Inform Fridays

Spring showers on the Upper West Side. 3:30 PM. Photo: JH.

Fridays are a day of relief around here. The hectic New York merry-go-round slows to a near stop: no deadline for the next two nights. A big relief for us. Dinner with friends. A book. A trip to Zabars. Not to mention a trip to Inform on Friday mornings.

I’ve written about Inform when I first started. They even advertise on the NYSD, as you might have noticed. I got into it thanks to my friend Charles Stevenson (see The List [1]). We were having lunch one day at Michael’s and he had to leave at a certain time to get to an appointment at 2:30. He was wearing a suit and tie at lunch which led me to believe he probably had a business meeting.

DPC during his first workout at Inform.

After lunch I walked with him over to Infrom on 56th and Third. He told me about the workout that took no more than a half hour once a week. He considered it the best workout he’d ever known. Charles has always been very fit, very athletic (as you may have read) and even has his own top-of- the-line gym at his country house.

I’ve never been into workouts or gyms or athletics. As a kid I was always tall and skinny (willowy was the word I hated). In those days Charles Atlas used to advertise his weightlifting techniques on the back of matchbook covers and in comic books. A cartoon of a skinny-belink of a guy, a “98 pound weakling” getting sand kicked in his face by some big pneumatic dude. I was the 98 pound weakling of course. A brutal reality for a teenager who only wants to be cool and accepted. But as time would have it, I got so I never thought about it or cared. About ten minutes ago. Nevertheless….

A number of years ago when I first moved to LA, the land of the Bad and the Beautiful, I joined a Nautilus gym near my house in Brentwood. It was the thing to do in LA. (Although not yet in NYC, for example, where New Yorkers were still making fun of the LA people and their fitness craze. Just as they later made fun of the LA craze for cell phones.)

I’d go to Nautilus three times a week – it was no more than five minutes from where I was living. But it was a bore. After three months, despite what seemed like some progress, I quit. Or rather, dropped it. To no great regret.

[1]Adam instructing DPC, who's made vast improvements since his first session. See for yourself.

So on this day walking east with my friend, I listened with interest while he talked about the advantages of this program. He even suggested I try it. So I went and watched. Five or six exercises in a total of 22 minutes. Very slowly executed exercises. Charles never even removed his tie (he loosened it). I could see from watching, however, that he was really working it.

I started a couple of weeks later. That was six months ago. I don’t actually look forward to it. Especially the leg press. Gawd. But according to my trainers, my numbers are going up and so I’m making progress. What’s good about that is I am now at the age where progress as an experience has begun to ebb from one’s expectations. Or realities. Unless, you keep at it. That is the good news. JH does it too. He took this video of me on one of the machines. Nothing cool looking about it, I must say.

Adam Zickerman who created Inform is a very interesting fellow. He started out professional life as a lab scientist at Cold Spring Harbor. As an avocation he was very interested in physical exercise, body building, etc. The day came in his professional life when he felt that his own talents as a scientist did match some of his colleagues. He wanted something he could excel in. Through a series he found that in what is called “slow motion training.” It’s for anyone who: wants to lose fat, wants to gain muscle, is starved for time, hates to work out, loves to work out.

He’s even written a best-selling book (150,000 copies sold so far) called “Power of 10.”

[2]Click cover to order the Power of 10

Adam and I have got to know each other enough to have lunch at Michael’s too. The other day he was telling me about some fundraising he’d done at Inform. Recently the young son of a friend of his was diagnosed with leukemia. The incident led Adam to think about what he could do. Coincidentally he got a call from St. Jude’s Hospital in Tennessee. They’d started a program where they were trying to get gyms to fundraise for them. St. Jude’s founded by the late comedian Danny Thomas is one of the top three children’s hospitals in the country. And they take in whoever comes to them.

The fundraising program they put together was: people donate one workout session (about $75) to the cause and “put their name in a hat.” After a month of people donating sessions, there was a drawing for 6 free sessions. Or six weeks. 80 clients raised just over $6000. Here’s to Inform. And Adam!

P.S. One more thing about the late great Kurt Vonnegut: Go to http://headbutler.com [3]/

Comments? Contact DPC here [4]

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