Recently, I've taken a new tactic. I've lost 70 pounds via Weight Watchers and exercise, and have kept the weight off since May of 2009. I used to blog for my health coach, but have recently decided to branch my blogs off on their own. Health coach, Peter K, is still mentioned, but you can find all my witty commentary right here. Here is my latest gem, about how to exercise when you don't have a gym. Enjoy!
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“Closed For Renovations”
WHAT????
I look at the sign next to the closed, darkened door of my hotel gym in utter disbelief. I am attending a 3 day conference in
Peter always says that if you want to succeed, you need to plan. My thought was that I would spend as much time as possible in my hotel’s fitness center; I brought stuff for swimming, spinning, biking, running, everything. I may have even packed some grappling hooks in case the gym had a mountain to climb inside.
My first morning I grabbed my bands and went to the gym. Then I got there and saw the dreaded “Closed For Renovations” sign on the window. Now what? Once the shock of being gymless for three days subsided, I was overcome with a sense of relief. Maybe this was a sign that I shouldn’t work out at all! I felt my constantly sore muscles actually cheering at the idea before they started to relax. Then I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the glass door of the closed gym. But, I didn’t see me, the “Fit Girl” whose body I’ve been living in for the last year or so. I saw the old me, “Fat Girl”, with lots of chins, lots of thigh, and perpetual food stains on her shirt. So, I rethought my workout for the day and decided to do a “double band” session, which would be 40 minutes long.
I went to my room and actually had fun with my extra resistance band time. I made up new sets, tried exercises that I only ever do in my one on one sessions with Peter K when he forces me to do them and I pretend that I do this hard stuff all the time.
The first day of food went pretty well. I followed my own rule of when you can’t plan, just make the best choices on the spot that you possibly can. I chose lean chicken over fatty steak, veggies over mashed potatoes. So far, so good.
Day 2 started with 20 minutes of bands, and a 60 minute run. At home I usually tell my husband what my route is and then follow it up with, “That should take me an hour. If I’m not back in 3, you can tell the police you know roughly where I was abducted.” But, I was in Vegas. I didn’t know where to run. I almost talked myself out of running completely. Then I remembered Peter K rule #2: when in doubt, try SOMETHING. If you try something, you might do just fine. If you do nothing, your result will be, well – nothing.
I left my hotel, jogged to the corner, and on a whim turned right and started cruising straight down the Vegas strip. It took me a few minutes to realize that I’d chosen poorly. The “good” part of the strip ended in a few blocks, and the neighborhood I had run into wasn’t exactly on anyone’s tourist attraction list. The first thought in my head was, “You’re fine. You’re a native New Yorker with a junior black belt in Tae Kwon Do,” and the second thought in my head was, “Yeah, and the rapist knows that.”
I kept running, looking straight ahead like I was a force to be reckoned with. Finally, my timer beeped that I had run 30 minutes and it was time to turn around. Happily, I left the neighborhood that I would only need to return to if I either wanted a tattoo, needed to be bailed out of jail, or was looking for a drive through wedding done by an Elvis impersonator.
Food was OK until I got to lunch. Where did I find myself? Of course, the all you can eat buffet with a colleague. Yikes. But, I remember the Peter K rule #1: go in with a plan. I turned to my coworker who was at the conference with me: “Fish,” I said to her. I’m having fish. Oh, and you should take a dessert and I get one bite – and it should be chocolate.”
Morning #3 started off slowly. My alarm went off, but all I kept thinking was that my bed was warm and comfortable. Plus, I had the entire King sized thing to myself, with no 6’4” husband and two cats to share it with. When would I get that opportunity again? I should just stay put and enjoy a lazy morning before the conference started up again. Then I pictured “Fat Girl” again, and how hard I worked over the last two years to rid myself of her. What did I deserve more: a healthy, fit body, or an extra hour of sleep in a comfortable bed? I chose Bod over Bed and dragged myself out.
The problem I had was that I was running out of options. I had done bands ad naseum, I’d run through the red light district of Las Vegas. What else was there? Then I thought of my walking club at work.
At my office a bunch of us started a 5K walking team that Peter coached, where we trained for and did a 5K back in the spring. People liked it so much that a group of us have continued to walk at least once a week outside at lunch. And what do we do when it rains? The stairs.
I strapped my bands to my doorknob and did my 20 minutes. Then I went over to the stairwell and made up a routine on the spot: I went up 10 flights, then down 10. When I got back to my floor, I went up 9, down 9, then up 8, down 8, etc, until I got to 1 up and 1 down. When I finished that, I went up and down 10 one more time. Yes, you did the math right: that’s 65 flights of stairs up, and another 65 down.
On that last day, there were plenty of bad foods waiting for me (remember, it was Vegas after all). But making good choices was easy. I’d gotten through 3 days without a gym having three very different but all fantastic workouts. I wasn’t going to blow it all over a greasy meal.
All in all, I had a great trip. I used tools in my Peter K arsenal to come up with innovative workouts, and showed myself I could show restraint in the all you can eat buffet capital of the world. Oh, and the conference was pretty good, too :-).
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