This week has been one for the books! As I was writing about last week, Babe and I were downtown for the Can Fit Pro World Fitness Expo from Friday – Sunday this week, and between getting ready to go, and recovering from the weekend, it feels like that was pretty much all we accomplished this week!
I’ve been to the Can Fit Pro conference every year for the past 10 years (my first year was 2007…..I just can’t believe how the time flies!), and I wasn’t about to miss this year if there was anything I could do about it! This conference is one of the highlights of my year every year because it’s such a great opportunity to get together with like-minded fitness professionals from every walk of life across the industry and learn, learn, learn. It’s also a great weekend to spend with our friends from all over the industry, and just re-fill the old inspiration bucket (as if it could ever really get low when it comes to group fitness!).
The million dollar question that all of my friends and family from outside of the fitness industry always ask every year is….
So like…what do you do at these conferences?
And it’s a fair question!
The part that everyone sees on social media (sorry about that crazy tsunami of posts and pictures BTW, it only happens once a year for us and we get a bit excited!!) is what we call the “masterclasses”. These masterclasses are specific to Les Mills instructors, and basically, our team of Canadian Les Mills national trainers, combined with special international guest presenters from our educational DVDs (including some from New Zealand – sometimes even our Program Directors if we’re really lucky!) will take us through the NEXT round of new releases for all of our Les Mills programs coming to GoodLife clubs in the Fall, but on a huge, Lady Gaga style, rock-concert stage, with awesome lights and sound that would make Tiesto swoon.
These events have really gotten to be huge over the past several years, and we’ve really been to some MASSIVE classes (I think the biggest being the 2,000+ person BodyPump class that a few of us got to do in New Orleans back in 2014). It really is a pretty unbelievable experience to pack that many Les Mills nuts into one room, it’s nothing short of a miracle that none of these convention centre buildings have come crashing to the ground yet, I swear!
The OTHER, less publicized, part of the weekend is the more cerebral, lecture style learning that takes place, where we get to register for all different types of education sessions taught by world class presenters from all over the industry on everything from nutrition, to different mental health topics, to supplementation, to fitness for specific populations, to coaching, to injury rehab, to new fitness industry trends and fads, and the list goes on and on and on! Although slightly less sexy than the Lady Gaga style masterclasses, if you pick the right ones, the lectures can be really fascinating and really inspiring as well.
SO….normally, this weekend involves about 9 hours of pretty intense exercise in 2 days, pretty minimal sleep / food, and a fair bit of alcohol in the evenings (cause you know….balance). This particular weekend, as you can imagine, looked a little different for Babe and I!
I’ve been a little stressed about how on earth I was going to keep up with these masterclasses / workouts given that I can’t really jump or run anymore at all, and my back / pelvic pain has been ratcheting up and up with each passing week. I also had a bit of an emotional freak-out on Thursday night when I realized that there was literally NOTHING good / healthy that I could pack to eat for lunch on the Friday at the conference since there are no microwaves or anything like that at the convention centre (and there’s no way that I would eat meat or much else in terms of cooked food that was cool, or even at room temperature), and really no place to buy anything decent to eat on-site (or at least anything that meets my food safety OCD standards these days).
I finally defaulted to bringing bagels and cream cheese (packed in about 4 different ice packs) to get me through Friday. Eye roll.
I did my best with all of the masterclasses that I could, and was pleasantly surprised at how much Babe and I were able to do. We managed to do: RPM, SH’BAM, BodyPump, BodyStep, BodyJam and BodyAttack. Not too shabby for 33.5 weeks!!
I would have loved to have done more, and to be able to do the classes that we did do at full impact / intensity, but it just wasn’t in the cards this year, and that’s okay! One of my favourite takeaways from this year’s conference was from the Opening Ceremonies keynote presentation by Tony Horton (the creator of P90X; one of the Beach Body at home workout programs!) where he talked about the 6 steps to living a simpler, healthier, more fulfilled and productive life. And the very first step:
Something about that little tidbit really stuck with me and has become something of a personal mantra for me, and I’ve realized how true it is in so many aspects. All we can do is our best at any given time. Sometimes, our best isn’t really good enough, but that still doesn’t change the fact that our best is all we have to give. It’s all we have!
There’s no sense worrying about comparing our best effort to someone else’s on a given day, or to what we think the right way to do something is, or what life tells us is “the actual best”. All we can do is our best. Period. And I did my best all weekend long, so I can feel good about that!
By the end of the weekend, Babe and I were pretty exhausted from not much sleep, not great nutrition, and just general fatigue from a big weekend away. I’m coming down with a cold now, and fighting it off as hard as I can!! Please, please stay away cold!!
In terms of other pregnancy updates, I’m getting more and more uncomfortable, especially in the evenings, with aches and pains in my upper back / mid back. Sleep seems to regenerate me completely, and I always wake up 100% pain-free in the morning, but the pain seems to settle in as the long days in an office chair progress. I’m really looking forward to my osteopath / massage appointments coming up in early / mid September!
Eating has gotten a little better for me (in the sense that I’m slowly getting a little bit of mojo back for cooking / planning meals – even very simple ones) and I’ve been pretty happy with the balance of foods that I’ve been getting every day. I’ve still got my eye on that McDonalds meal, and the time is fast approaching…..mua ha ha ha. I’m also unapologetically eating a Nestle Drumstick a day.
Still not sorry.
Recently I’ve been finding myself in a bit of a panic mode that OMG Babe will be here in 6 short weeks, OR LESS. I don’t know what the hay my Type-A personality was thinking, but our prenatal classes aren’t scheduled until September 16th / 23rd…. 37 / 38 weeks?!?
WHAT. THE. EFF was I thinking?! He could so easily be here by then?!
My goal for the next 2 weeks is to get organized with some video / book resources and start doing some more home learning, JUST IN CASE little duck has a mind of his own and decides to come ahead of schedule / ahead of prenatal classes. Our hospital bags are getting packed at 35 weeks as well, so that really only leaves another week to gather that stuff together! Eeks!
Well, I think that’s all from us for this week, I hope that all of my teacher / parent friends and family are enjoying the last few weeks of the summer, and are feeling refreshed and ready for back to school! I’ve always, always loved the Fall, and the first week of September always feels so fresh and new. If you’re finding yourself stressed / overwhelmed leading up to September, give my new mantra a try….it works wonders for me in just about all situations!
-Sara & Babe xo
Going The Distance 