So you like the idea of starting a fitness program during the holidays rather than waiting until the holidays are over and the damage done, but you need something with structure? Starting a walking program, as we’ve discussed, is good, but if you need something to hold your feet to the fire (or treadmill, as the case may be), then you may be surprised by the number of fitness classes offered by your local parks and rec that run between Thanksgiving and the new year. Most of the classes are offered two or three times a week, in the evenings. And because they’re through your local parks and rec., they aren’t expensive.
Hikes You Can Do: Jones Lake State Park
Initially, I planned to do these Hikes You Can Do through Thanksgiving. But since I’ve been pushing hiking and walking as a good way to stay fit and sane over the holidays, I’ve decided to extend them through year’s end. So what’s a Hike You Can Do? It’s not a long hike (though we may throw in a recommendation for going long), it’s not a strenuous hike (though there could be a hill-climb option as well). This week, the 4-mile loop trail at Jones Lake State Park.
Recommended reading: the biggest losers (really)
If you’re debating whether to go the extreme, quick-results road with your New Year’s Resolution (which started yesterday, remember) or adopt a healthy, lifelong lifestyle, check out a New York Times story this week on past contestants on NBC’s “The Biggest Loser.” As you might expect, the long-term impact for many of the contestants over the past eight years has not been good, starting with first season winner Ryan C. Benson, who started that season at 330 pounds, dropped 122 and is back up over 300. Good insight into the show and why strategies that cause you to lose 15 pounds a week or more not only don’t work in the long run, they can threaten your life.
Happy New Year!
OK, so today isn’t the start of the new year, traditionally the time when we vow to change our slothful ways. It may not be the start of a new year, but you should think of it that way.
Starting today and continuing through the end of the year, our lives tend to change. This afternoon around 2, there’s the turkey, the dressing, the mashed potatoes, the sweet potatoes, the cranberry sauce, the pecan pie, the drooling, the nap. Repeat around 6 p.m. and again at 11. Figures very wildly on the total damage done on Thanksgiving Day, but the American Council on Exercise believes the typical American consumes 3,000 calories during the main meal and 4,500 calories over the course of the day. That’s more than twice the recommended daily caloric intake for the average American.
An up and down day in the Blacks
Getting to the top of the mountain is great. Getting back down even better.
I realized that, again, today after finally conquering — after two unsuccessful tries — the Woody Ridge Trail in the Black Mountains, then starting back down the east-facing flank I’d come up. Coming up, pristine blue sky above, clouds in the distant distance. But when I headed back over the crest of the Black Mountains, the highest mountains east of South Dakota’s Black Hills, and emerged through a thick balsam fir forest onto a knob looking east —