We didn’t know back in January 2021 that we would still be at it 200 crunches later, but here we are! Dave Sands and I were just looking for a reason to get together during Covid. We started back at school after a Christmas break locked into our family bubble, not seeing any friends socially. The rules did allow for meeting outdoors and so we decided to walk the Coquitlam Crunch together.
We met on a Friday after work, did the crunch, had a beverage sitting 6 feet apart on the parking lot railing, then headed home in separate cars. It felt so good to actually do something with a friend, that we planned to meet the following week. And a new habit was formed.
Starting our next school year, we decided that we would commit to at least 40 crunches a year, basically one crunch for every week of school. And we’ve stuck to this ever since. In fact we are boosting our average up above 42 by the end of this year.
Early on, Friday after work proved too hard to keep up and so we switched it up and met Saturday morning. A new after crunch ritual of coffee replaced the Friday night beverage. Our Crunch walk is something Dave and I often bend over backwards to make work. Last weekends Dave was heading out of town for the weekend and so we went on Thursday after school. The start of this weekend I was out of town so we did our crunch early this holiday Monday. In fact the reason we’re boosting our average by 2 days is because this year I think we only missed one week.
We’ve crunched in sleet, snow, and rain. We’ve started it in early morning darkness, we’ve ended in early winter darkness. In fact, in almost 5 years there is only one absolutely down pouring miserable day that we got to the crunch and both of us were not up to facing the weather. Besides that one time, we’ve faced some awful weather and still decided to commit to heading up and down this hill.
Today was a weighted vest day, and we were planning on doing it twice last week but my back wasn’t up to it after having IMS that day, so we just did one. So, we combined these two challenges and we did the double with weighted vests today. We did crunch number 199 and number 200 this morning, on our first ever double counted day. We’ve done a couple doubles before, not counting them as separate, but we figure if we are doing complete doubles, they should count as two!
Yes, this is great exercise. Yes, it’s an awesome habit to keep. But the real value in doing this activity 200 times is the connection to my buddy Dave. I can’t describe how mentally and emotionally rewarding it is to have this weekly connection to a friend. Not many people get to see a best friend a guaranteed 40+ times a year in addition to other meetings, plans and connections. We both cherish this time so much that we can’t think of valid excuses to not meet up, and we will consistently make up for lost opportunities when life gets in the way of us meeting on a Saturday.
So, we’ll just keep going, week after week, and our Coquitlam Crunch adventures are to be continued… starting again next week!
