3 days on and I feel like I've settled back into my routine. Up at 7am, on the tube by 8:10am, working - or pretending to, a girl's gotta have a little downtime between holidays and work, you know? - til 5:30pm and then off home for gym/dinner/American Idol. What Cape Town?
Yesterday was my first day back in the gym in 3 weeks. This was the moment I spent my whole holiday dreading. Going to the gym when I'm in a routine is fine. It's so much a part of my existence that I tend to exercise on automatic pilot. It's an hour of my day where I resemble a blank canvas on the inside, and a juicy, overripe tomato on the outside. I never get tired to comparing myself to the other suckers for torture to see which of us is the reddest/sweatiest/making the most off putting faces on any given day at my local Virgin Active. However, going to the gym after a nearly 3 week break has its downsides, to channel the master of understatement.
Thursday night is aerobics night. Scarf and I try to go every week, and when we're fit, it's a great class. It's almost exactly the same routine each week, so as you get fitter, you can push harder and test your body's intensity limits. When we're not fit, however, it resembles being chained to the inside of a giant hamster wheel and forced to run for 45 minutes while pulling the weight of a mack truck behind you. And before you suggest it, we don't walk out of classes - we're too chicken shit for that.
So there I am, puffing away after the first 5 minutes - which only constitues the very reasonably paced warm up - and trying to stifle my gaping yawns. This yawning thing is a fairly recent development, I do it all the way through my classes. I can't decide if these are "I am so over this right now" yawns or nervous "OMG what IS she going to make us do next" yawns. Either way, I imagine my instructor must be wondering what kind of bitch not only comes to her class and makes this half-assed attempt that would make James Cordon look good, but also has the cheek to act like her class is more boring than a One Tree Hill storyline.
I managed to fumble my way through the cardio by making sure every leg lift was 2 inches lower the normal, and every squat was more like the gentle knee dip you make when you courtsey. Once we were down on the floor for toning, I thought I was home free. I may have eaten and drank too much while on holiday, so its understandable that my heavier frame has the buoyancy of a block of lead, but surely my abs have survived the trip? Ha bloody ha. We hadn't even completed the first set of reps when I realised that in fact, they are even more incapacitated than my legs, and the burning sensation was so bad I was twisting like a pretezel in an attempt to get away from my own stomach. Even the warm down at the end was embarrassing, with my whole body doing the Beyonce shimmy when it was supposed to be held still in a zen-like stretch.
My only consolation is that there were plenty of other girls who looked as bedraggled as me at the end of it all. Claire-Bear wrote the other day about the annoyingly perfect looking people at Constantia Virgin Active in Cape Town - well, I can safely say that across the pond, there are very few gym bunnies. All the beautiful people are at Mahiki with Kate Moss and her posse; they opt for the Starvation Method over the Step & Sweat Method. I am truly grateful for the normal human beings inhabiting London gyms. After spending 3 years attending Green Point Virgin Active in Cape Town, aka The Gym Where All The Models Go, I get irrationally enraged everytime a see a girl coming into a gym with loose, freshly straightened hair and perfectly applied make up. And then, when they do that kind of slow mo jog so the hair can billow in the blasts from the air con....it is enough to send my sweat-soaked self into a state of treadmill rage, a far more dangerous syndrome than road rage (think of the damage potential in a gym...weights dropped on feet, people bumped off cross trainers).
I'm currently trying to work up the courage to go back for more tonight. My body is creaking like a cellar door, and some smoker has clearly stolen my good lungs and left their emphysema-riddled set in my chest as a joke. But I will persevere. Beautified gym bunnies, watch out. I will stairmaster your head.
Yesterday was my first day back in the gym in 3 weeks. This was the moment I spent my whole holiday dreading. Going to the gym when I'm in a routine is fine. It's so much a part of my existence that I tend to exercise on automatic pilot. It's an hour of my day where I resemble a blank canvas on the inside, and a juicy, overripe tomato on the outside. I never get tired to comparing myself to the other suckers for torture to see which of us is the reddest/sweatiest/making the most off putting faces on any given day at my local Virgin Active. However, going to the gym after a nearly 3 week break has its downsides, to channel the master of understatement.
Thursday night is aerobics night. Scarf and I try to go every week, and when we're fit, it's a great class. It's almost exactly the same routine each week, so as you get fitter, you can push harder and test your body's intensity limits. When we're not fit, however, it resembles being chained to the inside of a giant hamster wheel and forced to run for 45 minutes while pulling the weight of a mack truck behind you. And before you suggest it, we don't walk out of classes - we're too chicken shit for that.
So there I am, puffing away after the first 5 minutes - which only constitues the very reasonably paced warm up - and trying to stifle my gaping yawns. This yawning thing is a fairly recent development, I do it all the way through my classes. I can't decide if these are "I am so over this right now" yawns or nervous "OMG what IS she going to make us do next" yawns. Either way, I imagine my instructor must be wondering what kind of bitch not only comes to her class and makes this half-assed attempt that would make James Cordon look good, but also has the cheek to act like her class is more boring than a One Tree Hill storyline.
I managed to fumble my way through the cardio by making sure every leg lift was 2 inches lower the normal, and every squat was more like the gentle knee dip you make when you courtsey. Once we were down on the floor for toning, I thought I was home free. I may have eaten and drank too much while on holiday, so its understandable that my heavier frame has the buoyancy of a block of lead, but surely my abs have survived the trip? Ha bloody ha. We hadn't even completed the first set of reps when I realised that in fact, they are even more incapacitated than my legs, and the burning sensation was so bad I was twisting like a pretezel in an attempt to get away from my own stomach. Even the warm down at the end was embarrassing, with my whole body doing the Beyonce shimmy when it was supposed to be held still in a zen-like stretch.
My only consolation is that there were plenty of other girls who looked as bedraggled as me at the end of it all. Claire-Bear wrote the other day about the annoyingly perfect looking people at Constantia Virgin Active in Cape Town - well, I can safely say that across the pond, there are very few gym bunnies. All the beautiful people are at Mahiki with Kate Moss and her posse; they opt for the Starvation Method over the Step & Sweat Method. I am truly grateful for the normal human beings inhabiting London gyms. After spending 3 years attending Green Point Virgin Active in Cape Town, aka The Gym Where All The Models Go, I get irrationally enraged everytime a see a girl coming into a gym with loose, freshly straightened hair and perfectly applied make up. And then, when they do that kind of slow mo jog so the hair can billow in the blasts from the air con....it is enough to send my sweat-soaked self into a state of treadmill rage, a far more dangerous syndrome than road rage (think of the damage potential in a gym...weights dropped on feet, people bumped off cross trainers).
I'm currently trying to work up the courage to go back for more tonight. My body is creaking like a cellar door, and some smoker has clearly stolen my good lungs and left their emphysema-riddled set in my chest as a joke. But I will persevere. Beautified gym bunnies, watch out. I will stairmaster your head.
2 comments:
The gym I used to go to also (thankfully) had few gym bunnies, most people looked like I did. Too big T-shirts and not sure what to do with the handle on the rowing machine when it got to their boobs...
I think you should stop gym altogether and then you'll be as fat as me and I won't feel guilty for eating crap ;)
But then again I won't get to laugh at you anymore when you stand up :P
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