I’ve seen athletes push their bodies so hard during races that they vomit at (and sometimes before) the finish line. I’m pretty sure I’ve never even come close. Until today. Ok, drama aside I did not puke but I sure felt like I was going to.
So maybe I hopped back on the workout train a little too quickly. Weights yesterday morning, kickboxing last night and this morning I show up at 6am for spinning fully expecting to take it easy. That lasted just through the warm up when Danielle, the instructor, announced that our fast-paced workout would start with 16minutes out of the saddle. Um…..ok. I think I made it for about 2 of those 16 before plonking my butt back down on the seat for a tiny rest. Pretty sure I proceeded to do this about every 2-3 minutes for the duration of the 16. Then we cruised for a while then I SH*T you not she said “I think we’ll do another 16”. Dude. I repeated the same pattern of sitting/standing as I did for the first set and felt better when I looked around the room to find at least one of the other women who ran the marathon last weekend was doing a similar pattern. Toward the end of class I got freezing, shivering, teeth-chatteringly cold and seriously felt as though I was going to vomit. I put on my jacket, continued to drink lots of water, did a quick couple sets of abs and headed for the showers.
I know, I know. There’s a good reason why my body wasn’t ready to ‘kick it’ today. A reason I’m very proud of and this was pretty much the first time I’ve really had to back down in a class. I’m always up and at it even if it’s at a slower pace or a lighter intensity than the more fit folks around me. Today was a learning day, though. Learning that sometimes it is right to back off, but that it’s also still right to go, try, and get _some_ work done even if it’s not what I intended or what everyone else is doing. That latter bit is the crux of the matter. From my perspective it take a lot of self-confidence to be the one person in class sitting out an activity or visibly not performing the same as everyone else. Today I was forced to be that person. Forced to be the athlete for whom it was right to take it a bit easier and forced to practice what I’m sure will be a valuable lesson in the training & races to come: taking a rest when my body demands it but getting right back up and going at it again and again and again and again.
That said I think tomorrow's Diva Dash is going to be more of a Diva Crawl for me!
Comments