I said goodbye to gym in March 9, 2020.
In May 2020 Cate asked, When will you feel okay about going back to the gym?
In response to her question then I said, “I might ask Meg, the personal trainer I work with, to come visit our backyard in the summer and work with the group of us, including my mother. Between now and next winter, I think I’ll buy some more weights. I’m very happy with my indoor cycling set up and Zwift. We’ve got the TRX. If I had more space I might buy a rowing machine. Bottom line: I’ll proceed pretty cautiously. But I am also pretty privileged in terms of space and workout company at home.”
Update: My household did all that, including buying a rowing machine. And I think the bloggers all proceeded pretty cautiously about returning to indoor workout spaces.
I’ve enjoyed working out during the day and I’ve missed that now I’m back at the office. Don’t get me wrong. I’m so happy to be back in the office. But I miss the activity breaks (hi Cheddar!) I get working at home.
I have plans for office yoga, blog post to follow. And I’ve also rejoined the campus gym.
I love the university TRX classes, specially the shorter lunch hour ones.
I announced my decision to go back on the blog last week. See here.
“The university gym has been open for awhile but it’s only now that I’m happy to go back.
What’s changed?
Well, the university has a vaccine mandate and almost all of our students are fully vaccinated. Those who aren’t will be unenroled from their face to face classes in the week ahead.
You might worry, well I worried that they could still come to the gym, but the province has also enacted a separate vaccine mandate for gyms and fitness facilities. You need to prove your vaccination status to enter the gym.
And because the university’s vaccine mandate includes staff it means that everyone there will be vaccinated. Regular gyms have a vaccine mandate for customers, enacted by our provincial government, but staff don’t have to be vaccinated. Adherence to the new rules isn’t 100% in the big wide world either. Tracy’s former yoga studio is proudly breaking the law.“
So today, I did it. I went to the gym. It was great.
I went back to my usual lunchtime TRX class. It’s in a new room, a much much larger room. And there were only four of us there. We got to take off our masks when we were at our station. And once we got started things felt okay, better than okay, good, in fact.
Given the large presence of Zwift and indoor bike racing in my life, likely I won’t go back to university spin classes.
But lifting weights? Indoor personal training once it gets too cold to workout outside? Lunch hour TRX?
I’m in and I’m very happy to be back.
