Sari is Doin It!

I'm gonna open up a gym that has a female-friendly weight room, possibly with pink weights. Sari, the 'case study' subject many of you asked about has been courageously walking into a testosterone-heavy gym to do her Tone Lifting program. Sensing desperation and pressure-overload in her voice on one of our phone updates, it seemed clear to me that I needed to stop by her gym to get her comfortable. We did that yesterday morning.

We went over most of the exercises in her program. It's been slow-going with the her lifting program partly because it was so new to her. The rowing too. We decided that since there is so much new-ness to this experience for her, that we're gonna scrap the rowing program until the winter and swap it out for running in this fantastic weather we've been having lately.

I think now that she has more comfort in the weight room (I showed her how to flaunt her stuff and not take crap from any muscular monkeys) she'll be good to go with the lifting. It's important for her, and important for most women, to lift weights. I said as much in my last blog but I left out a critical part. Weight lifting increases bone density, an especially important benefit for women. Pilates, Yoga or Cardio do not have the bone-densifying effect like that of weight training. Any time you place a weight-bearing load on your shoulder girdle, spine or hips, it sends important messages to your central nervous system that your skeletal system has to adapt and handle that load. At the cellular level, this means creating more osteoblasts, which increases bone density.

So, Sari's plan is lifting to increase her lean body mass and running to simply let loose and soak up nature when the endorphins are flowing (a beautiful, and downright spiritual combination).

The success story so far: Sari and I are still working together. Exercising, or really making change, is hard work. It takes a team.