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MULTIMEDIA Video:  Boot camp workout:  Be all you used to be

I am not a morning person, never have been. My morning laziness and grumpiness gets even worse when it comes to exercising in the morning.

I will convince myself of any excuse to stay snuggled under my comfy down blanket for another 45 minutes where I am safe from sweat and exhaustion. I could always exercise at night or tomorrow morning I will really get up and go for a run.

But today, unfortunately, those excuses are not an option when my alarm clock goes off at 6 a.m. The Seacoast Boot Camp is waiting for me.

Frankly, I’m scared. But that fear motivates me to drag my lazy behind out of bed and over to Pease, the home of Guy Perreault’s Fitness Dynamics and the Seacoast Boot Camp.

I find the group members dressed in their military-style T-shirts declaring, “Seacoast Boot Camp: Be All You Used To Be.” Well that idea certainly sounds good to me.

The group is all ready to go, so we begin the workout with double-timing, a slow-paced jog. So far so good.

After a few stretches, Perreault begins what he calls the warm-up, even though I thought we were already well into our workout.

Then he brings out the cones, which he proceeds to make lanes out of. He says we’re going to run up and down the lanes doing a different activity at each cone. OK, I can do that.

But as I watch the group go before me and see them working hard, straining, and getting weak, I start to get a little nervous.

I run up and down the lanes, trying hard to catch my breath and keep up, pushing myself to do sit-ups, squat thrusts, prisoner squats and more.

Wow, could I feel the burn, in every single muscle of my body. Strangely, instead of getting more tired as I went along, I became more motivated.

It had been years since I had pushed myself so hard. I can’t remember the last time I did so many sit-ups, push-ups or squats. I didn’t even mind that I was covered in wet grass or that I was sweating and could feel my heart pounding with every breath because I was just so proud of myself.

I was actually a little disappointed when the 45 minutes came to an end. It didn’t even feel like I had been there that long. I couldn’t believe how much I did in that short time: I ran, I jumped, I was on the ground giving 10, I did more than 45 sit-ups. I felt motivated, refreshed, and ready to head off to begin my day, and all of this before I had even planned on getting out of bed.

I’m not even going to think about tomorrow, since from what I hear from my fellow boot-campers, my body won’t feel as good as it does right now ...