Day 23: A workout with "Sergeant Eli"

6 am this morning, bootcamp time! Today, another instructor joined Michael, his name was Eli. One of the “bootcampers” who was just arriving looked really nervous when she saw him. She then asked me “Is Eli doing the class today? Did he do yesterday’s class, too? Oh…”. Now that really scared me! While we were running our warm up lap, I couldn’t forget her fearful voice so I asked her why she seemed scared…She said “because his workouts are REALLY hard!”. Ha! I wondered how it could possibly get any harder (thinking about the Lyon Street stairs and running up Divisadero with Charles)… They divided us in two groups again, giving me the option to choose whether I want to go “beginner” or “advanced”. After the comment from the girl my mind strongly suggested “beginner”, but Lisa didn’t give me an option… So I went with Eli.

When you first see him, he can be a little intimidating…He’s tall, super-fit, has A LOT of muscles and a very deep voice… but hey, that doesn’t mean he’s not a funny and nice guy, right? In fact that description sounds like a good reason to go to his class ;-) He turned out to be nice - but also quite demanding, the workout was no joke, and yes, I had respect. We ran to the little Marina green ("I said RUN guys, come on, this isn't running! Speed it up!"..sigh....) and started with a circuit training. We jumped up stairs, did pull ups, ran around the green, did crunches and fast walking lunges. Then we did some agility training, with a lot of jumping (with one or both legs) and sprints. And “high knees”. We did everything in sets of three and there weren’t many breaks in between. Unfortunately, I sprained my ankle during the last round of high knees. It didn’t feel so bad when it happened, so I still did all the sprints and running. I didn't want to look like a wimp I guess. But now, a couple of hours later, it really hurts :( I hope it will be ok tomorrow, I really don’t want to take a break but I know I can’t do these kind of workouts if I am in pain.

The funny thing about Eli is that his workout was a more “military” style compared to the other instructors. He said “Ok guys, let’s do push-ups. ONLY 10. But I want them to be PERFECT! And if anyone cheats or breaks down before 10, we start at zero again!” I have no idea how many push ups we ended up doing… 30, 40? Always when we reached 8 or 9 (and he made us count out loud...) someone dropped out…But it wasn’t me!! He stuck with his words, no mercy…

On another instant, he said “I want you to start sprinting when I say “GO”, not earlier then that!” – doesn’t sound complicated but don’t ask how often we took off before he actually said “GO” (it was almost a reflex and a group flow). He wasn't happy about it... “Did I say “GO” yet…? Have I not been clear…? You guys need to LISTEN! ” and made us jog back to the start line and start over. I guess you can call this style “educational”… Someone whispered “you better do what he says, I think he can kill a person with his bare hands…”. Haha! But even though the style was a little more military (in a way that instructions were very precise and that he wanted us to strictly follow them), I enjoyed the workout a lot and I think that he is a really funny person – I am NOT scared to work out with him again :)

I think it’s great to mix up the instructors every once in a while, everyone has a different style and everyone has a different repertoire of exercises, that makes it a lot of fun. I wish I wouldn’t have sprained my ankle, I am a little worried. I will rest tonight and I hope it will be better tomorrow again. A glass of wine might help :)

Finally, I just looked up Eli’s profile on Basic Training’s homepage. That’s what they say about him on the website:

The first time you meet Eli, prepare to be intimidated. Not because he’s mean - in fact, we think he’s a real teddy bear. It’s just that he has a whole lotta muscle. Really, really big muscles. Eli built his biceps / quads / pecs / lats / glutes / etc in the gym, the ocean, and the military before finding his calling as a personal trainer in 2000. His clients love him for his no-nonsense advice and vast workout repertoire. Now he’s bringing his hardcore exercises and muscle mass tricks to Basic Training. No one will push you harder - or make you sweat / barf / laugh more.

I think that description hits the nail on the head… Thanks Eli for this fun workout!

23 days down, only 19 days left!