Body Combattered

Monday 6th August - Body Combat 

My eyes are sweating after this one. I am still in the testing phase of gym going, so I am trying to give everything and equal chance and not pay too much attention to the description. I will now point out that this is not a class "suitable for all levels of fitness". It is not one to be reckoned with.

Luckily I had Collette and Lorraine with me to offer some sort of solidarity in the studio. They were there illegally. Blatantly disregarding the queue system and therefore undermining the integrity of the gym, if you ask me. Shocking. But it was nice to think that if I passed out there would be someone I know to tell my mum I loved her.

It never bodes well when the sprightly, bleach blonde instructor wishes the newbies luck before the class begins. She did however assure us that all the moves would be in the warm up, which was mostly not a lie. It became clear very soon that this was going to be a difficult class. Lots of punches and kicks, and hopping from one foot to the other. The move that threw me the most was when she told us to skip, we involved us imaginging had skipping ropes. I genuinely could not tell you what my legs are supposed to do when I skip. All I know is when then is no rope to jump over; flailing is the only option.

She kindly took us through arms and legs separately so the other could recover. I know I said previously that I don't suffer from bingo wings, but punching imaginary hitmen repeatedly quite honest made my entire arm ripple, so now I'm not entirely sure if that is supposed to happen or whether I do, in fact, have fat upper arms. Maybe we will never know.

Things got immense when she whacked out the Pirates of the Caribbean remix. I swear every exercise on the planet should involve that piece of music. Hans Zimmer I salute you. We did some awesome sword fight moves followed by stuff I didn't really care about because the sword fight was taking up too much of my brain capacity.

After this she announced we only had two songs left (only?! seriously I thought I was going to pass out about 20 minutes ago). At this point she dimmed the light and whacked out O Fortuna. But we did not surf.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rbZr7YoqK0

My life flashed before my eyes about five times during this routine. Broken up slightly by repeatedly punching an imaginary figure on the ground. 10 points for guessing who I was imagining there. (Hint. She's sprightly and bleach blonde).

The class was rounded off by a sit up/press up session which I barely even attempted. Sweat was running off my face onto the mat (Dear next user, my apologies). My arms don't support my weight at the best of times, let alone after 55 minutes of that. 

We staggered back to the changing rooms. I had under-boob sweat and my eyebrows ceased to be functional pretty much until I got home and showered. I got a message from Amelia with the six best words on the planet "Would you like a bacon sandwich?". I actually had to ring her in response because my thumb-to-eye coordination was shot and I think my finger nails were sweating.

So I drove home, had a cold shower, downed the leftover jelly and drove to Amelia's for a well earned bacon sarnie.

This class gets 9.5/10. It was intense. I think its similar to childbirth in that I've now forgotten the pain and am actually pretty psyched do the class again on Friday.

I also just picked up my sports bra to find that 8 hours later, it is still wet.