Gym

On Thursday morning, about the time the Washington Redskins were supposed to be filing out the back door of the team headquarters for the short walk to the practice field, they instead were headed out the front door and into the parking lot. With no buses available on short notice, the players had to pile into their own vehicles and drive themselves to a suburban gymnasium a few miles away to hold practice. All because of a little snow. It’s an arrangement that’s far from ideal.

BOONSBORO - Wyldlife, a club for middle school youngsters, will be at the gym at Benevola United Methodist Church on Friday, March 23, from 7:30 to 9 p.m. A branch of Young Life International, Wyldlife is a nonprofit organization designed to make a positive impact on the lives of young people. Young Life reaches out to high school students and Wyldlife is geared toward middle school students. All middle schoolers in grades six through eight are invited to join Wyldlife for a free evening of music, entertainment, extreme games, and other activities.

Scoops & Wickets will feature ice cream and croquet for all ages, children's games, face painting, food and a silent auction Saturday, June 17, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Brook Lane, 13218 Brook Lane Drive, northeast of Hagerstown. The silent auction is from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Money raised will be used to start a fund to build a new gymnasium on campus. For more information, call Kay E. Hoffman at 301-733-0331, ext. 272, or send e-mail to kay.hoffman@brooklane.org .

Members of the growing Bethel Assembly of God have broken ground on a 19,000-square-foot addition that includes a gym and three stories of classrooms. The addition is expected to accommodate the 1,100-member church at 515 E. Wilson Blvd. "for the immediate future," said Pastor Terry Broadwater. He said he and others at the church had been pushing for the addition for more than a year. "We had been talking about and realized it was something we really needed to do," he said.

marlob@herald-mil.com A youthful appearance could be a plus for Matt Sargent as he attempts to attract young people to the Extreme Impact Teen Ministry at the Hagerstown Union Rescue Mission. "I want to reach out to the middle and early high school kids, the 10- to 14-year-olds," Sargent said. "My mission is to reach them for Christ. " In the early stages of his ministry at the mission, Sargent is beginning with open gym night on Tuesdays at the Shiloh Center in the old Hagerstown YMCA at 149 N. Potomac St. "From 4 to 6 p.m., we invite young people to come in to use the gym, swim in the pools," Sargent said.

The lawns at Brook Lane, off Smithsburg-Leitersburg Road, are being spruced up for the upcoming Wicket Affair and Scoops and Wickets fundraisers to benefit the Brook Lane gym. The Wicket Affair will be Friday, June 15, from 6 to 8 p.m. under a large tent on the Brook Lane campus. An evening reception will feature food and a preview of the auction items for Scoops & Wickets. Music will be provided by The Candice Mowbray Quartet. Croquet attire or business casual dress is appropriate.

The Washington County Board of Education endorsed a plan Tuesday to build a 5,000-square-foot addition to serve as an auxiliary gymnasium at Hancock Middle/Senior High School. The School Board agreed to give $80,000 toward the project, which is expected to cost $450,000 with equipment included. The Washington County Commissioners are contributing and Hancock has raised money through private donations. Currently, one gym serves about 336 students in seven grade levels. It is used for boys' and girls' sports, including junior varsity and varsity wrestling and basketball, at all times of the day. Hancock is 15 miles west of Clear Spring and 25 miles from a YMCA, according to School Board Director of Facilities Management Dennis McGee.

Girls Inc. of Washington County, a Hagerstown youth club for girls, plans to build a $1 million gymnasium at its Washington Avenue facility. [cont. from front page ] The new gym would give the club an indoor basketball court and could double or triple the number of girls involved in the club, Girls Inc. Executive Director Maureen Grove said Monday. "I think it'll attract more older teens because those sports like basketball and volleyball attract the older teens," Grove said.

The Martin Luther King Center in Hagerstown was flooded Wednesday night but Hurricane Dennis wasn't to blame. A group of teenagers had just finished a pick-up basketball game when a member of the losing side kicked the basketball and it soared more than 40 feet, hit a sprinkler head, and set it off around 7:55 p.m., said Michael Rodgers, whose team won the game 21-19. About a half-inch of water rained down and pooled in the center of the gymnasium floor of the North Street building, said Ruth Monroe, director of the Martin Luther King center, as she swept up debris from the incident.

Spring is here, summer is coming and new opportunities for fitness activities soon follow. But when the weather is nice and sunny, the last place I want to be is inside of a gym. I like to take my clients outside to workout whenever possible as it really opens up all kinds of creative options to get in a good workout. A lot of my clients would say that those workouts were their favorites (after they got off the ground). In this region, we are pretty fortunate to have some great parks and scenic areas we can use for fitness.

In the nearly 20 years I've been a fitness professional, I've found that only a handful of barriers prevent most people from beginning an exercise program that can literally and massively change their lives. What people discover is that when they learn to overcome these common barriers, the fitness results come quickly, and they wonder why they didn't start sooner. Maybe you've encountered some of these. No time There is always time. You just have to be willing to create it. Can you get up just a little earlier?

With time being a commodity these days, trying to create time for fitness can seem like a difficult task. Add not really knowing what to do, and the dream of fitness can feel completely out of reach. Walking into a big box gym with a dazzling array of machines and cardio equipment, a newcomer might wonder where the heck do I start? The good news is that just walking in and getting on any piece of equipment is better than what you were doing. The better news is I'm going to share my 3 favorite cardio trainers to get you the best results in the least amount of time.

Tuscarora School District officials recently received an unwelcome surprise when they learned Mercersburg Elementary School's gym floor has mercury that needs to be professionally removed. The elementary school is in the midst of a $7 million renovation that is expected to be completed before the Aug. 27 start of the academic year. Testing on the gym floor, which is original to the 1980 building, revealed mercury outside acceptable limits, meaning the floor needs to be removed through a special process, according to Stanley Morgan, facilities director for the school district.

Washington County Public Schools continues to replace worn-out synthetic gym floors with wooden floors after discovering the synthetic floors weren't lasting as long as expected, said Mark Mills, director of maintenance and operations. Springfield Middle School is next in line, with installation of a new wood floor for its gym and exercise room planned for this summer. The new floors will be ready for the next school year, Mills said. The Washington County Board of Education voted 6-0 on March 6 to award the Springfield Middle contract to the low bidder, Weyer's Floor Service of Odenton, Md., according to a video of the meeting available at www.wcps.k12.md.us.

At area gyms Monday, the busiest station was the sign-up desk as area residents made good on the popular New Year's resolution to get in shape in 2012. “We haven't been this busy in a long time,” Planet Fitness employee Tahlullah Barger said, surveying the crowded South End Shopping Center fitness center Monday afternoon. Barger counted 22 new members since the new year began. Eric Piper, 27, of Williamsport, was unabashed about being part of the New Year's gym membership surge.

The North Hagerstown wrestling team put on a show in its home opener Wednesday night, annihilating Frederick 78-6. “We don't want to speak too soon, but we have a lot of good wrestlers,” North senior co-captain Connor McHose said. The Hubs' actions spoke louder than any words against the Cadets (0-2) as they prevailed in 13 of the 14 weight classes and racked up 11 pins. “I was impressed,” North coach Greg Slick said. “I'm cautiously optimistic.” The match started at 126 pounds, and sophomore Brendon Colbert - The Herald-Mail's Washington County Wrestler of the Year last season - immediately put the Hubs in front for good.

Mike Kerekesh of Hagerstown admits his exercise schedule is extreme, but he's been doing it for more than seven years and it works for him. He's just one of the many people taking advantage of the 24-hour fitness centers in the Tri-State area. Kerekesh, 52, appreciates the early hours offered at Gold's Gym on Northern Avenue in Hagerstown. "To me, the best energy is early. I think you're exhausted at 5 o'clock (in the afternoon). I prefer getting it done, getting it out of the way," Kerekesh said.

A new fitness center owned by author Nora Roberts is on track to open at the beginning of October near the author's romance-themed inn in Boonsboro, according to the gym's manager. Fit in BoonsBoro, a two-story fitness center for men and women, will open in a building being renovated at 3 St. Paul St., Manager Heidi Bodenheimer said. Roberts decided the building - a former tanning salon - needed some "TLC" and thought a fitness center would fill an unserved need in the growing Boonsboro community, Bodenheimer said.

In the 17 years I've been a fitness professional, I've found that there are only a few minor barriers to fitness success — and that they are a matter of perspective. Things often look different when you look at them from the "30,000- foot level," then from ground level. If you really examine these "barriers," you'll see that in the scheme of things, they are easily overcome. Here are the top four: 1. No time.  There is always time. You just have to be willing to create it. Can you get up just a little earlier?

I was training a client one day last week (who makes a mean vegetable soup, BTW), when a woman I hadn't seen for a few weeks walks by and takes a look at a particularly difficult drill I was conducting. As she was watching my client work, I saw a look of amazement go across the spectator's face.  She shakes her head and says, "I wish I had her motivation. " She then walks off and leaves the gym.  What she didn't realize is that this client she was watching is in her fifth month with me, and has made leaps and bounds since her first month.