Sunday, September 28, 2008
Life, Health + Fitness

Operation Boot Camp

Get in shape and adopt a healthy lifestyle in 30 days

By Kirsten Ott

I’ve never truly been what anyone would consider in shape. I went from being a normal-sized kid to what I like to call “Rubenesque” as a teen into adulthood. Add to that a passion for pasta, chocolate and wine, a lack of willpower and a desk job, and I was just asking for trouble. So when I got engaged this year, I vowed to get in shape and start eating better so I would be able to be the bride I’ve always wanted to be. Plus, I want to be healthy for the rest of my life. What better time to start than now?

I decided to try Operation Boot Camp, a month-long program that meets every week day in one of the various parks around town. I signed up for Grant Park for the 6 a.m. class. I was scared to death. Visions of Army sergeants screaming at me while I did my scrawny version of a push-up over and over were almost enough to make me not go. But I knew I needed a swift kick in the keister to get myself moving.

I started in late August. Waking up at 5 a.m. wasn’t easy the first day, but the fear of being one second late was enough to pull me out of bed.

When I arrived, there was an almost equal number of instructors and campers. The leaders of this park, Ramsey Kazem and Nikki, introduced themselves and handed out little red logbooks, telling us to keep these on us at all times, record everything we ate and document our completed weekend homework exercises. OK, I thought to myself, I can handle that. Then we were given a brief list of foods we absolutely couldn’t have for the next month, such as alcohol, fried foods and sweets. Give up Argentinean malbec? Sigh. I supposed I could manage that, too. We were instructed to clean our fridge of all temptations and stock up on good, healthy options. Normally, I struggle with this, not always comfortable with cooking with healthy ingredients. Fortunately, grocery lists were e-mailed to us the weekend before we started, and we were sent menus created by a nutritionist in the beginning of the month. Out went the evening snacks of Oreos and in came sugar-free fat-free protein pudding (a special boot camp recipe).

With the food talk out of the way, we set out to take our physical fitness test, which consisted of a timed mile run, sit-ups in 60 seconds, dips in 60 seconds and push-ups in 60 seconds. I didn’t do phenomenal, but I completed all the tasks that were asked of me, and I was proud of that. Of course, I did feel completely nauseous afterward, but I held it in, drank tons of water and mustered up the courage to come back the next day for the workouts to begin.

Each day was different, which I outlined daily in my online blog at www.sundaypaper.com, but the workouts were consistently challenging. However, the difficulty did increase throughout the weeks, as we got stronger. Generally, we did a lot of circuit training, where we would run to different stations set up close to one another on a field or all over the park; either way, we never left Grant Park. At each station, we exhausted ourselves performing various strength-training moves like push-ups, planks (a Pilates-like move where you lay down as if you’re in a push-up position, but rest on your elbows and forearms and toes), sit-ups, crunches, squats and lunges. The workouts were never boring, there was much laughter, and the instructors were very encouraging. Having come into this program with little endurance, I was usually the last in line when we were running, but I was hardly ever alone. An instructor near my own age was usually nearby, cheering me on, encouraging me to break through my own mental barriers.

Four weeks later, I’ve now graduated from boot camp. On our last day, we went through the same physical fitness test, and I beat all my records except my mile, though it wasn’t for lack of trying. About halfway into my mile, I sprained my ankle badly and had to walk some of the way back, fighting back the tears. I was disappointed, sure. But when I returned and the test continued, I tripled the amount of push-ups I could do without putting my knees on the ground, and there wasn’t one drill sergeant yelling at me. SP
If you're interested in Kirsten's boot camp experience, you can read her daily boot camp blog. Kirsten Ott is the Life, Food & Style Editor at The Sunday Paper, and is appearing as a guest in Colleen Oakley’s column. Got a fitness challenge for Colleen? E-mail her at colleen@sundaypaper.com.