around since the 1990s. The regimen focuses on functional movement that you may perform in your day-to-day life like squatting, pulling and pushing.

Many workouts feature variations of squats, push ups and weight lifting that last for a certain amount of time.

Bean said the athlete's success has been the culmination of years of hard work.

"What's impressive about all of this is that Dale and Penny have both been doing CrossFit for five years. Jon has been doing it for four years," she said.

"It's something that's achievable through consistency and hard work. Coming in every day, day-in day-out training and looking after yourself nutritionally, mentally and mobility wise."

Bean said much of the success can be attributed to the supportive nature of the group often cheering one another on and sharing in accomplishments.

"Everyone knows the dedication that goes into coming in and working out each day and being nutritionally on point," she said.

"Everyone sees the hard work that goes into that as well so whilst it's a huge achievement for that person to win that medial or that gym, everyone in the gym will celebrate with you because they see that dedication."

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