Business Profile: Athletes Warehouse, Pleasantville
Providing a solid strength and conditioning foundation for athletes who want to be physically and mentally fit was the idea behind creating Athletes Warehouse.
The Pleasantville business, which opened last June, aims to educate athletes on how they can keep their bodies in the best possible shape with a program that is specifically designed for them.
Co-owners Scott Lauder and Nick Serio are on a mission to change some of the misconceptions associated with strength and conditioning training. Their focus is on teaching the proper motor and movement patterns associated with exercise, especially for youth.
The 17,500-square-foot facility includes a fully-equipped athletic training center with additional space for personal training of adults. It also includes 6,500 square feet of turf, which is used for baseball and softball skill sessions.
Programs include one-on-one training for children ages 8 to 18, small group training for two to five athletes and team training for six or more. Those who train at Athletes Warehouse usually play a sport in school.
To get the most out of one’s body and to compete at an optimum level, Serio said movements like the squat, the dead lift, the push-up and the pull-up must be perfected. Learning to perform exercises correctly is part of a science-based approach that he believes is missing from other training programs.
While the ultimate goal is to push athletes to achieve maximum performance through enhanced power, strength, speed and mental discipline, a key goal is to reduce the risk of injury, a problem that is increasingly common as young athletes spend more time in competitive sports, Serio explained.
He said many youth training programs are not scientifically based because there has been little research on how to prepare the adolescent body for sports.
“The consensus with other trainers is to get them in, beat them up and send them home,” he said, referring to the competitive nature of training that often feels like punishment.
Serio, who holds a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology and was an exercise science minor at SUNY Cortland, is passionate about how young athletes can reach their potential if their training is suited to their particular movement patterns.
“The human body is not designed to isolate one muscle,” explained Serio, who also earned a masters in sports psychology at A.T. Still University of Health Sciences. “It’s an amazing machine that relies on other muscles to help each other out.”
In an effort to educate their clients, Serio, Lauder and their staff of six trainers regularly post an array of well-researched articles on the Athletes Warehouse website. They cover a variety of topics, such as diet, exercise and the motivating factors that are necessary to becoming a strong, well-trained athlete.
“Every kid has the opportunity to become an athlete,” said Lauder, whose son trained with Serio before he decided to join the business. “Here, we don’t bill you as a specific athlete. You walk in the door and you are an athlete.”
Options for adults include daily boot camp sessions that focus on circuit-based cardiovascular fitness and strength exercises as well as personal training sessions. A functional fitness class, which includes power lifting, an introduction to Olympic lifting and metabolic conditioning, will be available soon.
In addition, Athletes Warehouse just launched a barbell club called the Westchester Barbell Coalition for clients who are interested in power and Olympic lifting.
Athletes Warehouse is located at 220 Tompkins Ave. in Pleasantville. For more information on the many programs available, call 914-741-1802 or visit www.Athleteswarehouse.com.
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