Resolve of steel, buns to match

We mean it this time: We will work out. We will get buff. We will join a gym ... again.

By MICHAEL KRUSE, Times Staff Writer
Published December 31, 2007

LUTZ - Midmorning Friday at Anytime Fitness on Oak Grove Boulevard, a young woman with a ponytail pedaled on a stationary bike, a big guy stuffed in sweats huffed and puffed on one of the elliptical machines, and owner Robert White sat in his office in the otherwise empty gym and talked about the coming storm.

The expectation of the annual onslaught of first-of-the-year memberships had White excited and even making up words.

"I'm gearing up for the resolutioners," he said.

Resolutioners.

"Sounds cooler than the resolution-makers."

Whatever you want to call them, here they come - to gyms on the State Road 54 corridor here in central Pasco, and anywhere and everywhere else people feel frumpy and fat.

The International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association in Boston says 12.4 percent of new gym memberships come in January - that's the highest percentage of any month, by far - and the not-for-profit trade association also estimates that about 1-million Americans will join a gym in the next 31 days.

Trend-watchers say the urge to make New Year's resolutions for 2008 might be greater than in years past because of the generally downbeat '07, what with all the mortgage issues, the gas prices, the housing slowdown, the weakening dollar and so on. In a Gallup poll earlier this month, after all, 70 percent of the respondents said they were "dissatisfied" with "the way things are going" in the country right now.

"The news is so severe and negative," trend expert Marian Salzman told USA Today last week.

It can't get any worse.

Can it?

Bring on '08!

"The change of the calendar seems to be a nice, easy transition point," said White, the Anytime Fitness boss. "You can make a resolution anytime, but I think people get optimistic at the first of the year."

Really optimistic.

Popular New Year's resolutions include: stop smoking, stop drinking, get out of debt, get a better job, get more organized, spend more time with friends and family, spend less time on the Internet.

But at or near the top, always, is fitness.

We want to get buff, toned, shredded, ripped, cut up, just generally rock-hard and whatnot.

We want to like what we see in the mirror in the morning.

It's like that scene in American Beauty.

"Do you just want to lose weight," the jogging neighbor asks Kevin Spacey's character, Lester Burnham, "or are you looking to increase strength and flexibility as well?"

To which Lester responds: "I want to look good naked."

TV gets in on the resolution biz as well.

Know that NBC show The Biggest Loser? Well, the newest weight-related reality show, which debuts this week on Lifetime, cuts right to the chase. It's hosted by Carson Kressley, one of those Queer Eye guys, and it's called How to Look Good Naked.

Some flavor from the online comments responding to the announcement of the show on mylifetime.com:

"How do I turn to see 213 lbs of stretch-marked, rolled, cellulite-covered body and go, 'Yeah, that's fabulous??'"

Tune in.

Catch the longing. The sadness. The couch-bound inertia.

Next week Discovery Health kicks off a show called National Body Challenge: Twins Edition. That's where we get to watch sets of overweight twins try to "reclaim their health and positive self-image," according to Discovery Health.

There's a reason, of course, people have New Year's resolutions every year.

They hardly ever keep them.

According to a recent survey by Kelton Research, 80 percent of people think it's more likely that they will keep their New Year's resolution than it is that they'll win the lottery this year - which means the other 20 percent, presumably, must think they've got a better shot at winning the lottery than keeping their New Year's resolution.

On Dec. 31, though, that's no-no talk. That's Debbie Downer stuff.

Optimism abounds.

Starting tomorrow.

At Anytime Fitness, White is ready for '08, with some new stuff in the pipeline: weight-loss classes in the evenings, reduced rates for personal trainer packages.

A year ago at this time, before Anytime Fitness was even built, when Oak Grove Plaza was a patch of sand and some cinder blocks, White sold early memberships out of an RV parked at the construction site.

And in between Christmas '06 and the end of February '07, he said, he sold 200 memberships - about a third of the current Anytime memberships.

"I had five people call on New Year's Day," he said, "who really felt like they needed a gym, to work out, right now."

Michael Kruse can be reached at mkruse@sptimes.com or 813 909-4617.

[Last modified December 30, 2007, 19:41:55]