Monday, January 24, 2011

You don't know Jack

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Sad news today on the fitness-front...

American fitness guru Jack LaLanne died Sunday afternoon at his home in Morro Bay. He was 96.

Neatorama posted some interesting facts about Jack...

In 1951 Jack started his own TV exercise show - the first fitness program ever televised, actually - that ended up running for 34 years. When it first aired, critics gave it 6 weeks tops. He even had to buy air time, because the studio didn't believe anyone would watch an exercise show.



Jack's choice of using soothing Wurlitzer music to workout to is an interesting one. Lady Gaga and Beyonce really should consider incorporating it into their new dance tracks to keep people motivated on the treadmill while listening to their music at the gym.

He also enjoyed wearing ballet slippers while exercising...

In those days tennis shoes were not popular, and only used to play tennis in…Most show business people and Hand Balancers wore ballet slippers, and Jack being a Hand Balancer, that was what he wore!

As a child he was a self-proclaimed sugarholic (I can identify with that)...

He blamed his bad diet for attacking his brother with an axe and setting the family house on fire. At 15, his mother took him to see a talk by nutritionist Paul Bragg, and Jack reformed his eating habit and became interested in fitness.

I can't identify with THAT, but I do get cranky if my giant Hershey bar is broken into pieces when I unwrap it.

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Jack could do 1,033 push-ups. In 23 minutes. At the age of 42.

I could eat a bag of Doritos and record two TV shows at once on my DVR at the age of 42.

He also opened the first gym...

Jack LaLanne opened the country's first modern health club in Oakland, California, in 1936 at the tender age of 21. He worked with a blacksmith to create many of the weight machines that you see in your neighborhood gym today.

His line of health clubs eventually became Bally's Total Fitness.

He also didn't think people should warm-up before working out. The idea of that really seemed to chap his...leg-warmers.

"Now, you listen to some of these so-called sports-medicine experts today--shit! It's just shtick. It's just something else to sell. Warming up," he scoffed, adjusting a red ascot fitted neatly into his jumpsuit, "warming up is the biggest bunch of horseshit I've ever heard in my life. Fifteen minutes to warm up! Does a lion warm up when he's hungry? 'Uh-oh, here comes an antelope. Better warm up.' No! He just goes out and eats the sucker. You gotta get the blood circulating, but shit, does the lion cool down? No, he eats the sucker and goes to sleep. And that," he concluded, folding his arms into a variation of the pose, "is the truth."

Warming-up really does seem to make sense. Of course, he lived to be 96...so what do I know?

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He also made a bazillion dollars selling his line of Power Juicers on TV.

I call people who get drunk very quickly "Power-Juicers".

I haven't made a dime on that phrase...yet.

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