thedrifter
02-03-08, 07:35 AM
Diet and fitness: No ifs, no maybes, and certainly no big butts
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 02/02/2008
Former US Marines drill instructor Harvey Walden, known for his TV appearances on Celebrity Fit Club, sees it as his duty to make us all fit. But Tessa Boase soon has him marching to her tune
Harvey Walden IV, notorious American ass-kicker from ITV1's Celebrity Fit Club, is a buff, chiselled, snarling slab of physical motivation. But the man who opens his door to me at London's Mayfair Hotel is pale grey, weary and robotic, eyes flicking towards the television.
Sure, his pecs look like weirdly pert breasts, but he has the stance of a zombie. International book promotion has exhausted him.
This is a shame, as I was hoping to get a taste of what Ann Widdecombe, Vanessa Feltz, Aldo Zilli et al got when they balked at crawling through mud or scaling a net.
"Get off your fat butt!" I'd wanted him to scream at me. "Move out of that comfort zone! Saying you've got no time to exercise is one great big fat excuse! And I hate excuses."
His book, No Excuses!, is aimed largely at poorly motivated couch potatoes with "gut, bat wings, man boobs and butt" to shift, and is based on US Marines exercise routines. These are workouts you can do in your living room in front of the TV, he claims. They don't take up much space or time. Just half an hour, four times a week, for which you'll get fabulous rewards - including "rocketing lust levels".
Walden, 41, devised the exercises when he was made a drill instructor in the US Marines and decided to make his platoon the fittest. He got them doing nightly circuit training in their cramped living quarters, with sentries posted at the doors.
After two weeks his platoon started getting the highest physical fitness test scores, and Walden got promoted. The same exercises are reproduced in his book: a series of dips, push-ups, flutter kicks and leg lifts, each punctuated with marching on the spot for 30 seconds. There is a lot of marching on the spot.
Harvey, I ask him, could you do some marching for me? Because I don't think I cracked it last night, in my attempt to trot through Stage One in front of Sense and Sensibility. At least I persisted; my husband bowed out after 15 seconds.
Walden leaps up and starts swinging his Popeye arms easily while lifting his knees lightly, like a ballerina. This is more like it: suddenly he radiates energy and fitness and a sense of possibility. I ask him what I can do to motivate a reluctant husband. "Start by going for walks after dinner," he says (perhaps a stranger to Camden Town at night). Now out of the Marines, Walden lives in Virginia with his wife and two children.
Has he always been this motivated? "I've always been competitive," he says. "I got my first martial arts black belt when I was six years old. Yoga pants and inner karma just isn't me." Is he a control freak? "I'm a neat freak. I have to have my socks folded in a certain way in the drawer." He's also a "portion-control man", rarely finishing everything on his plate. Would he balloon if he didn't exercise and eat healthily?
"My family is big," he sighs. "They're big and they're lazy. I've got aunts that are 300lb. I used to go to funerals all the time as a kid and I never knew why folk were always dying. It was only when I got to fill in the medical forms for the Marines that I learned that they'd all died of hypertension and diabetes." When Walden visits his family, they all pretend to eat healthily, "going back to the junk food as soon as I've gone. It's sad. They know what they need to do, but they're too lazy. I've heard every excuse in the book, and I'm tired of it".
No Excuses! is a wake-up call, not just to his family, but to the world. "Are you going to sit back on your butt and ruin your life or get up and turn it around?"
Harvey Walden's No Excuses! Fitness Workout (Rodale International, £12.99).
DO
Keep moving between exercises to keep the heart pumping.
Gradually increase the tempo and intensity.
If you're not fully fit or a little delicate, try water aerobics first.
Tap into your chi energy: learn to meditate to calm down.
DON'T
Say you haven't the time.
Think you need to join a gym.
Begin without finding your hidden motivator. (Walden keeps a photo of Halle Berry in his wallet.)
Use cosmetic surgery to get thin. It's lazy and invasive.
Ellie
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 02/02/2008
Former US Marines drill instructor Harvey Walden, known for his TV appearances on Celebrity Fit Club, sees it as his duty to make us all fit. But Tessa Boase soon has him marching to her tune
Harvey Walden IV, notorious American ass-kicker from ITV1's Celebrity Fit Club, is a buff, chiselled, snarling slab of physical motivation. But the man who opens his door to me at London's Mayfair Hotel is pale grey, weary and robotic, eyes flicking towards the television.
Sure, his pecs look like weirdly pert breasts, but he has the stance of a zombie. International book promotion has exhausted him.
This is a shame, as I was hoping to get a taste of what Ann Widdecombe, Vanessa Feltz, Aldo Zilli et al got when they balked at crawling through mud or scaling a net.
"Get off your fat butt!" I'd wanted him to scream at me. "Move out of that comfort zone! Saying you've got no time to exercise is one great big fat excuse! And I hate excuses."
His book, No Excuses!, is aimed largely at poorly motivated couch potatoes with "gut, bat wings, man boobs and butt" to shift, and is based on US Marines exercise routines. These are workouts you can do in your living room in front of the TV, he claims. They don't take up much space or time. Just half an hour, four times a week, for which you'll get fabulous rewards - including "rocketing lust levels".
Walden, 41, devised the exercises when he was made a drill instructor in the US Marines and decided to make his platoon the fittest. He got them doing nightly circuit training in their cramped living quarters, with sentries posted at the doors.
After two weeks his platoon started getting the highest physical fitness test scores, and Walden got promoted. The same exercises are reproduced in his book: a series of dips, push-ups, flutter kicks and leg lifts, each punctuated with marching on the spot for 30 seconds. There is a lot of marching on the spot.
Harvey, I ask him, could you do some marching for me? Because I don't think I cracked it last night, in my attempt to trot through Stage One in front of Sense and Sensibility. At least I persisted; my husband bowed out after 15 seconds.
Walden leaps up and starts swinging his Popeye arms easily while lifting his knees lightly, like a ballerina. This is more like it: suddenly he radiates energy and fitness and a sense of possibility. I ask him what I can do to motivate a reluctant husband. "Start by going for walks after dinner," he says (perhaps a stranger to Camden Town at night). Now out of the Marines, Walden lives in Virginia with his wife and two children.
Has he always been this motivated? "I've always been competitive," he says. "I got my first martial arts black belt when I was six years old. Yoga pants and inner karma just isn't me." Is he a control freak? "I'm a neat freak. I have to have my socks folded in a certain way in the drawer." He's also a "portion-control man", rarely finishing everything on his plate. Would he balloon if he didn't exercise and eat healthily?
"My family is big," he sighs. "They're big and they're lazy. I've got aunts that are 300lb. I used to go to funerals all the time as a kid and I never knew why folk were always dying. It was only when I got to fill in the medical forms for the Marines that I learned that they'd all died of hypertension and diabetes." When Walden visits his family, they all pretend to eat healthily, "going back to the junk food as soon as I've gone. It's sad. They know what they need to do, but they're too lazy. I've heard every excuse in the book, and I'm tired of it".
No Excuses! is a wake-up call, not just to his family, but to the world. "Are you going to sit back on your butt and ruin your life or get up and turn it around?"
Harvey Walden's No Excuses! Fitness Workout (Rodale International, £12.99).
DO
Keep moving between exercises to keep the heart pumping.
Gradually increase the tempo and intensity.
If you're not fully fit or a little delicate, try water aerobics first.
Tap into your chi energy: learn to meditate to calm down.
DON'T
Say you haven't the time.
Think you need to join a gym.
Begin without finding your hidden motivator. (Walden keeps a photo of Halle Berry in his wallet.)
Use cosmetic surgery to get thin. It's lazy and invasive.
Ellie