A funny thing happened on the way to the gym
I was on my way to my workout at the local gym when I looked at the car driving in front of me. A Honda Prelude. I felt honored to be graced by such a vehicle fording ahead before me, confident that I was really the star of the road. After all, I was driving a 88 Royale.
But it occurred to me that Prelude owners might feel a little slighted by their car purchase. Not that it was a bad car - far from it - but it would always leave me thinking if there was something better out there I was missing. 'If this is the Prelude, where is the main act? Why didn't I get thatcar?'
Anyway, I got to the gym and I started on my new* routine. I was on the treadmill pumping away when all of a sudden I heard a familiar set of beats. Dum-da da-da-da da-da-da-da... followed by the words, "I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar..."
About thirty seconds later I busted up laughing and nearly fell of the treadmill. I played it off to my fellow gym-mates as the Seinfeld episode I had been glancing at during the workout.
Interestingly enough, "Don't you want me?" has the perfect rhythm for my walking aerobic workout. Plus, I was suddenly more motivated while the song was playing.
When I was done on the treadmill I got over to the weights. Now one of the things I was intimidated with working with the weight machines is the scale on those machines. I sit down on the bicep curl machine, for example, and range goes from 6.25 to 150 lbs. Other machines go to 250 or 400 lbs (depending on the muscle group). I always feel a little sheepish when I select my weight, because I look at all the weights beneath it.
After all these months of 'lifting' I'm only about halfway to max. I keep thinking about how much time and effort it will take to get even another 50% towards the maximum. And then I look around at all these people with bulging biceps and quads and deltoids and wonder what level they are. I would feel much weaker going after one of them....
Luckily, that didn't really happen. Very few people actually used the same machine I was using. And I remember sitting down to one machine (something that worked the pectorals) just after a woman had gotten up from the machine. The setting: 12.5lbs. My setting: 125 lbs. I know she was in her 40's and not that in shape, but it still made me feel pretty good. I'm pretty sure that's one middle-aged philomath resident I can take in a fight. (*scratches name off list*)
Toward the end, a muscular looking guy was using a lot of the machines I was, usually just after I was done. The first thing he would do was increase the weight. Then he would do a few reps, and strut around the gym for a while. When I would come back to the machine (and actually saw that he was lifting around 30 lbs more than I was) I wouldn't do anything - just kept my head down and worked at my lower weight. He came back, increased the weight, and did his reps. I really started to get the idea he was competing.
My last machine was the Leg Press. He was doing some sort of leg extensors exercise next to me. He also had just been on the Leg Press machine just before me, so I know what he weight he was doing. I am proud to say, I beat him on that exercise by 60 lbs: 270 lbs pressed vs. his 210. As I did the fourth or fifth rep I could see him look over out of the corner of my eye. I ignored him, but continued to do about 15 more reps after that (20 total).
I never did get to see if he tried to up his original 'score', cause I left after that - feeling pretty good.
*my new routine consists of 1/2 hour of cario with 1 hour of weights, 2-3 times a week. My old routine was 1 hour of cardo, 3 times a week and 1 hour of weights 2 times a week. No real reason for the change, other than I've just been lazier lately.