"Hop on." Terrance said as he pointed to an exercising bike. He turned it on and the screen glowed. He set it to level one resistance helped to strap Sarah's feet in.
Sarah began to pedal. The wires were attached to her again and the data was filed into a system connected to a small, black device. She had no idea what it was or what it was for. Like the exercising she had done on the treadmill, she would do each level for one minute. She had very similar results as the previous test.
She would be perfectly fine until level 13, that was when she could no longer breath normally. She was soaked in sweat and she would begin to slow down.
Terrance noted down her results.
End of Stamina test number two.
Next, Terrance showed her to the spinning logs. He showed her how she needed to walk along one end of the log to the other side. It was like walking along a fallen tree trunk, except if she didn't have perfect balance and the perfect speed amount, it would spin like crazy, causing her to fall into the sea of square, foam blocks underneath.
Unlike the other tests, being able to last a long time was not the objective. Nor was the objective to just keep going. This was a test of balance, patience and skill. She had to carefully walk across the log, trying to make sure it did not spin because if it did, she would have to walk across a spinning log. And that was not something she looked forward to.
Terrance assisted her as she climbed up a few steps to stand on a block of wood before stepping onto the challenge. She looked over at Terrance who was holding a stopwatch. He would time her every single try it took her until she made it all the way across the spinning log without falling or until she reached twenty tries, whatever came first.
He nodded and she nodded back. He would only start the clock once she had both feet on the log.
She took a deep breath and tentatively placed one food onto the log. The log itself was slightly hollowed in the middle, making it possible to spin by putting a metal bar into the middle of i t and making it lighter at the same time. Because it was lighter, it made it a whole lot easier to accidentally spin the log while walking on it.
She placed her other foot on it. Terrance had begun to time her. She lifted her right foot again to take another step and then-
Bang!
She fell into the foam pit.
"Ughh." Sarah groaned as she rolled over to look at the ceiling. She had landed face first into the foam. He was glad that it was filled with foam rather than water like a pool because she would have belly flopped and the impact surely would have given her a bloody nose. "How'd I do Terrance?" Sarah asked, her face grimacing, prepared for the terrible results.
"That is personally, the fastest time that I have ever seen somebody fail on the log runner. Needless to say, I hope you do better before your twenty tries are up." Terrance said.
Sarah just groaned again and rolled out of the foam pit, landing face first onto the ground. "Ugh!!!" Sarah said. "Why! Why do I have to suck so bad at this?!?"
Soon, there was laughter coming from the doorway. Sarah whipped her head around to see who would dare to mock her and her failures when she saw a sharp jawline, freckles and short, curly black hair. "Alex! If you dare to laugh at me, let's see how you do better then!" She shouted. Rage written all over her face.
Alex looked at her blankly and that's when he knew; he messed up.
-
Alex climbed on top of the step, leading up to the platform. His guide, Molly, flipped through her clipboard and clicked her pen. She might as well write down the results of his attempts, it would save them from having to do it all over again, save time, and his results would be different because he would have already attempted it before.
Alex stood on the block of wood before the log. He stepped onto it and then placed his other foot on. Molly started the timer and he took another step forward.
Bang!
Just like Sarah had, before he could even put his foot down, he had fallen, face first, into the foam pit.
For a moment, there was absolute silence. Then, there was Sarah. She was doubled over with laughter, wiping the tears out of her eyes and pointing her finger at him. "You thought you were so great! Hahaha! And-and then you- Hahaha! You did as terrible as I did! Make fun of me. Hahaha! You can do no better! Ha- hahaha!
Alex got up and brushed himself off. Because both Sarah and Alex were doing the same exercise, Molly brought him to one of the other spinning logs in the room so that way they could just finish the test that they had already started.
Alex and Sarah both kept getting back onto the log to try again. Always trying to best each other. Soon, another pair walked into the exercising room. They did the treadmill test, the bike test, then they went over to the log test By then, Sarah and Alex had both finished the test and were coming out of the changing stalls after switching into their provided swimsuits.
They watched as the person looked carefully at the log and then placed both of their feet on it They walked gracefully to the other side of the log on their first try."What the-" Sarah said.
They looked to see who was talking to them and they waved.
"Max- how. How did you do that?" Sarah said astonished. Both Sarah and Alex had barely taken three steps when they had been flung off the log before their twenty chances were up and here he was, Max. Making it all the way across after his first try.
Max shrugged and said, "What do you mean? All you had to do was walk across the log."
"But the log spins!?!"
"So…? You just… walk. It's not that hard." Max replied
Sarah and Alex were stunned speechless. That log spin test was hard! He did it so easily. Then, Sarah remembered something. "Princess training?" She asked sweetly.