I have a friend Ward, who I know via my group guitar lessons, who runs an Olympic weight lifting gym and has been encouraging me to attend the Sunday workout session in Frederick about 30 minutes away. Jeremy is very interested in weightlifting and especially Olympic weightlifting and he knows all the folks on the US National team (I mean, on social, not in real life, obvs). So I proposed to Jeremy that we both go, I really know nothing, but it looks fun.
We went to the gym and borrowed shoes. I didn’t know there were special shoes, but apparently there are. Are there any sports without special shoes, I asked? I think not. Maybe swimming? You don’t need shoes while you are swimming, but you need the flip flops for pre-swimming (getting to the pool).
Edda came to watch us (there was a special needs teacher at the practice who recognized Edda!)
This is Ward – he’s teaching Jeremy how to snatch. There is an explosive movement that needs a lot of coordination.
OK, this might look heavy, but they had to keep trying to find lighter and lighter weights so I could do this – I think this is less than 25 pounds total – the two red plastic plates and the bar. Haha, I think they had me try at first with 15 kilos, but really I could not do this with 15 kilos. Ward kind of tilted his head and said – huh. 15 kg- that’s too heavy? And then I laughed and said – I’m a regular person! Like a middle age regular non-lifting person. To give you perspective on how far I am from anything, the female world record on snatch at my weight is something like 105 kg – 231 pounds. I don’t think I could even lift 231 pounds off the ground one inch let alone throw it above my head.
We mis-timed lunch (we left the gym about noon and everyone was starving) and had to eat two cookies and some pound cake that we found at a farmer’s market for lunch.
Then (so social!) in the afternoon, Megan came over to Edda’s delight and she taught me to crochet.
I’ve knit a lot before, but never crochet and I admired a kit she had when we last got together and ordered it also myself.
Sooo, we spent late afternoon happily playing with string (which, as I tell Vince all the time, is what we did before the internet was invented.)
