Whoo hoo! No procrastinating tonight. I am using the adrenaline from tonight's session to write this. I put enough people through the arduous task of reading the lead up and the full week rundown; with varying degrees of diplomacy - certain friends loved it, others commented on how lengthy and detailed it was, and last but not least, my father, who said it was downright too long for him to read. I consider this a triumph, since my father is the master of the novela-length email; the tendency of verbosity seemingly has been passed on genetically.
Mind you, Tuesday is not on the schedule, but my dentist, Dr. Marquis De Sade DDS, insisted that I come in on Monday, after not completing an on-the-fly root canal, which she had begun the Thursday before. Two shots of Novocaine does NOT numb you to the pain of a root canal - and for some reason, she couldn't understand the pain and anxiety I was exhibiting, and told me to try and calm down (I could rant about this further, but that is not the point). Reluctantly, I switched my Monday session, and wouldn't you believe it - the more senior dentist took one look at my tooth, and said he couldn't do anything. GREAT.
Given that the guys in the office were doing their Fantasy Football draft tonight (participating in a yearly ritual which, according to experts, costs American business $1.5 Billion in lost productivity on the day of the draft), I changed into my uniform in the conference room, walked out to grab something off my desk, to be greeted with a thumbs up from one of my colleagues. Judy in suits and twin sets and pearls, they are used to; camos are another thing.
It was strange to walk down to Chelsea without Sunil; but, I used the walk down to mentally prepare, and to people watch. Noticed that there were a few people walking in the opposite direction wearing camouflage shorts, and I couldn't help but wonder, had they also gone through the rigors of PPBC?
Arriving on the second floor, I signed in, and even though Linda (at the desk) was nowhere to be seen, I got on the floor and did my 5 pushups - non-modified! Dropped my stuff off in the pup tent, and ran into the women who I had seen on my first day, chatted them up a bit about the past week. Since we were a bit early, we got to witness some of the torture being inflicted on the 6:00 class.
A normal beginning - 7 laps around, which, to my delight, I managed without any sort of nausea and major shortness of breath. Back to the PT space, going through the stretches, and since we had an uneven number of people (someone came in late, was sharply reprimanded by the DI). So, luckily, I got double-duty stretches by the DI. And then, my faaaavorite - squat thrusts, 20 of them! I felt like a bowlegged frog trying to struggle through them. After this, to break it up, we did a lap around the course, but not at a run, you would leap forward and then touch the ground. All the way around.
Apparently, Tuesday is abs day, which was a bit scary, given that it has probably been around 6 years since I have done any major ab work. The first exercise: you partnered up, one person would lie on a mat, with the other standing above the other. The person on the floor would grab their partner's ankles, raise their legs up to the person's hands, and after coming back down, opening and closing their legs. This was a count of one. We were made to do 3 sets of 30. Thankfully, my lower abs were able to handle it, and my partner was a great motivator, and, admittedly, skipped a few counts on the third set, so I didn't do the full 90, but close to it (major improvement). The euphoria quickly dissipated when we were directed to the row of tires on the obstacle course, and were instructed to do 75 'canteen sit-ups' (for those who hadn't read my first post, it is a partner sit-up exercise, where you lock your feet into a tire, and pass a full canteen back and forth as you do the sit-ups. 75? Are you kidding me?? But, my amazingly diesel partner, into her 4th week, seemed undaunted, and determined to get me through it. We didn't know where the canteens were, and I was invisibly led by the ear by the drill instructor to a crate where the canteens were stored. The beginning was okay, but then I started to waver around 25. My partner said, let's just try and get to 40, and we could move on - I felt a bit guilty about slowing her down, so I did my level best to keep up. We got to 40! But then the DI yelled out for a count, and we weren't going to lie, so when we said 40, he said, 75! Somehow she got me through it. We got to 75! Okay, I'll admit it, I cheated a bit, and assisted myself by grabbing my pants several times. But hell, we made it.
Back to the PT area, we were given our next task - a series of 5 exercises. 1. Butterfly sit-ups, which had you on your mat, knees out, doing a set of 50. 2. Sit-ups with your legs at a 90-degree angle to the floor - 50. 3. Hard to describe - they were called in-outs, which had you on your mat, semi-seated, hands flat on the ground, pointing forward - and you had to use your lower abs to start out with your legs straight out, and bring them in towards your chest (IMPOSSIBLE - I needed a spot from the DI). 4. Clapping pushups - a set of 25. 5. Squat thrusts - 20. We were to repeat the whole routine 3 times. Ack. The butterfly sit-ups? No problem - my partner counted off 3 and I counted each sit-up. For some reason, the legs straight up sit-ups were difficult, I couldn't get my legs straight! And forget about the 3rd one. In the first set of squat thrusts, I was about to collapse, and then thankfully we moved back to the first exercise. But, I learned a sneaky trick - as opposed to doing the squat thrusts on the floor, I used the sandbag on the edge of the course, and the second set was infinitely easier. We got through the 3 sets, and I muscled through the final set of squat thrusts in time for the DI hollering for us to come to the climbing wall for group sit-ups. He didn't let up; made us do 25. And at the end, as usual, we had to shout out one of the principles of leadership - I was on the end, so I hollered out "TRUST"!
A pleasant discovery as I was leaving class - turns out that a woman I was chatting with is my neighbor. We were talking about living downtown, and she asked me where I lived. One thing led to another, and then it turns out that we live across Rector Park from each other. The things you learn in conversation!
Back on track for the week - going back tomorrow!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment