100 in 100: Greg and Ala Cusato- Day 91

Ala grew up unable to sit still — tag, Marco Polo, wrestling with her sister, recreational gymnastics through middle school, back handsprings on the playground whether she was supposed to or not. When her high school didn't have a gymnastics team, she found volleyball instead, a sport her family already played in the backyard at every party. She went on to play NCAA Division II volleyball at UMass Lowell for four years, then stayed an extra year finishing a third major and playing on the men's club team — which is where she met Greg.

Two athletes, long before Prototype

Greg grew up with sports just as constant in his house — soccer and baseball with his older brother, then volleyball, which followed him to UMass Lowell too. Today the two of them have pushed that same competitiveness onto their kids: Enzo plays soccer, and more soccer, and then even more soccer; Idalia is working toward her first-degree black belt in karate and also competes in gymnastics. Ala still plays in an adult volleyball league today — at the AA level, often against opponents ten to twenty years younger than her.

Different doors, same gym

Greg came to Prototype in 2022 while training for triathlons, dealing with joint pain and muscle fatigue from years of writing his own workouts and hoping they were right. What he wanted was simple: a program built by someone else, so he could stop guessing. Ala's road in took longer. She was already training hard at another gym built around fast-paced timed stations — doing well, but the quick transitions made her nervous about lifting incorrectly, so she held back instead of pushing for the heavier weight she knew she had in her.

She watched Greg talk about Prototype for years before she ever walked in herself. “Before I joined, he talked about the gym with so much excitement, and I never fully understood why,” she says. “Now that I'm here, I get it.” She joined this January — four years after Greg, and once she was already going to the gym regularly, she says it gave her the confidence to make the jump. “It was, 'what do I have to lose?'”

Learning to move weight

Greg had never trained with a barbell before Prototype. “I had no history or experience of how to properly weightlift,” he says. “Every movement was a struggle.” Working one-on-one with the trainers and alongside the same 6am faces every morning, his confidence built one class at a time. Ala's learning curve showed up in public, at her first CrossFit Open at Prototype this year. The first workout — wall balls, box jumps, medicine-ball step-overs — was all in her wheelhouse, and she finished in the top three. The very next week was pull-ups. She couldn't do a single one, and spent the whole workout jumping to the bar from a box while a member named Neal counted her reps and cheered her on the entire time, even though she was scaling everything at the foundations level.

The numbers so far

Greg is four years in and still setting personal records — most of his all-time bests were actually set in the last twelve to twenty-four months, not back when he started. His deadlift has climbed 110 lbs, his back squat 110 lbs, his hip thrust 160 lbs. He took a short break this summer and came back pulling 315 lbs for a single on his first day. Ala's numbers are younger but moving just as fast: an 8-month climb from a 125 lb back squat to 160, from zero pull-ups to two strict ones with kipping next on the list, from singles under the jump rope to stringing doubles together.

Built by the community

Ala goes to the 7am class, and says the camaraderie there surprised her more than anything else. Within one week, more people at Prototype knew her name than two years at her old gym. She counts on the 7am crew for a lot — the ones who push her, the ones who bring the daily dad joke, the ones who offer tips between sets, the ones who invite her for a walk or coffee after class. Greg says the same thing about his 6am crew, but with an extra layer to it: he's worked remotely for years, and having a group of people to see and joke around with each morning before the workday even starts has been one of the better things for his mental health.

Built to keep up

As a family the Cusatos ski, hike, swim, and spend as much time outdoors as they can. When Enzo and Idalia were little, Greg and Ala had to slow down for them. Now that the kids are older, it's the other way around — the two of them working to keep up instead. Ala says she has friends who can't do certain activities with their kids anymore, and that while not everything in life is in your control, staying in shape is. Greg puts it more simply: he wants to keep up with his kids as long as possible, and he brings Enzo into the gym with him partly to build that same gym mindset early — the knowledge he wishes he'd had a long time ago.

Neither of them came to Prototype looking for a community. Greg wanted a program he didn't have to build himself. Ala wanted a gym that would let her lift heavy without feeling rushed. What they found instead was a 7am and 6am crew that knows their names, cheers them through the workouts they're bad at, and keeps them both coming back — together, and separately, morning after morning.

It's been great watching the Cusato family grow within Prototype. It started with Greg, then Enzo, and now Ala — and it's been really cool to watch it happen in that order. Greg's told me before that part of the reason he has Enzo in the gym is to build that gym mindset early, the kind of knowledge he wishes he'd had a long time ago. So when Ala finally walked through the door this January, it wasn't really a surprise — it was just the last piece.

What sticks with me is how differently they each talk about it, but how it lands in the same place. Greg says he wants to keep up with his kids as long as possible. Ala says it's all “use it or lose it,” and that she'd rather be a sweaty mess after every workout than slowly lose what she's got and not even notice it happening. Different words, same idea. And Ala mentioned that within one week of joining, more people at Prototype knew her name than two years at her old gym — that's exactly the kind of thing we're going for.

Four years for Greg, eight months for Ala — and Enzo right there in the middle of it. That's the whole family, still building.

— Mike Collette
Founder & CEO, Prototype Training Systems

This story was developed through written responses submitted by Greg and Ala and shaped with the help of AI writing tools. The facts, quotes, and experiences are their own — AI helped organize and present them in a format worthy of the story they've lived.