The last few months have been full of changes for me, one of which was moving my personal training business from the Orange County area to the Los Angeles area, what a difference! In the middle of training for an upcoming bodybuilding show in September, my diet and cardio have had to get exponentially tighter and more intense. Like many of you, I too dread the idea of waking up to an hour of Stairmaster training or treadmill, especially before breakfast. Who wouldn’t want to start with a nice stack of strawberry pancakes and a ribeye from the nearest IHOP! Unfortunately, it won’t happen to me, at least for now. But the only thing I can do, and it’s something I wanted to share with all of you, is the ability to change my boring cardio routine, all with the help of my new location in Los Angeles. You see, there’s nothing like getting a good workout in an environment that motivates you and gives you the excitement and exhilaration that you won’t find in any indoor gym. By exercising outdoors, I’ve been able to eliminate the dreaded morning cardio hour by looking at the clock, watching the seconds tick by. Here, I would like to share with you some of my favorite surroundings, all close in the beautiful city of Los Angeles.
For those of you who enjoy the beach, nothing beats a morning workout near the beautiful California coastline in Santa Monica. Near the Santa Monica Pier there is an area complete with rings, pull up and push up stations, a climbing rope, as well as space for many other exercises. For me, I like to start my training on the rings, work my way through the bar, and finish it off with a grueling rope climb that challenges my upper body strength like nothing else in any indoor gym. After repeating this circuit 4 times, I complete my training with a 2-3 mile run on the shore, enjoying the coastal breeze and the sound of the waves crashing distracting me from the physical stress on my body.
Next, I would like to mention the only UCLA stadium that is open to the public. I enjoy coming here on the weekends because nothing beats an intense workout on the college campus of one of our Los Angeles sports champions. Starting with 8 sets of 100-yard sprints with a minute rest between sets, I get my heart rate ready for the intensity to come. Then I put on a weighted vest and head for the stairs. Halfway up the stairs and back up for a total of 10 grueling sets. Does it hurt … HECK YES! But the results are worth it. The bars and ropes at the end of the soccer field conclude my work here with about 3 circuits. For those of you just starting out, start at a slower pace, this is an advanced workout and to prevent injury, listen to your own body.
Finally, here is an activity that we all remember enjoying as kids, plain and simple riding a bike. There is nothing like the simplicity of riding a bike, something that for many of us can take us back to fond childhood memories of the days when we didn’t have a single worry in the world. As kids, many of us ride our bikes for hours on end, never looking at the clock to see when it would be time to stop, and most of us don’t find it tiring or physically exhausting. I thought to myself, why ride a bike in a congested gym when I can buy a real bike and pedal with the downtown Los Angeles landscape next to me? With a good mp3 player and my new bike, my 7am cardio session flew by before I knew it! Since my first ride, I can’t help but ride my bike twice a week, you just can’t get over the excitement!
Now we see that you don’t have to live near green pastures, forests, or mountains to get a good quality outdoor workout. Whether you live in Los Angeles or New York City, metropolitan areas provide us with many opportunities to challenge ourselves physically and mentally. We no longer have to think that to get a good workout you MUST go to a gym, this is not the case. As with anything else, repetition gets old and the last thing you want is to get bored and tired of exercising. The environment you place yourself in for your workouts will make a huge difference to your mental state that will eventually affect your intensity in your workouts. I challenge all of you to take a look at your local environment and find a way to physically challenge yourself outside of your local gym. For those of you in the Los Angeles area, I highly recommend the places mentioned above. Get out of your comfort zone and get out like our great ancestors did and have fun!
