Physical Funness for the Motion Starved

Fit more fun into your fitness while exploring the outdoors.

Category Archives: Fitness


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Rubber Feet?

Caveman running

I’ve been asked quite a few times lately what I think of those FiveFinger shoes, aka Barefoot runners, Skeletoes, etc. You know what they are…those shoes that look like Rubber Feet.* Remember toe socks? Like those, but made outa rubber.

The thinking behind Rubber Feet is that modern-day running shoes provide too much support and cushion, therefore changing the biomechanics of running, causing injury. They use the example of how children run before they walk, and that they seem to launch at full speed everywhere sans shoes. They also claim that cavemen used to run for miles and miles just fine sans fancy shoes. Apparently donning Rubber Feet is like being barefoot, but with a thin barrier between you and the earth. Call it, Paleolithic-old-school and the answer to pain-free running.

Here’s what I think (brace yourself). First of all… sure, kids run like crazy for a few yards in the grass or inside the house, not down the road for 10k, or up some single track covered with rock. The caveman point is especially fun as I’ve never seen a caveman that didn’t appear to have walked all hunched over looking like he was in unbearable pain. My guess is, his feet his back and everything else hurt because he spent all day running on rock! Not only that, but cavemen only lived for about 20 years. I bet if they had to run around for another 30 years sans shoes they’d have figured out how to stitch up some nice fat pads for their trashed tootsies.

Basically, I don’t buy the Rubber Feet hype. In my mind it doesn’t add up, they look incredibly stupid, they make an annoying slapping sound as they trot along, more seriously, I’ve never once seen a person wearing them that didn’t look like they were in severe pain. During my last half marathon (on the trail) my Asics Trail Runners and me started just behind a young man wearing a pair of Rubber Feet. When the whistle blew the man took off running, a mile and a half up the road I passed him as he limped along delicately navigating each small pebble in the trail. I never saw him again, guessing he didn’t finish.

If your feet hurt when you run then you need to learn how to run properly. If you don’t support proper running form and mechanics, your shoe choice will not change anything. Learn proper running form and then play around with footwear if you like. My suggestions, hire a running coach, attend a clinic or take a class. Don’t just jump on the Rubber Feet bandwagon.

Now…I realize that I’m not being completely fair, as I have not personally tried to run in Rubber Feet. I am only sharing my educated opinion. With that, if you wish to prove me wrong and or convince me that running in Rubber Feet is a good thing, I invite you to send me a pair and I will happily try them, and revise my post accordingly. I take a size 9.

P.s. If you want to run barefoot, go to the beach and run in the sand. That’s something I approve of whole-heartedly. Stand tall, pick your knees up and have fun!

* The term Rubber Feet is a Kelleyism used to refer to “shoes” that look like fat rubber feet, make annoying slapping sounds when they hit the ground, look stupid and don’t make sense, in her mind.


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The Skin-ny

When I left my hella fun advertising job to become a trainer, I though… Yippee! Now I get to be outside all day making people sweat. And with that, I’ll sweat and get super healthy right along with them. Yippee! The way the life of Kelley was meant be!

Well, fact is I am outside a lot, and I do sweat a lot, but the part I didn’t think about was the added stress this new life would place on my skin. See, sweat is good as it releases toxins from your body and cools you down, but if your skin isn’t clean and debris free it tends to get what they call congested. I call it zitty. Not that you need to know, but lately my skin has been seriously zitty, most likely because of all the gunk in the air that sticks to my sweaty skin.

Since I know enough to not wash my face or shower more than a couple times a day (because over washing will dry it out), what I need to do is make sure that once my skin is clean that it’s properly exfoliated and de schmutz.

With that, I took a gander at my friend Justine’s website. Justine is the esthetician who’s been making my skin look beautiful for years (and I hear she’s pretty good with the wax too).  You can check her out at Skin Remedy.

Anyway, I swiped the following info from Justine, I trust she won’t mind.

How to get rid of zit causing blackheads:

Here’s an easy mask that you can make at home to start on the path towards being blackhead free!

2 cloves of garlic (crushed)
1 tbs. ground oatmeal
1-drop tea tree oil (optional)
3 drops of freshly squeezed lemon juice
Sufficient amount of honey to create a paste

Mix everything together and apply strictly to the affected area (any area). Leave the mask on for 2 minutes, and gently rub in a circular motion for an additional minute…And voila! Blackhead free skin!

Justine doesn’t say but I would guess you should do this twice a week.

I’m off to mix up a batch now…

P.s. Your cell phone is the number one reason for congestion on your cheekbones. Think about it…you move it from one sticky dirty place to another, uck! Quick fix, wipe down your phone every morning and night with disinfectant wipes. Justine recommends, 7th generation chemical free wipes.

P.s.s. You fellas need to do this too! This ain’t just a chick thing!

P.s.s.s. I love you Justine!


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Hey there Mr. Bus, we kicked your butt and your friends’ butt too!

Where you been bus? Get a flat?

6:10 pm Wednesday, July 20th 2011. I arrived at the corner of Fillmore and Bay to find a group of 5 or 6 people stretching their legs. Yikes…I thought…it’s starting!

As I chitchatted with the first-comers, and suggested they warm up their legs, others showed up. Every time I turned around there were more people. My head was spinning as I tried to go over the “rules,” route and basic game plan. In my mind there was a lot to do. The initial plan was to get everyone to participate in a warm up sequence but alas all we did was swing our arms around.

As we warmed up (swung our arms around) I sent Mo over to make friends with the bus driver. Armed with a goodwill offering of a box of cherries (why cherries? Because they’re healthy and were on sale) Mo bravely went over to politely let our victim know what was about to transpire. I figured if he knew what we were up to, he might make an effort to travel at a respectable pace and play along.

After the cherries were delivered it took the bus about 10 minutes before it slugged over to the starting line at the corner of Bay and Fillmore. According to the official MUNI schedule the bus was scheduled to depart that out location at 6:32, it was 6:40 when it pulled up to the line (no surprise there). As the bus arrived it lined up at the light, loaded a few passengers and when the light turned green, bus and runners were off.

The pace down Fillmore to Chestnut was reasonable; the runners kept perfect stride with the bus all the way to the light at Chestnut. At the light everyone including the bus (obviously) stopped. When the light turned Green the runners went, immediately leaving the bus behind. That was the last any of us saw of the bus until the finish line, 1.5 miles up the road. Not only did the runners drop the bus they were racing in the first block, they caught up to, and passed the coach that had taken off some 5 plus minutes previous to the one we were racing.

It was amazing watching everyone run up the hill! 4 blocks of hard climbing! Every single person (and lady Jane, our K9 Mascot) dug incredibly deep, they even beat me to the top and I was on a bike! Geez!

In the end everyone seemed to have a great time, thanks to generous donations we had some fine top finisher prizes as well as a couple honorable mentions, all going to very impressive competitors.

Special thanks go to Brock at The SFist for helping me get the word out, Team P for their photos, support and bell ringing. I’d like to thank racer Ross for documenting the event and sharing his video and photos, to Mo for being Mo and to my two other fav Ab’s (that’s code) you made this event happen!

Finally, a huge THANK YOU to everyone who came and raced, brought their friends and had a good chuckle. This is the way life should be, a little nutty, a little challenging, and a little hot and sweaty!

Until next time…

P.s. Thank you for playing Mr. Bus! See you again next month. You might want to work on your hill climbing between now and then… Just sayin’

P.s.s. Wanna see more pix and a video of this event? Check out our Facebook page!


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Mud and mirrors

You get beer after your wreck your shoes in Seattle!

Happy Monday!

Wha’d ya’ll get up to this weekend? I’d love to hear your reports. But alas, few of you actually participate in my attempt to be “social.” Does my breath stink? Wait, you can’t smell my breath via the web. Not yet anyway, I hear they’re working on an app for that.

Well, here’s what I did. I went to my first Hip Hop dance class. Yep, I sucked. A white girl with rhythm I am not. It was fun, but a little stressful. Nothing like being in a room of about…50 people, all of whom you assume know how to dance. At the same time, being forced to stare at yourself in a massive wall of mirrors while you’re jumping around. I saw things shake in that mirror that had no business being attached to my body, they seemed to have a life of their own, and it severely offended me!

Once I realized that looking in the mirror wasn’t going to help me, I started to look around for people to follow. That however, was not an easy task, some of the folks seemed to be interpreting the dance differently from that which was being taught. You’d think I’d be happy to see other “dancers” dorking out (I have no idea why I just typed that phrase, but I like it) but it confused me even more.

In the end, I found a couple of women that I could follow and that made all the difference. Although, once they moved out of my line of sight I was dead in the water (more like, chub in the mirror).

The bottom line is, I had a great time because I was being challenged, pushed out of my comfort zone. The teacher, Micaya was beyond amazing. In all her cool, thinness, she completely understood every single person in the room and their struggles that day. The kind of teacher/person that makes everyone she comes across feel better for having met her.

I see another Hip Hop class in my future, not because I particularly care about being some great hip-hop dancer, but for the insane “fun” of it.

Lastly, while I was working hard not to knock anybody over in hip-hop class, my friend Dawn was working her inner Goddess at the Warrior Dash, in Seattle this weekend. What’s a “Warrior Dash?” According to the website it’s it “fire-leaping, extreme run from hell”. Yikes! I can’t wait for her report! I’ve seen photos and I gotta say, I’m crazy jealous! Stay tuned, Dawn was wearing a video camera on her chest, she & her hubby Mark are working on a video, which we’ll share here on Motion Starved very soon. No shit, this is gonna be something to see! Stay tuned…

See ya Wednesday, in the mean time, do something “nuts”…!


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OMG! Why did I sign up for that?

Around and around we go...

I have a client who’s running her very first 5k and it’s in just a few weeks. Currently, she’s pretty calm, but experience tells me that the night before her running debut she’s gonna wonder what the hell she was thinking when she signed up for such a thing. We all do that, we do it no matter how many times we race, participate in a competitive event or sign up for something that’s new to us. It’s just the way it works.

My advice to my client and to the rest of the world is to remain calm. Freaking out uses valuable energy that you’ll need later.

If you were smart, you’ve trained and planned well for your challenge. Perhaps you even scoped out the course, or spied through the window of a dance class so you’d know exactly what you’re getting yourself into. You read the event information packet ahead of time and you have all your ducks in a row. It’s anticipating surprises that freak us out, I think. Maybe you remember when I did that stair climb in the B of A Building for charity a few months ago, I got all freaked out because at the last-minute I read a note in the race rules that said “do not crawl on the stairs.” Just reading that set off all sorts of horrific thoughts in my head. I imagined that people become so exhausted that they had to crawl to the finish. In the end, I found that I was being very silly as the race itself was a piece of cake (because I trained for it!).

With that, my best pre event suggestions are as follows:

  • Get yourself completely ready a few days before your event. Make sure your cloths are clean, have good food in the house, read all the event info, collect your race number/chip everything you need so the last few days you can chill.
  • It’s important that two nights before your event you get a good night sleep. You may be anxious the night before making for a less than perfect nights sleep so focus on two nights before. If you have a good sleep two nights before, the night before you’ll feel less anxious.
  • Eating the night before. Frankly I never recommend stuffing yourself the night before. No matter how far, or what it is you plan to do. Remember, the more you eat the harder your body has to work to digest it. When your body works hard it gets tuckered out and can affect your sleep.  Remember, you don’t want to carry around a pile of pasta in your gut while you attempt to race. Get what I’m saying here?
  • What to eat the morning of your event can be tricky. The rule of thumb is, eat 2-3 hours before your event to allow your body time to digest the food (and so you don’t yack it up). That can be a problem when your event is in the early morning. From years of experience I’ve found that I can stomach oatmeal w/raisins & walnuts a couple of hours before seriously exerting myself. But, that’s come with years of trial and error and now I stick with just that. The most important thing I can tell you is that you need to practice eating just as you would anything else. As you train, try different foods and at different times. Not only will you figure out what to eat, and when to eat, you’ll find out what foods give you most energy. It’s trial and error.
  • Bottom line, never try anything new the day of the event. No new food, drink, lotion, shoes, clothing, nothing! You have no idea how you’ll react to it so don’t take the risk. As far as shoes are concerned, it takes 2 weeks to break in new shoes so if you need new shoes get ‘em early (bike shoes too!).
  • Lastly, have faith in yourself. Trust that you’ve trained and are ready for this exciting new challenge. As you lay in bed the night before say to yourself: Okay, self…this is how this is going to work… you’re gonna have a good night sleep and wake up feeling great. You’re gonna get to the event and you’re gonna go, go, go feeling great the whole time. Everything will be smooth and easy, and you’ll feel unbelievably great when you’re done.  It works every time. Trust me.

Now, go make me proud…


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Start with 10

I burned off 25 cookies today!

I first started exercising many years ago to lose weight. At the time I didn’t need to lose weight, but like most young women I thought I did. Because of my lack of sense, I ran 6-10 miles a day and lived on diet soda, apples and nuts. This system made sense to me at the time although I could never figure out why I kept getting fatter and fatter and eventually became so exhausted that I completely passed out one day.  After that little fright, it still took about 20 years for me to realize that one must eat to keep their metabolism going and legs moving. Geez…what a dunce I was!

Now, some 30 years later I eat plenty. Too much sometimes, but fortunately for me my metabolism now runs pretty high. I’m especially lucky being that I’m an “older gal,” at an age when typically ones metabolism slows way down. Mine however runs relatively high because I’ve learned not only to exercise, but also to feed my body keeping my furnace/metabolism running hot.

I exercise basically every day. Some days I workout hard, and some days I just walk and/or do an easy yoga/stretch class. The bottom line is, I move around quite a bit and have done so for years. Because of that, I’m still reaping benefits from exercise sessions I did years ago in the form of a much appreciated, fired up metabolism.

The oddest component to keeping a healthy metabolism is eating. If you don’t eat enough your body thinks you’re trying to kill it. It imagines that you’re starving it to death, and when you exercise on top of not eating, that just accelerates the body’s reaction. Think about it. Your body doesn’t want to die. It goes to great lengths to rebuild itself and heal when you hurt it, right? So it makes sense that it would freak out when you starve it. It responds by shutting down and holding onto the little food that you do give it and stores it as fat for later use. Basically it slows down your metabolism to keep from burning too much fuel. When you feed your body it burns hotter as long as you move it, giving it a reason to burn.

On that note, I once again ask you to make an effort to exercise. The more you exercise the more you get to eat. Think of that. My suggestion for today is to make an Exercise Box. Take a shoebox and place at least 5 short, 10-minute workouts in the box. Every morning after you’ve had your coffee, but your hand in the box, pull out a workout and perform the exercise noted.

10 minutes, that’s all it takes to feel better, jump-start your metabolism and might even encourage you to work out a little longer. If 10 minutes is all you can muster for the day, than fine, but it’s my hope that as time goes on, you’ll add more to your daily workout routine. Whether it’s working out for a longer duration or doing 2 or 3 of these short workouts a day.

Here are some ideas for your Exercise Box

  • Do 30 jumping jacks/15-30 bench dips/ 10 push ups (any style you choose) repeat the sequence for 10 plus minutes.
  • Walk ¼ way around the block/skip ¼ way around the block/jog ¼ way around/side shuffle both directions (face left/right) ¼ way. Repeat for 10 plus minutes.
  • High knees (like running in place, bringing your knees toward your chest/pump your arms) count to 30. 20 squats/20 lunges/10 burpees. Repeat for 10 plus minutes.
  • Run around the block/stop and do 20 squats/run around again/stop and do 20 mountain climbers. Repeat for 10 plus minutes
  • Do 20 jumping jacks/25 crunches/25 bicycle crunches/25 leg raises (lay on back bend legs at waist and bring them straight up/don’t rock/this is a small movement) finish with plank position for 60 seconds. Rest for a few seconds and repeat plank pose if you have time left. Do plank for up to 3 efforts.

Make a commitment to yourself, complete at least 10 minutes of exercise regardless of how tired or busy you may feel, five days a week. If you have kids, get them to join you. It’s only 10 minutes, how bad can it be?

If you need more suggestions, ask…


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Happy shoulders

Eagle Pose

Sitting at a desk all-day, or hunched over some other contraption can wreak havoc on your shoulders. There are lots of things you can do to give your shoulders a break, swing your arms around and across your body, shrug your shoulders and my favorite, Eagle Pose. In Sanskrit, it’s called Garudasana (gah-rue-DAHS-anna). Garuda was the mythic “king of the birds.” The word is usually rendered into English as “eagle,” though according to one dictionary the name literally means “devourer.” Do this stretch a few times a day and it will devour your shoulder stiffness. Trust me!

Eagle Pose

  • Stand with your big toes touching, heels slightly apart.
  • Bend your knees slightly, lift your left foot up and balancing on your right foot, cross your left thigh over the right. Point your left toes toward the floor, press the foot back, and then hook the top of the foot behind the lower right calf if you can, or you simply cross your legs. Balance on the right foot.
  • Extend your arms straight out in front of your body. Drop your left arm under your right. Bend your elbows, and then raise your forearms perpendicular to the floor. Wrap your arms and press your palms together (or as close as you can get them). Then, lift your elbows and reach your fingertips toward the ceiling. If your palms don’t touch quite yet, press the backs of your hands together, instead.
  • Hold for up to one minute, focusing on your breath and keeping your gaze fixed and soft. To release, unwind gently and repeat on the other side.

Doing this stretch while standing also works on your balance, which is always a plus. If you can’t be bothered to get up from your desk, do the stretch seated. Sit up straight in your chair, both feet on the floor and do the arm portion only.

Try it; let me know what you think.

Namaste…

P.s. Don’t forget to breathe!


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Can you do this?

But can she walk like that?

Apparently, good posture makes you act more confident. And, as I’ve said before, it makes you look slimmer as well as being critical to maintaining a healthy back.

It’s pretty simple. Stand up straight, sit up tall. Do a self-check every so often; imagine you have a book on your head (surly you’ve heard that before). As you imagine the book on your head, pull your belly button in toward your spine, open your chest and think like you’re squeezing something between your shoulder blades. Voila! Posture perfect. Now hold that, and check yourself every hour.

Okay, so maybe it’s easier said than done. Obviously exercise and flexibility help. Start by making sure you don’t neglect your back muscles when working out. Especially the rhomboids. They keep the shoulder blades in place, weak or tense rhomboids are the main cause of hunching. Try this super easy move to strengthen your back:

Lie facedown on a mat with your arms by your sides, palms down. Squeeze your shoulder blades together, lift your chest and arms off the floor, hold for two seconds. Do this 30 times. When you’re done with those, give your back a little stretch by spending a minute or two in Childs Pose.

If you need more, there are special chairs you can buy, you can sit on a stability ball, or the latest trend is something called a Posture Shirt. Read up on them if you want but basically it’s a girdle for your upper body. They’re super tight so you have no choice but to stand up straight. Frankly, I think you should just pay attention to your posture and practice the moves I suggested above.

Off you go…


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All Personal Trainers are not created equal


We’ll talk more next week about how to pick a Personal Trainer.  For now, I send you off for the weekend with a short glimpse into what it’s like to attend one of my classes.

Note: My client Diana has been having a hard time at work lately. I took that into consideration when planning todays workout (watch the :16 second video).

Enjoy your weekend. Get some exercise and do 200 crunches minimum, I’d prefer you do at least 500, but I told my clients 200 was okay.

See you Monday. Make me proud…


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It’s Summer, are ya lookin’ swank in your swimsuit?

Couch Potato

Hey now, it’s Workout Wednesday. How’s your fitness routine going? Are you working out consistently? Three, five times a week for 45 minutes? How about an hour plus? I know you have gym memberships and classes that you want to attend, are you going?

When I started this business it was my hope to offer a comfortable, fun, fresh air environment where all of us, non Lululemon clad, “look at me” Hot Bodies could converge and feel comfortable. A place where you don’t have to already be “fit” to get a good work out, a place to start, or simply work out sans the attitude and the judgment.

Unfortunately I’m having a hard time motivating these sorts of folks. Some have come around but where’s everyone else?  I know you’re out there. I see you and I thought I understood. Now I’m thinking that maybe people don’t really want a place like I’m offering. With a place like this, there’s no excuse not to exercise. Sure, it’s hard to find the time but I don’t buy that. I’m wondering if maybe I should cater to those Hot Body types after all, they seem to want to work out, hence their Hot Bodies. Better yet, maybe I should cater to Hot Body 40 Something Men specifically. Hummmm…. now that’s a though!

While I work on my new approach for generating clients and readers, I offer you an exercise sequence that should work for everyone. You don’t even need to leave the couch.

The Couch Potato Work Out — Do these exercises at every commercial break. Do 20 reps of each exercise; repeat at every break for an hour.

  • Push ups – Facing the couch, kneel on the floor about 2 feet away from it. Cross your ankles, and place your hands shoulder-width apart on a cushion edge. Slowly bend your arms, and lower your upper body until your chest touches the couch. Hold, press up again. Repeat
  • Side Crunches – Lie on the couch on your left side with your legs together and your knees bent. Place your right hand behind your head with your elbow pointing toward the ceiling. Wrap your left arm across your waist. Contracting the oblique muscles along your right side, lift your shoulder off the couch, bringing your rib cage toward your hip. Hold, slowly lower. Repeat, switch sides. (If your couch is too soft, you may need to do this exercise on the floor.)
  • Triceps Dips – Sitting on the edge of the couch, place your hands on the edge on either side of you. Move your feet out so that your butt is off the seat, and your knees are bent at 90-degree angles. Bending your elbows so they point behind you, lower yourself as far as comfortable. Hold, slowly press up again.
  • Scissors – Lie on your back on a couch (you may need to angle yourself for more room) with your hands (palms down) under your butt and your legs straight up in the air. Keeping your knees slightly bent and your feet flexed, slowly spread your legs as far apart as comfortable. Hold, then slowly bring your legs together, resisting as you press them in.

As always your comments are welcome.  Bring ‘em on!

Kiss, kiss…