My first real class

 About a week after my initial trial, I felt like I was ready to go back in.  My soreness and stiffness had waned enough that I could run again, get back to my regular push-up routine (I had upped my push-up game to 100 per day!), and I could put pants and shoes on without nearly being brought to tears due to pain.  If I hadn't mentioned this earlier, my toes were severely bruised, and my feet were puffy for days from improper, repeated kicks against the heavy bag.  Once I was ready, though, I found out which classes were best for beginners, and I signed up for a full month.

     The gym had a few pairs of new boxing gloves and handwraps at decent prices, so I purchased them when I went in.  I had no idea how to wrap my hands, so instead of asking around (I'm pretty damn shy and really awkward), I just put on the gloves without first wrapping my wrists and hoped for the best.  I knew I had no intention of knocking a bag off it's hinges, so I hoped I could learn from some online tutorial later, and I'd be o.k. for this one class.  Looking back, I was totally fine.  I would never advise it to a new person, but it was worked fine for my first class.  As a side note, this is probably one of the very few things I'm not stoked on at my gym, but it seems to be fairly common in a lot of gyms: Newbies are afraid to ask questions like how to wrap hands, and instructors and old timers are either too busy or assume you'll ask questions if you need to know anything.

     Not that my first trial was a bad experience, but almost immediately this class felt like a lot better fit for a newcomer, although it was still just as intense.  There were drills and moves I'd never heard of, but the instructor seemed more in tune to the fact that everyone was a beginner, and made corrections to most people's stance and form, and I felt like I got a little more attention this time around.  I also didn't feel as out of place, since this crew seemed a lot less advanced than the crew I had my earlier trial with.

   As I've mentioned before, I decided to chronicle all of these early days a little late.  This was all two months ago, so my memory isn't super fresh, especially with tiny details.  What I do remember are skip knees, a punching "burn-out", and another set of three exercises at the end of our workout, each incredibly strenuous, and done with the aid of a heavy medicine ball.  Skip knees is something that seemingly is done at the end of nearly all Muay Thai workouts, and to put it simply, is skipping one foot backward while slamming your other knee forward into a heavy bag.  We did this a hundred times, which, for me, was the easiest part of the workout.  I understand why some people run out of steam (or air!), but this exercise comes rather easy for me.  The punching burn-out was just punching repetitively for a minute straight.  This might not sound too wild, and admittedly now after just two months, it's not that hard to do.  My first night, and heck, let's just admit, my first month or so, it was a hard request to fill.  Twenty seconds of regular punches, twenty seconds of punching high, ten seconds of punching fast, and ten seconds of punching hard was an experience that got me winded early, and I was pretty fricken stoked when it ended.  

     The other thing I remember, and think it's important to mention, is the intensity and the pain.  I don't want to gloss over it, but I don't want to avoid talking about it, either.  I found out that there were three beginner classes a week, but there was no way my body was going to be o.k. in time for the next beginner class.  The morning after found me pretty achy and stiff, and during those first few weeks I had to down a ton of ibuprofin and take a lot of salt baths.  I hurt a lot.  As I've mentioned before, however,  I was pretty proud of myself, and there were younger people who got gassed a lot earlier than me on those first super early sessions.  I knew this was something I wanted to pursue, and I felt like I had overcome a huge hurdle, but I couldn't kid myself, it was going to take me a while to recover.  I don't know if it is because of my age, or the fact that this was the most intense thing I had done in thirty years...or likely both, but for the first two weeks, I could only handle one class a week.  I had to swallow my pride, listen to my body, and just acknowledge that my recovery was just going to take longer than I'd like.