On Bad Workout Days

Audrey
Audrey
Sep 4, 2018 · 3 min read

So, something I’m learning about this gym that I just joined is that no one else just joined this gym.

Today during announcements (which happen after the warm up but before the actual workout proper), the instructor mentioned the new organization system for shelving kettlebells. She said “I know it’s hard for most of us who’ve been here for six years to suddenly have to put things away, but yeah, we’re putting things away now.”

Everyone laughed knowingly.

I stood in the back next to the kettlebells and avoided eye contact.

By the way, this was a week 4 class, meaning it was the hardest version of the “essentials” class, which is the class they tell you to take first when you go through orientation, but it was only my second class, and I’ll be honest, at the end I very nearly water-vomited (which is when you vomit but all you’ve consumed recently is water, so you just vomit a sick-colored water).

It was intense.

I thought after it ended I’d feel amazing.

But I didn’t.

It was actually the worst I’ve felt after leaving this gym, and I don’t really know why.

Maybe my muscles are stressed from this new regime, maybe I didn’t like this instructor’s style as much, maybe I didn’t pick the right weights... I’m not sure.

It wasn’t awful, but I didn’t leave feeling the strong, badass, endorphin high with a side of jelly legs I’d come to expect from my previous class and semi-private training session. I left feeling nauseous and dizzy and spent.

As I was walking out, riding low on that feeling, another one of the participants came up to me and told me I did a good job.

She said “don’t worry, it gets much easier.”

Which really hit me: at one time all of these people were new here, but that time was way in the past. I mean, I was probably in high school back when they all wandered in and squatted their first squat.

It made me wonder where all the people at my level are.

I want to meet the other ninja n00bs and talk through techniques, learn to do things right, build up strength and endurance more slowly, instead of pretending I’ve been doing this for 6+ years while secretly feeling like I’m going to vomit.

But I don’t know where those people are. So I take the classes they offer and I accept that being the worst in the class doesn’t mean I’m bad; I did every exercise, I kept up (hence the near water vomit situation), I was just very clearly not as strong as some of these grizzled gym veterans.

And I shouldn’t be, I’m new.

The gym staff encourage you to “run your own race,” and that’s great, but at the gym that sells itself as community-based, and as “the gym for people who hate gyms,” I have to say, after three official classes, I don’t buy that.

I really wanted to, but I don’t.

I can’t imagine someone who had never swung a kettlebell before wandering into that class and ever coming back.

It felt like a solid, tight-knit group of people who had been there for six+ years… and me.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing; strong and flamboyant people need gyms just like us slightly less-strong slightly-less flamboyant people do. And everyone is super nice, that part is true. There’s funky lights and high fives and stuff…it’s just… inaccurate marketing.

And inaccurate marketing bothers me.

Plus, I don’t like to feel weak after a workout.

I like to walk out of that place feeling strong and tall atop my jelly legs.

And today I didn’t.

Hopefully that changes with time.

I know that if I do meet the rare unicorn that is another completely new gym member, I’m going to be nice to them. They’re going to need it.

Audrey

Written by

Audrey

Bilingual, dual-citizen, and reluctant 20-something.