Hi team, I'm Fitz Kohler, your very noisy race announcer from fromfitness.com and welcome to the fitness show. Today we have all sorts of exciting things to talk about. We're going to talk about how to get rid of love handles, how to lose weight while preparing for a race, how to strength train while training for a race. What else? We've got some other cool questions. When you're losing weight, should you rely on calorie deficit or exercise or both?
So we've had some great questions come in. I also am going to tell you all about my trip to Colorado Springs. That's right. I just got back from announcing Mud Girl Colorado Springs and had so much fun and so much adventure. And I want to share with you a good amount of the things I did because when you go away, instead of focusing on food, you should be focusing on making memories and athletic adventure, getting up and getting moving.
And golly, I did so much of that in Colorado and Colorado is really the perfect place to get up and get moving. So I'm excited to share that stuff with you. If you haven't done so yet, make sure you click like and subscribe wherever you're listening to the Fitz and the show. And if you'd like to rate, I say us because it's, I don't know, me. I am multiple people appearing. If you'd like to rate me and this show, boy, would I enjoy that.
And I certainly do love seeing your name pop up in those podcast reviews. Jennifer Riaz, thank you. Thank you for the sweet review. Here we go. My first question came from Lori Weiner. Lori, I'm outing you, but it's a great question, Lori, and you're built so well. Well, it's interesting how some people ask these questions and you look at them and think, that's not a problem for you. Really, that's not a problem for you. Why are you concerned about this?
But her question is, how to get rid of love handles? And I think everybody knows what a love handle is, but love handle is what most people consider a little excess fat above their hips, right? So above your hip bone, if there's a little extra something to squeeze, they call that love handles. I think the term was created affectionately because they love grabbing onto their favorite person's hips. But I think, you know, obviously some people don't want to have love handles.
So this is the truth about love handles or I'm going to say man boobs or thighs or whatever, whatever thighs. We all have to have thighs, right? But excess fat anywhere, the only way to lose excess fat from anywhere is to focus on losing weight overall, right? So we just can't pick and choose. Unfortunately, what I believe happens are rubble spots, whatever we personally deem are trouble spots. Traditionally, those are the spots where we lose weight last.
So let's say we're going to lose 50 pounds and it's coming from our face and our feet and our shoulders and our waistline and our thighs and our calves, like everywhere, wherever it lingers last. So maybe you get down to almost your ideal weight and you have five more pounds to lose and you think, oh, my stomach still sticks out or my belly still sticks out or my thighs are too much. Or I'm trying to think of the horrible things people would say about themselves, right?
Or my boobs are still too big, whatever it is. my rear end is too much. That's your trouble spot. That's the one you can't stand because it's the last to go before you become your leanest. So trouble spots, it's all... Problem areas. It's all very personal, whatever you deem. And I tell you, a lot of this is psychological. And I am very clear on being overweight is absolutely hazardous to your health.
Anyone who thinks you can be large and healthy is dead wrong, dead wrong, because large is the equivalent of wearing a backpack full of rocks and taking it everywhere you go. Oh, eventually it's going to have negative effects on your spinal column and your joints and your heart and your lungs and all sorts of other things. So being overweight is never a good idea. However, we don't all have to be super lean. That's a little excessive, right? To be ideal weight. I think you know what
your fighting weight is. You know what weight where you're actually healthy. You have some spring in your step. You can do all the activities you want to do. You have good posture. You are not in pain. That's your ideal weight. And oh, by the way, if you feel like you look good too, but it's interesting to me, let's say two different women, one, let's say that the same exact body type, one might be saying, oh my gosh, my butt is too big.
And the other might be saying, hot damn, my butt is curvy and round and sexy. And I'm going to show it off by wearing tight pants. So it's just very subjective. Once you're at your ideal weight, uh, you know, perhaps you've got some emotional burdens that are making you pick yourself apart. And then perhaps you really have some real issues that you should address. So problem areas, everybody's got their own, everybody's got their own ideas.
And even if you, your problem area might not be a problem to somebody else, somebody might look at you and think, oh my gosh, I wish that were my problem. That's beautiful. So going back to Lori Weiner's question, how do you get rid of love handles. The only way to remove fat or excess weight in a specific spot is by losing weight all overall. And that is your exact formula for weight loss.
You've read it. If you have not read it, go to thecoveroffitness.com and you will learn how to eat the right amount of the right foods for the size you personally want to be. If once you choose your formula and you stick with it, your body will start to shrink down to your ideal size. Is there a way to shrink that body part through specific exercise? No. However, the muscles that are in the region of love handles could be your hips and your glutes and your abdominal muscles and your back.
So, of course, strength training for those particular body parts will make that area much firmer and harder. And I think you will love it a little more. And so strength training is always going to make every part of your body better, feel better, look better, curvy in the right places. I couldn't express enough how important strength training is. It's truly the fountain of youth. And I think it's the secret to what I deem to be the most beautiful bodies.
And I'm not saying like bodybuilders. Okay, you can go be a bodybuilder. But really what I'm saying is a fit, healthy, strong body. So yeah, if love handles are your concern, you got to watch what you put in your mouth. Yes, you should move your body often. and of course, strength training in the areas, in the region you're concerned about will only enhance your strength. That section of your body. So I hope that was a good enough answer for you, Lori.
I know you exercise so much and you run, run, run, run, run so much, marathons and ultra marathons and half marathons. And so perhaps just a little more diligent in your eating habits will get you exactly where you want to be. But since your question came in and I know who you are and I know exactly what you look like, I think your body is perfect. My opinion doesn't mean anything to to you.
It's your opinion that counts, but boy, do I think you have a spectacularly healthy and beautiful body that you should be proud of. So do with that, whatever you'd like, Lori and whoever else is listening, right? Okay. Next question came in from Vicky Miko. I love Vicky. Boy, is she special. I met her, I believe in 2020. I just finished up my breast cancer care. She read my noisy cancer comeback. And we got to meet, she came out to Detroit Women's Half Marathon on Belle Isle
just to see me. She was still going through her treatment. She brought her handsome and sweet husband and we got that magical hug, which was so valuable to me, golly. So Vicki, I love you, Vicki. And Vicki is back in action. She's beaten up on cancer big time, and she's been running and running and running. And so her concern is how does she strength train during a race training because she says a strength training makes her sore.
And so I get that. I get that. But what I want you to know is if you do strength train properly for your races, your runs will become easier. You will run further, faster, and pain-free. So know that. Strength training is not optional. It's mandatory for you to have a great race. And so with anything, if you're just getting started, you're likely to experience some pretty solid soreness from any activity. When your body says, whoa, what was that?
Whoa, I haven't done that in a while. It responds with soreness. However, once you get into a strength training routine, you likely won't continuously be super sore from doing that routine. Where you will become sore is when you significantly change up the routine or increase the intensity of the routine. So, for example, you might do weight machines, right?
Matrix-style machines, nautilus-style machines. You're doing the hamstring curl and the leg extension and the chest press and everything attached to a seat. All right. If you're doing that and you do that every other day for two weeks, by the 10th time you do it, you're not sore anymore, but you are gaining strength. If you change it up one day and you do a bunch of squat jumps and lunges and bands, all of a sudden your body's going to go, holy heck, that was crazy.
And it's going to hurt for a couple of days. So what she's saying is if she gets in that sore phase, her runs are more challenging. I get it. Know that once you get into a quote unquote routine of strength training, you likely won't be very sore anymore, but you won't be sore to the point where it's affecting your runs negatively. And if you only increase your weight or repetitions, your intensity gradually, you should not experience major hurdles with pain and soreness after each workout.
I think there's actually a tremendous benefit to running on tired legs because what do you do before a marathon? You rest, right? You have that week of doing nothing, right? That week for your body to completely relax, your legs to fully recover. And then you show up on race day and you're not training on tired legs anymore. You're training on fresh legs. And those fresh legs have been trained aggressively. They have been trained in strength.
They have been trained in endurance, right? So I think you got to do it. Well, I don't think you have to do it. You have to do it. You have to do your strength training. Now, you could be very strategic about where you place your strength training workouts. For me, when I was training for Boston, for example, I ran three days a week only. So that was my training. You don't have to train like me. I ran a short run Monday, a short run Wednesday, and a long run on Friday.
I'm guessing I just didn't run on Saturday or Sunday. I must have done some other sort of cardio, swimming or cycling, things like that. But I would run on Monday and then I was strength training on Tuesday. Or sometimes I would run on Monday for 30 minutes. That was my short run. And then I would immediately strength train after that. So that gave my body killer workout on that day. And then Tuesday was rest. By Wednesday, I was kind of fresh again.
And the same thing went for Friday. day. Killer workout after your long run, killer strength training work right after a long run. I don't know if that's going to work out depending on how far you're running, but you can, you can space them out. You can do running on Monday, strength training on Tuesday, running on Wednesday, strength training on Thursday. Now know that strength training once a week is required for strength maintenance.
So if you only do once a week, no, you're not getting any stronger. You are maintaining the strength you have. If you're an athlete and you're aiming for speed or comfort while you're running, you should be trying to get stronger, right? So at least a second time. A third time if you really want to run further, faster, and pain-free.
And so space that out how you want. But once you get started with a strength training program and then you make gradual changes to your intensity and your repetitions, you really shouldn't have tremendous issue with soreness unless you're changing things up. And the real benefit there is, of course, you might have a little more soreness if you're going from training on weight machines to plyometrics to cables and
and so forth, your body is really being impacted. Your body's really making improvements. And that soreness really is a sign that your body has been challenged. And if you give it the appropriate rest, that 48-hour period between strength training workouts, you should be quite the machine by the time you hit race day. So that is my answer to you, Vicki. I hope that was was helpful. Now, somebody else asked, how do I manage weight loss while training for a race?
And I'm guessing this is a half marathon, a full marathon, or ultra, because with a 5K training, you really shouldn't have to worry about any of these things. But what happens when people are training for longer distance events, they start putting in lots and lots of miles. Now, can you eat for a calorie deficit while putting in lots and lots of miles? Well, you're going to have to compensate for those miles run.
So on a regular person doing regular types of exercise, let's say a one hour Zumba class or a one hour bootcamp class, your exact formula for weight loss works. You should be able to stick with your formula and still go have an hour long strength or cardio workout without having to make too many adjustments to your caloric intake. However, if you go beyond an hour or you feel like you really pushed it, absolutely. You should be bringing in more calories because food is fuel.
And when you expend a whole bunch of energy, you're going to have to replace that, especially with quality, quality fuels. Distance runners have an interesting history of gaining weight while they're training for a marathon, which makes absolutely no sense, right? Or a half marathon or definitely not even losing weight. Why? Because when distance runners get in their training mode, they think, oh, I'm running so far. I can eat whatever I want. And that's just unrealistic. And it's untrue.
It's untrue. You should always watch what you put in your mouth. And so, you know, for me, when I was doing 30 minute run on Monday, 30 minute run on Wednesday, 18 mile run on Friday. I adjusted my caloric intake appropriately. And so on Monday, I ate what I always ate. On Wednesday, I ate what I always ate. On Friday, when I was doing 18 miles, you betcha, I ate more. I would have a kind bar, some sort of high energy, high protein bar, bring in 300 calories that way. And I'd have a banana.
And maybe I'd come home and I'd bake some French fries. So I was not eating in excess. that. I mean, 18 miles for me is 1800 calories. That's a lot. So, you know, I would have to certainly consume extra calories. And I did most of that while I was running. So I'd get to mile three and I had already had a few bites of that kind bar or protein bar, whatever I was having energy bar. And then by the time I got to mile six, I had had more of it.
So I was refueling along the way because I don't think I would have gotten to mile 18 if I hadn't continued fueling along the way. So yes, you can use your exact formula for weight loss. If it's the day where you're not running, okay, well, you don't have to increase your caloric intake because you're not going into a severe deficit. But if you're going to go do a big long run, well, then sure, replace those calories or some of them.
Just do so judiciously. Know that running 15 miles doesn't mean you have carte blanche to go get a bacon double cheeseburger and a large fry and a massive soda. It's just foolish. And that's, you're definitely not going to lose weight doing that. And you may not even be a healthy person, right? I know healthy, I know marathon runners who have had a heart attack. In fact, I don't think he'd mind me sharing it. I know he won't because he talks about it publicly.
Dave McGillivray, the race, former race director, the longtime race director of the Boston Marathon, a man who I believe has run every Boston Marathon on since he was 17. He's now in his sixties. He also has a long history of running his, running the amount of miles of his age on his birthday. So when he would turn 55, he ran 55 miles. This is a man who was committed to running, committed to distance running and does a heck of a lot of it.
Dave has had two operations, not one, but two for heart disease. And that. Could be partial genetics, but he's definitely owned up to some nutritional errors. And so your eating habits always matter. It doesn't matter how big you are or how small you are. You should be aiming for 80 to 90% of your caloric intake to be nutritious. Is this healthy? Is this the stuff that was on the blackboard in kindergarten? Was your teacher saying, hey folks, you should get some of this processed salami?
Or was she saying you should have chicken and fruits and vegetables and beans? Those things that your kindergarten teacher was encouraging you to have on the blackboard, those are probably the types of foods you should be leaning towards and a little less of the, woohoo, I'm training for a marathon, I can eat whatever I want. So on non-long run days, you can stick with that exact formula without a problem. On your long run days, feel free to compensate for all of your energy expended,
to just do so judiciously. Aim for boots that you would eat in front of me. And I'd say, wow, I'm impressed. Okay. So perfect is boring, but judicious. I'm going to leave that in your hand. So great questions. A training for a significant endurance event, whether it's triathlon or a long cycling event or running, or I don't know, a all day karate match, whatever you're going to do, It does require some effort.
And one of the things that I think is so interesting when I announce a marathon or even half marathon, all those people show up, I know what they've done in advance, or at least the great majority. Not everybody has trained appropriately. But, you know, when you cross the finish line of a marathon and I tell you I love you and I'm so proud of you, I'm not just proud of the 26.2 miles you've accomplished at a destination.
I'm so proud of you for all those mornings you woke up early or you stayed out late to train. You skipped out on the office party. You skipped out on alcohol. You made progress. Disciplined and thoughtful choices with nutrition because you wanted your body to be ready. You strength train, you stretch, you did balance training, you do all those things, hopefully, right? And when I say attaboy or attagirl, it's a cumulative congratulations for everything you've done up into that point.
And that truly is why we say the actual race itself for most folks is a victory lap. I mean, some folks are really trying to win or win their age group or qualify for Boston and good for them. Those are great goals to have. However, finishing that race is symbolic of so many weeks or months of discipline and effort. Okay. Here's the other thing is if you are overweight, when you start training for a marathon or a half marathon, and someone says, don't try to lose weight right now.
You can't do that while you're training for a race. I think that person is out of their mind. Why? Because when you are running, every time you take a step, three times your body weight crashes to the ground. Let's say you're 200 pounds right now. That's 600 pounds with each step crashing down on your foot, your ankle, your shin, your knee, your hips, everything. And if we can reduce that amount of impact going through your entire higher body with each step.
Well, that would be nice, right? Let's say you took off those full 40 pounds and you went from 200 to 160 pounds. Let's do the quick math. 300 plus 480 pounds instead of 600 pounds with each step. So that's a real big deal. That's a real relief. And to think about it in reverse, let's say you're, you are in a ideal weight and you want to go out and and put 40 pounds on your back in a backpack and go run a marathon. That makes it way harder, right? There are actually people who do that.
Rucksackers. A lot of our military veterans and active military, they come out, they like to rock and I admire them fully. I also think they're nuts. I see it and I go, whoa, why are you making this process of going 26 or 13.2 miles or even a 5k more difficult than it has to be, but they're ambitious and I get it. And a lot of them do far far more walking than running because it really is dangerous, I think, to put 40 pounds on your back and run.
And our military does it, again, from an actual fitness expert standpoint, knowing what I know, scares the bejesus out of me. So if you are going to run and you're planning to run a big distance, well, it would certainly benefit you to shave off any extra weight you have to make the journey between the start and the finish line a little less difficult, right? And a little less traumatic on your joints and those bones of yours.
So if somebody is telling you training for a race is not the time to lose weight. I disagree. I think you can do so in a healthy, safe way. I think when you stick to the exact formula for weight loss on the days where you do not have long runs, you will certainly be losing weight. And then when you do have a day with a long run and you compensate judiciously, your body will be better for it. And yeah, why not?
If you're an overweight person and you're signing up for a marathon, I can imagine maybe your goal might be to get fitter, have more endurance and oh yeah, be closer to my ideal weight. I just, I think it's weird when people say don't lose weight while training for a race. I think that's absolutely crazy. So these have been fantastic questions. I've got another question. Val, I love Val from Fargo. She's such a sweetheart. One of the kindest people on earth.
She asked if I thought people should focus more on calorie deficits or exercise when trying to lose weight. And both, your body requires an extra excess 3,500 calories in order to gain a pound. And so let's say today I burn 1,500 calories and I consume 1,500 calories. That means I'll stay exactly the weight I am right now. However, if I sit down tonight and I eat eight slices of pizza, I got 3,500 calories. I will gain a full pound tonight.
Oh, hopefully people aren't gaining a pound a day. But over time, the extra consumption of 3,500 calories will lead to one pound of weight gain. Same thing goes in reverse. So let's say I consume, let's say I burn 2,000 calories today, but I only eat 1,500 calories. That gives me a 500 calorie deficit. opposite. So if I want to burn 3,500 calories at this pace, then I will lose one pound in a week.
So I can do that with a 500 calorie deficit every day, five times seven or 500 times seven equals 3,500. That's one week to lose one pound. Now, let's say I go out and exercise. I do a Zumba class or whatever, and I burn 500 calories. That puts me in a 1,000 calorie deficit for the day, which is not dangerous. And I might be able to lose a pound every three and a half days. And so, yeah, combine your quality eating habits, your exact formula and exercise to lose weight more rapidly.
If you feel like, gee whiz, I'm losing weight too fast, then you can consume more or pull back on exercise. That's totally up to you. But I certainly would combine both efforts because usually when people want to lose weight, they want to lose it now. You can't lose it now. You just can't, you can't lose it all today. You can't lose it all tomorrow, but could you lose it all in the next four months versus eight months? Yeah. Would that get you exactly where you want to be in four months?
Yeah. Would you look better? Probably. Would you feel better? For sure. Would you be less likely to be at risk for certain medical conditions? 100%. So we want to use the exact formula. It's a healthy, sane, non-restrictive way to lose weight. And then you add on the exercise and you get where you want to go a little bit faster. There's nothing wrong with that. Okie dokie. Now I'm going to go away from questions asked and,
and folks, please continue to send me questions. I love that you send them on fitsness.com. There's a contact button. You can send them to me on Instagram or Facebook once a week. Now I'm putting on a ask me anything story on Instagram. And so many of you have been responding to that, but I love answering your questions. No, if you have the question. Somebody else has the same exact question and I will try to reach out to all of you so you all have the solutions you're looking for.
Now I'm going to talk a little bit about Colorado Springs, Colorado. So I've been to Colorado quite a few times and I love it. In fact, I was there in October with my family and I announced Boulder Thon and we did horseback riding and hiking and all sorts of lovely things. I've never been to Colorado Springs Springs. And so I went a couple of days early. I was there specifically to announce Mud Girl, Colorado Springs and Mud Girl is just a blast.
It is a 5k distance filled with 17 plus obstacles that are very doable for almost everybody. And the crowds are just so delightful. I have more fun at these start lines than, than I should admit. I should admit we have the best time, it's targeted mostly for women. So it would be illegal for them to reject people that are not women. But I would say 99.999% of our participants are women. And it's just got this great pink army, pink and black, mud girl,
party party vibe, and everybody shows up happy. And it's just. It's a delight. It's such a delight. So I was privileged to be there, but I thought, well, Colorado Springs, I need to go in a couple of days early and have some fun because Colorado in general is a hotbed for athletic adventure. And that's one of my main focuses in life is getting out and doing things and moving my body and having big laughs and seeing wonderful things. And golly, Colorado is filled with beautiful stuff.
So I'm going to tell you the things I did that I absolutely loved. I started my first day there, went to see the Garden of the Gods. It's this area filled with rock formations, massive rock formations. I can't really call them mountains because they're not mountains. They're just these huge rock formations. They've jetted up out of the earth. There's weird shapes and some of them are totally confusing, but breathtaking and beautiful.
Drove over there, got out on foot, did some walking, did some climbing on some of the rock formations, just beautiful and fun. And they have these super cool one seed juniper trees, which are twisty and strange. And their barks are very kind of stringy, just loved it. And that's something anybody of any fitness level can do. You can drive around in your car or you can get out on foot and walk. You can walk really far or you can walk just a few steps.
The other thing that was really cool is one of the place I got out to walk, There was just deer roaming around, totally not afraid of humans. I guess the humans have always been great to them, which I love. And yeah, I got just within a couple of feet of a couple of deer and I love animals. So that made me instantly happy with Garden of the Gods. But that's a must do. Went straight from there.
To whitewater rafting on the Arkansas River. I did tell you that I was recently whitewater rafting in Georgia and that was wild. That was actually wild, crazy rapids. Our guide was a little nuts. Ginger and I, my daughter, we were at the front of the boat and I'm convinced he was trying to drown us.
Now, mind you, I loved it. It was so much fun, but he would take our raft into a nosedive in what they call a hole where all the water is rushing in and just put us down and all the water was just drowning us. And we were belly laughing. It was so crazy. We got to ride the bull, straddle the top of the raft or the front of the raft while it was going over these rapids. Just wild. So it was Raft Echo on the Arkansas and it's Echo Raft or Raft Echo.
They were so good. Beautiful equipment. They allow you to use their jackets. They're like windbreaker style jackets, wetsuits, full wetsuits, short wetsuits. If you want to, I didn't use any of that. I just wore my bikini and a life vest and a helmet. Everybody has to wear a helmet and a life vest, but it was fantastic.
And again, this is something almost anybody can do. If you are pregnant or you have a spinal column issues, spinal cord issues, maybe this is not for you, but for the most part, it's not incredibly physically demanding.
You can do, you do some exercise you are sitting in the raft and if you can swim that's that's a good good idea too but it was so it was beautiful it was so much fun and it was beautiful I did not get drowned this time which was kind of cool it was nice and hot so every time the water the icy cold water splashed on me within a couple of moments I felt okay because the sun was so bright and so hot but. Beautiful trip down the Arkansas River.
And we actually sailed underneath or rafted underneath the Royal Gorge Bridge, which is the tallest suspension bridge in all of America or the highest. I think it's actually the highest bridge in all of America, but it's a thousand feet up in the air. And I think the bridge is a thousand feet across. Very, very cool. We later went up And walked across that bridge, which was super fun to do as well. But the rapids were three, four, and five on the portion of the Arkansas,
which we enjoyed. It just was so fun. It was so fun. I never have done rafting and thought, gee whiz, this sucks. Every single time I have all of the laughs and all the giggles and all the excitement. It's just nice to have excitement in your life, right? What are you doing today? Is there anything in your day right now that makes you go, oh my God, I can't believe it. That's the type of energy, the type of feeling that whitewater rafting gives me and seemingly everybody else out there.
So highly encourage you to do it wherever you can get to. They also have a class one and class two rapid trip where you can go and just be a lot more leisurely. And I hear at that point you feel kind of hot because you're not being splashed and then you have to reach into the river and splash it on yourself. But if you're looking for something more chill, you could totally do that with the same company in the same area. but whitewater rafting, I wish I could do it every day.
It's such a good time. So yes to that, I chose Raft Echo. That's the company I bought my ticket through, but there's a few others and I'm sure they're all pretty special, but I really enjoyed the Raft Echo and our guide, David, was wonderful. It's really interesting to get to know these guides because they are actual grownups with this super cool job living out in the mountains doing this thing every day, but they can't raft all year.
So then they have to go get some other cool job. And I think on the other part of the year, he works in the Grand Canyon. It's just really interesting people worth having great conversations with once you sit down in the raft. But David, if you're listening right now, thank you so much. And thank you for sharing photos and videos. I will post those and put them to good use. So after that, went over to the Royal Gorge Bridge, which I just told you it's the tallest in America.
And even if you're afraid of heights, this bridge is not so scary. You pay 40 bucks, you enter this facility, they've got snacks and a gift shop, and then you have access to the bridge. But they will take you across the bridge by gondola, if you choose to do that. And then you walk around, they have a little movie that teaches you how the bridge came to be. And there's a playground for the kids, and there's a. I don't know, a beer stand and things like that. I didn't have any beer.
Beer just makes me tired. It's not that I'll never have a beer, but a midday beer, even though it seems like it might be a good idea for me, I just think, oh my God, it's just going to put me to sleep. So I did not have a beer and maybe have a little regret over that. But when I walked across the bridge, it wasn't scary at all. And I don't have a tremendous fear of heights, but there were cars going over the bridge.
So it's a very strong, very established bridge. You don't really have to worry too much about. And on the bridge, not only can you look over down where the people are whitewater rafting underneath, but they have the flag of every state in the union on that bridge, which I thought was pretty cool. I don't know. I don't know why they had a bit there, but I think it's fantastic and respectful to all of the visitors. And I certainly enjoyed seeing my sweet home Florida flag flying high over there.
But I definitely recommend Royal Gorge Bridge. You can zip line across the gorge. And I totally would have done that. I didn't. To be honest with you, I think I probably cheaped out. I think it was 50 to 80 bucks. And I thought, meh, I won't do that because I've been spending a lot of money all day doing all sorts of things. But zip lining looked a lot of fun. They also have some other crazy kind of ride where they slingshot you out across the gorge.
And I don't know, I probably Probably would do that too. If you're an adventure seeker, a thrill seeker, there are opportunities for you over at the Royal Gorge Bridge. But I mean, golly, if you wanted a cool family vacation. Colorado is spectacular in the winter, but it's also really cool with so many cool things to do in the summer. So that was day one. And then the next morning got up and I got on a choo-choo train. That's right. I got on the cog train from Manitow Springs up to Pike's Peak.
And Pike's Peak is the mountaintop over 14,000 feet high. And the train ride was just really lovely. Again, something you can do at all fitness levels. Sat down in the train. It's an indoor train, windows high, but the top part of the windows were open. in. So we had fresh air, met some really cool people, sat next to a bunch of New Yorkers and Howard and his crew fell in love with those guys and one of their wives. They were a lot of fun.
Our host, Susie, she was very sarcastic and funny as she taught us about the things we were seeing on the way up the mountain. The train moves at nine miles per hour and it's fascinating. Halfway up the mountain, you start to feel your heartbeat a little faster because you're at a higher elevation and then it starts to get cold. And she's encouraging everybody, you know, close the window. So I knew it was going to be colder. So I brought a jacket. I think, did I wear pants? I did.
I wore running tights or whatever, but I had a hoodie jacket and it was great. We got up there and going from, you know, every day has been 90 something degrees, whether I'm here in Florida or working in Minnesota or working in Colorado to go up where it was 40 degrees for 45 minutes was pretty cool. And the sites are beautiful, as you can imagine. But interesting, I would get a little excited and want to run to a specific location on the top of that mountain.
I'd maybe get seven steps in before my heart started saying, stop it, cut it out. You psycho, just chill out right now. This is hard. So the elevation certainly can be oppressive, but it's a cool place. I highly recommend the train ride. Now you could drive, I think it's called like Pike's peak highway or something similar, but, I hear it's terrifying. There's about 150 hairpin turns and there's not a lot of guardrails. This is what I've been told. I haven't experienced it yet.
But the train ride, just great. You feel safe the whole time. You have nobody in your family with a death grip on the wheel, praying not to send you off the side of the mountain. And you only get about 45, 50 minutes on the top of the mountain, but that's really all you need because there's nothing up there. There's what they call the Summit House, which again is a gift shop and a cafe. I did hear from one of my whitewater rafting raft mates who said,
oh, you should do the train ride. And I said, we are. And they said, well, you should have a donut up there. And I thought, well, I don't traditionally care for donuts. And they said, but it's really special. I think it's because of the elevation, but the donuts are fantastic. And then I thought, you know what? I'm going to go have one of those donuts. I'll at least buy one and have a bite.
And then the line at the cafe was 45 minutes long. And I thought, well, I'm not going to waste all my time up here waiting in line for a donut. But if you do choose to drive up to Pikes Peak, from what I hear, the donuts are pretty special. And so maybe just get one and share it with whomever you're with. Have that satisfaction. And then you can reach out to me and let me know if I truly missed something special or if not so much.
Or maybe you're just going to put one in a box and put my address on it and send it to me. But that was a really cool ride. Okay. After that, took a drive. Well, we went down the mountain. On the same train, took a drive over to what's called Cripple Creek. And I thought, well, where did this town get its name? And Cripple Creek got its name because when people would take their donkeys and horses across the creek, they were constantly getting injured.
So they called it Cripple Creek, which today, not so PC, but sometimes you just want to know, where did they get these names? But in Cripple Creek, there's a main street. Which resembles an old Western movie. It looks like saloons where they possibly have a shootout at noon every day. The population of Cripple Creek is just slightly over a thousand people.
So it's a very small town, but I went into the casinos and I'm not a big casino person, but I'm cool to show up at a casino with 40 bucks and play the penny slots until I run out of money. But instead, I played and I kept getting lucky on this Frankenstein machine, all hail Frankenstein, which is great because I love Halloween. And I walked out of there $200 richer. That is right. Fitz Kohler finally freaking won some money at a casino. So hip, hip, hooray.
Very, very thrilled with my time there. And, you know, casino, you can really only handle so much. You're indoors and it's loud and you can't see the sun. And I know they're, they're trying to keep you in there for hours and hours on then that'll never work for me. Cause I just need to get outside, but it was cool. It was cool. Had a few hours. It was fun. And I, it's like this weird little Vegas in the middle of Colorado. It's nothing like Vegas, but they do have a bunch of casinos there.
The nice one was Shaman X, which is attached to a really fancy hotel. And then they have one where I parked next to you called the a brass ass. And that was pretty cool too. But anyway, the little casino in Colorado Springs area, which some of you may enjoy just to go overboard. Like you just show up to a casino, like a well-adjusted sane person. You bring some cash. If when you run out, you're done, you go home and walk away because gambling of course can put people in a really bad position.
Okay. The other thing that's cool there, there's a thing called Manitow's incline in Manitow Springs, right next to where you board the train, which is 2,700 steps up to the top. It is just a big old staircase. It's rustic and unique. All the steps aren't the same as if you were going up the stairs in a hotel. They're made of stones and concrete and some are tall and some are short, but it's a really athletic thing to do. And there's a lot of people who show up for that workout every day.
Some people do that as their workout every day. They They probably have the best legs and butts on earth. Rob did it. He thought it was fantastic. So yeah, Minnetonka Springs, something to strive for. If you're headed over there and you're one of my athletic people, well then give it a go. Might be an hour or two hours of your life, depending on how long it takes you to get up there. Bring some water, bring some sunscreen, bring it.
But it looked awesome. And if I wasn't working, I probably would have given it a go as well. And then the last, oh no, not the last thing. Seven Falls. Very cool. Seven Falls is this, it's a privately owned park where you walk and it's beautiful. It's in the middle of the mountains and it is seven waterfalls that basically attach to each other. One falls down into this basin and then another waterfall goes into another and another.
And you can climb to the top of the waterfalls. It's almost 300 steps to the top. I had been announcing all day Saturday. So when I got up there, I was thinking, oh, I don't want to do this, but I did it. And I feel very proud that I did. And I got to see some beautiful things. It's a gorgeous spot and certainly worth your time.
And, you know, as I was feeling lazy and walking up this steep incline to get to the staircase, to walk up the steps, there was all sorts of super unfit looking people coming away who had done it. So know that even if you're not feeling like a superstar in fitness right now. There's a lot of people of all sorts of ages and sizes and fitness levels getting it done. You can take your time. Worth the trip. It really was quite lovely.
And then the last thing I'm going to tell you about was the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, or is Mount Cheyenne? Maybe it's Mount Cheyenne Zoo. Anyways, the zoo. And to be honest with you, I didn't think it was going to be anything fancy based off of its name. I just thought it would be a tiny little. Zoo with maybe one tiger and an ape. Who knows? Sometimes there are these little piddly things, but no, it was a real zoo. It was a fabulous zoo. It's built in the side of a mountain.
So again, incline going from one section of exhibits to another, but they have golf carts that long golf carts where you and your family can board if you need support getting up the mountain. Absolutely gorgeous and fun and filled with fabulous animals. The second we got in, there was a pen filled with giraffes and you could walk completely around the giraffe pen. And even if you didn't have food, the giraffes would come reach out, stick their little heads over to greet you.
So we got to pet a whole bunch of giraffes. If you've seen the image I posted, I posted a selfie on Instagram and Facebook. It's me with a giraffe over my head. The giraffe just did that. There was no coercion. It literally just put its head over mine and posed for the picture, which was ah, so wonderful. I just really loved it. And then I did buy some lettuce to feed the giraffes and it makes me happy to give money to the zoo because then they spend the money taking good care of the animals.
And then it rained and what a lovely thing to have happen because as I'd been traveling to zoos around the country, phenomenal how hot it's been and how lazy all the animals are. So I can't tell you how many sleeping lions I've seen, how many sleeping bears I've seen where they're just passed out because of the heat. So thanks to the rain, the animals were up and they were active. And there was a tiger who, when I walked up, the tiger just got up and walked
over. I was like, Hey tiger, that's pretty cool. And then a leopard did the same thing, just got down to greet me and the other folks roaming around. They had a grizzly bear demo and I'm learning that I really should spend more times going to enjoy the demos because Because I showed up for the grizzly bear demos. A, one of the bears, Emmett is his name, just sitting next to the glass. So I was right next to it, face to face with the grizzlies.
They're such beautiful, cute little animals or cute, monstrous animals. But the demo, they had three zookeepers come over. They lifted up the glass door and there was a cage remaining. And so the two grizzly bears, I think it's Emmett and Digger, came over because the zookeepers had snacks. They had these little pouches on their hips filled with fruits and vegetables
and they had tongs. And so they would reach through the cage and the bear would grab the piece of cantaloupe or apple and eat the snack. And just so freaking cute. And the bears would do tricks, much like dogs. They would give a paw and shake and do all sorts of other adorable things that just made you want to melt your heart, made you want to slide through those little holes in the fencing and wrap your arms and legs around the grizzly bear and kiss its face and tell it you
love it. That's the feeling I got there. But one of the things I really enjoyed is they were talking about Emmett's eating habits. And they were saying that when they had to relocate the bears temporarily to upgrade the exhibit, they couldn't get them into the crate unless they put cheesecake in there. So they put cheesecakes in the crate to lure the bears in. The bears are really total foodies and you have to give them what they want or they won't do what you want them to do.
But they did a taste test for Emmett. So they pull out one blueberry, just one blueberry, and pass it to Emmett. So Emmett takes it, puts it in his mouth. Nom, nom, nom. It's so cute to see this monster 700 and something pound bear just eating one little blueberry. Very delighted. And then they gave him a red raspberry. And he ate that and enjoyed it too. And then they passed through broccoli. And so he put the broccoli in his mouth. He gave it a few chews.
And then he spit it onto his hand. And then he flung it across the enclosure. So cute. He also did not like cauliflower. He got a bite of that and tossed it too. So just enjoyable. Nice to get to spend some quality time with these majestic animals, where if you saw them out in the real world, you might be absolutely terrified with good reason. But the Mount Cheyenne Zoo was one of my favorites. I keep saying that. I mean, trust me, I've been to zoos I did not love, but this one was a great one.
Minneapolis or Minnesota was a great zoo. Columbus was fantastic. I just keep hitting it. Keep hitting zoo home runs lately. And I'm very, very pleased. Okay, so that's Colorado Springs. I hope you take a trip there whether you go alone. If you go alone, there's plenty of stuff for you to do. You don't have to feel like a weirdo roaming around out there alone. You can have the time of your life, just you, yourself, and you.
I guess that's you, yourself, and you. And then if you bring your family, same deal. And I thought there were a ton of really decent, reasonably priced hotels in the area as well. Renting a car is easy, driving the car is easy, as long as you're not going up Pikes Peak. Mud Girl, I love announcing Mud Girl. Ginger is doing it as well. I would love for you to come see me. Come check out our schedule. We will be in Texas and a few spots in California.
I will be in Phoenix. Anyways, my schedule's on fitsness.com. Go check it out and come run, Mud Girl. And if you're a boy and you're not going to run, just come see me. Come say hi. That would be super nice. Okay, I got grammar message of the day and our song, The Day. So I would like you to reconsider the word amazing. I think amazing is overused. Amazing is not a bad word. It's not an incorrect word. There's nothing really wrong with amazing.
However, the intention of the word amazing is to say that something caused you such awe, right? You can't believe it. It's amazing. I think the word has been totally diluted because it's overused. It's the only word anyone can think of. And so this sandwich is amazing. That movie was amazing. This weather is amazing. I went to bed at eight o'clock and it was amazing. Really? Is your sandwich amazing? Because I could tell you that grizzly bear doing the tricks,
that was kind of amazing. But eating a sandwich, I don't know if it qualifies as amazing. So what I would like for you to do is diversify your language. And when I did the Dancing with the Stars competition, so boring. These hosts, I mean, the competition wasn't boring. But the hosts and the judges, all they kept saying to everybody, amazing, amazing, amazing. And it just, to me, when I watched it back on video, I thought, well, I guess they really weren't amazed by anybody.
They really didn't find anyone phenomenal because they weren't even inspired to come up with a unique word. Tremendous, spectacular, interesting, fascinating, cool, wondrous. There's a thesaurus in your phone for crying out loud. Let's dig through it and maybe find something else. and reserved word amazing for when things are actually shock and awe wow worthy. Yes? Yes. Okay. And our song of the week submitted from Jenny in Wilmington, California.
Her song she submits. She wants us to add to our playlist when we work out. That's right. When you are, what kind of things, when we're playing football or racquetball or we are doing judo, we should all play John Cougar Mellencamp's Authority Song, which is a really good one from way long ago. I like it when you guys submit some oldies. And she says it's on repeat this week from running errands, sitting in traffic, training, and rollerblading, which I love.
She recommends the song because it gets her amp to move. And she thinks you will love it because of the kick-ass drums and rhythm, not to mention the meaning behind it. So authority song by John Cougar Mellencamp for Jenny in Wilmington, California. Will you please play this while you're exercising? Yes. Okay, good. All right, folks. Well, I love you so much. I love you all the way every day.
I hope you're watching what you put in your mouth. I hope you are exercising often doing strength and cardio and flexibility and balance training. And yeah, visit me on social media and say, hi, get to work team. I love you. Hi, this is Rudy Novotny, the voice of America's marathons. We all love how much running has benefited every aspect of our lives, so much so that most of us only wish we'd started sooner. Wouldn't it be wonderful to gift the opportunity to children of today?
Well, you can. The Morning Mile is a before-school walking and running program that gives children a chance to start each day in an active way while enjoying fun, music, and friends. That's every child, every day. It's also supported by a wonderful system of rewards which keeps students highly motivated and frequently congratulated.
Created by our favorite fitness expert, Fitz Kohler, Morning Milers across the country have run over 2 million miles and are having greater success with academics, behavior, and sports because of it. The Morning Mile is free to the child, free to the school, and is inexpensively funded by businesses or generous individuals. Help more kids get moving in the morning by visiting morningmile.com. Champion the program at your favorite school or find out more about sponsorship
opportunities. That's morningmile.com. Long may you run.