May232010
Armchair Gym Sociology
Filed under health by Kim at 10:53 am on May 23 2010
Today was a special day in my gym. The SportFit Laurel is already pretty “for the people” in the sense that every time I am in there it’s like an episode of a mid-90s kids show trying to prove it’s diverse enough. Old folks! Young folks! Kids! Multiple languages, all different abilities, and everyone is friendly! Look we can all work out together! I love this. It always feels like there is no way you could feel like you don’t belong.
That does not extend, gender-wise, to the weightlifting end of the gym. That section usually has all men, or possibly one woman who is only over there because a trainer is working with her. But not this fine sunday morning. Today for most of the morning it was all women! And I don’t just mean two! Before I went over there to see if I could buck up and do the iFitness arm workout, there were four women. I made five. Unprecedented. Pleasing. By the time I left it was all guys again but still.
(I should note however, that as I went to close iFitness, I noticed the arm workout description said “for the man who wants to gain a little muscle in his arms”. I missed the memo where iFitness was only for guys, or that only guys wanted to gain muscle in their arms. Douches.)
Oh and while I am talking about it, someone convince me I can do a bench press without someone spotting me, because I am terrified to lay down under a weight bar alone, and out of budget to get a personal trainer. I need to go back and read the New Rules of Lifting for Women because it was very fear-dispelling.
There was one lady there who was already there and working hard when I got there. I worked out for 1.5 hours. When I left, she was still there, plugging away. Wow. Another lady, and I have seen this a lot, had a little binder where she was checking stuff off. I guess iFitness is my version of the binder, but I have slowly come to realize that nothing is dorky at the gym. Whatever gets the job done.
I am at the end of week two of the couch to 5k plan and it hurts and I am terrified of week three. I may repeat week two. Basically I have to listen to metal to get through the third run and I have to pretend I am in a preparation-for-extravagant-movie-revenge montage to push past that. My HR goes between 130 and 170 the whole time. Bleah. Oh and I let the treadmill give me the gentlest inclines the other day? Horrific shin splints were the result. Going from zero to hero is hard.
OH AND while I am brain dumping about exercise: I am SO UPSET with myself that I have an iPhone 3G. The final straw is that 3GS works with Nike+. I just bought fancy Nike running shoes. But to get Nike+ and C25K app to work together I would have to upgrade to a 3GS. WHY DID I NOT WAIT 6 MONTHS. Hrmph. (Other things: the camera on the 3G is shit compared to 3GS. And I hear that multitasking won’t be happening on 3G.)
1 Michelleon 23 May 2010 at 11:39 am
I’m so excited that we’re both doing couch to 5K now. It always seems to inspire me when we do something diety, schoolish, or workout-ish together.
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Kim Reply:
May 23rd, 2010 at 9:32 pm
I’m glad it inspires you. I can’t tell you though, how frustrating it is that we don’t get to decompress together over margaritas all the time. But knowing you are doing it too helps so much.
What week are you on? Did you have the same thing where you hate it but do it anyways?
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Michelle Reply:
May 24th, 2010 at 6:17 am
I’m on the end of week 3. I didn’t hate it in the beginning but it’s really getting hard now and it’s frustrating. But I want to keep going because I hate failing at things if that makes sense. It just seems to me that if I’m so good at weight lifting I should also be good at running. But I guess weight lifting was really hard at first too, right?
I wish we could hang out A LOT more than we do. It would make my life a lot happier.
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2 Lizon 23 May 2010 at 2:54 pm
All I have to say about women and weightlifting I learned from Mistress Krista.
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Kim Reply:
May 23rd, 2010 at 9:32 pm
Love her site. It used to be non-RSS friendly but it looks like it’s been vastly improved, I will have to go back and check it out again. Thanks!
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3 Terryon 31 May 2010 at 4:34 am
Reading about compatibility issues between running shoes and mobile phone apps makes me feel so, so old
(Does it run on a ZX Spectrum …. that’s what I want to know ..)
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Kim Reply:
May 31st, 2010 at 8:25 am
Oh I have not heard of a ZX Spectrum, not due to my youth I expect but due to my American-ness. At that time we had an Atari 800.
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4 Susanon 21 Jan 2011 at 8:56 am
I can also recommend one app for training – All-in fitness. It’s very convenient, easy to use and has more than 700 exercises for various muscles. If you have time – you can try it.
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