Get fit with Boot Camp

By Susan Taft
staft@campcountynow.com

Getting in shape is always one of the top New Year’s resolutions. It’s only been a little over a month since the New Year rolled in, but if you’re already having trouble keeping that resolution, Boot Camp Partners is here to help.
Boot Camp Partners kicks off every weekday morning at 5:15 with a brisk walk, followed by a 45-minute workout. Participants meet at the First Baptist Church parking lot if the temperature is 40 or higher. Anything below that temperature takes the team downtown to the office building of Nickco Recycling.
“Jim Nickerson and the ladies who work there have been great to let us use the building for free,” said Jennifer Sharp, who has been involved since the boot camp began three years ago.
“A football coach started it, and we paid him,” she said. “After he moved, about eight of us girls would still show up and we decided we could do it on our own, at no charge. So, we formed the Pittsburg group. We were solid for about a year, and we had ladies from Daingerfield who drove over to join us. One of them asked if we would start a boot camp there, and we would take turns driving to Daingerfield to get them going until they had some core members, ones you knew would always be there to coach or lead.”
Members of Boot Camp Partners take turns leading the workout.
“That’s one reason this works,” Mrs. Sharp said. “I don’t know what my workout is going to be when I show up, and that’s a good thing for me so I don’t talk myself out of the workout before I get there.”
Those that make up Boot Camp Partners come in all shapes and sizes.
“We have a 14-year-old member in Pittsburg, and there are women from their 30s to 60s and up,” Mrs. Sharp said. “We even have a male who has joined us.”
Judy Jackson celebrates her one-year anniversary with Boot Camp Partners this month. Her hard work earned her Northeast Texas Community College’s Fittest Employee award in December.
“Every time I’d see her, she’d ask me about boot camp,” Mrs. Sharp said. “She was afraid to join us because she was afraid she couldn’t do the workout. I finally got her talked into joining us, and the transformation in her strength is amazing.”
Mrs. Jackson said it took her more than 28 years to establish and maintain a habit of fitness.
“As Dr. Tom Seabourne at the college will attest, that is a major accomplishment for me,” Mrs. Jackson said. “There are no telling how many times I enrolled in one of his infamous early morning workout classes only to drop midstream. It was not until I returned from a doctor’s visit that it became clear gaining two or three pounds annually would have seriously consequences, not only on how I looked but felt.”
Getting up before 5 a.m. can be a little intimating.
 “Getting up that early when it’s cold or hot outside is not something to look forward to,” Mrs. Jackson said. “However, when you finish and go home refreshed, ready for the day, the great feeling you experience gradually increases your determination. It probably took three months before Boot Camp Partners became a habit I wanted to retain as a part of my life. On those cold, rainy, dreary days, I have a lengthy conversation with myself about whether to go or not to go. Usually, I get dressed and head out the door.”
Mrs. Sharp said one thing that keeps members rising early is just to be there to encourage others.
“Boot Camp Partners has helped so many people, and sometimes your presence is their biggest support,” she said. “All the ladies will tell you that the support from each member is amazing. Working out is only half of it. You meet so many neat people, and we are there for each other.”
Inspiration comes from many places. Pittsburg’s Boot Camp Partners has one member who is inspired by her 90-year-old mother who walks on the treadmill every morning.
“This lady says if her mother can do that, then she can at least make the effort to be more fit herself,” Mrs. Sharp said.
Mrs. Sharp doesn’t consider herself the leader of Boot Camp Partners.
“We like to be recognized as a whole,” she said. “It takes every one of us.
They are so committed to promoting fitness, they started boot camps in Daingerfield, Winnsboro, Mount Pleasant and Mount Vernon was well.
 “In Mount Pleasant, they had 57 ladies show up the first day,” Mrs. Sharp said.
Just this month, an evening boot camp was started in Pittsburg. The group meets in the parking lot at Emmanuel Baptist Church Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 5:30 until 6:30.
“It’s been exciting getting the night ladies together at the new location,” Mrs. Sharp said.
Mrs. Jackson encourages those who, like her, have caught the “fitness bug” to maintain for as long as their health allows.
“And, for those who’ve been erratic like me, or are still thinking about it, just do it,” she said. “If it is a 10-minute brisk walk around campus or early morning crunches, it’s a start to a better life.  And, if you can make it, head on down to a  boot camp, and we’ll get you started.”