Going to the gym obsolete in the age of the coronavirus
I conducted an informal poll on Twitter: What will get us first, the Coronavirus, or our families? Eighty one percent of respondents said our families.
As we all combat going Corona Crazy, there are a lot of us who have had our favorite coping mechanism canceled, thus making that “81 percent” feel not only plausible but accurate. Or low.
Especially now that a lot us can’t go to the gym.
Fighting fellow Americans over toilet paper and hand sanitizer at the grocery store may burn a lot of calories, and get those endorphins kicking, but it doesn’t feel quite right. At least not yet.
Fort Worth didn’t follow Dallas in shutting down all gyms, but reduced capacity by 50 percent as a means to fight the spread of the coronavirus.
Even in normal circumstances, “going to the gym” isn’t about trying to look like Zac Efron. (Writer’s note: I am often compared to him.)
“Going to the gym” is coping. It’s managing. It’s dealing with the anxiety, fear, frustrations and self-inflicted stupid that floats in your head on the days when there isn’t an international pandemic.
I tried alcohol. Failed. I tried food, which didn’t do the trick, but it tasted good.
Only thing I found was working out.
“It’s a CDC recommendation that people get daily activity. Physical activity is very important,” said Lee Hargrave, who owns and operates EnduraLab in Fort Worth. “When people come here, we try to make it the best hour of their day.”
Walking to the mailbox doesn’t count. Neither does playing video games, or scrolling through Instagram. In fact, any exercise where you communicate with people on your phone is out.
Get the heart pumping. Sweat. A lot. To the point where your workout clothes can no longer be cleaned but only should be burned.
As a vice, sweating never receives the proper amount of coverage like drinking excessive amounts of Vodka, or consuming sleeves of chocolate chip cookies. No TV subplot includes the mom or dad who has “an exercise problem.”
But exercising can have the same type of effect on the brain, only in the age of corona the activity is stuffed with fear, and closed doors, which put even more strain on local businesses.
My gym is closed for what essentially amounts to an extended bleach bath until “we can all go outside again.” My pickup basketball career, which I had planned in resulting into at least two NBA contracts, is suspended.
EnduraLab is going to offer online classes and instruction. Local yoga studios such as Indigo, where my wife teaches a class, and Soul Sweat plan to do the same.
My wife’s place planned to stay open in reduced capacity, while assuring its students of heightened measures to clean and wipe down everything. Yoga teachers were no longer allowed to touch, or “assist,” students.
On Monday morning, the studio went online only.
Zyn22 Spin, a popular bike studio in Fort Worth, had reduced its maximum capacity of students even before the announcement on Monday.
All of this leaves us all wondering what Plan Z looks like.
“You can move at home,” Hargrave said. “There are things you can do around the house.”
Yes. I know. It’s called laundry.
Suddenly, the guy who bought his wife a Peloton bike for Christmas looks like the greatest partner since Batman. And I will embrace the online Peleton life; I just need the mountain chalet necessary to place the bike.
National gym Planet Fitness offers classes online, including to non-members.
According to doctors and medical professionals, we are good to run, bike and hike outside.
A steady run is hell. Biking bores me. Exactly what mountain peak will I hike in Fort Worth?
I want to go the gym to burn calories and get my lather on. What I don’t want is to break into a sweat wondering if I’ll be able to buy an extra bottle of bleach at the grocery store.
