Marion Freijsen A blog about Sports, Fitness & Health

Skipping

As I am still fighting some very annoying and persistant injuries, I am struggling with my normal calorie-blasting activities. I keep telling myself this is a mental challenge instead of a physical one for once, and I can deal with it… but it is still v. hard not to experience that feeling of exhilaration when you have completed a good run or great, very muddy, bikeride through the woods…

So Caleb, my cross-fit trainer, managed to find one thing I can do… jumping rope! As I move up and down instead of forward, it poses not threat to my poor, painful posterior parts at all. But as I found, it poses a serious threat to my ego! When he handed me the rope, I thought “easy-peasy, I was a star at skipping!”… I just forgot that that was over xx years ago (hey, no-one asks a lady her age, remember? so am not giving it away here either!) and my body had not exactly grown more nimble since then. So as I aimed to impress by flicking a double just like that…I almost injured myself some more by tripping on the rope.

Since that painful first reconnection with skipping, I am actually getting better at it again. Not quite back to my 7-year old stardom, but on the way to at least being able to throw in a few doubles now and again. Skipping is surprisingly hard to do for any longer period of time and therefore great to get that feeling that I was missing so much – exhaustion. And exhilaration. I would strongly recommend picking up a rope and trying it. It’ll give you a new challenge in your workouts!