Joining The Gym, Part 2

HealthTree — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:39:06 +0000

O.K. I admit it. I’ve taken a big bite out of my Apple (couldn’t help it, sorry).

Apple is the name of the fitness club I joined just weeks ago. After I have my complimentary one-on-one sessions with a personal trainer, I’m thinking this may be a good decision after all.

Short recap: Now that I live in Idaho full time, I need a place to swim year-round As one of my friends says, “A swimming pool is a fountain of youth.” I get instant and lasting relief from back pain with swimming. And the Apple has three salt-water, heated pools; two are open year-round. So I join, against my aversion to fitness clubs in general.

My personal trainer simply explains how to use the gym equipment, all new since the beginning of 2009: treadmill, bikes (both regular and recumbent) and elliptical. I use a treadmill at home and I have my touring bike hooked up to a wind-resistant trainer in the garage, but these new machines are sweet. Right now, they hurt—and not in a good way. But I could fall in love with the elliptical any day.

The unexpected delight for me is the weight equipment. Smooth, easy to understand and to use, I could actually enjoy strength training. And I’m at the age where I need to take extra care with my bones.

I’m a convert. For a couple of dollars a day for the next three years, I can enjoy not only year-round swimming, but enjoy a variety of workouts, too.

Right now my “exercise” is unpacking boxes, which explains some of my current back pain. I’m on a mission to finish this process by the end of the month. Pray for me!

After this, it’s off to the Apple to check out the aquatic program. And I won’t be surprised if I’m down in Lady Apple lifting real soon.

Janet Muniz

Photo Credit: rinkjustice

Joining The Gym

HealthTree — Mon, 04 May 2009 23:54:40 +0000

I bite the bullet, and join the Apple.

It’s my local fitness place. The name Apple stands for “Always the Place People’s Lives are Enhanced.” The company is celebrating 23 years, offering membership for only one penny in April.

Unfortunately, I join in the last weekend of March. Pity that my membership coordinator doesn’t let me know of this deal coming up just days afterward.

He does offer a three-year deal, however, and I walk out of the newly-appointed-with-state-of-the-art-equipment Apple intending my life to be enhanced.

As well as my back. The Apple has three pools and that’s why I join. At this stage of my fitness, swimming helps with my pain tremendously, since walking exacerbates it. Most every other movement does, too.

I have my free session with a personal trainer and find out I actually get two of these sessions. Diane explains all of what’s available at the Apple (by now you may have surmised the Apple is its personally chosen nickname). We also set up my second appointment. I also learn how to choose, open and lock a locker.

For being 11 o’clock in the morning, the Apple is unbelievably busy. I find out that students from several schools in the area actually get bussed to the Apple for gym class. How cool is that?

I am not a fan of fitness clubs. The exuberance of simply walking out my front door to take a walk in my neighborhood is what thrills me. Hiking the back hills on the horse trails calls to me. Jumping in the car at lunchtime for the two-minute ride to any one of two pools fits into my schedule …

Oh yeah … I’m not there anymore. I live full time in Idaho now. It snows all the way into June (or longer) here. The wind reminds me of the Santa Anas, only it bites.

I feel the pain in more ways than one, I’m afraid.

So I join the Apple. I’ll keep you posted.

Janet Muniz

Photo Credit: Mimar Sinan

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Joining The Gym, Part 2

Joining The Gym