The Importance of Paying Attention!

It's easy to think that, if you are running in the safety of the gym, nothing embarrassing can possibly happen to you.  I'm living proof that this is most certainly not the case.  Allow me to share with you one of my more miserable experiences at the gym.  While this definitely can't be classified as one of my proudest moments, hopefully you will learn from my mistake...and have a little chuckle at the same time.

Back in the fall of 2007, I was in the thick of my training for the Portland Marathon...my very first marathon attempt.  I was very dedicated when it came to my training (this was my first long race and I wanted to make sure I was prepared) and I very rarely missed a run.  On one particular weekday evening, volleyball practice had run late (I was the assistant volleyball coach at the high school at the time) and it was starting to get dark out.  I didn't want to run outside at night by myself, but I had a 6 mile run to complete and I didn't want to miss out on the mileage.  So I did what any sensible female runner who is out of options does...I went to the gym.  The place was packed because it was after work and all the 9 to 5ers were getting their workouts in.  Luckily, just as I got there, a treadmill became available, and I jumped right on and got a-runnin'.

The gym I went to at the time had television sets mounted up above the treadmills.  I happened to notice that, while there was some silly reality tv program on above me, two treadmills down there was a football game on.         I decided I would rather follow the football game, so I would run a few steps, then take a quick peak over at the game to see what was happening, focus back on my running, then take another look at the game.  Now as most of us are aware, and have probably experienced from time to time, when you stare at something while in motion, you tend to drift toward whatever your attention is focused on...well, on the treadmill, it's no different.  And, unfortunately for me, human treadmills don't have protection walls like the doggy ones do.

So anyway, as I was running, I looked over at the game just as something exciting happened.  I don't remember exactly what it was...could have been a touchdown, could have been an interception, doesn't really matter at this point.  The thing that did matter was that my attention lingered on the game a little bit longer than I intended it to and, without realizing it, I started to drift to the left side of the treadmill.  What happened next was straight out of a slapstick comedy skit.  Before I knew what was happening, my left foot landed half on the stationary track, half on the moving belt, and my foot was twisted and jerked out from under me.  In what seemed like slow motion, I was pitched forward and slammed into the treadmill display, and I immediately started to ricochet backward.  I somehow managed to link my arm around the walking bar to keep myself from flying off the back of the treadmill, but I still lost my footing, and so my legs continued to drag along behind me on the belt until the machine realized that no one was running on it any more, and it automatically shut off.

The gym was so silent you could hear a pin drop.  Everyone was trying extremely hard not to laugh, and I was trying extremely hard not to die of mortification.  I pulled myself up to standing and almost immediately collapsed again...I had pretty severely twisted my ankle, and I was in a lot of pain.  But my pride was also hurt at this point, so I realized that I had two options...I could either limp away in pain to lick my wounds with people snickering behind my back the whole way out of the gym, or I could get back on the treadmill, continue to run, and pretend like nothing happened.  I, of course, unwisely chose option number 2, and continued to run for another 20 minutes until I had finished all my mileage.  As you can probably imagine, my ankle was pretty swollen when I finally got off the treadmill, so I figured my smartest move at that point was to get myself to an Urgent Care Clinic.  When I finally got in to see the doctor, he practically had to cut my shoe off my foot because my ankle was so big.  He looked at my ankle, looked at me with a weird expression on his face, and asked "Did you continue to run on this after you twisted it?", to which I promptly responded "Of course not, that would be ridiculous!"  I was outfitted with the following beauty...

...and told that I wasn't allowed to run for two weeks.  That pretty much put a damper in my training, but the doctor told me I was lucky I hadn't broken my ankle, so I counted my blessings.  At this point, the score is Treadmill:1, Reese: 0...but I'll have my revenge!  And in the meantime, I have to be content with the knowledge that...

What's the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to you at the gym?