8 Weeks of Pain: 30 Minutes Late

I’ve ended my last couple workouts at the Chris Frye Gym by lying completely still, on my back on the green Astroturf, waiting for my heart to slow. Completely spent and amazed that I was able to accomplish what was asked of me. But never more so than our last workout, on Monday.

Matt and I were 30 minutes late. An honest 30 minutes, as we had a meeting with the city water folks, and got stuck at a treatment plant off of Billy Graham. It’s not like we were hanging out at the Krispy Kreme eating a dozen glazed. We were doing good work for the magazine, and we were late to our meeting with Chris Frye. Never again.

The workout started easily enough – dynamic stretching, kettleballs and we were already approaching the end of our hour. But because we were 30 minutes late we were assigned 30 laps with the Prowler loaded with 50 extra pounds. My brain immediately flashed with a thousand reasons why I could not push that nasty sled loaded with the weight of an average-sized woman (140 pounds) 30 times the length of the gym. But we had to start, and so we got behind the sled and started pushing.

Somehow, after an enormous effort and with Chris’ insistent encouragement/yelling, we pushed that ridiculous sled almost continuously for 45 minutes. We accomplished two things in the process: increased our heart rates to a point where most humans go into shock; and maybe more important, expanded our confidence by knowing that we can push ourselves mentally much further than we ever thought possible.

See more at Chris’s Gym www.chris-frye.com

~ Todd Trimakas