CH 36

After finishing the radio exercises, I began to further stretch my body.

“Hey, don’t take your body off of me. This is an important preparation to make sure you do not hurt yourself.”

“…Sorry.”

Kashiwagi-san, wearing a white coat over her gym clothes, unknowingly stuck close to me and helped me with my stretching.

My heart rate was exploding even though I had yet to run.

“Then let’s start training! It is not enough to just blindly move your body. The menu I have created has been carefully calculated to facilitate the release of water from fat throughout the body. In addition to running, there is tennis serving, baseball pitching, swimming, boxing, table tennis, and even basketball free throws to use your fingertips.”

“It’s like practicing all club activities… Wouldn’t it be more efficient to simply do exercises that use that part of the body instead of going to the trouble of making it a sport?”

“No. Without a sense of accomplishment, improvement, and a certain amount of ‘fun,’ people get bored and lose focus. You will be training with the goal of actually improving in all of your competitions. This is a fact based on sports engineering.”

“Ugh, I’m going to be traumatized by sports…”

Thus began three months of training for me and Kashiwagi-san.

◇◇◇

— First week.

My body hasn’t screamed yet.

“Excuse me, my sandbag broke…”

“… Again, sigh. I’ll get you something you can hit.”

— Second week.

I was feeling the joy of progressing in exercises that I was not good at before.

It was a relief for me to be in an environment where I didn’t have to laugh at my efforts or compare myself to others anymore.

“I made 100 free throws!”

“I guess it’s because my teaching style is that good. Though I’m just referring to reliable videos and literature.”

— Third week.

Kashiwagi-san was right.

Exercise combined with sports can be very enjoyable to work on alone.

“Your pitch right now, measures 100, is at the speed of a gun.”

“Ohh! 100 kilos! That’s amazing! Maybe I’m really good at baseball!”

“…100 miles, you idiot.”

“Did you just say something?”

— Fourth week.

It was nothing of an accomplishment compared to the world.

But because Kashiwagi-san was there to rejoice with me and encourage me, I didn’t have a hard time making the effort.

“High jump, I jumped 1.2 meters!”

“You did it! You surpassed the sixth-grade average. Here, I’ll reward you with a Ramune Cigarette.”

“Grade student, you say…”

— After two months.

Kashiwagi-san was getting better at giving compliments and had recently begun to exaggerate.

Foreigners have big reactions, and I guess her’s is also the American way.

“Free throws, 2,000!”

“You’re an aspiring NBA player, aren’t you? Enough for today, let’s move on.”

So my training continues with Kashiwagi-san.