Stephen Witherden’s Website :: Personal :: Action Stephen

“Hello? It’s Craig here,” my phone enunciated in my ear.
“Hello Craig” I replied encouragingly.
“From… Body by Craig”, it added, somewhat apologetically.
Thus was my introduction to Craig, my personal trainer.

Yes, that’s right: I have a personal trainer now. I’ve been to the gym a few times in the past but I haven’t been particularly good at it. Since I have the money for it, I thought it would be best to give it a properly good go for 6 months at least.

I’ve only been to the gym with Craig 4 times, and I can already feel something of a difference in my body. “Look at those guns” Craig exclaimed encouragingly as I struggled to lift the weights he’d given me from the “girl’s rack”, peering desperately into the mirror to make sure my form was right.

It’s not just the change in my body, but the other changes in my life that I’m making. Perhaps the biggest one is my posture. “Your ears should be in line with your shoulders.” was the edict and since then, I have been walking to work with my shoulders and ears pinned back as far as they can go. “I feel a tear coming on, that form is perfect!” Craig enthused as I pulled down on yet another one of the bewildering machines, configured slightly differently today for reasons of obfuscation known only to Craig himself. Muscle confusion or something like that.

Along with the new posture and new exercise regime comes new food. Vegetables (yuck) and fruit (blerg) are now officially on the menu. I’m even going to attempt to choke down a bowl of porridge tomorrow morning for the first time in something like 2 decades.

I’m giving myself 6 months of concerted effort to see if this exercise malarky is really for me. I’ll let you know how it goes by about Christmas. In the meantime, I leave you with a collage of photos of me in my official gym get-up (with matching socks). I was trying to capture an “action” shot like all those insipid photos you get on the side of the ponsy modern gyms, but really just ended up having way too much fun jumping up and down on my bed in my shoes instead.