Mixing it up

Today the Star-Advertiser begins a recurring fitness feature we call Good Fit. We want to write about what motivates you and how you stay fit and healthy. We’re looking for inspiring fitness stories of change, self-discovery and challenge. Contact us at features@staradvertiser.com.

The epiphany was heavy. Twenty-five pounds, to be exact.

Russell Yamanoha, slightly out of breath after a workout last week at Punch gym, grinned when he remembered that realization: In March, he told his trainer, Snooky Fujikawa, that he had lost 25 pounds since starting a fitness routine last fall.

Yamanoha grabbed a 26-pound kettlebell — a round, black weight with a handle — and lifted it for emphasis as he explained Fujikawa’s response.

"He said imagine walking around with this thing all day on you, which is what I was doing," Yamanoha said. "That really hit home with me about how important it is to stick with the program and how great it is to feel weight loss. Because if you had to walk around with this thing all day it will kill you."

The secret to Yamanoha’s success? In a gym that specializes in boxing, the obvious answer is the smack and thump of gloved hands on a heavy bag — but that would miss the point, said Yamanoha, a 47-year-old former TV sports journalist.

It’s variety, he said. Variety keeps him coming back for more.

"The whole reason I like it, especially for someone who isn’t in the best shape, like me, is it is doable," Yamanoha said. "If you do something that is too hard or is so drawn out and monotonous, it becomes a drag. There were routines I have done in the past where I dreaded going to the gym."

Fitness has not been a big part of Yama­noha’s adult life, but he did start a routine in 2009 with the late Lyle Galdeira, when both were food reviewers on the popular TV show "Cheap Eats." They were part of a weight-loss challenge and chronicled their efforts with regular TV segments.

But Yamanoha’s life changed in July 2011 when he became the communications and media director for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1260.

"I put all my attention onto that job and turned my back on my workouts," he said. "But my health was getting iffy."

He gained weight — how much, he won’t say — and often felt tired halfway through the day.

His two young daughters, ages 8 and 5, figured into his re-evaluation of his priorities — and they still do.

"I want to be able to run around with them and not be gassed," Yamanoha said.

But there was no single trigger that brought him back to the gym, not even the untimely death of Galdeira, who was 59 when he died last November.

"In my case, it was just real life," Yamanoha said. "It’s the easy thing to do, to come up with excuses. But reasons why to keep going are tough. I had a lot of excuses."

Now Yamanoha works out four times a week, usually for an hour. Because Fujikawa is a lifelong boxer, the routine is built around 3-minute rounds, like a match, Yamanoha said.

"Boxing in and of itself is very difficult," Yamanoha said. "It is harder to do in real life than when you see it on TV. Some of it is as simple as punching a bag above eye level. But try and do that for three minutes and your arms feel like they are going to fall off."

And the workouts change all the time.

Sometimes Yamanoha does several rounds of a single exercise — whipping 50-pound ropes up and down or punching Fujikawa’s gloved hands or slamming a heavy ball onto the floor, picking it up and doing it again in three-minute intervals.

Other days he joins other members in a circuit and they swap exercises every 30 seconds.

No matter what comprises his workout, Yama­noha leaves the gym feeling exhausted.

"You (feel like) you have been hit by a truck when you go through one of those," Yamanoha said. "But it’s sustainable. I can do it. I don’t get discouraged or overwhelmed. It pushes you, it makes you work but it is not overwhelming."