Or the reporter is an idiot.
A boot camp that makes you shape up.
Nothing works.
Not the gym, with the treadmills that go nowhere.
Team in Training groups are great and worthwhile, but as you're making new friends, you're hitting the old ones up for money because you have to fundraise for a cause.
Something's got to take — and not just for summer, but for our very lives.
Some 21 percent of King County adults are obese, according to updated numbers from the Washington State Department of Health.
And the percentage of adults who are obese more than doubled over the past 20 years, from 10 percent in 1990. Meanwhile, food keeps getting more outrageous.
KFC just extended the run of its Double Down fried-chicken, cheese and bacon sandwich; more than 10 million have sold. Not to be outdone in the realm of food-as-cartoon, IHOP is sandwiching its pancakes with ... cheesecake.
Time to call in the troops on our behinds.
For 12 years now, Sgt. Mike Lawson has been getting the region's people to move.
He calls them names, makes them kiss the wet pavement, slog through the mud, do squats straight uphill — and they love it. They pay him for the privilege.
The other morning before dawn, I climbed Sundial Hill at Seattle's Gas Works Park and took in this man in combat boots with an accent as Boston as the Green Monster.
"Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life!" he barked as he sized up our shivering circle.
Lawson, 42, a former recon commando in the Army, has the longest-running boot camp-style fitness class in a city where at least eight have cropped up over the last few years.
More than 100 people have signed up for one of Lawson's two, 10-week classes, which are held at 6 a.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays at Gas Works Park, and 6 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays at Woodland Park. (Cost is $175. To sign up, go to www.therac.net/bootcamp.html).
Over 75 minutes, "troops" are put through sprints, squats, crunches, push-ups and stretches. Do what you can, at your own pace, Lawson said. Just don't quit.
"I don't care if you come in first place or last place," he said. "Just do the best you can do. And if you're not doing the best you can do, I'm on you. I can tell!"
Lawson started coaching when he was an Army private assigned to those about to retire. If they couldn't pass a fitness test, they wouldn't receive their benefits, or could be dishonorably discharged.
"These were heroes," he said. "So it's become my life's mission. I am saving people's lives."
Those who survive the first week of his class become devoted.
Jan Benson, 57, of Seattle, has been taking the class for 10 years. She likes that there are people in their 20s and 50s, that the class is not gender specific, and that it's inclusive.
"No matter where you are, there's a place for you," said Benson, who does computer mapping. "Everybody there wants you to do your best, so even if you're the last person, they're cheering you on.
"You just have to start."
Shannon Ellis-Brock, 43, started taking Lawson's class a year ago. She has since lost 35 pounds and no longer needs her medication for high blood pressure.
"I get bored easily," she said. "So I am not going to go to a gym. This class is always something different."
Lawson is as goofy as he is grueling. He gives people nicknames. He tells them he loves them, then threatens bodily harm. And he pesters them about everything ("What kind of sneakahs a' those?"), including what they consume. It worries him.
"The economy is depressing people," he said. "People just want to eat."
Which explains KFC's Double Down — right?
"I don't think I could eat one of those, and I am a meatasaurus," he said. "But you! Where were you this morning? I am going to eat cornflakes out of your skull!"
That'll work.
Army Recon Commando? Did I miss a DOD school? A PV2 or PFC running PT for soon-to-be retirees? APFT to get retirement?