I Took A Physique 57 Class and Lived To Blog About It

Over the weekend, I get a great idea!

On Monday morning, I will take a Physique 57 class! I will do it early in the morning, so as to have more time to enjoy my new found fitness!

I read the website and learn that I need to wear socks to class. This is good to know!

I also learn that as a first timer, I need to come fifteen minutes early so that the instructor can go over some basics, review my fitness history and offer me encouragement. I am excited because I’m certain that by “encouragement” they mean “treats” and I really like those.

I set my Blackberry alarm for 5:50 am and go to sleep feeling all pre-in excellent shape! As far as I’m concerned, the hard part, taking the first step, is done!

I sit up in bed on Monday morning at 6 am. Apparently, when you’re setting your Blackberry alarm, you shouldn’t set it to “silent”. You’d think that there’s be some sort of a public service announcement about it, or a constitutional amendment, but there isn’t. More evidence of anti-semitism.

But “fortunately”, I am still on time to be fifteen minutes early.

The woman at the front desk greets me and tells me where to put my coat and purse and I immediately forget what she said. She tells me where the class will be and that I should pick a set of light and heavy weights. I assume that there are two types of weights and that I should take one of each, but in reality, there are a kazillion of them, ranging from one pound to twelve pounds, so I am instantly mathematically flummoxed. I finally settle on 2 lbs. as my light weights and 4 lbs. as my heavy weights. And yes, I did consider the 1 lb./2 lb. combination instead, but I’m here to “push” myself.

I sit on the floor and faux-stretch, because I don’t want to hurt myself unncessarily.

Then something weird happens. The room start to fill up with other women. But instead of normal looking women in sweatpants and hips padded for warmth, these are some sort of gazelle/Clysdesdale hybrids. They saunter in, one after another, and line themselves by the ballet barre and suddenly I realize who they remind me of, with their high pitched pony tails and perfect bodies. You know when all the Project Runway models are lined up at the end of Models of the Runway, wearing black and looking stunning? Yes. It’s like that except now they’re all in my class. And except for our facial features, I’m resembling a pregnant Heidi Klum.

But I’m still excited! Look, there’s our teacher! She is pretty and nice and hooks up one of those mikes to her ear that makes me think she’s Madonna or a control tower operated or that my references are really dated and she asks if it’s anyone’s first time, and I raise my hand and here she comes, smiling, to offer me encouragement. She compliments me on my baby weights (note to self: take steroids to power lift before next class) asks me what my fitness regimen is and I tell her that it’s limited, because I don’t want her to be intimidated by my yoga practice and she says “well, this is going to be challenging for you, but just remember to breathe.”

Which is fantastic advice. Fantastic. I mean, I feel like I should probably go home now and just think about the breathing, because if I don’t breathe, I’m dead and she just saved my life. I am high on oxygen and feel better already!

And then we all start some kind of arm waving, leg kicking nonsense and after a while I feel the great kind of burn that lets me know that I’m getting really toned, and boy, I could use a break and maybe a bagel and that’s when I realize that we are wrapping up our warm up.

I would love to tell you what happened next, but there I am at the ballet barre, squeezing “the playground ball” as it’s unintimidatingly called by the teacher, with what are supposed to be my abs, and thinking, “hey, this isn’t so bad!” when I start to see black spots before my eyes. And quite possibly the Virgin Mary as well.

“You’re doing great,” the teacher says as she approaches me and readjusts absolutely everything about my position.
I flirt with the idea of leaving the room to search for an oxygen tank, but decide instead to take a brief break to readjust my pony tail. Because if there’s one thing that’s important to proper form, it’s a ponytail.

The class continues. At some point, I become alarmed that I signed up for some kind of contortionist training. Women are doing things with their bodies that I’m pretty sure are illegal in the Red states.

I am in root canal calibre pain.

We are ten minutes into the 57 minute class.

But like Patty Hearst, I bond with the teacher. Despite the awful things that she is telling me to do, she leas me through everything. “We’re doing ten reps!” she tells the class, starts to count and then approaches me for the necessary adjustments. Unfortunately for my classmates, the count is be suspended for the few hours that it takes to get me into proper form, so instead of doing ten reps, they end up doing eight thousand. Which is really for their own good, if you think about it. As a matter of fact, I think that Physique 57 is probably going to hire me as a teacher’s assistant.

There is more playground ball squeezing, some floor work and then it is over.

The teacher congratulates me and tells me that she is proud of me for sticking with it.
“Thank you,” I mouth, because somewhere at minute 15 I made a bargain with God that I would give up the spoken word if He made this hell on earth end.

It’s now two days later and everything still hurts. I can’t wait to go back.

One year ago ...

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