The Spin bike of death

Last night I got the brilliant idea to take a spin class, somehow I thought "I can do this! It will be great, how hard can it be? It's only sitting on a bike" Oh, how wrong and naive I was. If I could go back in time I would pat myself on the head and say "You sweet naive little thing. You have no idea". So at 5am this morning (I'm working from home this week) my alarm blared and I literally dragged myself out of bed after a fitful night of sleep. I dragged myself to the gym half asleep to be greeted by this lovely older woman. She was so excited and happy that I was there. I told her I was taking the spin class and she loudly (much to loudly for 5:30 in the morning in my opinion) "OH! My dear! You are going to love it! ENJOY!" Well alrighty then, if this lovely lady is so enthusiastic about it then it must be great. So I get to the room and to my dismay all the bikes in the back were taken by older men. Great so I get to be up front where everyone can see me, just ducky. The instructor quickly came over and introduced herself and told me that I should go at my own pace, but make sure to push myself! Then there was some shuffling around of the bikes as certain bikes are harder than others I guess. A really nice woman told me that I did not want the bike I was on and switched with me, I was so grateful. So I get on the bike and I immediately think that my bum is way to big for this little seat. Not so comfortable..Not.at.all.  Anyway, I settle in and start to pedal, thinking "this isn't so bad!"  The instructor settled in and announced that she was starting the class. So we get into the warm up and she's telling me not to worry about the gears and just go at my own pace. I think "psh I'll be able to keep up with these people, I'm probably the 2nd youngest person here!" Dead.freaking.wrong.  We start "going up a hill" which she tells me that means I have to turn up the gears (if I'm ready of course) so I do. I am starting to sweat, ok well this is what you're supposed to do when you work out. About 15 minutes in I am dripping sweat like I've never experienced in my 29.5 years on this planet. The instructor keeps shouting "GO FASTER EVERYONE. PUSH HARDER!" I am thinking "lady, I am going to knock you off that bike". Then she says "OK WE'RE GETTING TO THE HARD PART NOW!" "WHAT ARE YOU SERIOUS?! THAT WAS THE HARDEST THING I'VE EVER DONE IN MY ENTIRE LIFE!!" I can barely lift myself off the bike to do the up and downs at this point, My butt is ACHING from sitting on this seat that was probably used as a med evil torture device and my body is completely soaked. I am thinking of all the swear words to call the instructor at this point because I am convinced that she is my mortal enemy. I'm doing my best to keep up and I look around and everyone else looks just as tortured as I am feeling. I feel a little better about that, knowing I am not the only one dying here. Then the instructor announces that we're going to take it up for 4 minutes and then onto cool down. Ok, so I can do 4 minutes of this. That's it and then I will be done. For those 4 minutes I pushed myself way past my comfort zone. By the end I definitely thought I was dying like in poltergeist "CarolAnne come to the light!" and then it was over. I was done. I did the cool down and hopped off the bike, my legs were jelly. The instructor comes over and now that she wasn't trying to kill me, I felt a little better about her. "How'd you do" Awful. I died 8 times. "Good! that was a good work out!" "Your bottom will probably be sore tomorrow" well it's going to fall off at this point, so that won't be a problem "Well I'm so glad you came! I hope you'll come again" yes. "Yes definitely!" 

So even though I will likely have to sit on a donut for a few days and my legs feel like I ran a marathon, Spin was a GREAT work out. It worked so many muscles and I will definitely be sore tomorrow, my overall experience was much like how I feel about running a race: awful while I'm doing it but great after. 

I'm already looking into when the next spin class is.