Dear reader, I’m about to explain a part of the Bikram Yoga 30 Day Challenge that may require you to first sit down, hold the nearest hat, and wear a disposable diaper. Feel free to do those things in whatever order makes most sense for you. The thing I’m about to explain is the double.
No, not a two-base hit. Not two shots of Jamesons. Not even a doppelganger. The double is something you do when you miss (or expect to miss) a day during the 30 Day Challenge.
You’ve probably guessed it. It’s two classes in the same day.
That’s right. Three hours of 105 degrees, 40% humidity, and a 100% chance of suffering. Three hours of stretching, compressing, balancing, bending, twisting, grunting, groaning, inhaling, exhaling, and sweating like you’re a perspiration waterfall.
But wait, there’s more! Based on what I’ve heard and seen in the last week, the majority of people who have to do a double—and I’m pretty sure none of them do a double for the hell of it—the consensus is: do your double in back-to-back classes. This really surprised me. I thought most people would want to take a rest and come back again.
On a weekend you could do back-to-back classes, but depending on the time of day you could catch an hour’s break between the end of Class #1 and Class #2. It’s not something that appeals to me, and I’ve always felt if I had to do a double to keep pace, I’d do the earliest possible class on a weekend, and then come back for the latest possible class that day. But it’s the Bikram version of “do I peel the band-aid off slowly, or just rip it off?” Granted, doing back-to-back classes means you spend four hours (including the break) ripping off the bandage, but maybe people feel like it’s more painful to make two trips when you could do it in one prolonged sitting.
Then there was what happened on Monday: a handful of people fled the room at the end of the 4:30 session to run to the upstairs studio to do the 6 o’clock class. They did three straight hours of 105 degree yoga without a break. Holy humidity, Batman.
I’m sure everyone survived their three straight hours in the torture chamber. I would guess almost all the people who went immediately from one class to the next had done a double before, and likely had done it with back-to-back classes. So we’re not talking about rookies here, but experienced practitioners.
All I know is, there were only two ways I could stare down 30 straight days of Bikram Yoga: the second is something I’ll write about later, but the first was to plan my life around it. That meant occasionally leaving work a little early to catch the 4:30 class instead of the 6, so I wouldn’t get home at 9 o’clock every weeknight. It also meant taking a couple of days off of work in the middle of the challenge, so I could have a long weekend where my only commitment each day was the 90 minutes in the hot room, and the time spent getting to and returning from there. They key to that plan: one, and only one, class per day.
I have nothing but admiration for anyone who does a double. Perhaps the impressive double I know of was accomplished by our friend Caroline: not because she did back-to-back classes (which she did), but because she did her double a week and a half before she knew she was going to miss a day. She wasn’t doing a make-good; she was paying that double forward. To her and anyone who has the wherewithal to do that,or the double in any form or configuration, I can offer only an awe-induced “Namaste.”
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