Making My Television Debut

Guess what? Kettlebells are going to be featured on WCIU’s morning show this week. And guess what else? I was there for the filming!

WCIU’s morning news show (a local station in Chicago) contacted Rob and his beachfront boot camp co-teacher Jen to do a piece on their Chicago Beach Fit workout sessions held at North Avenue Beach. The TV crew wanted to tape a segment showcasing kettlebell workouts, which is pretty cool. When I talk about kettlebells with people, they tend to look at me like I have three heads because let’s face it: Kettlebells are still a fairly new workout style. I was amped for Rob to get more exposure because he’s busting his butt every day at the beach. It’ll be nice for a Chicago station to spread the kettlebell word around a bit.

Rob asked me to come to the taping so the class would be as full as possible with participants. I took a few hours off in the morning from work to support him. Heck, he has done so much for me, it was the least I could do for him! Plus, I thought it would be fun.

Turns out it was a lot of fun!

Thanks to the unpredictable Chicago weather, it was raining a bit right when taping was scheduled to start, so my two friends I had recruited to tag along with me ended up bailing out. I felt horrible because I know Rob really wanted the taping to go well and unfortunately it was NOT looking good. Luckily, though, the clouds parted, the sun started shining and our class of fifteen kettlebellers got down to business.

It’s weird to work out while being taped. On one hand, you have pressure to make sure your form is as perfect as possible, you commit to being really energetic and you pay attention to the instructor. On the other, I make ridiculous, squishy faces when I exercise, so I felt like kind of an asshole. And I know this is ridiculous, but I’m still not 100% confident in my body and there are some kettlebell moves I have to do that don’t make my stomach look its best. Not the most flattering look for TV.

In the end, I did it and I’m happy I showed up. The host of the morning show was smokin’ hot (and quite shirtless), which was fun to watch and it was cool to be in the company of so many other people dedicated to working out with kettlebells. Since I do my workouts alone for the most part, getting energy from a group was super cool.

So look for me on TV next week!