Yesterday, actually. Today, I slept through my alarm and missed spinning. Yesterday, though, I was a warrior! I went into Group Power thinking that it was probably time to add weight on one or two tracks, something I do every couple of weeks or whenever things start to get easy. I wasn't sure where to add the weight, but my instructor answered that for me. As we were setting up for the chest track, he said that he thinks the current chest track is easy (!) and that we should all think about adding on weight. Having grown up as a nerdy brown-noser, I do pretty much anything a teacher tells me to, so I added weight.
Its amazing what 4.4 pounds (2kg) can do. At 22 pounds (10kg), I spent the chest track humming along to the Black Eyed Peas' "I gotta feeling" and thinking about what I would eat for breakfast after class. At 26.4 pounds (12kg), I spent the chest track grunting and thinking about what I would do if I dropped the weight on my head.
It was worth it, though. There was a moment during our final stretching routine where I caught a glimpse of myself in the gym mirror and thought "Damn, I actually look like I belong here." That's not something I think often when involved in athletic endeavors. I've never played any sports in my life because I'm just really, really bad at them. When I was in elementary school, my grade in gym class consistently kept me from getting straight A's. I'm uncoordinated, unbalanced, slow, and generally happier sitting on the sidelines reading a book.
The only athletic endeavors I've ever enjoyed are running, biking, and swimming, and I never thought about competing in any of them until my late 20's when I dated a competitive runner. In the winter of 2007, he persuaded me to enter a couples' 5K with him, the Hartford Marathon Foundation's Romantic Niantic race. I didn't even know what "5K" meant. In the car en route to the race, I remember saying "This is 2.5 miles, right?" and almost passing out when he said it was 3.1.
The race was brutal- it took place along the Connecticut waterfront in February, meaning that it was about -5 degrees out. I was passed by old ladies and children and wondered several times if my lungs would collapse. My ex won his age group, finishing in under 18 minutes, and then came and ran with me as I collapsed across the finish line at 34:15. Between his stellar time and my mediocre one, we landed in the middle of the couples' teams.
As tough at that race was, I am so grateful for that day and for my ex pushing me. I came away from that race thinking "that wasn't easy, but I did it, and I could do better if I tried again." That afternoon, the ex and I both bought new running shoes and signed up for another race. Later that week, I started tracking my mileage. Over 450 miles later, I still have a hard time thinking of myself as an athlete, but its getting easier.
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