By Dr. Marie Miczak
What a fantastic summer this has been! No sitting on the sidelines for us. Here at Suite 101, we've kept you in the loop by offering a variety of ways to cross train and perfect your ice skating skills off season. We were out there cross training by inline skating, cycling, jogging and hiking. Our Summer Cross Training Sports Gallery gave you the 411 on all the latest equipment and accessories to get you well into the cross training lifestyle.
Why cross train? Well, for one thing it turns down the trend to get bored. Sticking with any sport for a number of years is difficult. Off season, when there are not any competitions to watch or look forward to, is the prime time for interest and students to drop off. That is why it was refreshing to look at our cross training perks which can keep you motivated. The second and most obvious reason to cross train is that doing different physical activities works muscles other than those used while ice skating. Exercises which can strengthen your body's core are very important to perfecting technique for both spins and jumps. Aerobic exercises such as walking and cycling increase your endurance without damaging your knees, ankles or back.
I'm going to give you a third reason to cross train that is so wonderful but because many of us shy away from going that far, it falls well under the radar as a benefit. That is the exhilaration of accomplishing something new in a sport that you've never excelled in before. For example, I began cross training with my road bicycle last summer and really enjoyed it. By that fall, I entered my first charity ride and came in first in my group. We weren't competing, it just happened. That kind of showed me how far I had really come as I had never done anything like that before.
This August, our oldest daughter entered both of us in the Woods Hollow Classic Mountain Bike Race! This was serious stuff now. Not only do I not have any experience with a mountain bike, (I'm strictly a road bike woman, thank you), but I only had a week or so to train on the actual equipment I was going to use in the race. Talk about upping the difficulty factor!
The day of the race came and keep in mind that we have never been in a serious race of any kind. More than that, we were in the Advanced Group of riders who had to do extra miles over the lower groups. It didn't help that I crashed early in the race, jamming my gears and knocking the wind out of myself. Thank God it was no more than a few scrapes and bruises. I went on. During the race, I noticed that I was often alone. My race buddy didn't fall,(plus being about 20 years younger) and with her excellent riding skills, surged ahead of me on the course. When I finished the race, I found out WHY I was often alone on the course. It turns out that more than half the participants quit after the first lap and simply walked to the parking lot, got in their cars and went home. So the result was that by God's grace and power, WE finished the race and were awarded 1st place plaques in our respective groups! So what did I learn? Well first is that prayer does change things! Second is that if you set you sights high and put faith in God and yourself, you can achieve most anything.
