I ♥ BC4C

You know you love it. We know you love it. Now you can let the whole world know you love it by wear­ing your heart on your sleeve, er, chest. And, remem­ber to Share the Love by let­ting your fam­ily and friends know that we always wel­come new mem­bers to the crew!

This month, we Shared the Love with PPC and Atlanta Bicy­cle Coali­tion and cel­e­brated a tally of $52,000 donated to our won­der­ful char­i­ta­ble partners.

Please post your results and improve­ments from today’s PT test — we want to hear your suc­cess stories!

See you next week and next month — Tues­day, May 1st!

4 Surefire Ways to Motivate Yourself to Work Out

Hope all those friends had fun with a taste of work­ing out BC4C-style. Work out every day with your friends in May — sign up today!

From Fit Watch

When it comes to exer­cise, moti­va­tion is crit­i­cal. Many peo­ple get very excited about exer­cise in the begin­ning, but as the work­outs get harder and the weight comes off more slowly, their moti­va­tion begins to fade.

You must make a con­tin­ual effort to keep your­self men­tally open to exer­cise. Here are a few tips to help you recharge your batteries:

Make Small Goals. It can help you to stay moti­vated when you make goals based on exer­cise instead of weight. For exam­ple, set a goal to exer­cise 3 times a week for one month. Then reward your­self when you com­plete it.

Cre­ate a Buddy Sys­tem. For many peo­ple, exer­cis­ing with a friend is a great way to stay moti­vated. When you’re not feel­ing like going, you have an auto­matic cheerleader.

How­ever, you need to make sure you choose a friend who is just as com­mit­ted as you are. Some­times friends can also sab­o­tage your efforts. You’ll have to use good judg­ment in select­ing a work­out partner.

Make a Com­mit­ment. One of the hard­est things about exer­cise is that you have to make a long-term com­mit­ment to it. You may want to make a con­tract with your­self that states the rea­sons why you’re exercising.

Think of as many rea­sons as pos­si­ble such as good health, shop­ping for clothes, being around for your fam­ily, and being a good role model. What­ever your rea­sons are, state them.

Once you’ve got them writ­ten down, you can keep them posted some­where you’ll see them often. This is a tan­gi­ble reminder of what got you started in the first place.

Cre­ate Some Friendly Com­pe­ti­tion. Another way to help you stay moti­vated to work out is to com­pete. Instead of focus­ing on your weight loss, you may want to focus on num­ber of times you work out.

Choose a part­ner and deter­mine a monthly award for the most work­outs. For exam­ple, the loser can buy the win­ner a pedi­cure, lunch, or cover the winner’s gym mem­ber­ship for a month. And if you both win, cel­e­brate by treat­ing your­selves together!

Helpful Hints for Allergy Sufferers

By Robin

Is the pollen killing you? Here are some ideas for relief:

Tip one: Try tak­ing your allergy med­i­cine of choice before you go to bed. It takes up to an hour for most to kick-in. If you take an extended release ver­sion before bed, it’ll be cir­cu­lat­ing in your sys­tem when your alarm goes off at O’Dark-thirty for boot camp. The pay­off? You won’t be snif­fling your way through your first three sets of sit-ups – or worse yet, hid­ing out at home when you could be work­ing out and hav­ing fun with us in Pied­mont Park! Sources con­flict on when peak pollen hours but at least one I found said pollen counts can be high­est in the morn­ings. Don’t use it as an excuse not to come out. Just pre­pare yourself.

I tried this tip of tak­ing meds before bed myself this week and it seems to be help­ing. Maybe it is just the placebo effect but I think it is worth the shot.

Warn­ing from per­sonal expe­ri­ence: don’t take the kind that are “non-drowsy” or you could be up all night. Pollen counts have reached record highs this spring in Atlanta. I imag­ine Pied­mont Park is ground zero with its beau­ti­ful green grass and bud­ding oaks, dog­woods, and aza­leas. Pro­tect your­self so you can be a work­out won­der and not an allergy zom­bie in the AM. For trusted med­ical info I always turn to WebMD.

For more tips and to learn more about aller­gies, check out these 5 Ways to Beat Spring Aller­gies or Allergy Tips: Your Out­door Exer­cise Check­list.

Could you be mak­ing one of these 6 Allergy Mis­takes Exer­cis­ers Make?

Do you have allergy tips for the rest of the BC4C fam­ily? Share them in the comments.

Source: WebMD

Get a Free Workout, Help a Cause Win $500

Tues­day, Feb­ru­ary 21 will be our monthly Try Us Out Day. Any­one and every­one is wel­come to join us for a work­out — free of charge!

And this Try Us Out Day is spe­cial. We will be giv­ing away $500 to the nom­i­nated cause that gets the most peo­ple out to the workout.

What are the nom­i­nated causes? Read on to learn more…

Pied­mont Park Con­ser­vancy receives 50% of BC4C’s pro­ceeds each month and Kate’s Club has been our fea­tured cause for the first quar­ter of 2012; but we want you, our boot campers and the gen­eral pub­lic, to choose our addi­tional 2012 causes. We will sup­port three addi­tional causes — one for each of the remain­ing quar­ters of the year.

A Little Sweat Goes a Long Way

To date, Boot Camp 4a Cause has donated $48,000 to local causes — $25,000 of which has gone to the Pied­mont Park Con­ser­vancy. BC4C’s dona­tion to the PPC has pro­vided the equiv­a­lent of:

• 119 weeks of sum­mer camp scholarships
• 50 envi­ron­men­tal field trips for camp children
• 714 Bales of pine straw for landscaping
• 72 Pieces of land­scap­ing equip­ment, includ­ing pitchforks
• Aer­a­tion of 25 acres of turf
• 250 week sup­plies of dog­gie bags
• Plant­ing of 20 hard­wood trees
• Cre­ation of 5 Bird habi­tats and nest­ing boxes for the wet­land area
• Pur­chase of 2,083 energy effi­cient light­bulbs for park facilities
• Two season’s worth of flow­ers for the entire park

We need your help select­ing our remain­ing 2012 causes!

Pied­mont Park Con­ser­vancy receives 50% of BC4C’s pro­ceeds each month and Kate’s Club has been our fea­tured cause for the first quar­ter of 2012; but we want you, our boot campers and the gen­eral pub­lic, to choose our addi­tional 2012 causes. We will sup­port three addi­tional causes — one for each of the remain­ing quar­ters of the year.