Thursday, May 14, 2009

Feb. 2009-The Devil's Hallway at the USAT Training Center


Last month I got a chance to do a 2-hour training session at the USAT Training Center in Burlington. I should have known what I was about to face when I found out one of the instructors had the nickname of “The Devil.”

We started out by doing stretching exercises that caused me to contort my body in ways that were not natural. I was told these were triathlon-specific movements. We would stand in lines and have to do the movements across the floor. I would wait for the row in front of me to go, having visions of the “killers” we had to run during high school basketball practice. You know the ones…where you run to a line on the floor, run back, run to the next line and back and so forth, until you are wheezing for breath. It was conditioning back then and technically not a race, but you felt the need to compete with your teammates. If you were an upperclassman, you better be leading the pack. I was feeling that again, the need to get from one end of the room to the other, faster and better than the others. “It’s not a competition, Lori,” I told myself. “Life is a competition,” I replied back.

Meanwhile they were setting up an “obstacle course” in the hallway. How hard can an obstacle course be that only goes the length of a hallway? We would all soon learn to dread the hallway, to fear the hallway, to call it the Hallway of Hell.

There were mini hurdles to jump over, cones to run around, We had to jump back and forth like we had skis on. We had to get on the floor in the push-up position and move our bodies with our hands. Throw in some jumping jacks and instructors yelling at us like Marine drill sergeants. The adrenalin was flowing, but my competitive spirit was replaced by a desire to just get through it. Pacing myself became more important than being the fastest.

In between there was time spent on bikes and a room full of different stations. We did each station for just a minute before rotating, but it seemed like forever. We might be on a machine or lifting a medicine ball or walking with resistance bands tugging at our ankles. I knew my body was going to be hurting the next day.

Soon it was back to The Hallway for the third time. I capitalize “hallway” because it had taken on a life of its own. I soon began to pray for the sweet release of death. Okay, maybe it wasn’t quite that bad, but by the time we were doing our final stretching, I was ready to leave the training center and never return.

We headed out to lunch and I could feel my body already starting to stiffen. I don’t think I even took time to breathe once they put a plate full of food in front of me. My body wanted food, rest and recovery. I knew there would be no cycling class the next day.

The USAT coaches know their stuff and they have improved the performance of athletes who have trained there. It would do me good to step up my game, learn what I was doing wrong, work on my technique, take it to the next level. Sounds good, but I would have to wait until my brain forgot about The Hallway.

No comments:

Post a Comment