I took a vacation! It was a blast! This past weekend as well as Monday-Wednesday, my wife and I took a vacation. Well, sort of. Lisa had a conference in Orlando, FL and she invited me to go and relax. I have a little trouble relaxing sometime, but I figured out how to do it for 5 days. My head trainer Tim was handed the rains and held the fort down. I had no worries with Tim in charge as well as Dixie there to keep Tim in line. I want to give a big thank you to Tim and Dixie. OK, back to vacation. Lisa and I had a blast. I relaxed as she was in meetings every morning. I slept in until at least 6:30 or 7:00 each day. That’s good for me. I did a little reading, a little walking with my wife, a little working out, a little sightseeing, oh yeah, and I had some great food. It was a time to forget about work and just relax. I am revitalized and ready to hit the road running now. Time off was good for me!
Here are some observations I made while in Orlando. I can get away from work, but never get away from wanting to help people and thinking about fitness. We stayed in a nice resort in Orlando. I walked the parking lot to see where the majority of people were from. To my surprise, most of the people were from Florida. I had 3 observations. One, people either don’t care what they look like or they don’t know how to become fit. 80% of the people walking around the resort were 50+ lbs. over weight. 19% were 20 lbs. over weight and 1% looked to be fit. That’s a sad state. This includes adults as well as children. Fat parents = fat children. Two, people have no idea how or what to eat or don’t care. I know its vacation and it’s OK to cheat a little on vacation. These people weren’t cheating. I could tell that this was the way they eat. I watched a guy eat a breakfast buffet. This is what was on his plate. He had eggs, lots of bacon, hash browns, pancakes with lots of syrup, everything was cover with gravy and he topped it off with a rice crispy treat. By the way this guy looked, this was the norm. I’m not saying he wasn’t a nice guy, but if he was, he’s not going to be nice for very long eating like this. There were plenty of good food choices on this breakfast bar. People just don’t know what those choices should be or don’t care. Third, the resort we stayed in had a very nice fitness facility. At least for a resort. It had dumbbells, some machines, a smith machine, a cable machine and tones of cardio equipment. The 1st day I trained there was an older gentleman lifting weights. He looked like he spends a couple of hours per day working out. By the way, he wasn’t watching his nutritional habits. He had been training for some time when I arrived. I knew this by the way he was sweating. He was doing single joint exercises with light weights and tons of reps. I saw him do no multi-joint, combination or body weight exercises. I wanted to help, but I kept my mouth shut. Everyone else in the gym was on a cardio machine. What a waste of time. My wife and I proceeded to grab a pair of dumbbells and do 10 push press squats. 10 renegade rows, 10 push-ups, 10 pull-ups, 10 hanging leg raises and 20 dumbbell swings. Three rounds and we were done. Great workout, lots of fat burning and cardio in 20 minutes. Everybody in the gym looked at us like we were crazy, especially when Lisa knocked out 10 pull-ups. We spent 1/3 of the time that everyone else did and got twice the workout. I guess people just don’t know. They must like spending an hour on the treadmill, bike or elliptical. I like to relax on my vacation, not spend an hour in the gym.
It bothers me that people don’t know how to train. I wanted to help everyone in there, but felt it would be over stepping my boundaries. That’s what my wife told me, and yes I listen to her!
Well, we had a blast and it was good to get away for 5 days! Now I’m ready to take it to a new level. Watch out Pro Performance clients!
