Lately, gym visits seem difficult to come by, so I've adopted a policy of staying a minimum of 1.5 hours, oftentimes 2, to make it worthwhile. Let's say I haven't been much of a workout freak in my life. Playing sporting games and jogging now and again? Yes. But working out for fitness' sake? Not so much. Until I turned 30. The impetus being fear of physically breaking down and losing my incredibly manly psychological edge over children. What in Insecurities' name am I rambling about?
So 1.5 hours seems plenty for me at the gym, and I make it work by cross-training. And by cross-training, I mean casually shooting basket hoops for a good hour, then doing 8 curls, then jogging for 10 minutes on some sort of futuristic moving floor apparatus, then hitting the hot tub and sauna for as much time as I can stand without shriveling up or becoming that creepy guy that is just ALWAYS in there.
Today, I started my workout like I often do, in the basketball courts. The gym I frequent is not your pick-up game type place. The court is used for local high school lacrosse practice more than basketball, but I relish the isolation at times. I still LOVE shooting. It's not because I think I'm going to become a rec-league All Star, it's because I love the rhythm and the sounds and the satisfaction of still being reasonably good at something athletic. And I don't just play H-O-R-S-E with myself, I do shooting drills. Really. I have to make 10 of 10 alternating right-then-left hand layups from under the basket (harder than you think, especially for those who played intramurals with me at GVSU and remember that 2 year period where I had layup mental block), then 8 of 10 free throws, then 6 of 10 3-pointers going back and forth from the corners of the arc to the top of the key. If I miss my goal in a given drill, I finish the 10, then start that drill over until I get them all. In between, it's just normal dribbling and shooting and imagining I actually get to take my warmups off this time- wait, that was high school. Super lame, right?
After totally sucking at free throws today, I finally hit my 80% mark, then decided it would be a good idea to test the hammies and see if a dunk was possible. Upon smashing the ball into the front of the rim, I realized another benefit of having, essentially, my own gym: lack of witnesses. This fact, however, would prove to be somewhat disappointing in a few minutes. That is, of course, because the strange event was about to happen.
Standing in the right corner, I watch the wall clock for the seconds to wind up to 0 again, knowing my 10 threes routine takes about 90 seconds. At 5:28 I loft my first shot: CLANK. Rebound, opposite corner, nail it. Retrieve ball, move back across but a bit further off the baseline, bury another. This continues until I hit my 6th trey, in 7 attempts. Nice, I'm at my goal with 3 shots to go. With minimal effort and my form locked in, I can 3 more in a row. 9 of 10 - as good as I've ever done! In my movements, I was cutting the lines a little shallow and never got to the very top of the key, straight away from the hoop. So I sauntered there and threw up another shot for good measure. Swish. 10 of 11. What the hell, I think, let's start over. Corner - boom. Opposite - boom. At 14 of 15 shots it hits me: I missed my first shot. That's 14 in a row. At this point I am starting to giggle a little bit as each shot falls. The meat heads doing lat pull downs outside the court door are probably thinking, "What's with Grinny McSkinny?" I continue my circuit and finish again at the left wing with #19 going down easy. At the top of the key I hoist again and it finally, belligerently, rattles out. 19 of 21 is sweet, but more freakishly, those 19 successfully scoring in order.
83% of you (basically, everyone who didn't play IM hoops with me) are waiting for a point, a different tangent, a horrifying ankle sprain to spice things up. But that was it. I made 19 straight 3-pointers today, and have no witnesses to corroborate my story. I considered leaving the gym immediately and rushing to Energy Solutions Arena to apply for a job as Kyle Korver's understudy (clarification for non-Utahans: that dude can shoot and has dreamy good looks. What?), but decided instead to do strenuous actions with heavy things for a bit before calling it a workout.
I am a man, I'm 30, and I still think it's important to be good at some sort of sport. Even if 'good' means able to make shots I've practiced a jillion times, without defenders, in an empty gym. It's my world, and you're all just not witnesses.
