Jamie has been attending a local fitness boot camp to get back her "rockin' body", as she calls it, so I decided to join her yesterday. I was really excited to go and work on my "rockin' body" after hearing her description of how fun it was.
The excitement continued building throughout the day. I kept thinking to myself, "Gonna get my flex on. Gotta get my sweat on. I'm gonna get ripped." All of those typical guy thoughts. I think that I even did my best Arnold impression in the mirror. "Get down! Get into the choppa!" (Bicep flex, Tricep flex, Mr. Universe pose) You get the idea.
I began to think back to my glory days when I lived in the weight room. "King of the Weight Room" title holder-1997. The more I thought about it, the older I felt. I was in high school over 12 years ago! This could be bad. I sit behind a desk all day typing away and making phone calls. Not exactly a physically demanding job. I began to worry. How sore will I be tomorrow, will I pull something, will I still have good form, etc...
The wife briefed me before going to the class. "Don't be all competitive and stuff. Just do the exercises and don't embarrass me." I just gave her the typical, under the breath, "Uh huh." I was about to own this class! I swelled up just thinking about it. How hard could it be. Jamie always came home saying, "We walked around the building carrying our weights. We did a bunch of squats today. We did crunches and leg lifts today." I thought to myself, "And they call it bootcamp?"
Well, here is a little back story. My aunt is the bootcamp founder and instructor. I always hear, "Are you related to Melody? I go to her bootcamp and I have lost 75 pounds." I reply with the robotic "Yes and congratulations!" After hearing the same question and story over a million times you just program your response in your mind. Really though, congratulations, I am glad that she is doing very well with her classes and helping so many people.
I stroll into the building, psyched up and ready to go. I have not been through a good workout routine in quite a while. We drop Charlie off in the daycare room and proceed to a large area where 50 people are rolling out their mats and getting ready for class. They line up their 3 and 5 pound weights and stretch a little. It is easy to recognize who the "professionals" are and who the "rookies" are. I thought that this was going to be a fun class until I realized that the "rookies" are the smiley people and the "professionals" are the not-so smiley people.
I made my way to the instructor, my aunt, and asked to borrow some weights. Now, everyone has 3 and 5 pound weights. I was expecting to receive some 3 or 5 pound weights for the class. I found myself with a set of 12 pound weights. At the time, I had no idea what we would be doing with the weights so I thought that 12 pound weights were standard for the males in the class.
We began the "warm-up" stage of the class and no one told me that it was just a warm-up until we were about 10 minutes in. We marched in place. That went well. We did some side-to-side shuffling. That was okay. We then performed some jumping jacks. Still good. Then the warm-up took a dark turn. Melody announced to the class that she had family members attending and she had to make a good first impression. Pardon my language, but I think that I said something along the lines of "Oh, s**t!"
We picked up our weights and began hammer curls. I made it through the curls without an issue. The hammer curls then turned into over-head presses. This is where it went down hill. I began the presses and after about 176 reps my shoulders began to tire very rapidly. Apparently I asked the wrong person for some weights to borrow.
The presses merged into hammer curls to over-head presses. In between sets we performed side step squats. I found muscles that have been in hibernation for several years. The burn was running through my body. My face had to be priceless. Just imagine a tough guy trying to keep a serious face mixed with the occasional break through of the, "Holy Mary and Joseph! What am I doing here?" face. My curls turned into wrist twist, the presses transformed into weights resting on the shoulder, squats became waist bends. I was done and we were only 20 minutes in.
As we were finishing up the "warm-up" my cousin came to me and said that Charlie was having a melt down. A part of me was thinking, "Thank you Jesus.", but another part of me wanted to try to get back to class. I was pushing through the pain and about to break through the warm-up stage. I went to console Charlie and he was not going to let me leave the room without him. I picked him up and grabbed his bag of Cheetos. Now I am walking around a fitness bootcamp carrying a bag of Cheetos. I tried to hide them to the best of my ability, but I could still read the minds of the people around me. They must have thought that I was the devil. I can hear it now, "Carrying Cheetos around here. What a great supporter he is." Sorry everyone. They were for Charlie.
My body is letting me know today that I got a butt whipping yesterday. We have arranged for Grandma to watch Charlie for the next class. I will be going again tomorrow. This time I will own that routine.
The excitement continued building throughout the day. I kept thinking to myself, "Gonna get my flex on. Gotta get my sweat on. I'm gonna get ripped." All of those typical guy thoughts. I think that I even did my best Arnold impression in the mirror. "Get down! Get into the choppa!" (Bicep flex, Tricep flex, Mr. Universe pose) You get the idea.
I began to think back to my glory days when I lived in the weight room. "King of the Weight Room" title holder-1997. The more I thought about it, the older I felt. I was in high school over 12 years ago! This could be bad. I sit behind a desk all day typing away and making phone calls. Not exactly a physically demanding job. I began to worry. How sore will I be tomorrow, will I pull something, will I still have good form, etc...
The wife briefed me before going to the class. "Don't be all competitive and stuff. Just do the exercises and don't embarrass me." I just gave her the typical, under the breath, "Uh huh." I was about to own this class! I swelled up just thinking about it. How hard could it be. Jamie always came home saying, "We walked around the building carrying our weights. We did a bunch of squats today. We did crunches and leg lifts today." I thought to myself, "And they call it bootcamp?"
Well, here is a little back story. My aunt is the bootcamp founder and instructor. I always hear, "Are you related to Melody? I go to her bootcamp and I have lost 75 pounds." I reply with the robotic "Yes and congratulations!" After hearing the same question and story over a million times you just program your response in your mind. Really though, congratulations, I am glad that she is doing very well with her classes and helping so many people.
I stroll into the building, psyched up and ready to go. I have not been through a good workout routine in quite a while. We drop Charlie off in the daycare room and proceed to a large area where 50 people are rolling out their mats and getting ready for class. They line up their 3 and 5 pound weights and stretch a little. It is easy to recognize who the "professionals" are and who the "rookies" are. I thought that this was going to be a fun class until I realized that the "rookies" are the smiley people and the "professionals" are the not-so smiley people.
I made my way to the instructor, my aunt, and asked to borrow some weights. Now, everyone has 3 and 5 pound weights. I was expecting to receive some 3 or 5 pound weights for the class. I found myself with a set of 12 pound weights. At the time, I had no idea what we would be doing with the weights so I thought that 12 pound weights were standard for the males in the class.
We began the "warm-up" stage of the class and no one told me that it was just a warm-up until we were about 10 minutes in. We marched in place. That went well. We did some side-to-side shuffling. That was okay. We then performed some jumping jacks. Still good. Then the warm-up took a dark turn. Melody announced to the class that she had family members attending and she had to make a good first impression. Pardon my language, but I think that I said something along the lines of "Oh, s**t!"
We picked up our weights and began hammer curls. I made it through the curls without an issue. The hammer curls then turned into over-head presses. This is where it went down hill. I began the presses and after about 176 reps my shoulders began to tire very rapidly. Apparently I asked the wrong person for some weights to borrow.
The presses merged into hammer curls to over-head presses. In between sets we performed side step squats. I found muscles that have been in hibernation for several years. The burn was running through my body. My face had to be priceless. Just imagine a tough guy trying to keep a serious face mixed with the occasional break through of the, "Holy Mary and Joseph! What am I doing here?" face. My curls turned into wrist twist, the presses transformed into weights resting on the shoulder, squats became waist bends. I was done and we were only 20 minutes in.
As we were finishing up the "warm-up" my cousin came to me and said that Charlie was having a melt down. A part of me was thinking, "Thank you Jesus.", but another part of me wanted to try to get back to class. I was pushing through the pain and about to break through the warm-up stage. I went to console Charlie and he was not going to let me leave the room without him. I picked him up and grabbed his bag of Cheetos. Now I am walking around a fitness bootcamp carrying a bag of Cheetos. I tried to hide them to the best of my ability, but I could still read the minds of the people around me. They must have thought that I was the devil. I can hear it now, "Carrying Cheetos around here. What a great supporter he is." Sorry everyone. They were for Charlie.
My body is letting me know today that I got a butt whipping yesterday. We have arranged for Grandma to watch Charlie for the next class. I will be going again tomorrow. This time I will own that routine.
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