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#WORKOUT WEDNESDAY: WipeoutRun NYC

Samantha

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September 23, 2015

This city is one big obstacle course. You dodge cars, bike messengers, dog poo on the sidewalk (horse poo if you’re in the park), and tourists daily.

You casually stand next to sky scrapers and slap them down with the back of your hand.

You’re one tough SOB.

So I’ll cut right to the chase: For your next obstacle race let’s up the ante. And add water.

Behold: WipeoutRun, a dosage of self-administered tough love in the form of crashing, smashing, and splashing your way through an insane action-packed obstacle 5K.

First of all, let’s make this clear: this is no mere race. This is a full frontal assault on your body that I willingly participated in last Saturday at the Aviator Sports and Events Center in Brooklyn on Flatbush Ave. Consider this the front-runner for 2015’s Best Use of a Decommissioned Airport award.

See, WipeoutRun was not an overnight concept. It’s been 5 years on the making. The original game show inspired obstacle race was developed in 2011 by Vavi Sport & Social Club in San Diego, CA. The creators of ROC Race (Ridiculous Obstacle Challenge) then teamed-up with the producers of the hit TV show Wipeout and created WipeoutRun.

After signing two liability waivers, you’ll do all the regular race stuff–check in, pick up your race packet, bib, T-shirt. Then it’s time to get to the irregular stuff. Like climb over smash walls, duck the unforgiving sweeper, and try to manuver across a lot of inflatable things like wrecking balls, moon bounces and waterslides or break your neck trying (just kidding there were no actual necks broken during this race).

Pace yo’self, you can walk, run or dance your way through this untimed 5K designed for all athletic abilities, and cross the finish line by soaring down the four-story tall Happy Endings water slide!

This race puts your natural instincts to go use to help keep your mind sharp, your nerves steeled, and your reflexes cat like.

My takeaway from the event: watching the TV show Wipeout, hilarious. Enduring WipeoutRun reality, not so funny.

#WORKOUT WEDNESDAY: What The Heel?

Samantha

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September 16, 2015

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This weekend you may find yourself stranded Uptown. Cabs: MIA. Your friend: not wearing her power-walking heels.

Your move: an exercise to access the full lengthening and tone of the hamstring muscles located in the backside of the upper leg.

Suspension Bridge

SETUP: Lie down on your back and place the backs of the heels on a stability ball with your knees bent at 90 degrees.

1)Place your fingers on your sits bones as you press the heels into the ball to discover how the hamstrings muscles on each leg connect on to each sits bone. 2)Extend the legs using the hamstrings. 3)Extend the lower spine in a subtle arch out the tail so that the pelvis isn’t tucked and the hip flexors remain released. 4)Perform the bridge, placing the hands down at your sides for support.

If you don’t have a stability ball, you can put your heels on a firm sofa or strong chair with an upholstered seat. If you are not using a ball, than just keep the knees bent to preform the bridge.

The idea behind this exercise is to develop an experience lying down that can be transferred into standing and walking.

Getting the hamstrings-to-sits-bones-to-hips connection is the first step in being able to tone the upper-outer leg and hip area, commonly known as saddlebags. These sensations in the backside of the body (which begin at the backs of the heels) takes the weight off the toes and also supports the spine, so you can shake it like a salt shaker pain free.

This is a great exercise you can do quickly before a night out on the town, and walk fiercely in a straight line in high heels whilst wearing them.

#WORKOUT WEDNESDAY: Take a Hike

Samantha

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September 9, 2015

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The best part about a great hike: all that walking around.

It’s great.

Some of the best landscapes inhabit hard-to-reach places. So this past Labor Day weekend I opted for wilderness woman over beach bunny.

Harriman State Park, Pine Meadow Lake is the surest way to release your inner Bear Grylls. Without all the fighting-for-your-life stuff.

That is unless you forget to bring your bear mace and a whistle….Probably not on your list of things to pack.

Maybe because you didn’t even know it was a thing…

Heads up: it’s a thing.

There are black bears and the occasional rattle snake in these here parts (luckily they were all on holiday at the beach while we were there, because we never saw any).

You’ll embark from Penn Station and take the NJ-Transit Port Jervis line to the Sloatsburg station. Just a few short blocks from the train are the hiking trails.

My boyfriend and I took the red trail all the way up until it spilled out into Pine Meadow Lake (which really needs another name because there are no pines or a meadow).

You’re hiking, you’re feeling one with nature, you’re hiking some more. One foot in front of the other. That’s the stuff.

Take a breather, enjoy the views, have a snack, pop a squat in a wooded area. Good, then you’ll be ready to keep going up toward the top of the climb, the trail comes out on a rock ledge with a panaramic southwest-facing view.

It took my boyfriend and I roughly two hours of trekking up fairly steep rocky terrain to make it to the grand oasis.

Crystal clear blue water with large rocks that all give you the opportunity to lounge on just the way Mother Nature intended. The lake is fed by a spring which is why it’s so clear, there’s no current strirring up anything.

If that all sounds a little too safe, there’s always cliff jumping.

Walk along the edge of the cliffs and you’ll see signs that say things like “No jumping.” That’s where you’ll jump.

Since there’s usually a crowd cheering from the jump point, perhaps you’ll receive a nice round of applause.

Swimming is great exercise for the whole body and also gives us a sense of freedom, it’s as close as it gets to (unsupported) flying. Maybe it was all the fresh air going to my brain, but there’s a nostalgia about Pine Meadow Lake that brought back fond memories of my childhood, and the summers I’d spent at sleep-away camp.

Doing shit that scares you as an adult is a good thing. It seems that as we grow older we tend to loose that fearlessness of the unknown we once had as a kid.

Every time your heart starts beating out of your chest from fear, being uncomfortable, or getting stuck in a new place where nothing is familiar, it’s a reminder you’re alive.

And every day you wake up healthy and pain free is a great day.