The Dreaded Gym

I made it to the dreaded gym finally. I've been a member at the YMCA in Niles, MI since the end of May and I went once in June to a different location and that was it. Since starting tracking my calorie intake on myfitnesspal.com I lost another 4 pounds and my weight yesterday morning was 251.0 pounds. Even though I'm happy with the progress, I feel stir-crazy about sitting around the house and computer and I want to get out and do active things. I love to swim but still haven't used the pool.

Today I procrastinated a little too long to use the pool at the right time before work, but I had time for 20-25 minutes on the recumbant bike. I've been preparing for the gym by buying things that I think I need to use the gym. This makes it a financial commitment and it gives me less excuses not to go. The purchase I'm happiest about is the gym bag because we went shopping for a gym bag and a carry-on bag the other night and ended up finding a three-peice set that included both that was well under budget for what we planned to spend. At $32 for the set, that's less than my wife would have to pay to the airline if she doesn't stick to carry-on luggage.

My Gym Bag Contents:
Almost Prescription Goggles - These things are orderable on the internet for a low price and are great for finding ones towel, shoes, or family and friends on a crowded beach when without them everything is a fuzzy blob.
Tiny Radio - This thing is supposed to allow me to hear what's on the TV at the gym. This is ideal for the poor college student who might want an Ipod but doesn't want it so bad that over $200 seems like a must-have item.
Ear Plugs - There were two types at the sporting goods store for swimming. At $3 and $4 respectively, I decided it would be cheaper to buy both than to spend money on gas to come back if I wanted the other kind.
Swim Trunks - I'm not at the competitive level nor do I have the body of Michael Phelps. Modesty is in order here. At the same time I don't want to be in the water with board shorts and while I wouldn't mind wearing them outside of the water or in a jam, I'll stick to the more traditional size of swim trunks if I can. When I found some for around $10 each that fit well I grabbed two different colors. They also seem to work fine for working out when I'm not in the pool, at least for now.
Shower Gel - I guess I didn't need this since the Y provides soap and towels, but hey, it's marketed as being good to use as shampoo also.
Deodorant - Between my deodorant and my shower gel, I left the gym smelling much better than when I got to the gym.
Padlock - Since I don't want to walk home in wet swim trunks with no wallet and no truck, I've selected a $3 steel lock that was imported from China and was conveniently available at the Dollar General store near the gym.

My experience was pretty good today. After getting to the parking lot of the gym and realizing I could use a little something under my arms and I should also get a padlock, I left for my last three gym bag purchases. I looked at the time after the purchases and realized it was really cutting into my potential workout time, but I wasn't going to use that as an excuse to not go. I went in and changed and sat down and started pedaling on the bike. I entered my desired workout information and then kept pedaling while I tried to adjust my radio to the frequency provided to hear the televisions. This didn't go so well. I could barely hear one of the stations and there was a lot of buzzing. I left it there and then put my hands on the heart-rate sensors on the side of the bike. After about five or six minutes I decided to try to get a better station, whether it was for a gym television or just the radio. The bike started displaying that it had lost my heart-rate, but being confident that I still had a heart-rate I kept trying to find a station and kept pedaling. When I did put my hands back on the sensors, nothing happened. The resistance had stopped and the screen was frozen in the screen telling me that it couldn't read my heart-rate. It wouldn't tell me anything else and my miles and calories burned and time were all gone. I had to reset the program and just opted for a manual program instead of a target heart-rate. I rode for another 15-minutes on the manual program and burned another 149 calories. When I saw that I only had five seconds left I tried to pedal faster to get to 150, but sure enough my unfriendly bike happily stopped at 149 and gave me my stats exactly when it had been told to end my workout. I'm claiming 200 calories for my first workout this month under the circumstances.

Afterward, it felt so good to use a shower that doesn't spray rust all over me. I like the setup because there is a curtain for the dressing area and another curtain for the shower. I could almost just go to the gym once in awhile to take a shower sans rust. On a side note I realized that most of the shower stalls we taller and I had probably used one that was made for kids :)

I also wanted to share the website that I'm using for tracking fitness and calories and I know quite a few other people who are using it. I actually learned about www.myfitnesspal.com because of conversations resulting from blogging! It's free to use and is ad supported but the ads don't seem annoying or pervasive.