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If you’re considering setting a goal for this New Year (and there’s still plenty of time!), take the advice of APOGEE life coach Persephone Zill and create a resolution that’s built to succeed.

What else makes a goal work?
You also need to gather the right tools, including classes, equipment or the right foods in your fridge; visualize success, taking time each day to picture yourself overcoming obstacles and enjoying the benefits of reaching your goal; and plan rewards for progress–a massage, new clothes, short trip or time with friends, for example.

What’s a good timeframe for my resolution?
It takes 21 days on average to change a habit. Set your finish line at least three weeks in the future so your resolution results in lasting change.

The last thing Angela Simpson needs when she works out is noise and chaos. “I live with chaos, “ she says. “I have three boys, ages 8, 9 and 10.” So when Angela dropped her membership at a national gym chain because of the loud music and crowds, a friend told her to try Pilates classes instead, and Angela found APOGEE White Plains.

“It’s calm and friendly,” she says of the APOGEE studio on Mamaroneck Avenue. “And I’m getting a complete workout—toning, cardio and strength with weights.”  In early July, Angela took her first Pilates mat classes and private Pilates training sessions.  A former gymnast, she found herself calling on core muscles in ways she never had before. “Now my stomach is flat, and I also have curves at my waist,” she says.

When  APOGEE introduced Functional Integrative Training (F.I.T.),  Angela signed up for IndoRow and Kettlebells, eager to add intense strength and cardio to her routine.  And has she ever! “In IndoRow, Lesly Levy takes me places I’d never go on my own,” she says.  Lesly synchronizes the class, so everyone is rowing at the same pace, then repeatedly takes the group to peaks of intensity, alternating with short periods of recovery. “I always think I’m not going to make it,” Angela says. “But I do!”

In her weekly Kettlebells class, Angela challenges her body in a different way.  “It’s really works  my backside,  especially my butt,” she says. Lunging and squatting while keeping a 5- or 10-pound kettlebell weight in motion is a challenge that builds total-body strength.  “I’d never even seen a Kettlebells class,” Angela says, “but after five minutes I said, ‘This is amazing!’”

“I’m getting a complete workout every week,” says Angela. She’s doing Pilates twice a week, usually one mat and one Tower or Reformer class, and one IndoRow and Kettlebells class, for a totally of four weekly visits.

As much as her body is challenged, Angela has found that time at APOGEE also creates a mindful awareness that benefits her outside the studio. “I go in all stressed, but come out feeling calm and refreshed—that is something I didn’t expect,” she says. She now has tools that help her in her daily life. For example, a Pilates teacher  pointed out that Angela holds tension in her shoulders and tends to take shallow breaths. “Now I am aware,” says Angela, “I’ll be in the car and notice that my shoulders are up around my ears. Or if I’m at home in a stressful situation, I can ask myself, ‘Am I breathing?’ and remember to take a breath.”

“I feel better in mind, body and spirit,” Angela says. “APOGEE is my own personal oasis.”

Find a Pilates or APOGEE F.I.T. class in White Plains.
Find a Pilates or  APOGEE F.I.T. class in Bedford Hills.

To be fit—and get the health and body benefits that go with it—you have to invest time. But maybe not as much as you think. Minutes of intense training can deliver the same health benefits—and fat and calorie burning—as hours of steady, moderate intensity exercise.

You probably know about APOGEE’s new F.I.T. classes, including kettlebells, TRX and Tabata classes. They’re structured with repeated periods or intervals of intense training to create a time-efficient workout. The intensity can be physically and mentally tough, but the benefits are worth it. Here’s how vigorous workouts create results:

Go hard: Intervals are bouts of vigorous exercise that alternate with a period of rest: You can alternate one minute of walking with one of jogging, for example, or 30 seconds of pushups with 30 seconds of stretching. In one study, subjects biked hard—at 95 percent intensity—for one minute, then slowed down to almost nothing for one minute. They did this for 20 minutes three times a week and had the same positive body changes—calories and fat burned, aerobic capacity boosted—as subjects who had biked for five or more hours a week. That’s 60 minutes a week compared to five hours a week!

Then go easy: The rest intervals are important because it’s then that your muscles sweep away the waste products that can cause muscle soreness. It’s also hard to maintain high physical intensity for more than a minute or two; the rest period allows you to repeat the vigorous period, again and again, adding up those high-heart-rate minutes.

You’ll burn more fat and calories: Studies have shown that bouts of vigorous exercise burn more calories than steady exercise. Intervals have been shown to improve the way your body uses blood sugar, potentially lowering your risk of diabetes.

And accrue health benefits: Intervals stimulate many of the same changes as exercising at a steady pace. You’ll gain cardiovascular fitness, meaning more blood vessels form to deliver blood to muscles (including your heart muscle) and your fit muscles will work even more efficiently.

It’s not easy! Anyone can do intervals anywhere, but quite frankly, it takes a lot of mental discipline to perform the intense bits again and again—it’s tough! That’s why APOGEE F.I.T. classes are a good idea: You can hand over the discipline and motivation to someone else.

Be safe: Whether you’re on your own or in a class, you have to warm up for at least five minutes and cool down properly as well. And you should check with your doctor before starting any new exercise program, intervals included.

APOGEE F.I.T. at White Plains
APOGEE F.I.T. at Bedford Hills

Heart pounding, sweat producing, calorie burning, fat busting, exhausting, invigorating: Spinning is all these things and more. No wonder the Spinning® classes at APOGEE Bedford Hills are among the most popular.

If you’ve spent the winter on a Spin bike, though, cycling on a road bike can be a bit of a shock. Yes, your legs are pushing the pedals, but that’s about all that a Spin bike and a road bike have in common. APOGEE Spin instructor Jennnifer Cromie, an experienced bike racer and national class biathlete (run-bike-run) has advice for Spin class devotees who want to ride on the road.

Be aware! When you’re out of the studio and on the road, you have to be mindful of what’s going on around you. Keep your eyes on the road and not on your cycling computer or heart rate monitor. Gaze about 50 yards ahead of you and be mindful of traffic signs and lights, potholes, and other road hazards. No matter what the road is like, you should ride a predictable, straight line.

Use the proper gear. In the Spin studio you can ride a high gear with no repercussions. But on the road, you should select a gear you can spin at 80 to 100 revolutions per minute (rpm’s) on the flats and 60 to 80 rpms on the hills. Your Spinning instructor can help you learn what these spin rates feel like.

Practice handling your bike. Even if you’ve been Spinning with clip-in pedals, don’t be discouraged if you have a low-speed fall when you clip in and out of your pedals on the road. “It’s a rite of passage!” says Jennifer. “Understand that this is not a permanent problem.” After a few rides, you’ll be clipping in and out like a pro.

To learn more about road cycling in Bedford Hills and Westchester County, join Jennifer Cromie and other instructors at workshop “Cycling From Studio to Street,” on Monday, June 21 at APOGEE  Bedford Hills. Learn more.

For APOGEE instructor Noell Clark, yoga doesn’t end when she steps off the mat. “Part of a complete yoga practice is Seva, the practice of selfless service,” says Clark. Clark fulfills that aspect of her yoga at My Sister’s Place, a Westchester County-based non-profit that helps survivors of domestic violence and human trafficking.  For the last two years, Clark has been teaching yoga to the women enrolled in the center’s Life Skills Program, a 12-week empowerment and job readiness program.

For ten women at a time—a total of about 30 a year—the Life Skills Program provides skills and empowerment workshops. Clark has managed the Life Skills program since 2006. As a whole, My Sister’s Place provides legal services, counseling, education, and emergency shelter to thousands of women recovering from abuse and trafficking.

Yoga and My Sister’s Place are a good fit for Clark. She has a degree in Women’s Studies and Political Science from Purchase College, with a concentration in human services and social work.  And she knows personally how yoga, with its focus on joining the physical and spiritual, can help someone to become empowered. “I don’t come from the most pristine background—I’ve faced many challenges and overcome a lot in my life. Yoga has helped me with these transitions.” Clark says. “Yoga completely changed my life. For me it’s a no-brainer to give others the gift that was given to me and allowed me to get to the other side of my adversity.”

Exactly what yoga poses Clark teaches depends on her students. “If the women need to work through their anger, I do a rigorous practice so they can release their emotions and take it out on the mat,” she says. “If they’re farther along in their resolution, I do healing, restorative poses.” (We recently featured one of Clark’s restorative poses on this blog.)  Clark teaches five classes a week at APOGEE White Plains and encourages APOGEE members to practice Seva, too. “There’s a concept that in order to keep a gift you have to give it away,” Clark says. “If you act compassionately to others, the more you are open to receive compassion from the world around you.”