Getting the kinks out

Across the gym, I spotted a woman huffing and puffing.

She is pretty overweight. Her face was red and sweat was pouring down her cheeks. Her shirt was damp, accentuating the parts of her body she’s trying to get rid of.

I have some serious competition.

Rumor has it someone in the Just Lose It! contest has already lost 12 pounds. I’ve lost about 6 in 14 days. Today was my fourth day of interval training, although it should have been my fifth. I was too busy last Thursday misbehaving in Utah.

My legs ached as I got started with my run. It wasn’t shooting pain, it was discomfort in all those parts where stringy material holds things together — the tendons and the ligaments, especially around my knees.

Hard to believe, but I was once a very skinny young man who weighed 155 pounds and had somewhere between 2 and 3 percent body fat. That was when I was 18 and a letterman in track and cross country. I’m nearly 33 now and just over 256 pounds.

I was actually too skinny then and as I began to fill out in college people told me I looked so much better with some meat on my bones. Even if I wanted to be as thin as I was in high school, I don’t think I could get down to that weight, unless I was sick with a grave illness. My mom complained back then that I was too skinny. I didn’t have any muscle mass of any significance.

But the comparison is still staggering: 32-year-old Troy is 100 pounds heavier than 18-year-old Troy.

In high school, one of my cross country coaches always described warming up as “getting the kinks out.” During the thick of cross country season, my legs never felt quite right. Every time I took them out for a spin there’d be some discomfort. Some of those strings that hold things together would bother me for a few minutes. Then they’d go away, after warmups helped me get the kinks out.

Which brings me back to today. I had some serious fuckin’ kinks that brought two things to mind as I tried to get going on the treadmill. First, I think I have so much excess weight that it’s making it hard to get the full benefits of these exercises, which are tempered by the jarring sensations I feel as my feet make contact with the treadmill. It’s like 18-year-old Troy is trying to run a race with a 100-pound backpack. My legs weren’t built for this.

The other thing I thought about was Dave Robbins, my old cross country coach at Sunset High School, ordering his runners to “Go get the kinks out, then let’s all meet back here when you’re ready.”

Five minutes into my interval training I wasn’t sure the kinks would come out. I’d stepped on the treadmill intending to do 30 minutes. I’ve done only 20 minutes during the previous three sessions at my trainer’s advice, even though her workout book calls for 30. She probably questioned whether I could even do 30.

All I had to do to gather inspiration was look across the gym at the red-faced woman sweating profusely. She has more weight to lose than me, and judging by her red face and wet shirt, it looks like she’s trying harder than me, too.

I went for 30 minutes. The kinks never came out.

Food Journal:
Breakfast: Oatmeal with dried cranberries, milk and a hard-boiled egg.
Snack: Protein shake with banana.
Lunch: Grilled chicken in whole wheat tortilla, apple
Snack: Chinese-style barbecue pork, hard-boiled egg
Dinner: Grilled chicken in whole wheat tortilla, brown rice, celery sticks