Formula Running Center will feature coached treadmill workouts focusing on high-intensity intervals training and high performance recovery, with classes catered to runners of all fitness levels.
Additional features in the space include full-body cryotherapy, an infrared sauna, a cold water plunge pod, stretching classes, and more.
“Our comprehensive list of classes and recovery services is made to keep you hitting the tread, pounding the pavement, and crushing personal fitness goals,” the company wrote on its Facebook page.
Formula Running Center is slated to open this fall, according to owner Christopher Hoffman. It will be located on the first floor of the office building at 3101 Wilson Blvd, in the former American Tap Room Space.
The member-based running and fitness center was previously called “FootFire” in permit filings last year.
The studio applied for a construction permit in April, per county records. It will join the ranks of nearby boutique fitness studios SoulCycle and Barry’s Bootcamp, among others, and is also just steps from the Clarendon Metro station and running store Pacers.
The studio is sponsoring the upcoming Clarendon Day Run on Saturday, September 21.
Summer yoga session held outside the Ballston Exchange (photo via Facebook)
CorePower Yoga in the Ballston Exchange
CorePower Yoga in the Ballston Exchange
4040 Wilson Blvd, future home of VIDA Fitness, under construction
CorePower Yoga and VIDA Fitness aren’t open yet, but they’re offering free classes for anyone looking to get a little more limber in Ballston.
Today (Thursday), VIDA Fitness is offering a “Glow Up! Power Yoga Class” from 6-7 p.m. at the Ballston Freshfarm Market (901 N. Taylor Street). The VIDA Ballston website describes the class as an outdoor yoga class aimed at improving flexibility and reducing stress.
VIDA has been holding free fitness classes the first Thursday of every month since May, with rotating themes and topics. The next fitness event — Pinot and Pilates — is planned for Sept. 5. The free classes are scheduled to run through November.
VIDA is planning to open its new Ballston location in the still-under-construction 4040 Wilson Blvd tower The opening date has not been announced, but staff said VIDA is eyeing an early 2020 opening.
CorePower Yoga, meanwhile, is scheduled to open at Ballston Exchange on Thursday, August 22, and has also been holding a series of free yoga events ahead of its launch.
Next Friday, August 9, the yoga studio will host a sunset yoga event from 5:30-6:30 p.m at 4201 Wilson Blvd. The event is free and open to the public, though attendees are encouraged to bring their own mat and water. Another free yoga class is scheduled for Monday, Aug. 30.
Update at 12:20 p.m. — The gym is opening this Saturday, July 27, from 11 a.m.-2 p.m., according to its owner.
Earlier: Potential patrons of an upcoming gym in Courthouse may have to wait a few more days before they can give the facility a test run.
Owner Mike Savitch, a bobsledder who represented the Virgin Islands in the 2002 Winter Olympics, told ARLnow that The Conditioning Room (2050 Wilson Blvd) should be open within two weeks, but hasn’t settled on an exact day.
Located near the Courthouse Metro station, in the former Cosi space, the new gym has missed Savitch’s desired opening date of June 1. But progress is being made: Savitch said he has moved in the exercise equipment in and hired artist Jack Labadie to put the finishing touches on the space with his graffiti-style artwork.
Unlimited memberships will be available for $205 per month. Once the gym opens, scheduled classes are set to run throughout the day Monday through Saturday.
The gym will also offer a free trial class on Saturdays at 10:30 a.m.
EvolveAll studio front desk (courtesy of EvolveAll)
Staff at EvolveAll pose in front of the gym’s new location off Columbia Pike (via @EvolveAll)
The expanded EvolveAll fitness studio near Columbia Pike is now open, after missing the mark on its original goal to open in May.
Owner Emerson Doyle said that the company had problems “trying to line up getting out of our old lease, coordinating the move, finishing the build out, and getting our [certificate of occupancy] with Arlington County.”
The Columbia Pike studio, which is located at 1058 S. Walter Reed Drive, has 10,000 square feet of space, separated into four rooms that allow trainers to run simultaneous classes.
EvolveAll has nine instructors who teach a wide gamut of classes including children’s martial arts, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, kickboxing, yoga and fitness boot camps. Personal training and massage therapy are also offered.
“We have the same schedule as before but are adding early morning yoga and bootcamp classes, starting with Tuesday and Thursday at 6:15 a.m.,” Doyle said of the new class schedule.
The company’s website notes that the fitness studio aims to serve as a “meeting space for local communities of growth minded people.”
Almost exactly five years after it first launched in Courthouse, kickboxing gym franchise 9Round has left Arlington.
At one point, 9Round had three locations in the county, in Courthouse, Ballston and Columbia Pike. All three are now shuttered.
A letter in the window at the Courthouse location (2250 Clarendon Blvd) confirmed the closure was permanent.
“We regret to inform you that 9Round NoVa will be closing, with our last day of training on Saturday, June 22,” the sign reads. “We want to thank you all for your loyalty and patronage!”
A email address listed on the sign, for patrons to seek additional information, is no longer active. Phone numbers for the Arlington locations go straight to voicemail and their respective webpages are no longer active.
Both the locations at 927 N. Quincy Street in Ballston and the original location at Courthouse were locked up and in the midst of having gym equipment packed up.
The Columbia Pike location (2501 9th Road S.) closed earlier this year and is already in the process of being converted into an F45 gym, though the website says the gym is not yet open.
Arlington County has a plan to lure in fitness-lovering tourists with retro sports ads.
The County Board is considering accepting $10,000 in state funds for a marketing campaign designed to attract exercise enthusiasts to Arlington, as the state celebrates the 50th anniversary of the “Virginia Is for Lovers” slogan.
A staff report to the Board said the Arlington Convention and Visitors Service (ACVS) will use the money to promote sports tourism in the county:
The goal is to attract travelers from at least 50 miles away to stay in Arlington hotels on vacation. Centered on the fall race season and major Arlington-based events like the Army Ten-Miler and Marine Corps Marathon, ACVS’s initiative will appeal to fitness-focused leisure travelers through retro, 1969-style visuals and sports accessories, along with creative storytelling via blogs, videos and national social-media influencers.
The item is included in the Board’s agenda for its meeting this Saturday.
If approved, the county would accept $10,000 from the Virginia Tourism Corporation and apply the funds to the Arlington’s Economic Development Commission.
“This fall, ACVS will use the grant funds to collaborate with local fitness and neighborhood organizations to fuse Virginia’s ’50 Years of Love’ campaign with the idea that ‘Arlington is for Fitness Lovers,'” said the report.
Arlington County is ranked the fittest “city” in America, according to a new report by the American College of Sports Medicine.
“Arlington, VA’s balance of both healthy behaviors and community infrastructure earned them the #1 overall rank,” reads the 29-page American Fitness Index report released today (Tuesday)
The American Fitness Index scored the nearby District of Columbia at No. 6.
Arlington ranked as high as it did in part because 92.6 percent of adults reported exercising in the last 30 days. By comparison, 75.7 adults in D.C. reported exercising in the last 30 days.
Arlingtonians also ranked the highest in terms of health, with 71.4 percent of people recorded as being of “excellent” or very good health.
Other specific data helped improve Arlington’s ranking, including the low number of smokers (6.5 percent), and a low pedestrian fatality rate of less than one fatality per 100,000 people.
Pedestrian fatalities is a new variable for the study, which this year also added criteria to the ranking based on bicycling, air quality, and street infrastructure.
A vacant storefront under the Penrose Square Apartments on Columbia Pike (2501 9th Road S.) is currently bulking up for a transformation into an F45 gym.
F45 is a gym franchise that started in Australia and has been expanding throughout the D.C. region, with recently-opened locations in Ballston and Tysons. The new gym is underneath the Giant grocery store on the second floor of the complex, sandwiched between a barber shop and a dry cleaner.
Trip O’Connell is the very enthusiastic managing partner of the Penrose F45. He also manages the U Street F45, which opened a little over a year ago.
“We were the first location in D.C.,” O’Connell said. “It’s been going great. We have a lot of people in the area who liked the vibe and wanted more.”
O’Connell said he turned his attention across the Potomac, where there were already successful F45 gyms like the one at Pentagon Row.
“Finding locations is tough,” O’Connell said. “There’s a lot of new builds going on in Maryland and D.C. and Virginia, but those locations always jack rents up.”
O’Connell said that he was lucky to find the space in Penrose that had previously been occupied by 9round Fitness, a boxing-oriented gym. Currently, O’Connell and his partner are in California getting final approvals from the F45 HQ, but if things go smoothly he hopes to start a pre-marketing campaign on May 15.
“We’re hoping to start running people through test classes,” said O’Connell. “If that goes smoothly, we’re looking at an opening mid-June.”
The plan is to offer first-time visitors a two-week free trial on which they can take as many classes as they want. After that, membership is $55 per week for unlimited access to the gym or $45 for those purchasing membership for those signing up to the gym early on.
It can sound like a steep price, especially with the $10 per month Planet Fitness moving in nearby at Pentagon Row, but O’Connell said the program offers a specialized workout routine.
“The F45 program speaks for itself,” said O’Connell. “Everyone’s heard about high-intensity interval training. F45 breaks new ground on how that applies to a workout. You’re coming to a new gym every day and it’s the same room, but a different set-up.”
O’Connell said the free trial gives people a chance to experience the program first-hand and get hooked.
“We want people to come in and try it,” said O’Connell. “You can’t describe the feeling of doing it with 36 other people — getting through the pain of the workout, and then it’s over. Unless you get people in the door to experience that, it can’t be described.”
Nationwide gym franchise Planet Fitness says it will be opening a new location at 1301 S. Joyce Street in the Pentagon Row shopping center.
“We’re eager to expand our ‘Judgment Free Zone’ to the Northern Virginia community,” Mike Campagnolo, CEO of Planet Fitness, said in a press release. “Planet Fitness will provide local residents a convenient, high quality, judgment-free fitness experience at an extremely affordable cost of $10 per month.”
The Pentagon Row location is one of five newly announced locations in Northern Virginia. Gyms are also planned for Manassas, Springfield, Fairfax and Alexandria.
Planet Fitness isn’t the only gym in Pentagon City. Australia-based F45 has a location at 1101 S. Joyce Street, also at Pentagon Row.
So far there’s now word yet on when Planet Fitness plans to open.
The running apparel-focused shop is welcoming customers once more on the first floor of the revamped Ballston Common mall. The shop is located behind the CVS, in the outdoor section of the development.
Potomac River Running didn’t have to go far to move to Ballston Quarter — the chain moved into a space near the corner of N. Fairfax Drive and N. Glebe Road in 2013 before making the switch over to the development.
The shop also has locations in D.C., Fairfax, Burke, Leesburg, Ashburn, Reston and Vienna.
Potomac River Running is the latest in a series of stores to begin opening to customers in the development, which has experienced a series of delays over the past few months.
The future home of a new Solidcore pilates studio in Courthouse.
A Courthouse office building at 2311 Wilson Blvd.
A new Solidcore Pilates studio looks to be on the way for a Courthouse office building.
The company announced plans to expand to the neighborhood earlier this month. A recent Facebook post promises that the new location, Solidcore’s second in Arlington, will be open by April.
However, the company has so far been tight-lipped on where the studio will be located in Courthouse. The company’s website does not list an address for the new location, and a spokesperson did not respond to questions about the company’s plans.
But an eagle-eyed ARLnow reader recently spotted plans in the base of an office building at 2311 Wilson Blvd suggesting that the studio is bound for a ground-floor space there.
