North Highlands, CA Health and Fitness

Guiding Fitness’s staff doesn’t believe in quick fixes or fads. Instead, they’re partial to the simple approach of informed exercise and eating. The team of certified personal trainers do their part during private and small-group personal-training sessions, and the team of fitness instructors schedules month-to-month in-studio and online fitness classes.

Copses of serene pines, oaks, and redwoods cluster along no fewer than 36 rye-grass fairways at Lincoln Hills Golf Club. Even after creating its first 18-hole Hills course, designed by professional golfer Billy Casper and famed course architect Greg Nash, the club decided it wanted another. Its ambition created a second par 72 layout—the Orchard course—giving golfers a choice between two courses where large greens nestle amid rolling hills and naturally occurring wetlands.

The older Hills course unfurls over 6,876 yards. Its second hole demands a tee shot over a lake and onto a tight fairway before players even begin to aim at a green guarded by a bunker on the left. The newer Orchard course also makes golfers sweat at the second fairway, its hardest, which earns a par 5 by coming in at 598 yards and offering a plethora of sand bunkers as well as a 75-foot slope from the tee box to the green.

Instead of smashing cell phones to make rudimentary compasses, golfers navigate the course in GPS-equipped golf carts. The club also entices players with an 8-acre driving range, a practice area for putting and chipping, and individual or group lessons with professionals Steven Treadway and Patty Snyder—a former LPGA Tour player.

At East Wind Yoga, instructors have options for every skill level. Basic classes ease newcomers and returning students into the body mechanics of yoga. Flow classes improve their breathing and cardiovascular endurance, and yin classes combine postures from hatha yoga with deep stretches to address any joint compression and misalignment. Held in a room heated at 105-110 degrees, hot yoga classes help purge toxins after a long day of sleep-testing sarcophagi. Intense Yosu yoga targets balance through the use of soft and rubbery BOSU balls.

Each of the studio's two locations offers a welcoming interior of paper lanterns, exposed brick, and stacks of colorful yoga mats for rental.

When Sandra Augustin, owner of Fitness Rehab, started training for her second Tri-Fitness competition, she needed a change of pace. She began working out outdoors, jogging along the beach, lunging through parks, and scaling the flag poles at local elementary schools.

She drew a crowd. Friends and passersby started joining in, inspired by her enthusiasm and charisma, and soon a regular Sunday group formed, dubbing themselves S.A.S.S. (Sandra Augustin's Sacramento Sisters). The unexpected support group transformed her training into a motivating, communal experience that Sandra wanted to extend the community, so she started Fitness Rehab.

Today, Sandra keeps that same spirit alive in group fitness classes and personal-training sessions. She makes use of body-weight resistance exercises, cycles, and cardio-intensified yoga—a style she designed herself—to help her clients sculpt their bodies and rehabilitate their energy levels. She continues to compete internationally in fitness competitions, and organizes a local Hero Challenge obstacle course, an event that pits civilians against the tests used to train police officers, firefighters, and batmen.

There are no mirrors inside the Bodytribe Fitness gym. When explaining this to reporters from Sacramento News & Review, founder Jeff Conrad explained, "I don’t care about what people look like when they come to my gym. And I want them to not care either, at least for that hour." A freethinker, musician, and fitness aficionado, Jeff challenges current fitness trends and their emphasis on aesthetic appearance inside his unique gym, where he requests that clients silence any cellphones or Theremins they may have on them. Amidst the kettlebells, free weights, and pull-up bars, Jeff and his trainers guide students of all fitness levels through functional workouts that focus on building strong and fit athletes rather than what he calls "pretty little flesh packets".

The seasoned and dedicated trainer is also an avid writer—you can find his fitness philosophy and workout advice in magazines, newspapers, and in his book, Lift With Your Head.

Iceland Ice Skating Rink welcomed local skaters and hockey players for 70 years, until an arsonist’s match burned the facility to the ground in 2010. But, thanks to a committed community effort, volunteers got the facility back in operation in less than a year, clearing 1,000 cubic yards of debris, polishing and lacing 400 pairs of skates, and refreezing the rink’s icy surface. Today, the rink's instructors give back to the community that embraced them in their time of need, grooming aspiring figure skaters and teaching young hockey players to body-check dangerous-looking penguins.