CrossFit Armada

I’m sure Armadas actual experience is wonderful, unfortunately mine was cut short. I am coming from out of town, I called multiple times before my drop in, no one answered. When I showed up to the 12pm class I was told that I needed to email and the lady quickly hopped in her car and left. As a customer I was offended, I’m pretty easy going, and was planning on attending multiple classes throughout my stay in Pearland.
The owner of the box contacted me personally and apologized and explained their practices. Im sure this is a very good business I just received a different side.

I joined Armada only a few weeks after it opened, and I was a member for 1 year and 8 months (until April 2014). I originally had a five star review on Unilocal,but I decided to withdraw it when I left Armada because I didn’t want my review to be responsible for bringing in more people to Armada. It took me a while to finally write this review, but I feel sharing my experiences may benefit current/​future members. So here it is.
Safety:
There has been an alarming number of injuries at Armada. Although some of them were «freak» type of injuries and were hard to prevent, many of them would have, and should have, been prevented with proper coaching. We are all responsible to know our own limit, but it is very easy to get carried away in CF and I firmly believe it is also coach’s responsibility to make sure members handle weights/​reps within their capability. The owners/​coaches (I’ll call them Coach1 and Coach2 in this review) are very good at pushing people, and that’s good, but they don’t seem to know when to hold back people when it gets to a dangerous level. This was especially evident during the CF Open season in March. When I decided to leave Armada, I sent the owners a long email, pointing out those injuries and how they could have been prevented. I got a reply from Coach2 saying she refused to discuss those injuries because they did not happen to me (really, do I have to wait until I get hurt if I want to express my concern??), and although Coach1 did not send me a reply, he un-​friended me on Facebook. I know my email was probably hard to read and must have hurt their feelings, but somebody had to bring up these issues to them, and I emphasized that I was writing that email out of friendship and love and because I sincerely cared about them and other members’ safety.
One more thing about safety. Coaches allowed little kids to be present in the workout area (I donated a safety fence but it wasn’t used much). I remember while I was doing a Turkish Getup with a kettle bell, a 2 year old boy came walking towards me. If I were to lose my balance, I’d have to drop the kettlebell on the floor to make sure it wouldn’t fall on my head, but with a little kid around me, I would not be able to do that. I yelled for Coach2 and she eventually noticed and got the kid away. Kids should not be allowed in the workout area.
Coaching:
I was always in Coach2’s 8:30 classes, and I did not find her a good coach. The problem is, she cannot do many CrossFit movements, like pull-​ups (not even Kipping) and ring-​dips. Not even a single rep. So she cannot demo those movements, and I find that a big limitation. Sometimes I got lucky and Coach1 worked out with us, and he was able to coach me on those movements. But that was not every time I was there, so it took me a long time to master those movements. Also, Coach2 did not correct my form (although she herself has good form). I still remember, six months into CF at Armada, we had a new coach (BTW she was a fantastic coach but she no longer coaches at Armada) saw me lift and told me my back was not arched correctly. And I saw myself videtaped, and she was right! The question is, why did Coach2 not correct my form in those 6 months, ever?! This new coach corrected my forms on other movements, too, and I am so glad she did, before I hurt myself because of bad form. Also, Coach2 could not give me advice on what weight to use in WODs. Whenever I asked, she’d say «I don’t know, you should know.» Well, she coached me 4 – 5 times a week, is it too much to expect her to be able to advise me on weights, at least give me a percentage based on my 1 time max? Coach1, on the other hand, was a very good coach, though. I learned good forms from him, proper way to do some of the advanced movements, and he was also able to give me advice on weights.
Punctuality:
Classes always started 5 – 10 minutes late. Often the reason for the delay was because people (including Coach2) were busy chatting.
Summary:
My experience at Armada was not all bad things. Like I wrote above, I learned good forms from Coach1 and I got really strong quickly. Also, their facilities are very nice; the place and the equipment are clean, and they have fancy CF gadgets. And I liked their programming; they have longer WODs to work on your endurance every now and then. But I think the lack of safety is a major flaw for any CF box, and because of that, I do not want to recommend Armada to anybody. I hope current members will think twice before renewing their membership, and consider going to a different box with more experienced owners/​coaches before they get seriously hurt. And I sincerely hope Armada will change and one day become a safer place to CF. If that happens, I’ll be happy to revise my review.

If there was one phrase I had to use to describe my experience with CrossFit Armada it would be this: life-​changing. I have been coming to this box since July 2013 and it has been nothing short of an ongoing, amazing experience. The coaches are patient and knowledgeable and maintain a good balance of knowing how hard to push you and directing when you should pull back. The community aspect of this box is like no other I’ve experienced in my lifetime of working out. I was hesitant at first because I felt intimidated by the concept of Crossfit, thinking that I had to be «in shape» before I could belong. I was dead wrong. One can scale any WOD to their own abilities and you literally see yourself progressing day by day. Everyone cheers you on to keep going and to not stop — such an inspiring atmosphere. CrossFit Armada is spacious and has plenty of equipment. I cannot say enough good things about CrossFit Armada and its coaches — only that I will be coming here for a long time.

I recently joined crossfit Armada with my husband and we really love it! The facility is brand new and all the equipment is spanking new. My husband is new to crossfit and he really enjoys that the coaches take the time to acclimate him crossfit. We both feel comfortable and like that the coaches are very welcoming and knowledgeable. Also I have a daughter so it is nice that they have a kids room for when I bring her with me. Just not what you usually see at most Crossfit gyms around town. This is the best facility in Pearland. The professionalism and customer is also impressive. When I first started looking for a crossfit gym in Pearland, I called Pearland Crossfit ready to pay for personal training packages and sign an annual contract. They never answered the phone. They took forever to call me back and when they did, they told me that they were busy and would call me back in 15 mins. He forgot to call me back and ended up calling me 8 hours later. Turns out the guy is a full time lawyer and he has other people working under him at the crossfit gym. So really he is not even there to know what the schedule is like. No one ever called me back so I decided to look elsewhere and boy am I glad I did! Crossfit Armada was the best choice I ever made. You will not regret it if you are looking for a true crossfit facility with coaches who actually work there answering the phone, GO TO CROSSFIT ARMADA!!!
By the way, the wods are fantastic!