Fighting for the Fan

This is a post that is pretty unimportant and that most people won't appreciate but I have to tell you the story behind the title anyway.

I do group exercise classes quite a bit.... key in on the word "group" and "exercise".

What do those 2 words have in common?

HEAT!

It gets HOT in these classes.... especially in the south where I'm from.

At Family Fitness in Lake Jackson Tx, no matter what class I went to.... whether it was Body Pump or Boot Camp or Zumba.... I made sure I got there in time to the position right in front of the....

Fan!

And I turned that thing wide open and pointed it straight at me.

And people learned not to mess with my fan.

I am hot natured and sweat a lot.... I sweat less now that my bodyfat level is fairly low.... but I still sweat a lot.

So I want to stay as cool as I can.

And there's some science behind this.... no not "some" science.

Definite science.

You can Google this and read all the articles you want and the bottom line is that if you are sweating, you are sweating because your body is trying to cool itself....

Which means it's too hot inside....

That is your core temperature is above it's "setpoint".... that point at which your body works its best.

So when you hear people say, I just wanna work up a good sweat in my workout, that's fine... if they're trying to sweat some liquids out of their body.

But what they are probably not aware of is the fact that their body, their organs, their muscles.... are not working as efficiently if they are HOT!

That's why the fastest Marathon times are won when the ambient temp is around 35 degF.... nearly freezing.

That's why the Tour de France riders "precool" their core temperature with "cold vests" before beginning their rides on warm days.

Every place I've been to.... Family Fitness in Lake Jackson Tx, Gold's Gym in Beaumont Tx, Ridge Fitness in Bozeman Mt, Anytime Fitness in Santa Fe NM.... has fans in their group exercise classes.

And almost invariably, if you turn the fans on, somebody complains about it.

Same thing happened to me the other day in Liz Prehm's PIYO Strength class at Anytime Fitness.

As I've explained before, the heat in most structures in Santa Fe New Mexico is radiant heat through the floors.

And you can feel it in the studio at Anytime Fitness.

So about halfway through the class, I'm sweating my ass off, so I reach over to the fan which is almost right in front of me and point it directly at me....

And turn it on.

Aaaah.... that feels great....

For about 5 minutes.

And then this lady behind me walks right up to the fan.....

And points it at the ceiling.

WTF?

First of all, there's no way she could've been feeling that much of the fan cause I nearly had it totally blocked with my body and this lady was at least 8' behind me.

So she basically disables the fan by directing it off me and points it at the ceiling.

Naturally.... I didn't do anything.

I just spent the rest of the workout sweating my ass off.....

But it kinda pissed me off.

So I lost the....

Battle of the Fan.

That day.

Next time I won't be so nice.