I'm fully convinced that the gloomy, at times rainy day was a result of having to sit in class all morning. On the other hand, it probably made being in a classroom more bearable. Had it been sunny and 70 again today I would have only been thinking about catching the bus down to Bondi Beach and hopping in the water to body surf the waves. After class there was a long buffer period while everyone spread around the city, going to their first training sessions. My roommate Alex is doing the surfing program here and caught the ferry over to Manly beach. My training wasn't until 7:30 tonight but we had to leave around six to make sure we got out there, especially at "peak time" (rush hour). The train takes about an hour to get to Olympic Park with all the stops along the way. It's a group of about nine of us doing the strength and conditioning program. We are going to be training in the gymnastics facility from the 2000 olympics and we've been set up with the highest level of a character as well as a trainer.
Demitri (last name unknown) began his introduction stating that he is from the "Soviet Union, which they now call Russia". He is a former USSR national gymnastics coach and has also spent time coaching US olympians. He currently works in Sydney training stunt doubles for major Fox movies, Australian special forces, "Thunder Down Under" performers (a Las Vegas show... no more detail required) and even, believe it or not, the Wiggles. *Anyone not familiar with the Wiggles should type them into the Google machine and discover that they are synonymous with America's Raffi or Canada's Sharon Lois and Bram...but also Australia's top selling recording artists of all time...multi-platinum and apparently extremely fit!*
Our lesson today was more of an introduction. We are to be focusing on the core which apparently no one but gymnasts have properly developed. Warmup consisted of ab exercises, handstands, somersaults, cartwheels, and more handstands. Demitri took us through some basic exercises like climbing the rope, handstands on the wrings to flat front and back positions, "crosses" on the rings (arms straight out) and some other ab exercises all the while explaining his philosophy on training. From what i got through his accent, Demitri and his training friends get together and workout constantly for an hour, running from climbing the rope to ring exercises, to crazy parallel pullups to exercises i can't explain. There aren't breaks or time in between, they just go and go and do as much as they can then go and go and do more and find new things to do and go.....! This guy is nuts! I doubt there is much science behind his methods except for the fact they work. To get biceps that seem to also have their own sets of biceps you have to be a bit crazy, and get back to basics. It was a bit frustrating for me because I'm not quite built to be swinging around in a gymnasium and I literally couldn't do some of these exercises. But, I'm excited to go back tomorrow and see what Demitri has in store for us. I think that this will be an unbelievable training tool and i'm looking forward to the challenge. Some nice six pack abs wouldn't be bad either. Tonight is the first and likely the only night I catch the train home from the gym wanting more out of the session. I have a feeling i'll be cursing my new Soviet friend and his crazy gymnastics in the not so distant future.
Goodnight for now, another big day tomorrow!
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