30 Day Bikram Challenge -- Class #2

When you come to your first class, the instructor will tell you a few things.  1) If you get light headed, please feel free to take a knee.  2) Sit out the first posture and watch if you are unsure how to do something.  3) There is only one official water break. If you need water any other time, please only drink between postures.  4) Stay in the room.

The last is the most important. In all of the classes I have taken, I have only witnessed three people leave class, and even then, they always came back into the room to finish.  Until class #2.

Class #2 was the craziest, hottest class I've ever been in.  To start out, I made the mistake of sitting under some sort of vent pumping in air straight from hell.  Or the sun.  Either way, I was angry.  How could I have been so stupid?  I kept berating myself for not paying attention to where I was rolling out my mat.

Deliriously, I wondered if I had put on enough sunscreen because I felt like I might be getting sunburnt.  

I eventually realized that I was not the only one suffering from the blistering licks of solar wind.  Everyone around me was having a terrible time.  I've never seen so many people drinking water, taking a knee or leaving the room.

All around me, bikram veterans were reduced to mere noobs! I wanted to yell at the instructor;  don't you see what is going on??  Turn down the heat, dummy!  Instead of turning down the heat, she would call out: "hold on guys, there are only _____ more postures".  Was that supposed to be encouraging!?!  Crack a door, you loon!

At one point, I saw a woman roll up her mat to leave before the class was over, only to stop and prop herself up on the back wall.  Instead of continuing on towards the door, she slid down the wall and sat there with her matt between her knees looking as wrung out as I felt.

It was a disaster.

The man who had practiced beside me had also parked next me in the garage.  As we walked to our cars after conquering the heat, he told me that he had been going to the studio for seven years.  In all his time there, he claimed that was by far the hottest class he had ever been to.  I felt like some sort of warrior for making through the class without leaving.  I also felt like I wanted a nap, and a bucket of ice.

I later found out why the class had been so unbearable. Apparently, it was not the heat so much as it is the humidity.  This particular class was ultra crowded and there was thunderstorm outside, which both contributed to the misery.  Lesson learned.