Mike Suhadolnik: 
Crossfit Instinct – Doctors and Nurses Get Fit
When was the last time you met a 77-yearold man who could lay on the ground and touch his toes behind his head? He’s one of Mike Suhadolnik’s fitness pupils, and before he joined Suhadolnik’s Crossfit Instincts program, he couldn’t even touch his toes. Most of the participants are medical professionals over the age of 40 who started with debilitating strength and flexibility limitations, but who are now pushing through those barriers.
An athlete all his life, the trim, muscular Suhadolnik has always been reasonably healthy, so he didn’t think much about fitness until his doctor commanded him to change his diet and lose his body fat to avoid prostate problems. It was that experience that not only focused Suhadolnik’s attention on his overall health, but also led him to question why so many doctors don’t take care of themselves. Suhadolnik, 70, is now on a mission to transform doctors, nurses and other medical professionals in Springfield into living examples of the health advice they give to their patients.
“I think that there are so many doctors who take care of everybody else, but they don’t take care of themselves,” Suhadolnik said. “It’s just like anything else; you expect your advisors to participate in their advice. There are some physicians who do that, but the majority of them don’t. Doctors need to be an example. If we’re going to ever address obesity, the most influential people in our society are doctors.”
A typical class with Suhadolnik includes deep stretches and cardio exercises, scaled for each person’s abilities and designed to challenge them. They work out six or even seven days a week, but the class is only 45 minutes, meaning it’s easy to fit into a busy schedule but intense enough to still have a noticeable effect. He also puts his students on the “paleo” diet, which cuts out processed sugars and other processed foods.
The 21 people who have undergone Suhadolnik’s 90-day program collectively lost 781 pounds, which is an average of more than 37 pounds per person. One person, a doctor who had been diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer and was expected to die, is now able to push through 300 revolutions on an exercise bike without even getting winded. While Suhadolnik doesn’t claim his program cured the cancer, he says it certainly didn’t hurt.
“If you increase your work capacity and reduce your body fat, typically what happens is your vitals improve,” he said. “As a result of that, you need less medication to monitor and take care of an illness.”
By working with doctors and other medical professionals, Suhadolnik hopes to indirectly reach the rest of Springfield, especially older people who are now facing major medical problems.
“It just seems that the previous generation and my generation really didn’t pay attention to taking care of themselves,” Suhadolnik said. “I saw what they went through before they died, and that simply is not going to happen to me.”
