Back in the 80s I was a spaghetti-thin teenager on a swim team. My brother and I went to swim camp, and they made us do about 500 sit-ups a day, often as a puni

Back in the 80s I was a spaghetti-thin teenager on a swim team. My brother and I went to swim camp, and they made us do about 500 sit-ups a day, often as a punishment, but also because they said it'd help our flutter kicks. All of us were extremely sore. We hurt too much to laugh. I sneezed once, and it was so painful I stopped halfway through. My brother and I decided next year we'd be ready. We started with 50 sit-ups, and added five a week. Then five a day. Then twenty a day. He made it to 900, I got to 1000. Then I started working on my time, and got it down to 30 minutes. I added a hundred sit-ups on a piano bench, leaning my head back to the floor. My abs were like cobblestones. A kid punched me in the stomach and hurt his hand. A cute girl told me with scorn that they were the only visible muscles on my body. It didn't help my flutter kick at all, probably because I didn't hook my feet under anything. My flip turns were Olympian. I'd make up a whole body length on every turn. Three months before the next swim camp, I got so sick of sit-ups that I just quit. At camp they thrashed us with sit-ups again and I was as sore as I'd been the previous year.