Jake Martin
Developer and Extreme Sportsman

Land developer Jake Martin is always looking for the next challenge. A Florida native, Martin, 31, buys properties from Tampa to Anna Maria, building Key West-style houses that pay conscious tribute to the Florida seaside tradition.

He's also always looking for the next sport to conquer. "It started for vanity. I was a small 14-year-old and wanted to be big," he says. Martin tried every sport in high school-football, tennis, baseball and swimming-but it was in solitary and extreme sports that he found a second career.

Today, the surfer, snowboarder and amateur boxer follows a disciplined fitness routine. "A strong core-my shoulders, chest, abs, hips and back-is the source of my body's power, speed and coordination." Exercise is stress release. "If I don't work out hard I don't sleep, eat or digest well," Martin says. "I am deeply connected to my body and if that isn't up to form, I can't be. The discipline in dealing with injuries and ups and downs athletically, that's the same stuff I use in my business successes."

ROUTINE

"Cardiovascular workouts in the morning, usually at 6 a.m. Lately, I have been into a sprinter's routine, running 100-meter sprints as hard as I can for 40 minutes, three times a week. That is alternated with biking three times a week. The heart is the most important muscle, so I give mine a lot of attention. I do my core training and weights at the LifeStyles Gym on Cortez Road five days a week. Lots of lunges, jump rope and strength training. Also yoga if I am in the mood. A lot of leg training for snowboarding and surfing."

TIPS

• "Consistency is the key. In the last 15 years the most I have ever missed was five days, and that was to go on a surfing or snowboarding trip."

• "I always do what I hate to train first."

• "Eighty percent of fitness is clean living and a clean diet."

• "Even if you don't want to work out, work out. Sometimes those days you think will be the worst turn out to be the best."

Melinda Delpech
Attorney and Biker

For Sarasota attorney Melinda Delpech, 42, one of life's pleasures is rolling down Longboat Key after work on a silver Litespeed bicycle. Dressed in spandex shorts and a jersey that reads "Biker Chick," Delpech says she is "pounding out my day. I have my own practice in family law, and it is not an easy job. I don't look at scenery at all, just at the bike in front of me, or the road if I'm in front. I find peace when I ride for a long time."

Her training also girds Delpech for bike races. "The end of September we went 180 miles from St. Augustine to Daytona and back," she says. "Then it was the MS ride, from Tampa to Orlando and back. It was 185 miles over two days. Next is the Horrible Hundred in Claremont, Calif. You know from the name that is a grueling 100-miler. Lots of hills, and most Florida riders are not used to hills. Here, the biggest hill I ride is the Ringling Bridge."

Bottom line? "It keeps me sane," she says. "I don't know what I'd do with myself if I didn't ride."

ROUTINE

Monday and Thursday: 5 p.m, YMCA stair climber for 20 minutes, then Pilates class or an hour of weights.
Tuesday: 6 to 7:30 p.m., running clinic at Brookside Middle School.
Wednesday: 5 p.m., short bike ride (20 miles) with friends on Longboat, dinner at the Old Salty Dog on City Island.
Friday: the gym or laps over Ringling Bridge. "If I haven't missed any workouts all week, Friday is really my only day off, and then it is off to happy hour with my friends."
Saturdays and Sundays: 7 a.m., 40-mile ride back and forth on Longboat Key with the Sarasota Manatee Bike Club.

TIPS

"Just get out and do it. We all have excuses, but make exercise the priority and it turns into a habit and then becomes an addiction."

Dale O'HaraRealtor and Ironman

A committed ironman triathlon competitor, Re/Max real estate agent Dale O'Hara, 36, has a theory about winning. "I don't enjoy training. I love racing. When that starting gun goes off-whoa-that is what gives me all the juice I need. I'd be sitting on the couch watching football and drinking beer with the best of them if I didn't have to race."

An ironman triathlon consists of a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike race and a 26.2-mile marathon. It is a challenge for even the fittest athletes. "Physical preparation can take the emphasis, but it is the mental component of endurance racing I need. Sit on a bike for five hours pedaling as hard as I can after swimming through two and a half miles of waves, and the demons start coming out."