Posted on 04/01/2002 1:07:13 AM PST by JohnHuang2
RAWFORD, Tex. — President Bush ran on Saturday morning on his 1,600-acre ranch here, between phone calls from Secretary of State Colin L. Powell about Israeli tanks smashing into Yasir Arafat's compound in the West Bank city of Ramallah. He ran on Air Force One on his way to Mexico last month, on a treadmill set up in the jet's conference room. Mr. Bush ran on the flight back to Washington from El Salvador, too.
In the United States, the president runs in the nation's finest hotel suites, in the woods of Camp David, and, of course, in his exercise room on the top floor of the White House. During the summer at the ranch, he keeps track of who is a member of his Hundred Degree Club — Secret Service agents who can keep up with him in the heat.
"I really like to run," Mr. Bush said somewhat unnecessarily in the East Room last week at a ceremony announcing the nomination of two top health officials, including Dr. Richard H. Carmona as surgeon general. "It makes me feel better. The doc and I are going to encourage all our country to either run or walk or swim or bicycle for the good of their families, for the good of their own health and for the good of the health of the nation."
Mr. Bush seems determined to be the poster president for working out. His personal best is a 6:45 mile for three miles, a record he set last Thanksgiving at Camp David. He runs four to five days a week, uses an elliptical trainer about twice a week and lifts weights at least twice a week. He can bench press 185 pounds, for five repetitions.
"That's certainly better than the average bear," said Tom McCarthy, a personal trainer at Tenley Sport & Health, the gold standard of Washington health clubs, when told of the president's bench-press poundage. "He's pretty strong."
All other recent presidents have exercised while in the White House — Jimmy Carter, the first President Bush and Bill Clinton were runners, and Ronald Reagan lifted weights — but no one has approached the focus or intensity of Mr. Bush, who was working out, at 11:30 a.m. on a Wednesday, when a gunman fired shots outside the White House fence last year. (Mr. Bush stopped his workout while the Secret Service informed him of the gunfire, then resumed. The less-buff vice president was at his desk.)
The physical benefits to Mr. Bush, 55, are obvious. After a 5-hour, 50-minute checkup at Bethesda Naval Hospital last August, the president's doctors proclaimed him in "outstanding health" and said that his cardiovascular fitness — Mr. Bush was monitored while running on a treadmill for 26 minutes with a maximum heart rate of 178 beats per minute — placed him in the top 2 percent of men his age.
Mr. Bush had lost weight as well, down to 189 pounds from the 194 pounds he had carried on his six-foot frame on the campaign trail. His body fat had declined, to 14.5 percent from 19.94 percent.
The psychological benefits are clear, too. On the morning of Sept. 11, before the World Trade Center and Pentagon were attacked, Mr. Bush went running on a golf course in Sarasota, Fla., with Richard Keil, a White House correspondent for Bloomberg News and a former All-American distance runner. Mr. Keil, who at 40 averages a six-minute mile for three miles, said that Mr. Bush talked to him then about how running helped ease the stress of his job. Mr. Keil said he was impressed with Mr. Bush's speed.
"We were running probably 7:15 miles, and he was clipping along, and talking very comfortably," Mr. Keil said. "If you're not in real good shape and running that fast, you can't carry on a conversation."
Since then, Mr. Keil said, Mr. Bush has made comments to him making clear how running has helped him manage the stress of a presidency that changed forever that morning.
It is telling, too, that the only time that Mr. Bush ran a 26.2-mile marathon was in January 1993, just two months after his father lost the presidency to Bill Clinton. Mr. Bush, who was deeply wounded by the defeat, had first set his sights on the Dallas marathon in December. But his doctor told him it was foolhardy to push so hard and so fast, so he settled on the Houston marathon the next month. He finished in a respectable 3 hours 44 minutes.
Mr. Bush declined to be interviewed about his fitness regimen for this article. But last week, shortly after a domestic policy briefing and a meeting with the prime minister of New Zealand — and as the Middle East veered toward crisis — Mr. Bush answered 20 questions that had been e-mailed to Ari Fleischer, the White House press secretary, who walked them into the president in the Oval Office, then reported back.
Mr. Bush said he began running in 1972 and lifting weights in 1989, for cross-training purposes, and he works out at different times of the day — late morning, afternoon or evening. His workouts usually last an hour, he has no personal trainer, he watches his diet, but he likes desserts.
Mr. Bush did not answer a question about whether his exercise regimen helped him manage angry or bad moods. "I have never seen him be in either," Mr. Fleischer intoned.
It sounds to me like we've got one secret weapon we've yet to drop on Osama!
You got that right!!
As for the article ... does this mean the NYT is starting to like Bush??
Nah, even a broken clock gets it right twice daily ;^)
. . . and Ford skiied while he was president. 'Course the template was that the former star college lineman was "clumsy", so mentioning that (rather than talking about his falling on the slopes) would be too much to expect, even in an uncritical article about P43 . . .
Nixon, LBJ and Eisenhower were the most recent presidents to have no public reputations for fitness (Eisenhower golfed--but had heart problems . . .). JFK talked a good game, but journalism was flacking for him big time; I shouldn't wonder that Reagan was actually more physically fit than he.
Regards,
btw that's not the body of someone who runs or exercises.
And Good morning to ya!
Gore allowed Clinton to "sprint past" him; and then Gore feigned exhaustion, doubled over.
It was quite a performance.
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