All New Plan for the New Year!

For most of you, you haven't noticed the new found energy that we've recently brought back to the gym and the carry over to the workouts. Trainers are no different than anyone else, except for the fact that our entire job is focused on being on top of the world at all times, which means we have to constantly motivate, motivate, motivate!
Motivation takes it's tole on the mind after a long day at the gym. On average a trainer may have to deal with 30 or more different personalities each day. Some are intrinsically motivated and some need our slap across the face to get going. The intrinsic guys are easy but at the same time as a trainer we need to take them up a level as well. The tough ones are the ones that show up dragging there feet through the door and the last place on Earth they want to be is in the gym.
For years, I've dealt with both kinds of people and at the end of the night I was exhausted at the end of the night. You see, the motivation was being sucked away from me. I would let, those certain people who didn't like fitness, get to me.
After a couple of years of dealing with this issue I was having, I finally had an epiphany! Those folks that needed me to motivate them, I would go above and beyond the call of trainer duty. Instead of just letting people go upstairs and walk on a treadmill prior to training, I would grab them (even when I had another client) and get them to grab a med ball and warm up with abs or something completely different then what they had been doing for ever... you have to break the cycle and at the same time motivate someone and educate someone on the reasons why they need to break the cycle.
Here's my question to you: Do you do the same exact thing every time when you go to the gym? You walk in, throw your stuff in a locker and do what, look to walk on the treadmill at a pace that is slower than what you were doing before you walked through the door? Why? Oh yeah, you are warming up, right? Well, who told you that? Oh yeah, my fault, I was probably lazy one day prior to working you out and said "hey, Joe, hop on a treadmill/bike/elliptical and get loose."

That is what you call a trainer being a lazy instructor and not a trainer. So, ever since I opened up The BAR Fitness in our own building I've tried to get you guys off the treads and grab medicine balls, do a dynamic stretch, ab work or whatever will get the body into sweat mode and ready to rock. Many of you have figured it out.. mainly the Hybrid members because since day one we have warmed up with dynamic stretching. I bet every one of our Hybrid members could run a dynamic stretch themselves without even stuttering about what exercise should come next. It's been instilled into your mind and therefore you could do it without a trainers help... why don't you do it then??????? Well, that's easy too. Hybrid is a team! You do everything with your team and you don't leave anyone out!
My personal training clients: this week, don't use the treads/elliptical/spin bikes to warm up. Grab a med ball and do some ab work or your own dynamic stretches. Do you think you can do it? I know you can.
I'll work with the trainers and get them going again. Look for all new motivators and exercises to keep everyone on track.
This blog was just a shout to what to expect in the new year. You are all up for it and can do it! Get ready for 2010. It will be the biggest year for you as a member and The BAR Fitness as a place to call your second home!
See you in the gym on Monday!

The Great Unknown

Tonight is the night for the Spencer Shores fundraiser. Hopefully 500 people show up and we don't know where to put everyone. I've received more than 50 silent auction items, probably 20 raffle items and a couple of live auction items. If all goes well, we should be able to raise quite a bit of cash for the family.
South Mountain Cycles came in huge for us. They've donated 4 really nice Specialized bikes. Two mountain and two road bikes, all at cost but still, we could get at least $100 over the cost for the foundation and everyone wins.
Stone Creek Furniture donated a queen sleigh bed.. it's really nice and to buy it new you'd be looking at $700. We are giving away about 5K worth of training. I figure if you have been blessed with the ability to help someone why not go all out and give everything you have. Hopefully the training alone brings in 3K but you never know who is going to be there to bid.
Times are different then they used to be. Two years ago, people would be throwing cash at this stuff without even batting an eye. Now, everyone is watching what they spend. I figure if you put one dinner out on hold for a week and donate to Spencer, you've just put yourself a little closer to the front of the line at the pearly gates.
Not everyone thinks this way but what the heck, that's just me. Anyway, hopefully we sell everything and auction off everything as well. More then anything I just want to see a smile on the Shore's face, especially Spencer. Hey may not understand the cash flow issues right now but someday he'll look back and say, remember when all those people helped my mom and dad? Perhaps he might raise some dough for someone else when he's older..

Random thoughts and now off to start the day... see you all at the party!

Where the Wild Things Are!

I remember back when I was a little pain in every one's butt.. yeah I know, you're saying not much has changed but whatever, I used to read a book with the title "Where the Wild Things Are." All I can remember is that it was a little spooky but I loved it just the same. Anyway, the movie came out based on the book, I figure it would be amazing so I decided to take my oldest daughter Kate to the show today.
Not sure what the director was trying to accomplish but I thought it was rather weak and tough to follow. Kate, who is 3, loved it until the end when it became redundant and boring. She started to get ency and rambunctious.. she became the "Wild Thing."
Anyway, I don't think I would recommend it to anyone unless you where a die hard fan like I was prior to the movie coming out. Go into it with a open mind and you just might enjoy yourself, otherwise, drink heavily and sleep through it!

What's Your Approach to Fitness?

I just finished up the newsletter so my brain is pretty well shot but here you go: We all need a little motivation to start back up with a fitness program but seem to lack the know how or where to even start. Even as a trainer, I get into a rut of weighing the options for fitness and then weighting too long to decide so I never actually start anything.

A few years back a good client friend of mine got me started with mountain biking. I purchased a fancy bike or at least I thought it was fancy and started hitting the trails at South Mountain. I soon found myself on the mountain everyday and getting in the best shape of my life. I couldn't get enough of the sport and the fact that I could do it by myself and without anyone criticizing or watching me do it. I deal with people and different personalities all day so anytime I can get out and listen to just my heart rate and the tires hitting the dirt, I'll take it!

Anyway, summer roles around and mountain biking days are few and far between unless you get up at 5am and don't mind running into snakes occasionally. So, I opt out of the early mornings. I've got two little girls that I like to have breakfast with so my priorities tend to shift towards family life instead of my fitness life.
Long story short, I slack off in the summer with riding which means that my fitness becomes an occasional Hybrid class which gets the job done but I prefer to ride and do an occasional class.

Anyway, I've looked up all kinds of mountain biking races in the state and have set a goal to do all of them. I figure if I pay the dough for each event, I have to go and continue to get my butt in shape to complete them. i just finished one in Pinetop and took 10th out of 85.. I was really proud of myself considering the last one I did in April I took 48th out of 100.

My next race is in February and it's a 24 hour team race. I'm putting together teams of 4 that want to do it with me. It will motivate all of us to get in shape and the end result will be a great time near Tucson and lots of memories to go along with it.

So, if you need a motivator and want to try something different, throw leg over a bike and join me. Anyone can do it but you do however need a bike. Go see Erik at South Mountain Cycles on Ray and 36th. Tell him I sent you and he'll help you out.. he's a good dude who always takes care of my bikes.

Later.. I have to go ride now!

Biggest Loser

My favorite show that has ever hit the market is Biggest Loser. I can't stand the lady trainer. I think she gives trainers a bad name. Bob is great. Positive yet tough with the wussy's that think they are uncapable of doing something.

I run accross a lot of people that have told themselves for pretty much all there lives that they can't do certain things with there body. Truth be told, exercise is tough at the start. Even as a trainer, when we take time off from working out, it's really tough getting back on the saddle.

Anyway, check out the biggest loser sometime. You'll love watching these people change there lives.

We got an ongoing contest at the BAR. Eighty pounds down is the largest amount of weight loss that we've had at the gym. We do however have a fairly new person who is about to break that number and continue on and add insurance runs to the thing. Mark Schembri is already probably 70lbs by now.. it is Sunday for pete's sake. He seems to lose at least 5-8 lbs a week. How does he do it? He is one of the few who listens to what his trainer says and works his butt off when he comes in.. and he never misses a workout.

Anyway, it's refreshing to watch Mark workout. His life is going to change forever and I'm proud to be a part of it. Ryan has done all the work for this guy as far as creating a program for Mark to follow... nice work Ryan.. you don't get enough recongintion for your work but from my standpoint, you're doing a great job...

Everyone have a successful week!

God and me!

Most of you know that I'm not much a religious person. In fact, the only time I really ever say prayers is during dinner on Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. Tracie wants me to go to church but I tell her that God doesn't need me to go to a building and hang out with hundreds of strangers for him to know that I believe in him.
I remember when I was twelve, I lost my big sister to a car accident, she was 17. I would imagine I said hundreds of prayers during the month that my sis was holding on to her life. After she passed on, I had my doubts about the man upstairs. I had so many emotions running through my head (so many that I think I ran out of them) that I didn't know what to think. I told myself there was no such thing as God, how could he take someone who had so much going for her?

Well, after sometime passed my brother and sister in law had a baby (Lexus). Come to find out she was conceived right around the same time that my sis had passed. This is where it gets interesting; I used to think that Lexus was filled with my sister's spirit. Of course years later, I realize that Lex got the artistic side of her spirit and her hard headed nature. My daughter Kate was born on the same day that Stacy passed some 19 years later (kate was 2 weeks early).

Anyway, after Lexus was born, I came to terms with God. My sister was a good person in the world and judging by the thousands of people that came to her memorial service I would say that she made an impact on a lot of people. I realized that if she would have come to, her way of life would not be too good. She loved volleyball and loved to dance. She had severe head trauma which means that she would more than likely be in a wheel chair and with no way to communicate. God and me had a chat: He needed a leader and a saint to help upstairs as well as a front blocker on his cloud volleyball team. I figure when it's your time and God needs your assistance, it's time to check out. I'm cool with that now.

Truth be told, my sister has always been by my side. When I used to step to the plate at TCU, I would dig in, clean the landing point, step out and draw a "S" in the dirt next to the box and always say, "alright Stace, what do you have planned for me this time?"
Sometimes she'd help me and sometimes not! You can't be victorious all the time.

Well, this is where the God things comes into hand again. Yesterday my brother called me and the first thing out of his mouth is, "I've got some bad news." If wasn't sitting down already, I would have fallen because my knees buckled. I said those three little words, "Oh My God." I prepared for the worst and Jake said, "mom's been kicked by a horse!" I said those three words again, mainly because I was speechless and couldn't think of anything else at the time. For one second, my world got turned upside down. Jake's next sentence was, "she has three broken ribs and a possible broken arm." Oh thank God!

Now, I'm not sure what you would call what happened but to me, I said a prayer and he came through. It wasn't her time to go. Apparently, there are plenty of horse trainer, jewelry makers and marketing people up there so she gets to hang around for a while longer.

Not sure where I was going with this story. Perhaps I just needed to get it out. I don't talk about my sister much and I haven't showed emotion in more than 20 years. As I write this, I'm sure my eyes are swelled up and I can tell I still have some emotion within. I probably still won't go to church but I'll say prayers more often. Not just for my family but for those that are less fortunate than myself or those who may be going through rough times. Perhaps that is what we all need to do. Give some thanks and be grateful for the people we have around us!

Again, thank you God for keeping my mom on this Earth!

Way Too Many Tech-E Things To Deal With

As many of you have probably noticed or more than likely have given up on, is the fact that my Blogs have been few and far between these days. Reason being, Twitter and Facebook have taken over my life. Business wise, both Twitter and FB are really helpful when it comes to reaching out to potential members. The Blog stuff was fun when it was all that I had, now with the other two websites, I can communicate with 100 times more people.

So, the Blog thing may go by the wayside but I may keep writing some occasional garbage about how some people make me angry. For instance, a lady who is new to the gym and on a free pass of the next couple of weeks, hammered my wife for not having a particular piece of equipment.. it wasn't even a workout piece of equipment. Anyway, seriously you have been given a gift.. a free gift at that, you don't have to sign up for anything so for the sake of being a good person in the world, please let me run my business the way I see fit and perhaps instead of badgering my wife, why not take it out on the workout.

Those of you who are rock star members, thank you for being you and for supporting the business that I love. I would say that it is all of you and I won't let one bad apple ruin for the rest of us.... thank you for letting me vent.. see you all at the gym... oh yeah.. sign up for twitter and type in www.twitter.com/barhybrid... get on board with the rest of us...