Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Snowboarding, a lesson in gravity

Note: NOT a picture of me!




Hey you guys, guess what? We did it! We went snowboarding - twice! Huzzah!

For those of you who have yet to hear my woesome tale of snowboarding woe, let me summarize. R and I used to snowboard (him with much more zeal, skill, and grace than I). Then we moved to SE Ohio, with its pathetic slushy winters and total lack of mountains. And we did not snowboard for 8 years. Eight sad, sad years.

So it was high on the list of things that must be done when we moved to northern Idaho. We have now gone two times. And it. was. awesome! I picked it up right away...I'm not saying that I'm good, but I am not the pathetic, scared snowboarder that I was worried I would be.

On our first outing, I fell frequently, but hopped right back up to practiced basic maneuverability. Yesterday, outing number two, I worked on improving my control and tried for a bit of grace. I also worked on not freaking out when I start going fast*. I was mildly successful. I fell a fair deal, sometimes spectacularly, but had some really good runs.

*This is really hard to do.

I knew I was going to be sore, but WOW. After outing one, I took a salt bath and then curled around the heating pad - for two days. My whole upper body was rigid and overworked from pushing myself up after my various crashes. Today I am feeling pretty good. Stiff, sore, and with the mother of all bruises on my knee, but mobile. I will partially attribute this to improvement in my skillz, but must admit that after outing one I started exercising everyday (once I could move), including using my 5 lb dumbbells and doing lots of stretching. As I'm sure many of you have experienced, once I get back into regular exercise I enjoy it.

Anyway, I'm excited to go back. I hope I continue to improve, and I sincerely hope that no one posts any of my accidental aerial cartwheels on YouTube.




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