April Featured Athlete - Chelsea Morrissey

1. Where are you from? Scipio, NY

2. Why do you do for a living? I'm an MRI technologist

3. What brought you to ithaca? I work at Cayuga Medical Center

4. What brought you into Pallas? I followed my personal trainer there, and when the Core 45 classes began I joined and went from working out one or two days a week to going to every weekday noon class. The reason I was working with a personal trainer was that I wanted to become stronger. Between transferring patients at work and being a volunteer firefighter/ EMT I knew that working on my strength and conditioning would help me to reduce the risk of injury to myself. And since working out at Pallas I have noticed such an improvement in those areas of my life, tasks that used to prove difficult have become much easier and I find myself applying the safe lifting techniques I would use for deadlifts in many every day situations with patients to protect my spine.

5. What keeps you at Pallas? The community! I've been doing the at home workouts since the pandemic began and boy do I miss my fellow Core 45 nooners and the coaches!

6. What’s a goal you’ve accomplished here at the gym? My upper body strength has improved tremendously and my push ups have gotten so much better.

7. What’s the next goal you’re working to achieve? Pull-ups!

8. If you could write a workout, what would it look like? I like the longer conditioning pieces, something like a 25 min AMRAP of 10 pushups, 12 KBS, 14 deadlifts and 16 situps.

9. Do you have a favorite movement? Snatches

10. Do you have a least favorite movement? Wallballs or thrusters

11. What do you like to do in your spare time? Hiking with my dogs

12. What do you do for self care? Get outside! Fresh air in the woods always makes everything better.

13. What’s your favorite dessert? Wegmans ultimate chocolate cake

14. If you could have dinner with any musician or actor, who would it be? Definitely Shania Twain haha she was my childhood idol

15. Winter/Spring/Summer/Fall and why? I'm probably in the minority here, but winter! I love the peace and silence of the outside after a fresh blanket of snow

16. What would you tell someone hesitant to join us? You can't find a more welcoming environment between the coaches and other athletes. It is so empowering becoming a stronger, better version of yourself and its impossible not to push yourself when surrounded by so many determined and supportive individuals. I can't wait until things settle down and my schedule allows me to return to the gym, but I am so thankful to still have the sense of community while doing the home programming.