Students have many options for staying in shape

STA offers many opportunities for students to work out, from sports to conditioning classes and solo workouts. Some students, however, find ways to keep moving outside of school.

story by Christina Elias, photos by Arinna Hoffine

 

According to PE teacher Stacie O’Rear, there are plenty of options available to girls looking for ways to stay in shape, inside and outside of school. STA offers a variety of sports, conditioning classes and opportunities for girls to utilize the workout equipment. Aside from school-sponsored opportunities, however, some STA girls take the initiative to work out outside of school, in gyms, classes or on their own.

“I know I have girls in my class who mention that they go and work out at like 24 Hour Fitness, or some of them belong to country clubs and stuff like that,” O’Rear said. “We have a lot of athletes who do workouts with their teams and who also do club [sports]; they do a lot of workouts with their clubs.”

According to O’Rear, exercise is vital to maintaining a healthy cardiovascular system. The Surgeon General, the leading health official in the U.S., determined that “to maintain a healthy cardiovascular system, you should do a cardio workout a minimum of three times a week,” O’Rear said.

“Now, can you do more than that?” O’Rear asked. “Yes. Can you do less? Sure, but to maintain a healthy cardiovascular system, you need to do it at least three times a week, and [that means] maintaining . . . your heart rate in that cardiovascular training zone for a minimum of 20 minutes. And that’s just the minimum. You can do a lot more than that.”

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F3 Fitness fanatic

Junior Emily O’Neill’s family has a unique tradition: she, her father and her mother get up at 5 a.m. three days a week to work out at F3 Fitness in Brookside.

“My aunt started doing it, and then my dad started doing it, like, a couple years ago,” O’Neill said. “I’ve been doing it for like a year and a half, [because] my dad wanted me to do with him, so I’ve just been going since then.”

O’Neill is a member of STA’s tennis team but does not participate in any conditioning or exercise classes after school. Instead, she goes home from school and immediately does her homework so she can be in bed early, ready to wake up at 4:30 a.m. and work out at 5 a.m. According to O’Neill, working out so early is a way to kickstart the rest of her day.

“I actually have more energy throughout the day because it gets my day started, and it’s made me want to eat healthier, too, because if I eat dinner like a Chipotle burrito, then in the morning, I’ll feel that,” O’Neill said. “It feels not good.”

These regular workouts also serve to relieve some of O’Neill’s stress, she said.

“It does actually help with stress because getting my homework done by 5 [p.m.] or something makes me more relaxed throughout the day,” O’Neill explained. “I feel like I can kind of just watch a movie or something until I’m ready to go to bed.”

O’Neill said that she would recommend F3 Fitness or something similar to other people.

“I feel like people would like it once they start,” O’Neill said. “It’s hard in the beginning. I’ve tried to ask my friends if they wanted to go, but they’re like, ‘There is no way I’m doing that.’”

 

Experimenting with exercise

For senior Grace Wilmot, exercising is a necessary part of her everyday routine. Wilmot alternates between different types of exercise, she said, and has participated in everything from STA soccer, track and summer conditioning to CrossFit and yoga classes. Mostly, she said, she prefers to work out at home.

“All of the classes I’ve done, I’ve done with a friend,” Wilmot said. “Like boxing, [which] I did with Mary [Burke] and Willa [Knight]. At home, I just work out on my own. . . .  I have a jump box . . . it’s just like a wooden box that you jump on.”

Wilmot makes a point to exercise most days of the week.

“It depends on the week,” Wilmot said. “An average of five times a week. Right after I nanny, I usually go home, and I usually only work out for 30 minutes to an hour. If I don’t work out, I usually feel crappy, and I can’t get anything else done.”

For Wilmot, exercise serves as a way to stay in shape and relieve stress and aggression.

“It helps you throughout the day for sure,” Wilmot said. “I just feel better about everything. It makes me more positive . . .  it releases endorphins and it just makes me feel good, and I can focus more afterward.”