Physical Funness for the Motion Starved

Fit more fun into your fitness while exploring the outdoors.

Tag Archives: inspiration


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Incredible?

Did you know that Lou Ferrigno, Aka The Incredible Hulk is now a part-time cop in San Luis Obispo? It’s curious that a successful actor is now putting his life on the line to protect the people. Kinda cool as it’s “the people” who made him a star. How incredible is that?

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about how lucky I am to live in such an amazing city and to be surrounded by so many wonderful people and things. Along with my love for this life, I feel a pressure to do something “incredible.” Like run 100 miles in a day, or win The Mt. Tam Hill Climb (bike race) again. (That fete was actually a miracle, which is why I should do it again. Just to be sure it was real.)

Every day I’m surrounded by so much excitement and incredibleness it’s sometimes overwhelming. It wasn’t until today that I realized that incredible comes in all shapes and sizes. It’s all in how you look at the world.

With that, here are a few things in my life that I find inspiring and incredible.

GGB from Crissy Field

This is my view almost every day. In my mind, no other city in the world is more incredible. The hills in the distance are my training ground, my escape, and my quiet place. They call my name like a siren, inspiring me.

Meet The Pigs, aka Pigstas (Pigs are People Into Gluttonous Situations). These ladies are undeniable evidence that keeping fit keeps you young. Their spirit is both inspiring and incredible. The Pigs mission statement:

3 Pigstas

Legends say that Pigs float free of time, carrying hopes for love, joy and celebration. Like a Pig, we aspire to Hoof It, and savor each moment as it passes, embrace all that life has to offer and to celebrate the joy of everyday. The Pigs “delicate” grace reminds us that life is rich, beauty is everywhere, every personal connection has meaning and that laughter is life’s sweetest creation. 

It’s a Grand View!

These are some of my clients. Every day they inspire me to give my best. It is these people who are incredible in

Stretching?

my mind. They trustingly run up and down stairs and hills, in rain,

wind and sweltering heat. Then, without a word they willingly lay on the sidewalk and twist their bodies into pretzels. And

when it’s all over… they hug me and smile lavishly. It feels incredible!

My Dad

This is my dad. A couple of summers ago we rode our bikes 500 miles across Iowa. While the ride itself was incredible, the inspiration I get from my dad runs much deeper. In my mind, there is no one more incredible than my dad. He is an inspiration to many, and he doesn’t even know it.

Lastly, I remind you that we all have moments of “incredibleness,” open your eyes and you shall see. I leave you with my new mission statement:

The view is always better through sweat covered eyes. 

The top of my world…

Go out and find your incredible.

XoXo, Kelley


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After all, isn’t it all relative?

Grizzly Ryder

I’m not like a lot of my friends. Half Marathon, 21K/13.1 miles is my distance. I don’t run “long” and I don’t run “fast.” The folks I measure myself against and admire run much faster or much longer than me. It’s silly that I sometimes feel insecure measuring myself against them.  After all, isn’t it all relative?

For some, 21K is hella far.  For others it’s just a moderate training run. To me, my average 9++ minute-mile is slug slow. To some, that seems fast. Does it really matter how fast or how far? Should’t I just appreciate that I have what it takes to drag myself out of bed early every weekend morning when others are snug in their beds?

A more experienced bike racer friend once advised me; “If you’re not moving forward you’re moving backward.” He was referring to positioning oneself within the field of riders, but the statement works for life in general. With that said, I imagine we should wake up every day and push to make ourselves better than we were the day before. Move forward so to speak. Be your own “better.”

I write this post because I recently finished my first race of the season. It was 17k. It was hilly and it was beautiful. I ran slowly up hill and I ran fast down hill.  I got passed a lot on the first climb, but I too passed people going up and then I passed people going down. I passed people who had passed me earlier in the race and I loved that feeling. I was out there on this day for no other reason than because I wanted to be. I expected only to finish feeling proud of my accomplishment, for having taken steps to keep moving forward, to better myself. In the end I found that in spite of myself, I’d managed to finish first in my age group and better than halfway through the total field of women. I beat men & women many years younger although I’d been beaten by many more than I beat. My lesson; a reminder that my typical measure my success is out of whack. It had no place here on this day and it really has no relevance what so ever, as… success is relative, specific to any given day, situation, imagination.

So, go out and run/ride, whatever… do it because you can and because if you aren’t moving forward you’re moving backward. Remember, how you measure up in your own mind doesn’t really matter. What matters is that you get out and do it… Do it every day and do it to the very best of your own personal ability. You may just surprise yourself one day.

P.s. My pal Pen raced this day as well. Pen was one of the very first people over-all to cross the finish line. And, Pen even stopped before the line to pick up her 3-year-old son Max so they could cross together. Nice job Pen! (Is it any wonder why Pen is at the top of my measuring stick?)


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Inspiration seeds

Bespoke inspiration

You’ve heard of “paying it forward” right? It’s when you do something nice for someone and in turn that person pays it forward by doing something nice for someone else, and so on and so on and so on. Pretty soon everyone is doing something nice for someone else and the world is a much better place.

The same thinking works for inspiration. If you inspire someone to better himself, they may just inspire someone else to do the same, and so on and so on… See where I’m going with this?

Here’s a current example:

Last January  I started working with Diana, she wanted to lose some weight and tone up. At first, Diana could do about 3 abdominal crunches before she’d slam her legs to the ground and groan in pain. After a few months Diana got much stronger and actually began to like working out, she lost a nice chunk of weight and people took notice. One day about six months into Diana’s training, her mother became so impressed with Diana’s new ways that she talked her neighbor into power walking 3 mornings a week with her, something she had not done in years. After a few weeks of steady walking Diana’s mother and her walking partner inspired another neighbor to join their morning walks. Now, six months later they’re walking five mornings a week and have added another two walkers to their group.

So you see… it started with Diana, she inspired her mother, her mother inspired the other three walkers, those three walkers have now gone on to inspire their friends and family.

Pretty cool, don’t you think?

Inspire someone; all you have to do is plant the seed in one person and then watch it grow…


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What motivates you?

What motivated him to do this?

I’m motivated by fear. I sign up for tough fitness challenges because the fear of pain and failure motivates me to get off my ass and train. When I look in the mirror and see my hiney sliding down the backs of my legs, the fear of a pancake butt motivates me to do the dreaded step-ups (although it seems gravity moves faster than the rate at which I can do enough step-ups).

It’s pretty basic or me. It’s about my selfish, personal fears. Nothing more.

I need your help — Tell me what motivates you. Acceptance? Health/fitness? A smaller pant size? A person? An event? Use a fake name if you like but help a gal out. I need inspiration. If you can’t say what motivates you then tell me about something that inspires you.

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

Kisses…


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You don’t have to be Kenyan to run

Run like the wind!

A fellow named Geoffrey Mutai won the 115th Boston Marathon yesterday.  Yep, Geoffrey is from Kenya.  Apparently a Kenyan has won the famous race for five out of the last six years. Geoff’s time, 2 hours 3 minutes 2 seconds, was the fastest marathon run by nearly a minute, and it smashed the course record, set last year, by nearly three minutes. Very impressive! I’m guessing he didn’t run with those tea-leaves in his hair.  The wind resistance would have slowed him down quite a bit. Anyway…well done and congratulations to you sir!

As of yesterday, Dean Karnazes has run his way from Los Angeles to Ohio. He has run across 10 states in 53 days. Dean’s on a mission to “Inspire a Nation.”  Maybe you’ve heard of Dean, he’s pretty well-known in the running world, he’s an ultra marathoner, author and speaker who lives here in The Bay Area. Apparently he’s pretty funny too. By the way, Dean is not from Kenya.

Anyway, Dean is running 3,000 miles from Los Angeles to NYC hoping to bring attention to childhood obesity. From what I can tell he’s doing pretty well.  As I said, yesterday Dean arrived in Ohio. According to his website, he’s running about 40-50 miles per day at an average pace of 11.5. Not bad considering the distance.  If you want to follow Dean’s progress, or spy on him to see what he’s eating, you keep track of him on his site.

My point — Check these guys out, they’re inspirational and deserve some recognition. The next time you go for a run, or in some cases a “trundle,” imagine you’re Kenyan, you just might run a little faster…