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Tackling Dummy
A football-challenged paper lioness sees if she has what it takes to swim with the New York sharks
I’m running full-tilt down the field with Tonika in hot pursuit, remembering what she told me earlier in the day. "I love to hit people, to be honest with you," she said, her eyes shining with glee. "This is the only place I can hurt someone and not get arrested."
With these words in mind, I pick up the pace and do my best to expand the distance between us.
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Physical Phashion
Six-pack abs? How retro. Here are the new definitions of the body beautiful
The most coveted fashion accessory of the moment is the designer body. High fashion is now thigh fashion. And the height of haute couture is the perfect hip contour. Increasingly this involves a few nips and tucks. "People customize everything now from their clothes to their houses to their ears. Customizing their bodies is just a logical extension of this," says Randall Hayworth, M.D. FACS, the board-certified plastic surgeon responsible for the transformations on Fox’s reality show "The Swan."
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Cutting Class
Bringing out the samurai warrior in you
When I was 8 and my brother Mark was 10, we got into a massive battle with hockey sticks. It ended in an impressive head wound for me, along with no TV privileges for a week. As usual, Mark escaped unscathed and unpunished. This was my one and only experience with martial arts, but I never forgot it. So it was vindication that piqued my interest in a hot new fitness trend: samurai sword fighting. I saw a flyer for private lessons at the gym and decided that vengeance could be mine for only fifty bucks.
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We Come to Mars
How NASA’s astronauts are preparing for life on the Red Planet
Since President Bush announced plans to send a manned spacecraft to Mars, NASA scientists have been hard at work trying to define the limits of human physiology. Designing better equipment is the easiest part. But how do you build a better human?
I recently wrangled myself an invitation to NASA and the Johnson Space Center in Houston to learn how their experts are overcoming human obstacles to the Mars mission. In between interviews, I even subjected myself to some of the foods Martian astronauts will be eating. Once my stomach stopped doing flip-flops, here’s what I learned.
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The Tougher Sex?
Emotional and metabolic strength favor women in athletic events that test endurance
Gail Marino, a 42-year-old Staten Island resident, recalls her performance in the 2002 Joe Kleinerman 12-hour "ultra-marathon." The race is held in Queens every year and the object is to see how much distance you can rack up in half a day of running around a 1-mile loop.
"I ran 71 ½ miles and finished in first place overall," she says. "The second-place finisher was also a woman. She ran 70 miles. Third place was a man who ran 69 miles and fourth place was a woman who ran 68 ¾ miles."
While it’s still unusual to see women dominating any athletic event to this degree, it seems the longer they go, the better women perform. Some experts even think that possessing two X chromosomes is an advantage when it comes to extreme distances. Or that, to some extent, it at least levels the playing field.
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Who You Gonna Believe?
A Coney Island contortionist disputes new findings about the benefits of stretching
"Oh, my knee," says the Scorpion King as he eases on to the low wooden bench at the front of the theater. Though he’s quick to point out that his knee just feels tired, rather than painful, it’s hard not to wonder if stuffing yourself into a 30-inch duffle bag and wrapping your legs behind your neck several times a day isn’t a little tough on the joints.
"I discovered my talent for flexibility after I was stung by a scorpion as a child and almost died," says the Scorpion King, who along with Blazing Tyler Fyre the Fire Eater, Eak the Geek and the Beautiful Insectavora, is a cast member of the Coney Island Side Show, housed in a tine theater just off Surf Ave. in Brooklyn.
The slim, shy 19-year-old, whose real name is Ravi Sagar Seepersad, is the show’s contortionist. He swears he did not invent this story for his act. But it’s more likely that his astonishing bendability is due to natural talent, four hours of daily kung fu and stretch training.
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It’s Only a Number
When stepping onto the scale, many women lose their sense of proportion
"Oh, no, no no, no!" shrieked one woman when she saw them lined up on the floor. Two other women rounded the corner and stopped short, looks of horror on their faces. Another woman burst into tears.
What inspired such hysteria?
Bathroom scales. Fifty of them.
They strike terror in the hearts of women everywhere, regardless of age, background, education or income. And when conceptual artist Emily Caigan displays 50 of them in her "Scale Dances" installation, women react.
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In this corner . . .
The Bush and Kerry workout routines give new meaning to the concept of presidential fitness
President Bush likes the go-it-alone sameness of distance running. Sen. John Kerry likes to dabble in extreme sports, trying windsurfing one day and snowboarding the next.
You could argue that how the candidates choose to work up a sweat reveals more about them and their politics then their campaign platforms do.
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Different Strokes
Bent out of shape? Crippled by stress? Hobbling because of a bad back? Try one of the many alternative massages city therapists can offer
Chaunce Hayden hit upon the perfect cure for his aching back while watching "The Simpson." In terrific pain, Homer draped himself over a dented garbage can, whereupon his backache instantly disappeared.
"Last year I was suffering from horrible back pain," says Hayden, 41, editor of Steppin Out magazine. "With nothing to lose I staggered to the back of my house, laid my own metal garbage can on it’s side and began to roll my back over it. It actually gave me some relief, so each day I would do it a couple of times for about five minutes. By the end of the week, my back pain was gone."
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Full Throttle
Break out of your workout rut by pushing your body to the limit
It’s 7:30 on a Tuesday morning and I’m struggling up a 30-foot rope, my lack of coordination on full display. My heart rate hasn’t dipped below 180 in more than two hours. People are shouting at me. "Use your legs!" they scream. "Grab the knots with your feet!" I finally reach the top of the rope, then promptly freefall into a pit of thick mats.
Welcome to the Full Throttle experience, an intense eight-week training program at the Sports Center at Chelsea Piers at 5:45 a.m. along with 20 or so other hardy souls, and we subject ourselves to a tow-hour heart-pounding, body-busting workout. We sprint endless laps in the pool, race countless miles around the indoor track, pedal heavy resistance on the spin bike - and then there are the grueling 30-minute military-style calisthenic drills, including the rope climbing.
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