Before we’d embarked on the weekend, my boot camp buddy Clare and I had filled in a diary – food consumed, exercise taken, highs and lows of mood and general health.
This allows your weekend to be structured to meet your specific needs.
As we pant up to the finish line, following in the footsteps of Sarah and Chris, our super toned ‘body double’ experts, Clare and I start to exchange intimidated glances.
Warming up
Despite the biting wind, we’re warm before we know it.
We charge up and down the dunes stopping to jump, lunge, punch or ‘fast feet’ – a blast of running on the spot.
At each stopping station one of the trainers awaits to ensure you put your back into it and, with just two of us in the group, there’s nowhere to hide.
We regroup by the water’s edge and walk through the next drills.
Giant rubber resistance bands are pulled and arced above heads.
We curve bands across our bodies, pulling hard against our trainers, and we stretch as much as our power will allow.
With bands around our middles we pull our trainers down the beach like a horse and cart and scream in frustration as we hunker down trying to win the ‘race’.
A welcome break
Lunch is hungrily consumed back at the log cabin we’ll call home for the next couple of nights.
With floor-to-ceiling glass windows, flashy bathrooms, large plasma screens and a high-spec kitchen, it ain’t half bad.
Exhausted, we laugh at each other’s red, wind-blasted faces and hide fears of how we’ll survive part two.
Later that day we’re back at the resort studio being blasted with tunes as we launch into more drills, only this time the sand isn’t there to work against us.
We do controlled squats, press-ups, lunges and star jumps, and my legs burn.
We work our core with medicine balls, and in the breaks we loll on them tired and useless.
My stomach hurts from all the work, my brain can’t concentrate any more and I fear my legs won’t carry me down the winding drive back to our rooms after it’s all over.
Chris sees we’ve had enough and sends us to the spa for our massage, and the aches and pains simply melt away.
Chewing the fat
On the morning of day two we limp to reception to be met by Jason for an hour of measuring our fat bits, checking our cholesterol and body mass index, and deciphering whether or not our fat is clinging to major organs or available to burn.
Jason explains how best to improve things. It’s a simple equation: eat better, move more.
We jump on stationary bikes in the outside studio and Sarah, all swishing blonde hair and honey tan, shouts into a microphone as we start a 45-minute spinning class climbing imaginary hills and sprinting to finish lines.
Still glowing with sweat, we slip into the empty swimming pool like seals, and each with a set of floats we work arms and legs separately.
We drag each other the length of the pool in drills, and enjoy the slower pace of it all as our heart rates return to normal.
It’s a wrap
At the end of the last day I relax into the boot camp’s finale – the Thalgomince warm body wrap which kick-starts weight loss.
Lying covered in oil and cream and wrapped in a warming and detoxifying package of films and towels, the cold compress over my eyes forces a light sleep.
I daydream of continuing this routine at home, of soon becoming a mere shadow of myself.
As I get dressed I’m sure my jeans are looser, I have a spring in my step and my motivation is soaring.
Bring on the summer.
