training & racing

Fear & Loathing in Hout Bay

August 4, 2015

I may have vomited a little in my mouth.

Yes, that appeared to be my body’s response to the raw fear I felt when I looked at the box in front of me and realised that there was nothing smaller coming my way.

unnamed (1)

It was an evening of weights, weights and more weights. And box jumps, but more on that later.

On the upside, it appears I still have my mojo when it comes to hard headed persistence (thanks to years of kung fu and months and months of triathlon training).

We learnt about push presses and other kinds of lifting work, which was awesome as I enjoy weight training and the technique that goes with it. And not even the small matter of hitting my chin with the pretend weight bar, seconds into a push press, could dampen my spirits. Thank the old gods and the new for PVC pipes, or I may have had a medical emergency.

Push Press
Push Press

It was around this time that I learnt a new term: AMRAP (as many reps as possible).

The boxes came out and I kinda stood back waiting for the baby boxes to come out. But… nothing. We were given two options: jump on the box or step on the box. Either way, we had six minutes to do as many reps as possible – one rep being 6 box jumps and 6 push presses.

unnamed (5)

Like… WHAT?? My life started to flash before my eyes. I eyeballed the height and tried to calculate my risk of injury. I am so very short and that box was so very high (yes, even when turned on its side). And I am extremely accident prone, as two ankle surgeries will tell you.

So I put my big girl panties on and I stepped onto that box and I lifted that weight bar, again and again until my specs started to fog up and my legs started to buckle. And then I did some more.

All that was missing was Eye of the Tiger playing in the background.

It was at that point that I could taste the rusk I had with my tea this morning… TMI? Clearly you never read my poopy pants triathlon posts!

**********

Lessons learnt today:

  1. My body has places I never knew about. I know about them now because, PAIN.
  2. Training from Level Zero sucks. Don’t let yourselves go, peeps! Just. Don’t.
  3. Jumping on the box is a state of mind. Right now my mind is stating “you will step, not jump.”
  4. You won’t fit into your skinny chick jeans the morning after your first proper training session in two years, despite burning a gazillion calories in the process.

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