Beyond Kindergarten, the Buddy System Still Works : An Irvine psychologist says when you are accountable to someone else, you’re more likely to stay on track of a goal.

Ann Saramago loves working out, and she was determined to go to the gym after work. She’d blocked out the time on her calendar, and her workout clothes were already packed in her gym bag.

But by mid-afternoon, Saramago was losing steam. It had been one of those days, and the last thing the 28-year-old property manager felt like doing after she left the office was to go work up a sweat in a noisy, crowded gym. What sounded far more appealing at that moment was to return to her Huntington Beach home, eat pizza and fall into bed.

And that’s exactly would she would have done, Saramago admits, if Pam Marceca had left her alone.

“Pam’s my workout partner and one of my best friends,” Saramago explains. “We meet at the gym four days a week, and we check in with each other every afternoon around 4 to confirm. That day, I told her I just wasn’t in the mood, but she wouldn’t let me off the hook. She basically told me to snap out of it. She said, ‘We’re going,’ so we did.”

But even after they met at the Family Fitness Center in Orange, Saramago was still resisting.

“I only felt like doing two sets on some of the machines, and Pam kept pushing me to do a third,” Saramago recalls. ‘It took me a while to get into it, but by the time I left the gym, I was feeling terrific. I did free weights, Nautilus and rode the Lifecycle. Not only did I get in a great workout, but I followed through on a commitment to myself and to Pam.”

For Saramago and Macheco, their workout regimen epitomizes the buddy system at its best, motivating both women to stay committed to a program that each agrees would be far more imposing if they were on their own.

“It’s tough to maintain consistency on any sort of self-improvement program, so doing it together really keeps us on track,” says Marceca, 32, who lives in Tustin. “There are times when she motivates me, and others when I’m the one who does the encouraging. What’s great, though, is that we always follow through. When I worked out by myself, it was too easy to procrastinate and let it slide. You rationalize that you’ll do it tomorrow.”

Saramago and Marceca, who met in 1989 while working for Arnel Management Co. in Costa Mesa, have been working out together for three years.

“Knowing that Pam’s planning to meet me at a certain time gives me that extra push,” Saramago say. “It also makes it a social thing as well as a commitment to health and fitness. We have a great time talking and getting caught up on what happened during the day. And as busy as we both are, the gym is often the only time we get to spend together.”

*

In recent weeks, Bill Orr of Yorba Linda and Steve Turi of Irvine have also become big fans of the buddy system. They’ve employed it to achieve a goal that neither had succeeded in reaching on his own: losing weight. The two friends, who both work at Turi’s custom door, frame and hardware business in Fountain Valley, began the Nutri-System weight loss program together three weeks ago. Between them, they’ve lost 30 pounds.

“I was sick and tired of my belly hanging over my belt and feeling self-conscious about taking my shirt off at the beach,” says Orr, 31. “I’ve tried dozens of times over the last three years to drop the weight, and I stuck to my diet during the week. But on weekends, I always blew it. It was very discouraging.”

Orr and Turi were both inspired by Turi’s brother, Bob, who recently dropped 22 pounds on the Nutri-System program in six weeks.

“We both watched Bob lose the weight and thought, ‘If he can do it, so can I,’ ” says Turi, 40. “One morning Bill came to work and said he was ready to do it. By coincidence, I had already decided that I was going to go sign up that day at lunch, so we went together. It was sort of a fluke, but I think that doing it together has been a real advantage for both of us.”

For the past three weeks, Turi and Orr have spent their Monday lunch hours weighing in, ordering food and meeting with their counselor at Nutri-System’s Irvine office. Orr, who stands 6-foot-4 and began the program at 258 pounds, has lost 17 1/2 pounds and is more than a third of the way to his weight loss goal of 43 pounds. Turi, who is an even 6 feet and weighed 240, has lost 12 1/2 pounds; his goal is 205.

“The buddy system definitely helps keeps you focused and honest,” Turi says. “It’s not that it’s a competition, but knowing that Bill and I are going to weigh in together every week is a real motivator. There’s a certain amount of pride and ego at stake.”

Orr agrees.

“I have a competitive streak, so doing this with Steve helps keep me on the straight and narrow,” he says. “I don’t need to do better than Steve on this program, but I have to say that it would really bother me if he was losing weight and I wasn’t.”

Adds Turi: “You lean on each other for support because you’re in the same boat. We talk about our occasional desires to cheat, and we compare notes on which food we like or don’t like. We talk about overcoming obstacles and resisting temptation. You compare notes a lot, because you know the other guy understands what you’re going through.”

*

Irvine psychologist John Musser says the buddy system works because it empowers people to establish connections and nurture relationships.

“When you know you are accountable to someone else, you’re much more likely to stay focused and on track,” Musser says. “Back when I was doing my dissertation, I played tennis once a week with a friend who was also writing his dissertation. Every week after we finished our game, we got caught up on how each of us were doing. We talked about what the experience was for each of us and what obstacles we were encountering along the way.”

Their buddy system, while informal, resulted in both men completing their dissertations in less than a year.

“It made a significant difference,” Musser says. “Friends of mine who didn’t create that support system for themselves found it much more difficult to keep moving and on track.”

Musser says mutual goal-setting is an important step in creating a supportive partnership that works.

“It’s important to verbalize you goals,” Musser says. “Be specific, and also be clear on the steps you’re going to take to get there. Make a commitment to yourself and your partner. What are you going to do and when are you going to do it? When you give your word and put your integrity on the line, you’re less likely to let thing slide.”

Equally important, Musser adds, is that both people remain committed to the partnership, even if one temporarily strays off track or loses momentum.

“If your buddy isn’t living up to his own expectations, there’s nothing to be gained by making him wrong,” Musser suggests. “The idea is to lend support. Find out what’s going on and what, if anything, you can do. Talk about what’s working and what isn’t so he can recognize where he might need to make adjustments in his plans.”

Musser says it’s important to create some sort of payoff or reward once both parties have achieved their goals.

“It’s always nice to dangle a carrot out there, something fun that both people enjoy doing. It’s an added incentive to stay the course, and looking forward to a night out or some other special event can really help make the process a little more fun.”

Orr and Turi, who talk at work every day about their experiences on their weight-loss program, agree that the buddy system has given each of them the jump-start they needed to achieve their goals.

“I know myself well enough to know that it would be a lot harder for me to stick with this program if I was doing it on my own,” says Orr. “Steve has been a real source of encouragement. They say that misery loves company, but so does success.”