As the barre bro entered his 36th year of life in 2019, his metabolism plummeted and he gained almost 15 lbs. as a result. So now, in 2020, it’s time to get back into fitness. Let’s do this!
A few months ago, a friend of mine named “Action Dan” proposed that we do something called the Smolov Squat Routine together. It’s a 13-week program where you squat a lot. And I assume it was invented by a Russian guy named Smolov. Have you ever noticed how all Russian names sound incredibly badass? Even female Russian names just sound dangerous, no matter the context. “Welcome to Starbucks! My name is Svetlana. Vould you like a shot of cyanide in your soy latte this morning?”
Anyway, the point is that I’ve been doing a lot of squats. And so, this past Sunday, I thought hey I’ve been decently active for 13 weeks – let’s just jump right back into a barreSHRED class!
barreSHRED is our intermediate/advanced barre class. It’s actually only about 20%-30% harder than tuck’s normal barre classes, but since the baseline barre class at tuck is so tough, that extra 20% really means something. 20% off any size fries at McDonald’s? Not that significant. 20% proposed increase in the Pentagon budget? We’re going to need to find some new countries to bomb.
Three baskets, only one choice that isn’t completely mental. Always pick the purple 2 lb. weights.
Like flying on an airplane, much of your barre experience will be determined by those placed nearest to you. This particular day I was placed next to Michael, who has been doing barreSHRED since Callie invented it, and Julia, who I’ve previously described as the Kevin Durant of barre because she makes everything look so easy. Look at those two, taunting me with their happy faces while I squeeze this stupid ring. They’re actually laughing because Callie was saying ridiculous things. Callie used to be semi-funny when teaching barre, but she’s clearly run out of jokes at this point. Now she just says weird things that make no sense. That day, she was saying “You’re driving! You’re driving! And it’s a Tesla! It’s a lease not a rental!”
The day only got worse from there. Not only was Michael showing everyone up by grabbing green AND blue weights, he had great form and a straight back while I’m hanging on for dear life like Quasimodo.
Here’s me dying some more.
And here’s me dying in an upright position while Michael checks himself out in the mirror, approvingly. 
We did some pushups with this ring underneath. At first I thought, great! The springiness of the ring will make me feel lighter and make the pushups feel easier! Stupid me. When do props ever make things in barre easier? The ring was there so you never completely go up all the way to resting position. Also, implicit in the ring’s presence is the threat that if you tire and collapse, the ring could simply break and impale you – great motivator!
Merciful end of class.
Other than that barre class, life has been pretty good recently! We went to Miami where there was lots of terrible dancing.
Why are they dancing in our hotel room? Because we lame ass thirty-year olds tried to go “out” in South Beach to a dance club… at 10:00 pm. At some hotel bar, we asked the bartender where the nightclubs were. “Oh, well you’re standing in one… but it doesn’t turn into a nightclub for another two hours.” We tried mightily to hang out until then, but a glass of wine later at about 10:45am, we all got tired and called an Uber home.
Recently we also crashed some little kid’s birthday party! All I remember is there was a ton of awesome, delicious pizza.
Mmmm pizza.
the barre bro 