Two McPherson women have created the ideal program for community youth. Focusing on health and fitness, they have reached over 50 students in just a short time making a true impact on each life.
There are many non-profit youth programs in the state. Forging Youth Resilience, also known as FYR, is one of the many. FYR is a program for youth fitness to not only exceed at the physical level but also to be mentally confident.
FYR has 23 clubs all around the nation. One of them is in McPherson Kansas at Mac-Town CrossFit. Sarah Muehler, the owner of the gym and is a CrossFit level three certified coach and Precision Nutrition level one coach, says she started off coaching volleyball and basketball and has loved it ever since.
She has owned the gym with her husband for almost 11 years. The FYR class times are 4:15 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. for the kids’ class. The teens’ class is 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Sarah noted that the hard part of owning the gym isn’t the people, “the people are great,” but the business part is what they struggled with.
Muehler says the positive of having Forging Youth Reliance at the gym is “Exposing kids to fitness at a young age”. She expressed this is important because she sees the improvement of kids all the time. She says it’s important to introduce fitness
to kids by “educating kids on fitness that isn’t tied to how you look or what their parents tell them or what their friends say about them. That they could just have some autonomy about fitness. For the kids to say they enjoy fitness and it makes their body feel good.”
Muehler knew that FYR was a good idea and it was very important to her because she has 6 kids. The main thing she wants her athletes to take away from the gym is for people to always believe in themselves and to improve in all aspects of life, not only fitness.
Meaghan Reamy, the head FYR coach of Mac-Town CrossFit, has worked with FYR since October of 2021. Reamy went to Central Christian College and got her bachelor’s in Exercise Science and master’s in Public Health.
She started off coaching pitching lessons in 2013 and coached the leadership program at the YMCA before she joined FYR. She knew she loved coaching kids and hadn’t looked back since.
According to the CDC, doing physical activity regularly helps children and adolescents improve in fitness to build strong bones and muscles and to control weight. Also, physical activity reduces symptoms of anxiety and depression.
Reamy said FYR is “skill building and confidence building” but it is so much more. It teaches many young athletes around the nation life skills through fitness. To many athletes, it’s like a second home where they always feel safe and welcome.
Forging Youth Reliance also has a great impact on the coaches. Reamy voices “It’s cool to see kids hit personal records, but getting to watch them develop as people is way more fulfilling”. Reamy also says that some of the best memories of FYR are “watching 2 young athletes go from very quiet and shy kids to disrespectful and now being serious/mature and having fun.”
Sometimes we forget all the work the coaches put in for us. Coach Reamy puts the kids’ workouts together and has to take into account all the different ways kids learn. She does this in different ways through motivation and first and foremost just knowing the kids!
There is something really special about helping kids. It’s something the whole FYR program does. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you came from. Forging Youth Reliance doesn’t discriminate.
These 2 coaches along with all of Forging Youth Resilience have impacted youth lives in ways they never knew; by instilling the importance of fitness and always being warm and welcoming.
