15 April 2010

Granny Sport

In an effort to become healthy, I've started an aquajogging class. Aquajogging? you ask? Yeah, apparently it's a water sport that the physical therapist thought would be good for my knee.

Yesterday was the first day. A whole squadron of girls showed up and giggled as we watched the last few minutes of synchronized swimming. But the giggles turned into I-feel-stupid-and-don't-know-what-to-do giggles as we strapped on these babies:


Aquajogging belt

Finally a few were able to shame-facedly slip into the water and the others slowly followed, where we felt both amazed that we couldn't sink and frustrated that we couldn't seem to move very quickly. At first we were supposed to swim around and introduce ourselves to each other. I think I can only remember a few names now--Katharina with the Arena swim cap and Lisa with the nose ring and Nora who could be any one of them--because people in swim caps all look the same (at least I was the only one with a red cap). Right as we were getting more comfortable in our granny sport, a hairy man with a drooping belly and wearing a speedo walked in and the nervous giggles started up again. Yikes. Luckily, he seemed to already be a pro and didn't involve himself too much with us.

We ended up playing a game where the last person always has to overtake the first. And it took us so long that the teacher finally said the passer-uppers could swim to pass. As we were making our rounds, I thought, "If anyone were to see us right now and not know what we are doing, they would be really confused." From above the water, it just looks like we were all really slow swimmers. But below the water we were getting a good workout. We even did some balancing exercises, and pushups and other exercises with a swim noodle.

So, though aquajogging seems like a grandma sport to me, it was fun and it was good for me.


Aquajogging Aquajoggers

Now the adventure in the showers afterwards is a story for a different time . . . ;)

What weird things have you done that ended up being fun?

3 comments:

  1. haha. i did water aerobics for a semester. i ended up not renewing my membership because i hated getting into the pool when it was cool outside. also i was the only one in the class who wasn't pregnant. ALSO, my friend mel calls water aerobics "old lady stew" which seems to be a pretty accurate description.

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  2. Cool! Sounds perfect for you because you love old people so much.

    Once my friend invited me to a quilt exhibit. I thought it sounded lame (and old ladyish), but I went anyway and it turned out to be fascinating. I think I blogged about it at the time . . .

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  3. That sounds fun to me! I'll join an old lady crew with you and we can all be "old lady stew"! Old people are awesome.

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