A by-the-book workout class
Local trainer helps LeFrak City residents get in shape at Monday library exercise sessions
»»By CHRIS ERIKSON
A library isn’t a place you expect
to see people break a
sweat, unless the air conditioning
conks out in August. But visit
the LeFrak City branch of the Queens
Library on a Monday evening and
you’ll find a large group of people doing
just that.
They’re taking part in a “total body
workout” fitness class that’s been
drawing a growing number of LeFrak
City residents for the past three years.
Every Monday the class is put through
the paces by Ronald Williams, a physical
trainer and a Corona resident who
started a nonprofit, Get Right Fitness,
Inc., with the goal of promoting wellness
in the community.
Williams, a former boxer, gets no
pay for the weekly fitness classes, during
which he leads participants through
a complete workout including sit-ups,
pushups, jumping jacks and other exercises
that work all the muscle groups.
He says the reward comes from seeing
class members – some of whom never
exercised before they joined the class –
get stronger and healthier, and create a
supportive community that he calls “a
family type of thing.”
“That’s a blessing to me, when you
can touch people’s lives in that way,”
said Williams, a 30-year employee of
the city Parks Department, where he
currently prunes trees. “What really
drives me is to see people’s laughter and
to feel a part of something, and feel the
overall happiness of what’s going on.”
Williams, 51, grew up in the South
Bronx, where he learned early that
a focus on sports and fitness could
make a difference in someone’s life.
His father was a boxer who taught him
the sport, and spending time in boxing
gyms exposed him to people with
“positive motion” that was a contrast
to the ways of the street. He also saw
how kids without good role models
could “get caught up in the wrong
thing.”
So when his career as a Golden
Gloves boxer was sidelined by injury,
he decided to become such a
role model, and in 2004 he started a
program called Knuckle Up Boxing,
training local youth at the Powerhouse
Gym on 99th Street. He taught boxing
skills, but also respect, discipline, and
“what hard work is.” He points with
pride to the many kids he mentored
who “I see nowadays, and they’re going
to college, they’ve got good jobs.
They’re doing great things.”
When the gym closed Williams
couldn’t find another home for his
program, so he decided to focus on
Get Right Fitness founder Ronald Williams (foreground, right) has a loyal following for his Monday
workouts at the LeFrak City Library. Wiliams teaches the free class as a community service.
training. He became certified as an
instructor for Shape Up NYC, a Parks
Department fitness initiative, which
set him up to do a six-month stint at
the LeFrak City Library in 2015. He’s
been there ever since, and has also run
fitness classes at local schools and at
the Malcolm X Day Care Center, and
is looking to expand his reach into the
community.
While he calls what he does at the
library “boot camp,” Williams and his
co-trainer Jackie Oates are no whip
crackers – rather, they favor a gentle approach.
20 JULY 2018 | www.qns.com | lefrak city courier
“I don’t push them hard because I
don’t want no one to feel like they can’t
do it,” he says. “You want to start slow,
and get people to a point where they
start pushing themselves.”
That was a big draw for Dorothy
M., a longtime LeFrak City resident,
when she first visited the class three
years ago. The idea of an exercise class
seemed intimidating, but she found
Williams’ class inviting and accepting.
“You do it at your own pace, and everyone
is at a different level.” And, she
said, “He makes it fun. He has that energy
and that personality that you need.”
She credits the class with helping
lower her blood pressure, increase her
energy and bring her weight down. “I
was upset – I had to go spend money
for new clothes,” she jokes.
Williams, who serves as president
of the Friends of the LeFrak City Library,
says he’s seen a lot of such
changes. Like the woman with asthma
who “couldn’t walk five steps without
breathing hard” when she started, and
now “you can’t stop her.”
“I see the change,” he said, “and
that’s a beautiful thing.”
Get Right Fitness’s Total Body Workout
classes run every Monday at 6 p.m.
at the LeFrak City Library, at 98-30
57th Avenue, in Section #4. The class is
free and open to all.
PHOTOS: Dean Moses
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