Oh mein gott in himmel, y'all. I went to the spinning class this morning.
Okay, there is no polite way to say this, so here it is: my crotch hurts. (Crotch is okay, right? My ma always used that word, even when we were kids, so I tend to think it's fine for polite society. Sorry if I'm wrong about that.) Yes, it was hard and no, I couldn't do everything the instructor shouted out to us during the course of the 45 minutes and yes, I sweated like a whore working overtime (hey look: it's not all polite society around here after all) but the real takeaway here is that my crotch freaking aches. In a way that really shouldn't happen unless you have great memories of a terrific time to show for the pain, you know?
Owwww. See, when people say "bike butt" they don't ever tell you what I am telling you: they don't mean bike butt, they mean bike crotch. Which is to say: bruised crotch. Man, buy a girl a drink first, jeez.
So that's my first discovery in this endeavor, that grown-up bikes do not feature a banana seat, and there is a price to be paid for that lack. And the currency in which you must pay is Pain. My dilemma is this: there is another class tomorrow. Do I go? Or do I nurse my wounds? (Try not to picture said nursing, thanks.) Is there some kind of very thick adult diaper that could possibly help me out here?
Oh well, I guess this is the incentive to get your knee/leg muscles all strong - so you can stand up in the pedals and get out of the infernal seat. INFERNAL, I TELL YOU. And the workout itself was just strength-sapping. I immediately wanted a nap. Well, a nap and many, many, many carbs. I could've eaten my way through a loaf of Wonder bread and asked for more before passing out for a 6-hour nap. Honest to pete, it's like it ate through all my energy stores. And I store a lot of energy, okay.
In recent developments, I am getting freaked out at how little time I have to get myself up to the task of 100 miles. I looked at the training schedule from the fall century ride -- oh hey, they call this a century ride. Because 100 miles. And probably because it feels like a century, the ride. Anyway, the training schedule for the last century ride shows that your first day out on the bike, you do like 20 miles. Twenty. As in a two followed by a zero. Your first time on the real bike, and it's 20 whole miles. I'm not saying I can't do it; I'm just saying that a mere 40 minutes on the bike felt semi-miraculous today. Twenty miles seems awfully far-fetched. Unless these training coaches are willing to spend the full 10 hours it's likely to take me to go 20 flipping miles, it could be a pretty awful day. And so I am freshly afraid.
Anyhows, that's how my first spinning class was. Painful, exhausting, and a bringer of fresh terror. Ooh boy I just can't wait for the next!
(that was sarcasm.)
Dude seriously, I gotta go to bed now. That class just vampire-sucked all the energy out of me. So good night, and thank you for your support, and pray that I'll make it to and through tomorrow's class.
2 comments:
I go through this with saddles for my horses. If you think a bike seat is bad, think about it bouncing under you for an hour! I've bought 2 saddles just this year and will probably have to change one out for a third, and they ain't cheap. They are like buying shoes, they must fit perfectly, not only to you, but to the horse.
My advice, if it hurts, stop until it doesn't. It will only get worse.
Go to a bike store, there ARE a lot of padded things to wear. The store can probably give you some advice about the problem too. ;) You Are Not Alone.
Good point, LK - it now hits me why everyone I've spoken to who's done this before waxes rhapsodic over bike shorts. They're so INSISTENT how wonderful the shorts are, and all I've been thinking is how I don't really like shorts, especially tight ones. But, DUH - obviously the shorts are designed specifically for this problem. (I mean I'm sure that's supposed to be obvious, but people have to stop using euphemisms like "bike butt" and how "essential" bike shorts are. Jeez.)
I think you definitely have it worse with horses. Not just because the saddle has to fit you AND the animal, or because you can't stand up in the pedals for relief so much, but because riding (from what I remember) is a full-body jarring of the bones. It's like there's no escape.
Still, better to be a girl with girl-parts in these particular moments. ;-)
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