NEW YORK -- Barack Obama says he wishes he had more time for staying fit. And the Democratic presidential candidate admits that he still occasionally smokes a cigarette. "Most of my workouts have to come before my day starts," Obama told the magazine Men's Health in an interview for its November issue. "There's always a trade-off between sleep and working out. Usually I get in about 45 minutes, six days a week. I'll lift one day, do cardio the next." If he had the time, Obama said, he would spend 90 minutes working out. Quitting smoking didn't create "huge withdrawal symptoms," the Illinois senator said, partly because he smoked only seven or eight cigarettes a day at his peak. His wife, Michelle, pressured him to quit, he said. Obama's advice for those trying to kick the habit? "Eliminate certain key connections -- that first cigarette in the morning, or after a meal, or with a drink," he said. "If you can eliminate those triggers, that should help." Obama said he's bummed a cigarette a couple of times during the campaign. "But I figure, seeing as I'm running for president, I need to cut myself a little slack," he said. Obama said when he told daughters Sasha and Malia that he was running for president, they asked whether the "secret people" -- his Secret Service detail -- would be following them around all the time. "And I told them, well, not right away," he said. "They've adjusted wonderfully. And I've tried to make sure that they haven't had to participate too much in the political process."
