Spinning My Wheels

I have a confession to make: I go to spin class.  

Once a week, I voluntarily wake up before 6:00 am in order to torture myself for an hour.  Tracy and I sleepily sneak out the door by 6:10, hop in the car and get to the gym before the 6:30 class begins - and before the sun rises.  We descend into what is essentially the gym's basement to get assaulted by techno and house music, 90s jock jams and spandex.  The British instructor shouts at us over the thumping music through her mike while we pedal, and sweat, madly on our stationery bikes.  "Push! Push Push!!  Down, down, DOWN!!"  We wear our biking gear - spandex, clip-in shoes, the whole bit; except for a helmet, obviously.                                                                                                                                                                  

But we've tricked ourselves.  Everyone there has tricked themselves.  We've somehow managed to embrace this whole scene - not only embrace, but become addicted to.  Why?  How?  Because it hurts so good.  

It started out innocently and rationally enough.  It was January of 2011 and I had my first triathlon looming.  I was looking to bump up my training.  I needed to get more riding in because the Folsom Triathlon was a 16 mi mountain bike ride.  I was nowhere near meeting that mark by riding once a week, so Tracy suggested spin class.

"Spin?"  I asked, almost offended by the suggestion.  At the time, my mind couldn't distinguish a spin class from Zumba.  It was all the same to me.  To me, 'spin class' evoked the worst sorts of generic aerobics class imagery: sweaty people jumping around on top of each other, top 20 chart pop songs blaring, dancing, mirrors - pretty much death on wheels, the 9th Circle of Dante's inferno.  

"You mean, an aerobics class?  At the gym?  With loud, incredibly lame music?  You're kidding."  

"Yea, spin." Tracy responded, confidently.  "I started doing to spin in college - twice a week at 6:00 am.  It's an hour of stationery bike.  The first few weeks are pretty rough.  But after that you'll be hooked.  I want to get back into it.  We should do it! Come on!" 

I was unconvinced, but I was desperate.  "Okay, but I'm not going at 6:00 am.  There's gotta be a later class."

"Yea!  9:15 am.  Sunday mornings!" 

Madonna bangs over the mega-speakers, the instructor shouts over the music, and sweat exits from places previously unimaginable at rate in which, for the first time, the word "profusely" doesn't quite suffice.  I couldn't look at the person in the mirror reflecting back at me.  Not only out of self-loathing, but because I knew that if I did, that would be it.  It would be the straw that broke the camel's back.  If I looked in the mirror, not only would I finally see a full panoramic view of this curious scene, but I would surely lose it and puke everywhere.  If I looked up from the floor, I'd get dizzy and nauseous.  I'd see everyone's legs cycling furiously.  I'd see how depleted I was, how haggard I looked, how close to the edge I was.  Its the same instinct that makes you look away when you get a shot - if you don't see it then maybe it won't exist, maybe the pain won't be so severe.  Just focus on the same spot and breathe.  

It worked.  I survived my first spin class.  I "survived;" I did not thrive.  It was harder than two-a-day sprints during hell week.  My heart rate thumped faster than the techno beats, and never recovered throughout.  It was kind of humiliating.  I had been doing some pretty rigorous mountain biking every weekend, each ride being at least a few hours.  But an aerobics class with make-believe bikes and "simulated climbs" for an hour?  Out of your league, dickbrain.  If it weren't for Tracy, who continually reassured me that this was totally normal, I would have been one and done.  

So I stuck with it.  And it got better.  I mean, I still hated it.  But my heart rate started adapting and I no longer had to worry about falling of the ledge and landing in the City of Pukeville.  And because the class so thoroughly kicked my ass and got my heart rate to peaks it had never been, the rest of my Sunday was bliss (and not just because my skeeball league matches are on Sunday nights).  I started realizing how damned good this stupid class made me feel afterwards.  

I crossed a huge threshold when I realized I could wear my mountain biking shoes to class.  Being able to clip in to the pedals made the spinning itself feel more like actual riding.  It made it easier.  I could push and pull on the pedals, instead of just pushing.  From this point on, it was a downward spiral - or upwards, depending on the perspective.   

After I brought in the mountain biking shoes, everything else just followed.  I like mountain biking in my spandex because of the comfort and lack of restriction.  Why not wear them to spin class?  Why draw distinctions?  (In other words, why differentiate between wearing spandex in the isolation of far-away trails and wearing them to your university gym, one of the biggest in gyms in San Francisco?)  There are obvious reasons to make the clear-cut distinction, but I didn't.  And so it began.  

We got hooked.  We started going to the 6:30 am weekday class.  That way we'd feel that goodness during a week day, as opposed to just a Sunday.  It also opened up the weekends for mountain bike rides.  And man, did spin make us better mountain bikers.  Holy shit.  

Honestly, it's fitting that this is the last area for me to write about.  I've written about everything other part of my triathlon training, transitions and transformations.  My transition into swimming, barefoot running, into triathlon culture in general, that's gotten all the attention.  But spin has been like the offensive lineman who makes all the plays happen but gets no credit.  But the truth is though, it's because it's probably the transition of which I've been most embarrassed about.  The extent of which didn't hit me until two Thursdays ago.  

It was 7:25 and the class was winding down.  We were getting off our bikes and stretching a little.  Our British instructor's choice Jock Jam was still piercing the eardrums of those within a mile radius.  Tracy and I were unfazed.  We were in our post-spin blissful state after sending our lower bodies through a meat grinder.  We toweled off the last remaining drip of sweat.  But just as we were about to shuffle our stationery bikes over to their respective wall of the room in order to make some space for the 7:30 yoga class, we were intercepted.  

"Well, this is an interesting way to start the day."

"Hi, David!"  Tracy and I said laughing, but both thinking: Oh no!  Our old yoga teacher whose class we never go to anymore!  He thinks we've ditched him for Jock Jams!  He thinks we're no longer centered or mindful! We've been exposed!  We were both genuinely excited to see him, but not under these circumstances. 

He congratulates us on our engagement.  We thank him and stand there in the gym's basement under florescent lights, showing our sweat-soaked tees and spandees.   Tracy self-deprecatingly tells David that he now "knows our guilty secret."  David laughs it off and then proceeds to run around to get ready for his class.  I can tell that Tracy has the same sense of being embarrassed, of being caught cheating, of wanting to explain ourselves.  We both want to tell him that we miss him and his class, but that it just doesn't work with our schedules.  We want to tell him that we still go to yoga, but on Monday nights, and at a different studio.  We want to justify the spin class, the loud music, the spandex, everything.  But we don't.  We probably would have just been spinning our wheels anyway.  

We say goodbye and leave.   But my thoughts of this encounter didn't end there. 

When I left the gym that morning, I started thinking.  Why do I subject myself to this class?  Why don't I go to yoga instead?  I'm not currently training for any race in particular.  So I'm doing this by choice.  But why?  Why this choice?  Wouldn't I be more centered if I started my day with yoga instead?  

I really pushed myself on these questions and mulled over them for the next few days.  I went to our regular Monday night yoga class.  Thought about it more.  Then it hit me, on a morning while reading the Sports page.  

Yoga and meditation are centering.  They are calming, peaceful and bring serenity to a lot of people - and luckily, for me as well.  

But you know what else is centering?  Beating a guy off the line of scrimmage and running full speed at the quarterback and absolutely crushing him.  There's nothing more serene than throwing a high and tight strike-three fastball past the batter in a close game.  Nothing will make you sleep better at night than outplaying your opponent in the paint; out-rebounding him, blocking his shots, going up to the basket stronger than him.  Want to be at peace with the world for a minute?  Crush a golf ball 300 yards down the middle of the fairway.   Hit a baseball 300 feet.  Hit something.  

There's more to being centered and peaceful than introspection, meditation and yoga.  To me, that's just one form of serenity.  An important way, but just one.   I think a more honest approach understands how the other side of human nature functions and respects it's needs too.  

In Freud's political tome, "Civilization and Its Discontents," he argues that much of human behavior and motivation stems from our aggression impulse. (The other impulse being, unsurprisingly, the sexual drive.)  Freud argues that modern civilization will always be in tension with this aggression impulse.  As a result, the impulse gets suppressed, buried and then manifests itself in strange, untoward ways.  Therefore, people need to find ways to release that impulse in socially constructive (or at least, not destructive) ways.  

Even though much of Freud's ideas regarding the field of psychology have been debunked, his philosophical argument is particularly persuasive.  Finding ways to release our aggressive tensions in socially constructive ways has, in my mind, led to many forms of exercise sports - from running and biking to football, boxing and UFC cage fights.  (Why are we so drawn to the big hit in a football game? Freud must be right, right?) 

For many years of my life, sports kept me centered.  They provided the outlet.  And in doing so, I felt peaceful.  But now, since I don't have organized sports, I've found other ways to channel the aggression impulse.  And now it is clear to me that spin is the primary victim.  

The thing about spin is that it doesn't seem like the obvious choice for a place to release aggression and get centered.  And I think that's part of the main reason why I've been so embarrassed about it - that, and the house music.  But try it.  Put yourself on a bike in a room full of people with techno bumping while a drill sargeant instructor shouts at you, telling you that you're not going fast or hard enough.  Trust me, you'll start seeing red.  You'll be a bull chasing the red cape.

But it feels amazing.  The troubles and anxieties of the rest of the day drip off my shoulders.  I feel like I treat people better.  I treat myself better.  I feel the serenity of coming out of yoga, but just through a different means.  

The main difference between yoga and spin is the difference between mindfulness v. mindlessness.  In yoga, the focus is on mindfulness.  Your focus is on breath and posture.  The point is not to let your mind wander, but to be completely present in the moment.   But in spin, the point is to let your mind wander, to pretend you are somewhere else.  The idea is to day dream, to pretend that you are actually climbing up a steep hill overlooking a lake.  The point is to dream and fantasize that that stationery bike you are on is actually on a race course, in the final stretch, passing up the leader to win the race.  

Dreaming is just as important as being present and mindful in the moment.  Being able to step away from that dream and back to the present is just as important as creating the fantasy. 

Each time, I win the race.   

But then I step off the bike, head out of the basement studio, and up the stairs to start my day.  Then I'll hear a faint thump of a 90's house jock jam from below, and I am acutely brought back to reality.