Donate to help Gulfport FL community stay strong post-Helene

I'm Olya Schaefer and I own The Athleticus Personal Training Studio in Gulfport, Florida. Our focus is on injury rehabilitation through strength training. We specialize in corrective exercise and keeping people safe as they train through illness or injury.

Gulfport was decimated by Hurricane Helene on September 27th, and although The Athleticus studio was unharmed, 14 of our clients lost their homes, businesses, or both. They can no longer afford to train with us, so we have offered to train as many as we can for free through the end of the year. And people are coming in! Exercise offers them a respite from their huge and complex problems, a chance to mentally unwind, be taken care of, work through stress, take care of their health and continue a small part of normal. They get to spend time with trainers who care and who can, for an hour, focus completely on helping them.

We are working with a full time business owner who's taking care of her elderly mom and training for a big athletic event to mark her 70th birthday, a recently retired auto mechanic who's dealing with severe back and neck pain from years of working overhead, a parent who's gone back to school full time. They and others lost their homes to the flood, but they don't want to end their fitness journey. They want to push through. And we at The Athleticus want to support them.

But as a small business owner who lost a very large amount of business overnight, my resources are limited. I want to train all the clients affected. They have all become my friends. And I want to continue to support my coaches, and retain my amazing employees. But we could use some help. If you would like to sponsor this effort from a small, local gym, I'm sure our small community at The Athleticus would appreciate it. The empathy, health benefits and a sense of normalcy are going to really help.

All funds raised will be used to provide free fitness training sessions for people who lost their homes and businesses in Hurricane Helene at The Athleticus Personal Training Studio in Gulfport, FL.