Nutrition Tip :: Walking in extreme heat has felled some of our best WoW Power Walkers. No matter what your fitness ability and training experience the effect of extreme heat is never entirely predictable and it is best to be cautious when training in extreme heat conditions over 25°C. Be sure that the foods you eat contain plenty of electrolytes, as these salts are excreted with your sweat. Potassium is an important electrolyte that should be plentiful in the diet. Oranges, bananas, mangos, wheat germ, bran, tomatoes, and grapes are high in potassium and are perfect to eat before training and to bring along with you. The dried version of fruits that are high in potassium contain more potassium per serving and are perfect to pack for long training walks. Our favourite recovery drink, chocolate milk, is also high in potassium! Please note that people with kidney problems or diabetes may need to limit potassium intake. If you have any concerns, always consult your physician.

Strength Tip :: Here’s a special treat! Starting today and for 6 days after, a new strength exercise will be posted on our blog each morning. Log on to the blog and practice the exercise of the day. After you have tried the exercise, write a descriptor down that will remind you what it is. Place the written description in a box beside your door. For the next 6 weeks, use these exercises to build your strength. As you leave for your walk, choose 2 from the box to execute at the end of your walk! Strength exercises are an excellent complement to your walking workouts!

Babies like to get outside too! And there is no reason why you can’t walk your butt off while pushing a stroller! We are excited to be introducing WoW Power Walking coaching for moms and dads with wee ones in strollers. For the fall, this class will be offered in our High Park location only. More details to be announced in our August newsletter.

WoW Power Walking® coaches are
proud to wear New Balance shoes.

Membership :: It may have been American Express that declared membership has its benefits, but WoW Power Walkers are confirming it to be true. As we approach our one year anniversary of offering a membership option at the point of class registration on the website, we have noticed that many walkers are taking advantage of the member privilege to attend two or more classes in a week. While research has shown that one class a week of the intense interval training we do in class is sufficient to improve key fitness indicators such as resting heart rate, blood pressure, and resting metabolic rate (i.e how well you burn off calories at rest!), it is still important to incorporate other workouts into your weekly routine. For those of you that find it difficult to this without the motivation of a coach and fellow class participants, the WoW membership has been invaluable. We are thrilled to see so many people benefiting from this programming change and we will continue to offer it through the fall of 2010. If you want to see where and when classes are available in an easy, one-page format, go to the Training Schedule page on our website and select Membership Summer 2010 Weekly Class Schedule.

Special deal! For July only, we are offering a special deal on our periwinkle shirts. 35% OFF – any periwinkle shirt that we have in our inventory – prices have been changed at the website already. This is a great colour for summer and our shirts have been among people’s favourites for many years. They were designed and manufactured uniquely for WoW Power Walking!

BIG SUR ALERT :: Registration for all Big Sur International Marathon events
for 2011 including the marathon, 21-miler, 10.6 mile, 9 mile, and 5 k opens
on July 15 this year, six weeks earlier than in the past. If you have any
questions about doing this race, contact Lee. There should be several of us
making the trip for race day: May 1, 2011.

Words to walk and live by . . .
To tend, unfailingly, unflinchingly, towards a goal, is the secret of success”

– Anna Pavlova, Russian ballerina