Body what?

A few weeks ago while on a run, my dear friend and local gym manager, mentioned that the gym was going to add Les Mills Body Pump classes. She wondered if I would be interested in becoming an instructor. Without much hesitation I said yes and signed up for training.

As an avid runner taking the plunge to "group fitness instructor" is one that I'd thought about but didn't ever really think would happen. I don't have an educational background in health and fitness, at the time had never heard of Les Mills, and oh yeah...I haven't been exactly consistent about lifting weights ever since Andrew and I tied the knot in 2005. It is 2012.

After Ben was born I joined the small group WOD (workout of the day) crew in our friend's basement for Crossfit workouts and I loved the challenge and the fact that it was helping me shrink up after the beach ball of a baby was gone. Once we moved to Fredonia however, my lifting was limited to the squirmy child I haul around the house and the occasional kettle bell swings and sit ups on my living room floor (often with a baby on my lap for extra weight).

The time between the Body Pump training class and the idea planted in my head was just under 4 weeks.

I am a procrastinator at heart. I knew I should be lifting weights in preparation but knowing isn't the same as doing. It wasn't until I received my training video, choreography book (seriously?) and 100 page training manual courtesy of FedEx did I start to realize I might want to actually try to get ready. All of that arrived in my very weak arms twelve days before the training weekend.

Twelve days. Of course I had to put it off. Then I had 11 days, 10...and my husband knew that I needed to actually do the training video. We put Ben to sleep, he tied up his sneakers and I pulled on some workout clothes at 8:45 one Thursday night. In the comfort of our bedroom we turned on the video with presenters that looked like super heroes and I wondered if I would make it through the warm-up. Andrew was a little spooked by the enormous winking woman who led parts of video and tried to convince us that Body Pump is changing the world.

The class is an hour long and divided into 5ish minute segments (or tracks) each aimed at a different part of your body. It is set to loud (rather annoyingly catchy music) and in the hour you do about 700 repetitions of weight lifting. It is long, challenging and fun.

In the days leading up to the training I received countless emails from Les Mills about what I would need to bring to training (food, changes of clothes, all the stuff they sent me, an Ipod, paperwork, muscles...). Five days before training I received an assignment to teach a portion of the class to the training class (thankfully I was assigned the chest track and not the tricep track as my triceps are still wondering why they are no longer allowed to atrophy).

In preparation for training I did the video every other day, drank a lot of water and my most consistent lifting was the Cadbury egg I lifted to my mouth every time I went to the grocery store. I was a nervous wreck the day training arrived. I rode up to Buffalo with two other people from the gym here and felt like I might throw up. When we got to the gym I didn't feel much better. Every single person there was a personal trainer or fitness instructor and looked the part. As I nervously tried to introduce myself to those around me and act confident that I did, in fact, belong there, in walked the Les Mills instructor.

If you googled fitness instructor I think her face would appear. Short hair, spunky attitude, ridiculously fit, arms that could bend a lead pipe--basically a female Jack Reacher. Her six pack was evident through her shirt and as she lead us through the class, she made the massive men in the class look puny as she loaded up her bar with weight plate after plate. For two long days (Saturday 8-5:30, Sunday 7-3) with limited lunch breaks we lifted weights, listened to helpful tidbits about learning choreography, lifted weights, watched videos of us teaching, lifted weights, learned how to launch our classes, lifted weights, learned to teach a segment of the class and lifted more weights. It was a long two days and by the time our last workout rolled around Sunday afternoon my entire body was aching. The amount of lifting that we did forced the strongest of the bunch (a former college football player and personal trainer) to do tricep pushups in the most modified form on his knees.

When it came time for my evaluation where my fitness was a part of the grade I was exhausted. In order to receive a pass for the weekend I had to teach my assigned track with perfect timing, choreography, technique and coaching. I was a nervous wreck but managed to pull it off and made it through. In order to receive my certification I still have to submit a video of me teaching the entire class where each thing I do is evaluated but I have until May 5th to continue to work on making my triceps actually look like muscles.

Now that the training is over the soundtrack to my life is Body Pump music. Over and over and over again as I study my choreography book, work on form and try to learn each track 110%. At times I feel a little overwhelmed, but I still have a few weeks until my first class. I can slowly feel myself getting stronger and I'm looking forward to teaching four times a week. I will strive to be a warrior against a sedentary lifestyle (part of the Les Mills creed) and perhaps by the time I'm ready to teach I'll be able to lift two Cadbury eggs to my mouth at a time.