By Mary Ann Bragg
mbragg@capecodonline.com
March 31, 2012
Visit the online article by clicking here
PROVINCETOWN — It’s the last week!
Provincetown Fitness Challenge participants are going into the final seven days of the 12-week get-healthy regimen that 100 people began on Jan. 16.
How they’re doing
Austin Knight, 54
Waist: 41 inches
Sit-ups in one minute: 40
Weight: 209 pounds (starting weight 222)
Comment: One more week, ha! No change this week. But everybody tells me how much I look like I’ve lost weight, so I guess I have.
Kathleen Fitzgerald, 53
Waist: 31 1/2 inches
Sit-ups in one minute: 56
Weight: 140 1/2 pounds (starting weight 149)
Comment: I’m back from our Florida vacation. I did pretty well. I was able to keep up with the workouts and the dieting. Now I have the big push until April 7. Alicia (my wife) has been doing her own fitness challenge on the side. She’s lost about 30 pounds this winter. It’s the ripple effect. It’s helped both of us.
Dan McKeon, 57
Waist: 41 inches
Sit-ups in one minute: 50
Weight: 206 pounds (starting weight 217)
Comment: These are the stats from last week. I’m out of town for a family emergency. I’ve stuck to my diet. I went shopping here. But I didn’t bring a tape measure or a scale. I don’t know how I’m doing.
The challenge ends April 7 with a weigh-in and fitness test from 10 a.m. to noon at the high school gym at 12 Winslow St. and a group plunge at 2 p.m. at Herring Cove Beach. A party follows at 3 p.m. at Harbor Lounge at 359 Commercial St.
With the end comes the good and the bad, said organizer and personal trainer Denise Gaylord.
“There’s a lot of tension, no matter how people did this,” Gaylord said. “There’s tension around the beginning and the end. It’s kind of bittersweet. People are happy but people are like, ‘It’s over.'”
A photographer will be on hand at the gym to take the “after” photo of each participant, to compare with the “before” one.
“In a year, I swear that’s what people remember, is the picture,” Gaylord said. She ran a five-person version last year.