Hey everyone, I am blogging from
Arizona State University in Tempe Arizona. I have been here with Liesa since tuesday. What an interesting place. Blazing hot during the day and cool to cold at night and in the morning. Apparently it is like that in the desert! We are here attend the
Fitness Fest Conference at the University. I have been attending workshops with my mentor
Phil Kaplan who always, always delivers the goods in terms of immediately useable information about training or business matters related to fitness. Yesterday's workshop was mostly about mastering "influence" over people to help them achieve their goals. In other words, many, many people know how to "eat right" and how to exercise, but then (for whatever reason) don't follow through. Guess what? No follow through..... no results. For my money, mastering influence is the difference between an average trainer and one that gets phenomenal results, always. I am also attending a workshop presented by the highly esteemed exercise physiologist
Dr. Len Kravitz. I have never met him or heard him speak so I will try to soak up as much as possible to bring back to Hamilton!
The really interesting (verging on psychedelic!) thing the last couple of days has been trying to adjust to the 3 hour time difference after getting up at 4am on the day that we left. That would be 1am Tempe time! When we arrived, we were starving and found a cool patio that was serving great nachos grande and ice cold Corona (when in Rome, eh?). After a snack and a couple of beers, we headed back to the hotel for a bit of a siesta. Well...... a nap that started at about 5pm local time (8pm Hamilton time) stretched on and on and on into the night. I woke up to listen to the
Montreal Canadiens playoff game on the internet (they won, btw :) and then fell back to sleep. After sleeping for what seemed like days, I finally woke up at around 3am (6am in Hamilton) and could not go back to sleep. At a little after 4am, I decided to explore Tempe, so I put on my running shoes and hit the road. I ended running and walking for about 2 hours until I found a Starbuck's that was open and grabbed a paper and a coffee. I tell you, there is nothing more beautiful and peaceful then exploring a new city by foot as the sun rises. After Liesa awoke, we ate breakfast and then re-traced the route that I had run and checked out all of the stores and shops that had by then opened for the day. All in all, I think that I ran and walked about 30 kms yesterday!
Tomorrow, I am going to the world famous
Athlete's Performance Center for elite professional and amateur athletes. I can't wait. Check it out here: www.athletesperformance.com
some Jelly Belly Energy Beans (more on that later) and some water, I headed out for a good 2 hour ride. Check out the pictures below to see the scenery. To be honest, the actual trails were very similar to the riding that we do in Dundas, but, the scenery makes it feel like you are riding in an old western (or the Coyote/ Roadrunner cartoon!).
