This morning, after our run through Decatur and Winona Park, I walked my dog, Ms. Ava, and then, I made the following quick breakfast. Man, I was hungry. This bowl of goodness provides me with calcium, omega 3, fiber and more.
It’s always a challenge to come up with something interesting in a routine where you basically want boot campers to run and do exercise. Run and exercise are the basic components and then there should be an infinite number of combinations to put together to make it interesting. However, it can be hard to think outside the box when you have been doing this for a long time.
The instructors of Kick In The Fit spent some time coming up with new routines last year and the first one I came up with was “Roll Them Bones”. Since I work at Agnes Scott, sometimes I will just stop as I am walking around campus and look at a particular area and see if something comes to me. For this workout, I kept coming back to the Science Quad. The area around the Science Quad is so perfect for working out; it’s hard not to think of it when coming up with something new.
My plan was to incorporate a lot of different exercises so it would be a full body workout and I wanted to use different components such as PVC pipe, different forms of cardio to move around the quad and utilization of the middle of the quad. I thought all of these items would help to keep the workout fresh even when doing multiple laps through the 1st and 2nd rounds.
I also wanted to add a fun element to the workout and it took me a while to think of it. Then it came to me: Dice! I was downstairs in my basement looking through some of the things we have on our shelves and I came across several board games. When my eyes settled on Yahtzee, the dice idea struck me. I opened up the box and there were enough dice to make 4 pair.
I spent the next couple of days putting together the routines for each round, thinking through the exercise, the cardio used between stations and what to do regarding the middle of the quad. It seemed natural to do something with doubles so I came up with six different side adventures to use when doubles were rolled. This enabled me to incorporate the PVC pipe and the middle of the field.
I think the idea that as boot campers come to each station that they have no idea what will happen next keeps the workout challenging, exciting and fun!
As a member of the Agnes Scott community and an active ”Kick In The Fit” member, I tend to look at the campus a bit differently. While it has beautiful buildings, lush green lawns and incredible trees; I also view it from the workout routine perspective. This mornings “Ring Around the Chapel” workout was one of those inspirations.
I was walking around the Science Quad one sunny afternoon and decided to take a stroll around the Chapel. It had been a while since I looked at the grounds and I thought I would check to see if anything had changed on the landscape. As I walked around the building, I could see in my mind’s eye boot campers working out and running around the path. The next day I came back with a piece of paper and walked around jotting down ideas.
You always hope the routine you come up with has a balance that makes it challenging and lasts the proper amount of time. “Ring Around the Chapel” has a lot of cardio and every muscle group is worked at the exercise stations. Boot campers were paired and while one team member ran around the Chapel, the other team member did an exercise. When the running team member returned, they swapped. When the second team member returned, they advanced to the next workout station. This went on through six stations with two rounds. When I yelled “Time!”, we got some great feedback from our boot campers that they really liked the workout and found it challenging.
Music to our ears!
What an awesome group for our second day of Kick In The Fit boot camp! Talk about energy! You could feel during the warm-up that everyone was raring to go! Of course…it may have had something to do with the temps in the high 30′s. Nothing like a little run around the Science Quad to get the blood moving!
And what better way to see the beauty of Agnes Scott College than taking a running tour of the campus and occasionally stopping to see the sites while we work out? Gary was an excellent tour director and kept us on our toes with some new routines. I believe the alligator crawl may be the most challenging of our animal themed exercises!
Jason had us sprinting across the soccer field Braveheart style for the finishing routine. Of course in Braveheart, they didn’t have to do 5 push-ups following their sprint!
Suzanne finished things off with a nice cool down and stretch before we headed back up the hill!
Everyone did an awesome job today and really pushed hard! Enjoy your Wednesday and come back ready to rock on Thursday!
It was great to be back at Agnes Scott College this morning for the first day of Kick In The Fit boot camp 2012!
The instructors have been hard at work this past month getting everything ready for our first boot camp group of the year and it was very gratifying to welcome new boot campers and reunite with our awesome vets!
Everyone did great this morning on the PT test and really gave great effort. The instructors look forward to presenting challenging and fun workouts and helping everyone achieve their goals!
We are up to 31 pushups today! Don’t forge to log it!
Was it casino night this morning at Kick In The Fit? No! We were just “rolling” our way around the Science Quad this morning during the “Roll Them Bones” workout!
This morning we did two rounds for 15 minutes each. There were four exercises in each round. The mystery was that a roll of the dice determined how many reps you did of each exercise…..and if you rolled doubles, there was extra fun and excitement! Doubles added crab or bear walking, lunge walking, running a lap or even yelling “Four!” to make everyone at your station start over with their exercise.
We introduced a few exercises that our new boot campers have not experienced such as: kayak twists, row boats, step ups, grape vine, boot camp skip, leap frogs and every one’s favorite exercise: The Burpee!!!
From what I saw, McCall appeared to be the winner of the “most consistent high roller” award and Susan may have won the “Most Doubles” award. I heard Larry yell “Four!” quite a bit so a special shout out for making everyone start over!
So if you left for Vegas today, do you feel like you will be lucky at the craps table or will you be hitting the hotel spa for a relaxing dip in the jacuzzi?
We are on number 28 today for the push-up challenge! If you participated in todays “Roll Them Bones” workout, you may have already completed your 28 with just a couple of rolls of the dice! Log em if you got em!
Today was the first full workout for our new boot campers, and a great welcome back for our many vets.
You can now brag to your friends and family that you have completed a fartlek…yep, that is really what it is called! Fartlek really is a word. It is Swedish for “speed play”, a workout used by many athletes to train and improve their running times.
The concept is to run fairly short distances (fast) and then either slow down for a recovery jog or stop to do various exercises. If you are interested in reading more about this training concept, please check out these links:
http://www.brianmac.co.uk/fartlek.htm
http://www.netplaces.com/running/advanced-running-workouts/fartlek-workouts.htm
http://www.runnersworld.com/article/0,7120,s6-238-263–12081-0,00.html
You should all be very proud of yourselves for the work you did today! No matter what your current fitness level is, the fartlek is a terrific workout for everyone. Today we ran a little more than a mile and stopped 7 times to do various exercises…way to go!
Remember to drink lots of water and stretch throughout the day. We look forward to seeing you all tomorrow!
~ the Kick in the Fit Instructors