Celebrity helps open nutrition, fitness store

Folsom's Broadstone Marketplace became the newest franchise location of IN2IT Nutrition & Fitness and eight-time Mr. Olympia Ronnie Coleman brought in the crowds.Coleman, a former Arlington, Texas, police officer turned International Federation of Body Builders icon, signed autographs and posed for pictures with fans throughout the day's grand opening event. Placerville resident and store owner Aaron Work organized the fundraising event to benefit the Twin Lakes Food Bank.IN2IT Nutrition & Fitness has a handful of stores in California, each said to be the first nationwide franchise offering a combination of sport nutrition and one-on-one fitness training.Work and his wife, Amy, said they jumped at the chance to be owners of the new store in the Broadstone Marketplace.As the eight-time Mr. Olympia signed autographs in the fitness area of the store, Aaron, Amy and their two sons Dalton (10) and Wyatt (6) were excited at the buzz around their store."We thought the Broadstone Marketplace was the nicest shopping center in Folsom and that's why we decided on being a part of it," said Aaron. "Everything is in Folsom. This area is new and the Palladio is getting ready to open across the street. No one [besides IN2IT] has the full service on-site like we do. We'll even go so far as taking you grocery shopping if we have to."The franchise is said to have at least 20 new locations to be built, but likely not with Coleman as the feature for each ribbon cutting ceremony.Coleman has family in Sacramento and was able to visit on Friday before the event. He had just returned from two months of work in England, Turkey, Germany, Cyprus and Australia."I don't even go on vacation anymore because I do so much travelling," said Coleman. "All of the great body builders are here in the United States so I'm much bigger around the world than here. When I was in Cyprus I met with the president of the country, but I doubt I'll be hanging out with Barack Obama here."He will however be training the Prince of Qatar for the next couple months in Los Angeles and has a new online nutrition company coming out.Fans young and old came to see Coleman. Anyone arriving early enough could have seen him doing push-ups with a female reporter on his back doing a live remote.Two young fans with grins from cheek to cheek were Work's sons. Amidst muscles and supplements the boys had a front-row seat to one of the world's strongest men."He's 300 pounds of muscle and it's amazing," said Dalton. "Wyatt wants to sit on his muscles and make him lift him. It's really exciting."Another local aspect to IN2IT's newest store was Alex Cosentini, a Folsom resident and body builder on staff.Cosentini is the sponsored athlete of Work's store and the only one of his five staff members to have a matching age and bicep size, 20 and 20."My goal is to help as many people as I can through a sponsorship with IN2IT," said Cosentini. "There's nothing better than learning from the best and we all know who Ronnie Coleman is. You see him on YouTube doing an 800-pound dead lift and a 1,200 pound leg press. It's unreal."Coleman had memorabilia available for sale to benefit the Twin Lakes Food Bank and canned food donations were also accepted.IN2IT Nutrition & Fitness is located at 2766 E. Bidwell St. next to Bel Air.