Fat Woman had developed the idea that she could enjoy going for a run. This was a major shift in perception because everything Fat Woman knows about running is that she is much slower than everyone else, that she doesn't enjoy being left behind, and if she tries to keep up with everyone else it physically hurts. Fat Woman has a particularly lovely memory of when it was the 1500m at school. Fat Girl tried extremely hard and spent her energy before getting to the end of the course. The gym teacher was trying to get Fat Girl to run the last twenty metres, which Fat Girl wasn't going to do because her lungs already hurt unbearably. Fat Girl heard the teacher say in disgust "She won't even try." Fat Girl thought that was particularly unfair because she had tried so hard for the whole thing and was still trying hard, both to get to the finish line and not to cry at the humiliation of being so far behind everyone else.
Fat Woman had asked Personal Trainer to teach her natural running. Fat Woman wasn't entirely sure that Personal Trainer was on board with natural running, but certainly they started with running. Personal Trainer taught Fat Woman a very useful technique for sprinting from a standing start. Fat Woman will apply this to netball.
Fat Woman found it all very overwhelming, especially coming on top of the most stressful week she could remember for years. To top it all off, it was what Fat Woman considered the first day of the rest of her life. Fat Woman had done the course she had been waiting for, thus ending the year of time-off fitness. Fat Woman wasn't going to melt down in session, but skipped a shower and promised herself a few self indulgent moments when she got to the car.
On her way out of the gym Fat Woman was waylaid by Personal Trainer. Personal Trainer wanted to introduce Fat Woman to Mrs Personal Trainer. Mrs Personal Trainer is not actually married to Personal Trainer but might as well be according to all accounts. Fat Woman was utterly brain frozen, only just stopped herself from saying: "Aha! The future Mrs Personal Trainer" and was in addition concious of her unwashed hair and red face. Fat Woman's only comfort was that Mrs Personal Trainer didn't seem too chuffed to be introduced to a new person whilst she was in the middle of her own workout. Certainly Mrs Personal Trainer wasn't stopping her progress on the elliptical machine to make conversation, so Fat Woman made a quick escape, concious that she had not covered herself with conversational glory.
Personal Trainer later wanted to know if Fat Woman had been "in a mood". Fat Woman made a mental note to recommend alternative phrases such as "Are you all right?" and "Is anything wrong?" but was fairly impressed that he had both noticed and asked.
Showing posts with label running. Show all posts
Showing posts with label running. Show all posts
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
Fat Woman takes up running
Fat Woman had some unintended therapy. Fat Woman was learning a new technique and had to have it practised on her. Fat Woman was asked to come up with a fixed idea. This was very hard for Fat Woman as she prides herself on not being a person of fixed ideas. You are extremely unlikely to hear Fat Woman say something prejudiced or sweeping about any identifiable group. Fat Woman even tries not to have fixed ideas about individuals. What Fat Woman does have fixed ideas about is her own experiences.
Fat Woman's fixed idea was "I could never enjoy going for a run".
Fat Woman had to think of this idea, then think of the opposite idea: "I could enjoy going for a run." Fat Woman visualised starting by tying her trainers, pictured herself running with some friends, then alone running around the nearby lake, and finally arriving at the park café being applauded by her running friends. It was a nice ending to the visualisation and Fat Woman felt positive.
For some strange, unearthly reason later that day Fat Woman went for a run. It wasn't a long run, perhaps thirty metres, from the seminar room to the ladies, but Fat Woman enjoyed it. Fat Woman enjoyed the run so much that she did it several more times that day.
Fat Woman has enjoyed going for a run.
Fat Woman's fixed idea was "I could never enjoy going for a run".
Fat Woman had to think of this idea, then think of the opposite idea: "I could enjoy going for a run." Fat Woman visualised starting by tying her trainers, pictured herself running with some friends, then alone running around the nearby lake, and finally arriving at the park café being applauded by her running friends. It was a nice ending to the visualisation and Fat Woman felt positive.
For some strange, unearthly reason later that day Fat Woman went for a run. It wasn't a long run, perhaps thirty metres, from the seminar room to the ladies, but Fat Woman enjoyed it. Fat Woman enjoyed the run so much that she did it several more times that day.
Fat Woman has enjoyed going for a run.
Friday, 28 September 2012
Fat Woman and the sound of pounding
Fat Woman went to warm up before a training session. Fat Woman is a naturally lazy person and lives by the belief that if a thing is worth doing twice then it's worth automating. Sadly, Fat Woman has not yet found any way to automate her gym warm up. Fat Woman has, however, worked out how to get her heart rate to the required level in under two minutes. Fat Woman does this by running up the stairs to the gym and then cycling madly on a lowish resistance for ninety seconds. This method has been particularly useful when Fat Woman has been chatting to Swimming Coach for longer than she should have done and wants to avoid being bawled out by Personal Trainer.
Unfortunately, Fat Woman's time-saving routine has been thwarted by Personal Trainer's new gym. This gym is all on one level, so there are no stairs. There are just three upright stationary bicycles, compared to the sixteen at Fat Woman's gym. Today Fat Woman found that one bicycle was (still) out of order and the other two were being used. Fat Woman must have been feeling particular masochistic because instead of taking a reclining cycle she voluntarily got on a treadmill.
Fat Woman hates the treadmill. Fat Woman knows that treadmills were used in prisons both as a punishment and as a tool to demoralise prisoners. Fat Woman understands how the prisoners felt as they laboured away, achieving nothing and going nowhere. Personal Trainer says it is not a treadmill, it is a running machine. Fat Woman doesn't think that makes any part of the exercise any better especially as she can't run anyway.
Part of the reason Fat Woman hates the treadmill is that she is so heavy, therefore she is very slow. When Personal Trainer set Fat Woman a target of 5km walking a week Fat Woman nearly died of boredom. Buying the Endomundo tracker for her phone bailed Fat Woman from her treadmill sentence that time, but obviously isn't much use for a warm up. Fat Woman would love to be able to run, but as her most recent efforts ended in compressed cartilige of the knees, she is saving what passes for her running for sports like netball. However, Fat Woman knows that walking is an important part of functional fitness, blah, blah, blah, yawn! so she got on the treadmill, set the elevation to 2.5% and started walking at 5kmph (3.1mph).
Fat Woman does a very fast walk now, and makes good use of the crossover point of fast walking and slow running. Fat Woman feels the whole process is a massively inefficient use of energy, and feels a little bit like a charging cow, but just for the one day she was going with it.
Fat Woman didn't feel that 5kmph was doing her much good so she upped the speed 6.5kmph and was considering going for 7kmph when she realised that the sound of her feet striking the treadmill was not the usual slightly noisy drumming. Fat Woman's feet were making the kind of loud, echoing thump made by giants walking over a bridge or by large, heavy metal boots (see this clip from Aliens and imagine that going at 150 beats per minute).
Fat Woman wasn't yelling "Get away from her, you bitch!", nor did she have cool futuristic technology to play with, but the slamming down of the hefty foot noise is pretty spot on. For a moment Fat Woman thought pehaps she was in a live action cartoon and someone was helpfully illustrating where people should laugh at her efforts by providing suitably humourous heavy-person-walks noises.
Fat Woman used the emergency stop button. It was worth slamming to a halt in order to instantly stop sounding like a charging rhino on a wooden bridge.
Apparently there is one treadmill which is very noisy. Fat Woman is glad to have found out which treadmill that is so she will never, ever have to use it again.
Unfortunately, Fat Woman's time-saving routine has been thwarted by Personal Trainer's new gym. This gym is all on one level, so there are no stairs. There are just three upright stationary bicycles, compared to the sixteen at Fat Woman's gym. Today Fat Woman found that one bicycle was (still) out of order and the other two were being used. Fat Woman must have been feeling particular masochistic because instead of taking a reclining cycle she voluntarily got on a treadmill.
Fat Woman hates the treadmill. Fat Woman knows that treadmills were used in prisons both as a punishment and as a tool to demoralise prisoners. Fat Woman understands how the prisoners felt as they laboured away, achieving nothing and going nowhere. Personal Trainer says it is not a treadmill, it is a running machine. Fat Woman doesn't think that makes any part of the exercise any better especially as she can't run anyway.
Part of the reason Fat Woman hates the treadmill is that she is so heavy, therefore she is very slow. When Personal Trainer set Fat Woman a target of 5km walking a week Fat Woman nearly died of boredom. Buying the Endomundo tracker for her phone bailed Fat Woman from her treadmill sentence that time, but obviously isn't much use for a warm up. Fat Woman would love to be able to run, but as her most recent efforts ended in compressed cartilige of the knees, she is saving what passes for her running for sports like netball. However, Fat Woman knows that walking is an important part of functional fitness, blah, blah, blah, yawn! so she got on the treadmill, set the elevation to 2.5% and started walking at 5kmph (3.1mph).
Fat Woman does a very fast walk now, and makes good use of the crossover point of fast walking and slow running. Fat Woman feels the whole process is a massively inefficient use of energy, and feels a little bit like a charging cow, but just for the one day she was going with it.
Fat Woman didn't feel that 5kmph was doing her much good so she upped the speed 6.5kmph and was considering going for 7kmph when she realised that the sound of her feet striking the treadmill was not the usual slightly noisy drumming. Fat Woman's feet were making the kind of loud, echoing thump made by giants walking over a bridge or by large, heavy metal boots (see this clip from Aliens and imagine that going at 150 beats per minute).
Fat Woman wasn't yelling "Get away from her, you bitch!", nor did she have cool futuristic technology to play with, but the slamming down of the hefty foot noise is pretty spot on. For a moment Fat Woman thought pehaps she was in a live action cartoon and someone was helpfully illustrating where people should laugh at her efforts by providing suitably humourous heavy-person-walks noises.
Fat Woman used the emergency stop button. It was worth slamming to a halt in order to instantly stop sounding like a charging rhino on a wooden bridge.
Apparently there is one treadmill which is very noisy. Fat Woman is glad to have found out which treadmill that is so she will never, ever have to use it again.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)