"Whatever the reason, his heart or his shoes, ..." Just like the Grinch I looked for a reason why I gave such a poor showing of myself today at boot camp. Of course, I know the only one I really disappointed was myself and disappoint myself I did. Could it have been that I have been feeling pretty lousy the last couple days and haven't quite recovered from that? Maybe it was a lack of sleep last night. Or maybe I just didn't have it in me today. I'm not sure. Just felt like I hit the wall.I woke up the same way I always do on the morning of camp. Although tired, I really looked forward to the challenges I knew Dustin or Ryan would have for us and whether or not I would feel like I've made some progress. Ryan was our instructor today and he put us to work immediately. His suicide drills got us going fast but I liked those a lot. Quick, intense, and fun. The fun didn't last long though because we moved to the hill. Eight minutes of running up and down the hill, and seeing how many times we could make it up to where the hill kind of plateaud out. For whatever reason, I could not motivate myself here. I was on the very edge with no one to my right, and no one real near me on the left. Probably should have moved in closer so I wasn't so isolated. Might have gotten my competitive fires going a little bit. The strange part was that my legs really didn't bother me that much, and actually felt pretty good at points. It just seemed like I was out of breath and having to breathe really heavily. I made it up and down 3 times during that time but feel I could have done so much better. I kept telling myself "you can do it" and "keep going" but just couldn't do it.
Our circuit was good. I did better than on the hill. It's amazing how long 45 seconds can be or how short it can seem. So I figure I either do better on some things or our timer isn't being as accurate on some rotations. Luckily I didn't feel overly disappointed here. I feel like I was able to push myself more. Still, I tried to go all out on the agility drill with the medicine ball and on the box hop but know it wasn't nearly as well as I've done on other days.
On the final group of core exercises I really floundered today. Again the breathing seemed to be more of a factor than anything else. I kept pulling back to take breaths. The russian twists and v-ups bothered my back a little more today too. At least I didn't quit though. I kept at it. I did as much as I could until the end. Ashamed to admit that I did modified push-ups for my partner push ups at the end. Again, I tried, but couldn't keep myself up. I was really glad when we were done because I don't think I could have done much more. Hoping I'll be ready to go again on Monday.
I must say though that being at boot camp is so inspirational. I love watching all the people in various stages of fitness continually push themselves to get better. At the end of our session, when Ryan was pushing us to our limit, there was no quit in these people. People jokingly whined or complained but they kept going. Everybody wants to be there. We've also been taking more time in the shelter after class to stretch and Sharon and I have been getting to know people better. It has been a real opportunity to learn about the personal and physical challenges other people face and to see that we're not alone using boot camp as a stress reliever.
Finally, just a quick address to how we are doing as a married couple working out together. Prior to starting boot camp I had a few people tell me that we were lucky we can work out together because they can't with their spouse. Some say they can't keep up with each other or too much competition arises between them and they get angry. Luckily, we've never had this problem. We actually met in a very stereotyped aerobic instructor, participant scenario. Only I was the instructor and Sharon was the participant. So exercise has always been a strong part of our relationship. When we work out at the health club we are pretty independent of each other but help each other out when necessary.
We decided to do boot camp together both to challenge ourselves in a new way and to help relieve the stress in our lives. We have a high, special needs child and a teenage daughter
(can there be anything more stress inducing than that?). By attending together we can understand what the other is going through physically and we know how we can best encourage the other. We are able to support each other, especially in those early mornings when it would be so easy to turn over and go back to sleep. It gives us a common point of conversation so that we don't spend all our time talking about our kids, but rather some time to focus on ourselves. And, luckily for us, we just like each other! We need some time independent of each other too but exercise is such a common interest for us, that this has worked out great!
Have a good weekend!
Roger
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