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He surely does not juice, but the more I read of Obama's dedication to the iron the more I realize he is like many of us. Out of today's (DEC 25) POLITICO.COM
--WashPost A1, 'As Duties Weigh Obama Down, His Faith in Fitness Only Increases,' By Eli Saslow: 'Being elected president forces a man to take inventory of his life, so Barack Obama has trimmed his schedule to the bare essentials. He's not in the White House yet, but gone are the hours he once spent reading novels, watching television and obsessing over the daily transactions of Chicago's sports teams. He eats out only once every few weeks. He visits friends rarely, if at all. But one habit endures: Obama has gone to the gym, for about 90 minutes a day, for at least 48 days in a row. ... The more Obama's life intensifies, friends said, the more he relies on the gym -- which is why he might be taking office in the best shape of his life. The gym is where he releases stress, maintains a routine and thinks without interruption. He sometimes wears headphones and barricades the outside world. ...
'To accommodate Obama during the 18-month presidential campaign, aides arranged workouts for him in several dozen states. The staff called gyms a few days before his arrival and persuaded them to close late or open early to oblige the candidate's schedule. Once, on July 17, Obama visited a gym three times within 16 hours. Other days -- often before primary election nights -- he flew in half a dozen friends to play a few hours of pickup basketball. ... Since the election, Obama's daily schedule has revealed an intense focus. Until he went to Hawaii for the holidays, his routine in Chicago was unchanging: breakfast at home with his family before heading to his downtown transition office, where he puts in as many as 10 hours a day. At night, dinner at his Hyde Park home, and more talking to advisers and reading preparatory documents. On some days, he spent as little as five or 10 minutes outdoors.
'But every morning around 7:30 he traveled by motorcade to the gym at Regents Park, a luxury apartment complex where his friend Michael Signator owns a condominium on the 18th floor, and where he usually worked out with Reggie Love, a personal aide and a former Duke University basketball player, or with Marvin Nicholson, his travel coordinator. The members-only gym features a sauna, a whirlpool and a row of machines pressed against a bay of windows overlooking Lake Michigan. Obama, 47, devotes half of his workout to weight lifting and the other half to a cardiovascular rotation that includes a stationary bicycle, elliptical machine and treadmill. Between his warm-up and cool down, he sometimes moves through a dozen different exercises in an hour.'
I thought one of the cheapest shots in this fall's campaign was when Arnold, campaiging in Columbus for John McCain, made several snide remarks about the size of Obama's "girly man arms" and that he needed to squat! Low blow on Arnold's part in my book!
Keep pumpin' Barack!
WORLDSPAN
--WashPost A1, 'As Duties Weigh Obama Down, His Faith in Fitness Only Increases,' By Eli Saslow: 'Being elected president forces a man to take inventory of his life, so Barack Obama has trimmed his schedule to the bare essentials. He's not in the White House yet, but gone are the hours he once spent reading novels, watching television and obsessing over the daily transactions of Chicago's sports teams. He eats out only once every few weeks. He visits friends rarely, if at all. But one habit endures: Obama has gone to the gym, for about 90 minutes a day, for at least 48 days in a row. ... The more Obama's life intensifies, friends said, the more he relies on the gym -- which is why he might be taking office in the best shape of his life. The gym is where he releases stress, maintains a routine and thinks without interruption. He sometimes wears headphones and barricades the outside world. ...
'To accommodate Obama during the 18-month presidential campaign, aides arranged workouts for him in several dozen states. The staff called gyms a few days before his arrival and persuaded them to close late or open early to oblige the candidate's schedule. Once, on July 17, Obama visited a gym three times within 16 hours. Other days -- often before primary election nights -- he flew in half a dozen friends to play a few hours of pickup basketball. ... Since the election, Obama's daily schedule has revealed an intense focus. Until he went to Hawaii for the holidays, his routine in Chicago was unchanging: breakfast at home with his family before heading to his downtown transition office, where he puts in as many as 10 hours a day. At night, dinner at his Hyde Park home, and more talking to advisers and reading preparatory documents. On some days, he spent as little as five or 10 minutes outdoors.
'But every morning around 7:30 he traveled by motorcade to the gym at Regents Park, a luxury apartment complex where his friend Michael Signator owns a condominium on the 18th floor, and where he usually worked out with Reggie Love, a personal aide and a former Duke University basketball player, or with Marvin Nicholson, his travel coordinator. The members-only gym features a sauna, a whirlpool and a row of machines pressed against a bay of windows overlooking Lake Michigan. Obama, 47, devotes half of his workout to weight lifting and the other half to a cardiovascular rotation that includes a stationary bicycle, elliptical machine and treadmill. Between his warm-up and cool down, he sometimes moves through a dozen different exercises in an hour.'
I thought one of the cheapest shots in this fall's campaign was when Arnold, campaiging in Columbus for John McCain, made several snide remarks about the size of Obama's "girly man arms" and that he needed to squat! Low blow on Arnold's part in my book!
Keep pumpin' Barack!
WORLDSPAN
