Spinning = Biking Like William Hung = Singing

Morning Workout
SPINNING CLASS
1 hour. Really, 45 minutes. The 45 minute hour is Spinning's equivalent to Psychotherapy's 50-minute hour. [insert spinning-psycho joke here]

Random Comments: With our bikes on a truck to Lake Placid, most likely somewhere in the middle of the Mojave Desert at this point, Cat and I were relegated to Spin Class this morning. Oh joy. Here's my take on it all: Spinning is to biking like William Hung is to singing.

In case you've been cryogenically preserved over the past few years, William Hung was a contestant on American Idol. He got kicked out after the first round but, miraculously, became a star anyway. William Hung's singing is so incredibly bad it's funny. But it's not your regular ha-ha funny. It's more funny like "I'm laughing, but I feel like I'm laughing at the retarded" type of funny. He's a car crash, the William Hung, and it's tough to avoid the car crash when you're driving by. And somewhere within your Hung experience, you realize one of two things is going on: either he's too stupid to know everybody is making fun of him, or he's the smartest guy in the room.

Spinning in Southern California is kinda like that. It's either quite geeky and borderline retarded to be indoors on a stationary bike when everyday is essentially nirvana-like weather outside, or it's the smartest thing to do for your body. At this point, we still don't know.

People who go to spin class regularly consider themselves serious bicyclists. People who bicycle seriously, look at spin class people as buffoons. Needless to say, only a week and a half away from doing an Ironman race, Cat and I felt a bit awkward and somewhat elitist walking into Spin Class this morning.

You get a certain geeky, borderline quality of participants in Santa Monica spin classes. I guess if there's a saving grace of it all, it's that the people watching is tremendous. There was the woman on the bike next to Cat who was drinking a large cup of Starbucks coffee as she pedaled. There was the spinning instructor who was literally yelling at us to be more relaxed. It was like a drill sargeant trying to teach you how to meditate. And of course, what's a Santa Monica spin class with out my favorite spinning people: the prima donnas that come into class 10 minutes late, hop on a bike and spend a half an hour pedaling like a bat outta hell, oblivious to anything else going on in the room, including the instructor's directions. Then about 5 minutes before the class ends, they stop, get off the bike and walk out, as if they were so important they couldn't spend the last remaining 5 minutes with the class.

And as for the music that was playing this morning? I still have a headache...

I miss my bike.
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