You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but you can maybe teach a reporter how to drive. To kick off the new year, three Post staffers decided to take on three different challenges: Max Gross got behind the wheel for the first time, Tim Donnelly attempted to ski and editor Margi Conklin put herself in a literal sink-or-swim situation by hitting the pool — despite her fear of water. Each has spent the past 2½ months trying to conquer these challenges — so how did they fare?
Downhill From Here
Immediately after my first attempt at skiing — which led to an almost instantaneous somersaulting crash into a faceful of mountain — I was sure I had broken my thumb. I hoisted myself back up on my skis (which should be an Olympic event on its own) and was determined to keep trying, lest I let my lifelong nemesis, Old Man Winter, get the better of me.
I had hopped a bus to Mountain Creek, NJ, the nearest ski resort to the city. Like most things in New Jersey, it had the ambience of a jam-packed shopping mall, full of screaming children and preening mothers overcrowding the slopes.
So maybe this wasn’t the best place to learn for the first time.
I was worried that I’d be in a class full of 8-year-olds who would surely embarrass me with their dexterity. But when the class started, it was all people my age (32); all the young kids were across the slope in the snowboarding class, which confirmed to me that snowboarding was both easier to learn and probably the cooler sport to try.
Our instructor seemed to gloss over what I would have thought were critical skiing basics, such as “How to get up after falling,” and “Oh God, I’m going so fast, how do I stop immediately?”
After the lesson, I found my way up to the easiest slope. The ski lift wasn’t encouraging: From above, the slope looked like the carnage of a Siberian war scene, with bodies splayed out everywhere and equipment scattered like shrapnel.
I pointed myself downward, pushed off and instantly turned myself into a jacket-clad missile going 90 mph, straight into the waiting fist of the painful mountain.
That crash resulted in only a sprained thumb, as a doctor told me the next day, but later in the week I discovered a bruised rib, too.
Despite my better judgment, I scheduled another go at the slopes, this time at more picturesque Windham Mountain in New York. My goal was to make it down without falling once. Or, at least, not to sprain the other thumb.
Rolling into Windham, I decided not to tempt fate and enrolled in another lesson. The instructors here were much more accommodating: Instead of a big bell curve group lesson, they work in stations, meaning once you’ve mastered one skill (say, squatting and extending legs in the skis), you can move on to the next.
After the two-hour lesson, I felt more confident and met up with friends who were headed up to the easiest slope. Wary of redamaging my thumb, I went as slow as my skis would allow. But the course was long, and, as the turns started to blend together, I started to pick up speed — and then my peaceful stroll down the hill turned into the runaway bus from “Speed,” with no way to stop. I fell, this time on purpose.
In the final run, before my ankles could not stand being in the ski boots for another minute, I crept down the hill, my legs spread in as much of a wedge shape as I could manage. Still, I hit some patches where I couldn’t help but go fast, and found myself bailing to avoid a certain death in the roadway that ran perilously close to the slope.
At the end of the day, I felt like I’d vastly improved since my first outing. But at the same time, I was glad to be off the godforsaken mountain and back in the comforts of a warm cabin. Skiing may have its charms, but I can’t say I’m hooked. Hurry up and get here, summer. While I’m not the world’s best surfer, falling into the water hurts a lot less than falling into a mountain.
Best Advice: If you’re learning to ski for the first time in your 30s, you might want to do what I did and bring a buddy along who spent two years as a ski instructor in Germany; he can be your personal mountain sherpa to fill in where the official instructors failed you. Other than that, keep your thumbs tightly wrapped around your poles and hope you don’t snap one back like I did.
Where I Did It: Mountain Creek, Vernon, NJ. Weekend lift ticket: $66 (you can get there on the NYC Snow Bus, too, which charges $67 for the lift ticket and bus ride. Tomorrow is its last outing of the season: nycsnowbus.com).
Windham Mountain Resort, Windham, NY: Weekend lift ticket: $75. Find group tours from NYC here: windhammountain. com/groups-weddings/ tour-operators.
–Tim Donnelly
She’s Taking a Victory Lap!
“We don’t waterboard,” says Ellis Peters, his brown eyes twinkling as he leads me to the basement pool at the Equinox gym on Greenwich Avenue.
It is my first swimming lesson since I was 6, when two instructors held me down in my hometown pool for 60 seconds to teach me how to exhale underwater.
After that experience, when I came up gasping for air, fearing for my life, I vowed never to swim again. And yet, here I am at 41 confronting my greatest fear, as part of a New Year’s resolution challenge.
The first thing I notice is that the pool is only 4 feet deep. Surely I can’t drown in that, so I’m happy to take the next brave step: Sitting poolside on a bench with Ellis and talking.
A 6-foot-3 swimming instructor with a ready smile and a penchant for saying “right on,” Ellis is an athlete crossbred with a psychotherapist.
In his 20 years as an instructor, he’s taught landlubbers “aged 7 to 102” how to swim, and I can see why he’s so successful. He listens patiently to my story of childhood trauma, before exclaiming: “Who does that?”
He reassures me that he will never hold my limbs or force me underwater, and I feel the nerves in my stomach start to untangle. I can trust this man.
I agree to venture into the pool, feeling like an impostor in my lap suit, goggles and swim cap (all hastily purchased on Amazon). After our reassuring chat, I expect a gentle start.
So I am shocked when Ellis issues the following command: “Now put your head underwater and breathe out bubbles for as long as you can.”
I panic.
“Ellis,” I say, “that is my greatest fear. Do I have to?”
Ellis climbs into the pool and looks me straight in the eye. “If you cling to the edge when you’re under you will know you can pull yourself out.” He also says he’s coming with me.
I summon all my bravery, conjuring images of heroic women like Sally Ride, Janet Yellen and Daenerys Targaryen from “Game of Thrones,” and take a breath so big it hurts my lungs. I plunge. Underwater, I see Ellis, bubbles floating gracefully from his mouth. The water is serene and quiet, and I am exhaling like a normal person.
Back in the air, Ellis says: “Let’s talk about that.”
I tell him I can’t believe how easy it was.
“Right on,” he smiles.
He tells me to go under again, this time wrapping my arms under my legs. Suddenly I am curled into a ball, blowing bubbles underwater.
That’s when the truly shocking thing happens: My body floats to the top like a rubber ring. I am buoyant!
Ellis is jubilant. “You’re going to have no problems doing this.”
He asks me to glide in the water with my face down, blowing bubbles while humming. (Tip: If you hum underwater, you will only ever breathe out, not in.) To my amazement, I glide across the surface like a ship, feeling more QE2 than Titanic. By the end of the class, I am elated.
But despite my early success, I still battle fear at every lesson. Sometimes when my face pops up and I try to breathe, I feel water creeping into my nose and mouth. I panic and stand up.
“Let’s talk about that,” Ellis says.
When I tell him I feel like I’m drowning, he videos me on his iPhone. I see myself gliding through the water and realize I am only imagining imminent death.
About 20 minutes of each hour-long lesson is spent talking about my phobias. Props help too: flippers to learn a proper kick, a leg buoy that helps me understand the natural rocking of my body, like the listing of a boat. And gradually I get used to being underwater, the solitude, the soundlessness. It reminds me pleasantly of yoga — breathing, balance, focus.
By my third lesson, Ellis teaches me how to do a forward crawl, which is a lot harder than even I expected. Every part of my body is tested: Like learning to dance for the first time without ever having learned to walk.
The old me would have thrashed across the pool, like the desperate survivor of a shipwreck. But Ellis helps me learn that the key is to go slowly.
Within four weeks, he has taught me the basics and it’s time for the final test.
“I want you to crawl slowly from one end of the pool to the other without standing up.”
I don’t want to disappoint Ellis, who has been my champion, my teacher, my therapist and friend. Crouching hesitantly in the water, I push off and start slicing down the lane. Counting, breathing.
My lungs are burning and I’m running out of steam. I know Ellis is videoing me. I think of Sally Ride.
Passing the final marker, my hands touch the edge. I’ve done it. I may not be the next Thorpedo, but, for the first time in my life, I can say three words I never thought possible: I can swim.
As Ellis would say, right on.
Best advice : Be brave and get your face wet on the first lesson. Once that’s over, everything else is easier.
Where I did it: Ellis Peters is a Tier 3 trainer at Equinox (equinox.com); a 1-hour swim lesson or training session with him costs $125. He also teaches a number of group fitness classes for all levels (both swimming and water aerobics).
–Margi Conklin
New Road Warrior
When you’re a high schooler, parents, grandparents and older siblings each want to help you assume your rightful place behind the wheel.
That changes when you hit 35. When you ask friends if they’ll loan you their car, the reaction is usually an awkward “Uh, maybe.”
Growing up, I’d always heard stories about the time my mom went the wrong way up Broadway (with an infant me in the back seat). Driving was not in the cards for me. But as an adult (with a non-driver wife), now was the time, and driving school really the only option.
I looked at five different schools in Manhattan — all of which offered the same basic package: Between five and 20 hours of practice time, the state-mandated five hour driver safety course and a promise to take you to the road test and loan you their car for the ordeal. These packages ran from $395 to $1,230.
So, one Saturday, I sat through the driving safety course, which consisted of some pointers from the instructor (if you don’t check your blind spot, you will fail) and viewing several films made circa 1983 about the perils of drinking and driving. (Texting while driving hasn’t yet made it into the curriculum.)
After that, I went out with a driving teacher from Citi Driving School — usually twice a week at around 8 a.m. Robert Morales, my teacher, always appeared outside my front door with a warm, “Hello buddy!”
We would drive around my neighborhood for an hour, making abrupt left or right turns, finding parking spots, and practicing threepoint turns.
“How’d it go?” my wife would ask when I returned from each expedition.
“I didn’t hit anyone.”
Certainly, I made mistakes. I never remembered to signal when pulling out. And my first attempt at a left turn was a big sweep across the divider. But, much to my surprise, few of these mistakes were disqualifiers.
After every session, I would ask, “Do you think I’m ready?”
With Zen-like calm, Robert would answer: “You will be.”
But something interesting happened when I went driving with Robert: I relaxed. While most people who start driving for the first time at 16 feel the adolescent sense of invincibility behind the wheel, I was neurotic and easily vexed as a teen. I was a much calmer, more collected 35-year-old, who didn’t jerk the wheel in a million different directions at the sight of another car. And I came to the conclusion that the thing that had held me back from learning to drive was entropy. If I had signed up earlier, I would have been driving earlier. After a few weeks, I was signalling when I pulled out and making my turns crisply. (Or, at least, crisper.)
The day of the exam, Robert drove me to the test site and we waited as two different examiners began testing the four or five cars that had queued up before us. (They were not afraid to fail people. The woman right before me flunked.)
“Hi Jackie,” Robert said to my examiner.
“Good morning!” I chirped.
Jackie did not look impressed. “Hello,” she said with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm.
The test lasted five or six minutes. “Make a broken U-turn,” she told me. “Park over here,” she said later. (“Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” she shouted when I didn’t move quickly enough — and which convinced me that I had doomed the entire effort.) After we had gone a few blocks around the neighborhood, she said: “Pull over.”
As I shifted into park, I looked over at her; she was hunched over a small mechanical device. After a few moments I couldn’t take any more suspense.
“Did I pass?”
“Yeah,” she said, without looking up.
“Oh,” I said. “Yay!”
She looked up. “What are you saying ‘yay’ for? You’re old enough that you should’ve done this years ago.”
Best Advice: Just sign up and stay calm.
Where I Did It: Citi Driving School (citidrivingschool.com) COST: A package includes the five-hour state-mandated driving safety course, a road test appointment and use of Citi Driving’s car for the test. A 10-hour practice package is $770; 15 hours is $1,060.
–Max Gross