Fitness for the Long Haul

With the impetus of the annual spate of New Year’s resolutions, he sees an influx of people that want to get fit. “I’ve been doing this for 10 years now, and its funny; I used to work for a big box gym years ago, the New York Sports Club, and you see in January and February the gym gets flooded with people. As a group exercise instructor and personal trainer, I would see faces that I’d never seen before, and they’re like, ‘I’m so focused, I’m gung-ho!’”

Vitanzo shares, “I would find out they would have really solid goals, but come March, it kind of dwindles down back to square one. You’re not going to lose 10 pounds a month, you have to think about how long it took to put the weight on. It’s probably going to take the same amount of time to take that weight off, if not more.” He believes that people have a clear understanding of what it takes.

“Let’s focus on what that fist week or month is going to look like,” says Vitanzo. “Let’s focus on what six months from now is going to be. After that six-month period, when they’ve hit their short-term goal—they lost the weight, run that race or made the high school reunion, what do we do from that point on? That’s the long-term aspect of it. They made the change, and now should switch focus to a maintenance-type setting What are we going to do to keep it off, to live healthier and better? At the end of the day, fitness should be a lifestyle change.”

Vitanzo says that he would never tell his clients no, they shouldn’t go out to eat and have dessert or have that bottle of wine. “At the end of the day, I’m not going to tell them something that I’m not going to do myself. I love to eat, I love to enjoy wine, I love to live life; but in moderation. Moderation means maybe having a glass or two of wine now and then, not a bottle every night.” For people that have to entertain clients for business, he explains, “If you know you have to go to that steakhouse three times a week and you know you’re going to be eating out, maybe we should reset your lunch so you have enough time to burn it off and you’re not exceeding that calorie count.”

Medical information, movement assessment and postural condition are all parts of Vitanzo’s in-depth coaching, but equally important, he says, “What you should understand is to stay focused mentally. To accomplish their goals, I constantly remind them of why they’re here in the first place. When you do that, you can keep that drive at a moderate pace so it’s not fluctuating high and low; you want a constant uphill swing.”