Park’s health and fitness centre, situated within The Nucleus central facilities building at the heart of the Park, offers Michael training support.

The Nucleus health and fitness centre has become a frequent training ground for Team GB duathlete, Michael Buchallet over the winter months. Michael, who qualified for his age group within the Great Britain team in 2013, is a local resident and approached the Park looking for support with various aspects of his training for the 2015 season.

A fairly recent convert to the duathlon discipline, Michael has made astounding progress in the last couple of years and has ambitions to take his competition to the next level in 2015 and beyond. Firmly in his sights for 2015 is to be placed within the top 10 at both the European Triathlon Union Championships in Spain and the International Triathlon Union World Championships in Australia. Looking further ahead, he would like to better those places in 2016 to finish within the top three in both events.

To compete at this level takes an immense amount of discipline, commitment and cost – Michael competes as an amateur and so has to fund his training, equipment and event costs independently.  Chesterford Research Park was only too happy to help, giving Michael access to The Nucleus health and fitness centre gym and associated classes during the winter months. 

Michael commented of the opportunity: “Having access to the gym at Chesterford Research Park is of huge benefit to me.  I am able to train there on average three times a week and the variety of classes and equipment on offer allow me to undertake additional strength training - a vital part of the multisport training required to increase my lean muscle tissue and decrease body fat.  The Spinning classes are a super way to maintain and improve bike fitness over the winter and are great alternative to biking outside when the weather is particularly bad!”

The Nucleus health and fitness centre is fully air-conditioned and offers the very latest cardiovascular and resistance machines.  It also includes an exercise studio hosting a diverse range of daily workout classes including Body Conditioning, Boxercise and HIT training as well as Spinning.  The gym has a friendly, inviting atmosphere where everyone is welcome and highly qualified, experienced fitness professionals are on hand to create personal fitness programmes, or to simply provide motivation if required.  Memberships are open to all who work on the Park as well as local residents.

Katherine Maguire, Park Manager at Chesterford Research Park said: “We are delighted that Michael is able to make such good use of our facilities to help with his training. It’s also very motivating for our members to see what can be achieved with dedication a lot of hard work. We will be following Michael’s progress very closely and wish him well with the 2015 season!”

To discover more about Michael, click here.