I have long heard of people talking about loving Crossfit classes so when I saw a month of classes being offered at a silent auction, I nabbed it. It was a moment of temporary insanity. After a couple of weeks of feeling guilty about not cashing in on my winning bid, I decided that I had to at least give it a try.
I contacted the owner of Crossfit Rutherford to let him know and to tell him that I do have a few physical limitations. What I wanted to happen was for him to tell me that I would not be able to take the classes and that I could give them to someone else. He instead said, “No problem” and told me to come on to tonight’s class….great. I had a “red flag” right before class that should have cued me for a u-turn. I have heard that some of those classes do odd things like carrying concrete blocks, rope climbing, etc. I wanted a challenge but my goal in buying the classes was not to have the skin on my hands ripped off. I sent the owner another message asking if I would be needing to bring workout gloves. He responded with, “Only if they match your purse.” I am so glad that I didn’t lead with the hand sanitizer question.
On the way I stopped and OCD’d…I mean washed my car. Everything was in order; I was prepared. When I walked into the facility I noticed a distinct absence of a smoothie bar and there we no machines with padded seats…actually there were no seats at all…and no machines. What kind of place was this? Couldn’t they afford any equipment? They didn’t even have carpet on the floors! The floors were concrete with some areas that had rubber mats. There were also no big screen TVs. How was I going to watch my afternoon shows while I worked out?
Fortunately, I saw an friendly face that I hadn’t seen in years. It was a realtor who had worked in my very first real estate office, Annette. It was sooooo good to see her. She was just back from being very ill and was not exactly sure if she was going to be able to make it. “Finally”, I thought, “someone to talk to while I workout.” Just as soon as we started to catch up with each other, the class leader, Todd came over and had me sign all the next-of-kin papers, in case I died in the middle of class. As it turns out, he was in my brothers very first elementary school class as a student and my brother was his teacher. There I was in a Crossfit class for the first time with the girl who worked at my first real estate office, in a class taught by my brother in his first year of teaching. It was a night of firsts. So, I signed my life away and boom, we started.
He explained what we were to do and to be honest it didn’t sound all that hard. I don’t know why it didn’t sound hard to me; I don’t do any of those exercises. I think I was in the denial phase of the night. I had to get on the one and only machine there, which was the rowing machine (how hard could that be?) and row for 400 meters. Next, I had to go over to what looked like low hung Olympic rings. I was to have my back on the floor, grasp the rings and raise myself up to the rings. It looked kind of like the way you would teach a granny to do pull ups. You only go a couple of feet off the floor and your feet stay on the ground. Piece of cake right? The next move was to do 20 push ups, going all the way to the ground and picking your hands up off the ground and then starting over. A split second rest between pushups sounded great to me. The only problem I had with it was that 20 was double my current “most pushups ever done at once” record. Last butt not least, was something that I thought I might just use to catch my breath. It was a box about two feet high. All I had to do was sit on it and get back up…20 times. I know that when I get up and down out of a chair that I use my arms to push me up and lower myself. I also know that I do 0 squats at the gym. Still, this was going to be a cake walk. He announced that we would be doing all this three times and that the entire thing would be timed….water off a duck’s back. I wasn’t sweating it at all.
We started and that rowing machine got me warmed up. It hit my legs and my shoulders. Going straight to the rings, I felt strong. I went over and got on the floor and grabbed the rings. I couldn’t believe how much effort it took to hoist myself up off the floor a couple of feet. Really gravity…could you not just cut me a little slack? To make matters worse, beside me was a beautiful college girl doing pull ups…real ones….20 of them. After a few rest periods in some white chalk dust, I finished and moved on to the push ups. There is something about picking your hands up when you hit the floor that flexes your back and makes it all just a little bit harder. Once again, 195 lbs couldn’t have felt heavier. Finally, I was off to my last chore and that was to go sit down and stand back up again. I was looking forward to the break. Funny (funny odd, not funny haha) when you are not using your arms to push yourself up from the seated position, you have to flex your leg muscles and your glutes. My lower half has nursing home muscle tone; I admit it. This little up/down routine pushed me to my limits. Nineteen, twenty, my legs were killing me and it I was done… and then it was time to start over again! Oy!
By round three, my Adam’s apple had been replaced with my heart; I could feel it. My face felt like it had a heat lamp on it and I was leaking water from head to toe. I was a human soaker hose. What was this new sensation and why didn’t I experience this at the gym every day while I workout and watch TV?
I made it thought the rowing machine but I couldn’t pick my feet up to get them out of the stirrups. I had to manually grab my feet and pick them up out of the foot holsters. I got over to the Olympic rings and all I can say is that cold concrete floor felt great. I wanted to put my face on it. I had to do my 20’s in four sets of five. “It’s all good” I told myself while doing my granny floor-pull-ups. I waddled over to the mat and did my push ups, also in small groupings and noticed that I was raining on the mat. Finally, I got to go over and do my final “sit on the box” workout and all I can say is that I felt the burn. I curse you Sir Isaac Newton…I curse you!
It was over! I made it without calling 911 and without throwing up. Those were my two main goals and I accomplished them both. I was a winner. I could feel, for the first time, every vein in my body throb in sync with my heartbeat. OMG. My friend, who had been sick for so long and who was weak, had been right at my heels the whole time. She’s a beast. I didn’t get a chance to talk to her the entire workout. Of course, if I had been given the chance, I wouldn’t have been able to speak anyway. I could almost not breathe. I had not felt like that in over 15 years. Not since my wreck had I pushed myself like that. I walked out and felt like someone had stuck a quarter in me somewhere; I was shaking all over. There wasn’t any part of me that could just be still. I can remember years ago, standing too close to the speakers at a nightclub and feeling my clothes and body shake; it was kind of like that but without the music and light show.
For the rest of the night I have just felt odd. I thought at first that something might be wrong with me but really, I think I am just relaxed. I have heard stories of endorphins but thought it was all a myth. Maybe that is what this is. I do know that rigor mortis is setting in…everywhere. Tonight I did have one lady tonight tell me that since she had been taking the classes her butt was two inches higher. That was actually a quote. I will say that I am pretty sure that when I get up in the morning, I will feel like I have had that procedure done. Of course, I am not sure that I want my backside to be two inches higher as I already have a very short waist. I wonder if there are any Crossface classes anywhere.
Yes, I have found the portal to hell and it is called Crossfit Rutherford. I am way to competitive to not go back, at least for my one month pass. It’s just that it is so….hard. Why do we do these things to ourselves? People pay for this? I know I will be paying for this tomorrow. If I had never heard of it I would never have gone and would not be sitting here wondering who I am going to call to help get me up out of this chair. Why is that song, “If I only had a heart” running through my head and why do my feet feel like two microwave ovens on high? Oh my, tonight I might need sleep in a lift-chair, just in case...that would not be a first.
