Editor's Note: The following represents the first installment in an ongoing health and fitness series in which Tribune staff writer Susan Wood goes through the ropes of personal training and organized aerobic activity at Sierra Athletic Club.

At age 46, I can be very much like an old dog - set in my ways and settled in when it comes to my fitness regime.

For years, I've balanced a slew of sports and time at the gym to maintain a certain weight class and condition to complete athletic pursuits like climbing Mount Whitney for a second time, riding around Lake Tahoe and completing a trans-Sierra cross country ski trip from Lee Vining to Yosemite Valley.

But as I get older, those events become fewer and I get more docile and forgiving to myself in what I'm willing to do. I needed to be pushed, and I found that place at Sierra Athletic Club, my home gym.

Rhonda Beckham, who runs Help Me Rhonda Personal Training, started to fill that niche a few weeks ago, and I hoped to complement those sessions with an introduction to spin class with SAC Manager Sam Wade.

My first session with Beckham seemed daunting with the weigh in. I turned my head away from the scale.

But much of her style revolves around encouragement. I've dabbled in weight training before, but seldom did I notice any significant difference in muscle mass and the good soreness that comes out of pushing oneself at the machines.

I told her my goal centered on ski conditioning, since my snow snob attitude had kept me off the hill for more than three visits this year. I also wanted to be in condition for a year-long program including the possibility of bringing back my tennis game, despite elbow and back injuries.

For starters, Beckham stressed the importance of working on the core, which can be described as the mid-body that holds it together.

With that, we hit the wall where I proceeded to do pushups. I realized it looks easier than it is as I kissed the wall. She's learned a few ways to watch for form, which in the past may have been poor for certain exercises.

"Squeeze my fingers," Beckham told me, as she placed two in the middle of my back while I pulled back the stretchy theraband tied around the bar of a machine.

We proceeded to machines where I performed leg raises and extensions.

"Are you going to make me look like him?" I asked her, while staring up at a photograph of Arnold Schwarzenegger in his body-building days.

"We'll put your picture up there," she countered.

On session No. 2, I was urged to write down what I eat. Oh no. That means that while beaming over eating stir fry, soup and stew, I also have to record those bags of Cheese Nips every time. And yet someone else gets to know about my coffee addiction.

She noticed the lack of protein, recommended shakes for that, and handed me a sample nutrition program that lists long-lost items in my diet like oatmeal and tuna fish. I eat a lot of veggie dishes and fruit until I binge on a half-pound burger and fries one day and pizza and nachos on others. At least the post-Rhonda days have limited my nacho consumption to four meals in one week instead of one.

Also on session two, Beckham measured my waist, hips and other body parts with at least the hope they would be reduced over time.

As we hit the floor, I began doing exercises to help with my balance. One involved coming up on my toes on one foot. I'd stumble and get disgusted at how difficult it was.

"That's why we do them," she said. "This will help you on the slopes."

Obliques, my chest muscles, got a workout in session three with pushups off the big ball, which I held onto to move into situps.

The next day, I felt a good tug in that area, and I knew she had tapped into stomach-strengthening potential.

Then, she'd utter a gutteral "whooooya," and we'd laugh.

It's amazing how vocal a personal trainer's work is. I'm often inspired by "squeeze those cheeks," "you can do it" and "good form."

- Susan Wood is a Tahoe Daily Tribune staff writer.



Help Me Rhonda Personal Training

10 session for $459

5 sessions for $249

Call (530) 208-6369 or see

www.tahoetrainer.com