Keeping Fit in Cusco

When traveling in different countries I like to keep to my routine as much as possible, which for me includes working out of some kind 4-5 times a week. With the exception of India, I have managed to do at least some kind of exercise in every country. I decided when I arrived in Cusco that it would be no different.

Cusco is at 3400 meters or 10,900 feet above sea level so it presents a whole new challenge to working out- just managing to breath is at times hard. When you add the fact that nearly every car here probably wouldn't pass emissions standards in the US or Europe, I knew that running here was not going to be an option. After giving myself a week to acclimate to the new altitude and actually not really being bothered by it, I found a gym in Cusco. 

I read that it is the "best gym" in Cusco online and decided to give it a try. I want to preface that I know that things in the USA are different than in Latin America, but the gym is a lot different.

The gym is in the basement of a shopping complex and is pretty small. It has 3 choices of memberships- aerobics, spinning or free weights/machines, since there are only some 30 year old elliptical machines I decided to try the spinning and aerobics classes. There are classes from 7am until 8pm. I, being a morning person, decided that I would go every weekday at 7am that I didn't go out or travel the night before.

From the first day I went and signed up I knew it was going to be drastically different. I arrived at the gym at 6:50am in order to have time to pay and become a member before class starts. The thing about the gym though is that the first class is at 7am and the gym opens at 7am. This means that the front desk person and the teachers arrive at about 7:05am to open the doors, sometimes later. You have to knock on the door to the shopping center in order to even be let into the building about 5 minutes before the security guard opens the door. 

After entering and paying for the gym, I decided to try the spinning class first since I like it more than aerobics. I made the start of the class since the teachers are always late. After about 10 minutes of standing on the bike and only switching hand positions I realized that this was all the teacher did. There are no sprints, jumps or even hill climbs. It's the same resistance for 45 minutes with a 2 minute break in between and only switching hand positions. I have had two teachers and both times it was the same. I have since decided to do my own thing during in the class, but every time I put on the resistance to do a climb the teacher comes over and tries to put it down- clearly they have no idea that it is good to put on resistance and you can actually sit on the bike and be working out.

Feeling a little discouraged I tried aerobics the next day. Unfortunately it's even worse. The teacher does a series of the same moves give or take some spinning in circles for an hour! One day the teacher didn't show up and when some other attendees ask the desk girl to call her to see if it was cancelled she replied that she didn't have her cell phone with her and couldn't possibly call. I actually think I had more fun without her doing my own thing, until some older crazy woman was trying to replicate the repetitive steps of the teacher and yelling "izquerda, derecha, rodilla, uno, dos, tres..." at me so that I would join her.

All in all the gym is not that great, but it feels nice to workout and I am happy that I am not too out of breath even at this altitude so at the very least it's bragging rights. Also, I will be in shape for the Inka Tral, Choququirao and Manú in the coming months!