Saving strength: Zach Silva

“3… 2… 1… Go!” 

Green Day blasts through the gym speakers, half-drowned out by the roar of 20 rowing machines. Twenty-nine-year-old Zach Silva’s machine is in the middle of the class. Each steady pull on the machine draws him closer to a poster of himself hung across the room. The poster declares him “Athlete of the Month,” the result of two years of 4:30 a.m wake-ups and thousands of pullups, situps and all the other “ups” to be found in a gym.

Zach looks out from the poster the same look of quiet determination he wears now. His goal was never to get a poster of his own or the physique of a Moral Kombat character. It was always to become strong: strong enough for both his own family and the family he’s found at the gym.

He wants to be there for his kids, he says: his 3-year-old and 3-month-old who he worries will one day run circles around him. He’s not as fit as he was 10 years ago, when he was a student athlete, but you wouldn’t know it. 

The class seems more like a family reunion than a hardcore sweat session. In between rounds, the music fades out and conversations pick back up. Zach slides aimlessly back and forth on his seat, laughing with the athleisure-clad men and women around him. 

“3… 2… 1… Go!” 

After finishing his last round, Zach lays down on his back. He pants hard as he taps out the beat of the music on his chest. Zach hates cardio. He pushes through the aching of his muscles to cheer on the stragglers. Though he’s still breathing hard, his enthusiasm is as natural as his rowing. No matter how exhausted he is, Zach Silva saves strength for his family.