Yesterday afternoon I was was coerced into trying a new exercise class at the gym (called 'Drums Alive!') as part of a kickoff event at the local gym for a cancer awareness program. The kickoff event featured four 25-minute classes on a rotation. While the other classes in the rotation were pretty typical (e.g., cycling, body pump), the drumming was definitely way way outside my comfort zone.
Try to imagine what it would look like to have 30 full grown adults hitting large rubber exercise balls with wooden drumsticks while doing aerobic movements -- in a small room. Now, superimpose some heavy drum music and an overly enthusiastic instructor and it make for a really...um...interesting experience. Keep in mind we're all in our workout clothes, so I was doing this in spandex pants. Have you ever seen the Saturday Night Live skit with Will Farrell hitting the cowbell? THAT was the instructor with the drumsticks over her head. MORE DRUMSTICKS!! It was completely surreal. I really can't put how bizarre it was into words. I'm typing this about 20 hours after the class ended and I'm still shaking my head.
I have to draw the line at a group of people doing jumping jacks with drumsticks. Does that seem like a good idea to you?? Fortunately no one got impaled. Although one of the other paricipants sassily noted, "This class would be a lot better if we were allowed to run people through with the drumsticks. Now that would be a class."
A couple of people really, really got into it though. I was happy for them and also for the instructor, or otherwise I would have felt bad for her. I honestly attended with an open mind but the unsatisfactory fwap-fwap noises on the rubber ball were very undrum-like.
Maybe another time I'll describe the hip-hop dancing warm-up that preceeded the drumming...
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