Tuesday, April 27, 2010

My GYM ESCAPADES

One thing that bothers you when you are fat ("Healthy" as  they say which to me is a more polite to say the former) is everybody greets you by patting on the stomach or the regular remarks "You have put on (a lot of - this they sometimes skip as a gentleman gesture but you know better) weight" or "You look 3 months into pregnancy".
But to tell you what a fat belly is a good Drum . Have  played it many times ! My fat stomach is generally considered a Good , Bouncy cushion and they say even a bullet will bounce back off it !! 
Just to complete the stats - In my Friends terms "I am 36-38-40" .

Though Fuming inside-out all you can do is smile (I had heard somewhere about a killer smile .. just hope that someday it should work for real!) and blame it on your hormones ,on God or on your never satiable Hunger (don't give me the shit of eating less .. Dude I have been there and done that.)

When so much pinching started to make my nights sleepless ; I resolved for a day's exercise if not a regular routine.So I marked the next day as a GYM day on my calender and slept early for a morning gym session.
I woke up in the morning early (really its tough:requires a lot of determination and hell lot of snoozes) to Someone's watching over me (my alarm tone) , pulled up my socks and headed out for the Mission Ispossible.

Now the first impression when you get inside the Gym  is well - it's monstrous machines.Had I come to a machine world leaving my comfortable and relatively safer Zion ?

I saw some model looking people exercising on them.My eyes scanned the room for my category type people. 1..2..3 OK So  I'm not alone.Dirty mind as I am , I rued over the non-existence of working females there (and cursed the rule that makes exercising girls' time and boys' time mutually exclusive.).But then Putting those thoughts aside I stretched my body.

It's Time to get started . Wait ! There is a problem ! . Where Should I start ? I don't know the technique to do them.What was the least painful of them all ? 
Suddenly I spotted the TREADMILL.
Yes!! That I can do !! It is a cake walk !! It doesn't require much effort too !!

So I waited patiently for my number.The guy whose number was just before me now had his turn.He looked ordinary to me till I found out he was Usain Bolt's cousin !! Running at 20 Kph for 6 min .. That's quite a feat. Sweating he left the tread-mill victoriously.
The Guys behind me praised him.A benchmark was set now .. I had to prove myself to those guys .. Common Bring it on ..
I entered the arena. But..How to get the machine started ?
"First time,eh" Somebody asked .
"Yes" I grinned .   
He helped me out with the button and settings,it all.Boldly I set the meter on 20 Kph too only to realize in horror that the machine was too fast for me and I lost the control and had a slip-fall (a slip that resulted into a fall.. a really nasty one) on that dumb,stupid piece of nuts and bolts.
"You OK?" some people gathered around a grounded me.
"Yeah! Me Fine ! Happy to make it out alive though" I lied .
Ouch My back! It hurts !    Gym 1-0 Pulkit.

I waited for the shattered pieces of my esteem to fit back again.


Next I went for the weight lifting exercise on a Smith Machine.Neglecting the amount of weights it had attached on both sides , I tried to lift it. Uff! It barely moved an inch ! A Gentle Guy told me to lessen the weight by a few Kilos . As it turned out eventually I just managed to lift the rod and along with it my shame .
'Even a girl could have done better loser' .Gym 2-0 Pulkit.

My third try was the pull up and i sucked in that too .No matter how hard I tried to pull myself up I couldn't gain but a few millimeters . I couldn't even manage a second continuous pull-up.The End result was that my hand muscles were moaning and cursing me . (Use me wisely dumb head - You will make me unusable . Fool!)
One of my Uncle had told me that a health guy should at least be able to lift himself (his weight).
He stood there mocking me.
'At 75 kilos what do you expect ? To Fly ?' . Gym 3-0 Pulkit.

The Gym was 3-0 ahead of me now and some curious on lookers started laughing (at least I thought they did ..May have been my consciousness taking a human form!).
The world was spinning now . Am I a good for nothing fellow who can't  even control a machine..so much for being a computer science engineer.
But Suddenly the face of my so called friends flashed before me. All  their teasing and stomach patting gave me the courage to still go on.
So with a new found determination I went for what I had planned as the last attempt and I would call it a day then.And so I went for the biceps exercise and picked a dumbbell in hand.
A dumbbell in a dumbbell's hand!This is Jodi No. 1.
Now the person next to me .. well seeing his biceps..I had my Jaws dropped !! They were huge !! His could even put  a professional wrestler to shame .. like a stone .I checked my biceps - they were cottony soft . I imitated him , felt satisfied after 5 or so times doing it and after a set it was all over .

My next stop was the LEG PRESS machine. I intended to do the leg extension and the lying leg curl to build what the video (which I saw later that day ) titled as 'Athlete Leg' .So I put on weights on the machine, sat comfortably and started the regime . I guess I might have done it  too fast and too wrong because after just 10 reps I felt that I might had a muscle pull . I winced in pain  . I realized it was  my own problem .
If I strain my legs too much , I have a terrible pain in my calf muscles forcing me to just roll on the floor and hit the muscles hard which then releases the tension in the muscle and I get back to normal.
So I found myself in one of those situations.Tens of eyes were focused on me now. I shrank to a drop size.
Bas Chullu bhar paani chahiye tha .. I would really have drowned in it today.

Well what next .. I came back to my room limping and after some minutes had excruciating pain in every other muscle of my body too.I felt exhausted and dead tired.
Better to have a fat body than to have a fit one if the latter comes with serious disadvantages of injury.
Better Sleep Now..Phew!

So Found out the hard way WRONG EXERCISE TECHNIQUES ARE INJURIOUS TO HEALTH.
( of course the easier way is to smoke cigarette ;)  )