Every so often I find myself stuck in a bubble. A bubble of work, the gym, family, and I lose the ability to see what life is like outside of these parameters. So when people ask, “what is FitLab,” “what is CrossFit,” “how does it all work,” I’m brought right back to the reality that we’re all busy and that my wonderful gym is not the cornerstone of peoples’ lives. When I have these realisations, I write down our values, beliefs, philosophy, and reaffirm what we do and why we do it.
I’ve decided to turn this into a blog post, so that you might know who we are, and why we do what we do.
What FitLab Is
FitLab is a functional fitness facility that offers group training, personal training and nutrition coaching.
We aim to build the health and fitness of our community by using the CrossFit methodology of Increasing Work Capacity Across Broad Time and Modal Domains.
Further to CrossFit, we offer programs in Endurance, StrengthLab, Olympic Lifting and Mobility. All of these serve to benefit the whole and create a broader base of fitness. We also have a growing Youth Program, and train young kids as well school groups from the area. We’re proud to now have CrossFit as a PE elective at Albert Park College!
Using the CrossFit philosophy of “Open Source,” we’re not restricted to any dogma or system. Rather, we take what is effective and apply it as it sees fit for our members.
Nutrition is a key part of FitLab, and all of our members receive a baseline of nutrition coaching, where we educate them on how to eat according to their goals and lifestyle.
What CrossFit Is:
CrossFit is a health and fitness program designed to create the broadest version of fitness.
Its goal is to Increase Work Capacity Across Broad Time and Modal Domains. What that means is that it aims to increase our ability to perform a wide variety of physical tasks. To do this, CrossFit performs its training under the method of Constantly Varied, Functional Movement, performed at High Intensity – relative to the individual’s capacity.
This means that workouts prioritise functional movements – ala, movements that are natural to us, and are multi joint. Workouts and exercises are constantly varied, in that they are best performed at the intensity that we all know and love. This means that we squat, bend, push, pull, climb, Sprint, and more. Think of the movements that your ancestors have done to stay human – that’s what we focus our programming on.
The CrossFit methodology is also Open Source. This means that we take ideas from other fitness methodologies and apply them to CrossFit. We’re constantly introducing new elements that will keep you challenged and on the cutting edge of what’s working in fitness.
An example of an Open Source approach means that if a new protocol or idea arises that fits within CrossFits definition of fitness, then we can take it on. Olympic lifting, powerlifting, breathwork, the paleo diet, HYROX – these are all methods, brands or approaches that have been adopted by CrossFit, and broadened the base of fitness that CrossFit participants have.
CrossFit challenges the traditionals about what “fitness” is. In his famous piece “what is fitness,” founder of CrossFit Greg Glassman made a wonderful case for previous ideas of fitness being too narrow, and that the CrossFit training methodology provides the best outcomes for overall fitness. This means having high levels of:
- Strength,
- Stamina,
- Power,
- Speed,
- Endurance,
- Flexibility,
- Balance,
- Coordination
- Accuracy.
- If you haven’t read this masterpiece, I highly recommend it. You can access it here
Other definitions of fitness (e.g. a triathlete), would excel in one of two of these, but a seasoned CrossFitter would be the best across all nine of them.
Thus, the goal of CrossFit, is not to be the best at one thing, but to be generally fit across multiple things.
This is a good time to introduce GPP – General Physical Preparedness. CrossFit is a GPP program, in that it will have you be prepared to tackle the widest variety of tasks. For example, if you want to help a friend move house, jump into a soccer game, or keep up with your kids – you’ve got it, and you’ve got it for life.
GPP stems from what’s wired into our DNA. We’re designed to move across multiple planes and perform the widest range of tasks. As we develop, we make the mistake of specialising in one domain (e.g. running), to the detriment of others domains.
Another way to understand GPP is to understand SPP – Specific Physical Preparedness. This refers to training for a specific goal in mind. For example, doing soccer related training to get better at soccer. While SPP certainly has its place, GPP should always be at the base, as we see the best and most resilient athletes develop from the broadest base of GPP.
What Our Coaches Do
Our coaches coach classes, take personal training and provide the knowledge and support for our community to thrive. They’re our leaders, and they’re who embodies the spirit of CrossFit every day. Our coaches are accredited L1 or L2 CrossFit Trainers, and most are Cert III and IV in Fitness qualified.
Coaching involves a combination of teaching movement, providing scaling and progressions, addressing movement dysfunction, and coordinating classes and personal training.
More importantly, a coach’s job is knowing what is best for his/her client, and our coaches have gone through thousands of practical and theoretical hours to get to the point of prescribing movement progressions and customisation of workouts to help our community move safely and effectively through a workout.
What’s best for the client is always communicated between coaches, so we can share the best ways to deal with different movement patterns and personalities.
Coaches share information daily and weekly on what is relevant for the people that’s infront of them.
What Our Programming Philosophy Is:
Our programming philosophy stems from principles of the CrossFit training methodology as well as traditional strength and conditioning principles. More importantly, our programming reflects FitLabs vision for health and longevity.
We offer a variety of classes at FitLab, which are all designed to improve the fitness of our members, and improve their work capacity across broad time and modal domains – ala their CrossFit.
All programming at FitLab is centred around CrossFit. CrossFit training is divided into three modalities:
- Weightlifting
- Monostructural
- Gymnastics
Our weekly programming includes a balance of each of these three implements. Days are divided into W days, M days and G days, as well as combinations of each. Programming is done to provide a balance of these three, to allow for the broadest version of fitness.
In addition to providing CrossFit group classes, we have separate programs that specialise on each of these modalities. The reason we offer these separate programs is because we believe that dedicated time and practice on these is the best way to improve them. For example, if someone really wants to improve their olympic weightlifting, then we don’t recommend waiting for snatch day. We recommend doing our olympic lifting class, or doing a hybrid membership which includes a weekly PT session.
If one wants to improve their cardiac output, we don’t recommend waiting until this specific day, we recommend coming to Endurance class, or doing an Enhance membership and getting a tailored program from our qualified coaches.
If we have someone wanting to improve their gymnastics or get their first muscle up, then we do not recommend waiting until gymnastics day. We recommend building the required strength through our StrengthLab program, as well as do an Enhance or Hybrid membership, where they get private coaching and/or programming towards their goals.
Follows Strength and Conditioning Principles.
As mentioned above, CrossFit has always been “open sourced” and taken aspects of different fitness elements into their methodology. For example, the CrossFit Football program (designed for strength and power) was heavily influenced by power based sports.
The CrossFit Strongman program was influenced by Westside Barbell and their powerlifting principles.
Programming at FitLab follows a similar trend, where we take principles and ideas from other domains and bring them into our programming. An example is the use of chains and bands for our lifts in StrengthLab. Another is the use of hypoxic breathwork in intense metabolic conditioning workouts.
FitLab programming, like CrossFit, is not limited by exercises or labels. It will take on anything that’s effective and that we are qualified to teach.
This approach is different to other gyms/boxes, who might follow a program written by a third party, or are limited in their beliefs or capacity. At FitLab, we pride ourselves on the broadest range of programming that we can find, in order to help the whole picture in CrossFit. So you’ll find barbells, dumbbells, kettlebells, sandbags, sleds, ropes, and more on a weekly basis in our gym.
Health First
Programming at FitLab has a “health first” approach.
We program strength and metabolic conditioning workouts, to promote and enhance health, while creating a fun productive environment for our members.
Before we go any further, we must first define what health is.
In our mind, health is not just the absence of disease (the traditional definition), but the ability to have optimal mental and physical capacity across a lifetime.
With this goal of high level health, we promote fitness programs that fit into this, and stay away from those that do not.
To understand this better, we must realise that training for performance, and training for health are not in total alignment. While there are some crossovers between health and performance, they ultimately lead to different endpoints.
While the athlete will have greater peaks in performance, this life cycle will be shorter, and usually come at a cost of intermittent injury, burnout, and sickness… Having observed blood work and hormone panels from many high level athletes over my 15 years of coaching, I can attest to this.
When training for health, you’ll see increases in mental AND physical performance, and see this improve across a lifetime. .
What We Believe
At FitLab, we believe that fitness should make your life better — inside and outside the gym.
Our goal isn’t just to make you stronger or faster; it’s to build resilience, health, and confidence that lasts a lifetime.
We believe in a holistic approach — where movement, nutrition, recovery, and community all play a role.
We believe in training with purpose, holding high standards, and creating an environment where everyone can grow — from their very first class to their hundredth or in the case of our members – thousandth!
We believe that true fitness is found through consistency, not perfection. Through effort, not ego.
And that the pursuit of health — not just performance — is the most powerful investment you can make in yourself.This is what drives our programming, our coaching, and our culture.
At FitLab, we’re here to build stronger, healthier, and more resilient humans — one workout, one habit, and one day at a time.
We’re deeply passionate about helping others, and we look forward to helping the next person who walks through ours doors.
Steve Hennessy-Maia
CFL2, OPEX CCP, Certified Sports Nutritionist, Certified Personal Trainer.