So there I was, standing in the middle of a diverse sampling of human beings.  I felt strangely comfortable though, like I was not sticking out in a good or bad way but instead was being absorbed into a solid group.

Eric, the owner of F.I.T., came out then and turned on some tunes.  It was nice to hear Nirvana come through the speakers and not crap like N’Sync (no offense to anybody who was a teeny-bopper ten years ago and might find that statement… harsh).  He began by asking us how we were doing and I quickly realized that that was not an obligatory, empty question but one that he expected a hearty response to.  We all started to get ready to do some work as we sort of clapped, sort of whooped, and sort of yelled back affirmation of the fact that we were excited to be there.  Like I said, this was a diverse group so he got a diverse reaction.  It was essentially fifteen different ways to show enthusiasm happening simultaneously.

While all this went on I looked behind Eric at a kind of confusing sight.  When you think of a gym, you probably think weight benches, racks of dumbbells, treadmills, elliptical machines, smudgy mirrors, and exercise machines that look like something invented for The Tower of London, right?  I know I did.  And yet, in front of me was a big open space with a couple of exercise mats sitting in the middle, a wooden bench against the wall to my left, and a huge bay door opened at the opposite end.  Outside the door I could see tires with ropes tied to them, and two huge tractor tires with the handles of sledge hammers sticking out of the hole in their centers.  I was intrigued.  A little confused, but intrigued.

Eric then led us through some warm-ups that included body-weight exercises I had never done, like inch-worms.  A normal warm-up to me simply meant doing what you were going to do for exercise, only lighter and more times.  For instance, if I was going to do dumbbell bench press and knew that I was going to use seventy-five pound dumbbells for six to eight repetitions, I would warm up first with thirty pound dumbbells and do fifteen or so repetitions.  Sure, this method got my blood flowing but it was only in the area I was going to work and did NOTHING for the rest of my body.  It actually wouldn’t even really warm me up all that much.  These warm-ups that Eric led us through though affected every bit of my body and left me with an increased heart-rate, a fresh sweat growing under my shirt, and feeling like I was completely warmed up and ready to go.  I can’t lie though: in my state of being out of shape I found myself also feeling like I had already exercised after just the warm-up.  It wasn’t bad, but I knew that this workout was not going to be an easy one.

Eric carefully showed us how to do each exercise in what I discovered would be a five exercise cycle.  He divided the group up so that we had about three people at each station, and then we began to do our exercise for one minute at the station that we were at, then at the end of the minute we would rotate so that we all spent one minute at each station with no rest in between.  They were unique exercises too.  The first was beating the tire with the sledgehammer, not in a spastic way but in a controlled way that I quickly discovered called all the muscles in my core into action.  The second was getting in a near squat position with your back straight and dragging towards you the weighted tires that were attached to the aforementioned ropes.  I felt my back wake up in particular, and my arms.  I then moved on to doing Planks (holding your body straight while resting on your forearms and toes) and I felt my abdominals kick into gear.  We then did one legged squats, one leg on the floor while the opposite is resting behind you (as though you were winding up to kick a soccer ball), and I felt my legs begin to work hard as not only were my primary muscles used, but also secondary muscles as I had to balance myself at the same time as squat.  We then finally did dumbbell bench presses on an exercise ball, and I again realized the double effect of having to balance while exercising.  We did this cycle again, and then a third, more abbreviated time.

Eric finished us out with a much needed time of cooling down and stretching on mats.  My heart rate slowly dropped and I found myself feeling totally exhausted, but really good.  In one hour I had just worked more muscles in my body than I knew I had AND received a cardiovascular workout that left me feeling like I had just come back from a jog.  In short, I was amazed.

In shorter (if I can say that), I was hooked.

Tags: Adam Zobel, Article, Bodyweight, Bootcamp, Common Questions, Education, exercise, fat-loss, fitness, informational, results, Workout