On Vacation

Taking this week, and the previous few days off. It's been good. Last year at this time, I felt awful with allergies and asthma kicking up. This year, it's all well managed. I still have some emotional stress (it's the anniversary of my divorce in a few days and my old wedding anniversary in a month) which I'm doing my best to manage, hence my vacation. Don't want to be around a lot of people so I'm mostly working in my yard and riding my bike. Every time I take a ride I'm grateful for all the trails around Madison. It's so good to not have to deal with traffic. That's all I have! Keep strong and beautiful, ladies!

When it rains, it pours

We are having a record summer as far as low temperatures and amount of rain. Honestly, I feel like I live in Wisconsin again. It won't stop raining!! And with the aquifers maxed out and the hard clay soil, every time it rains, it floods everywhere.

Its pouring in my life right now too. We had some serious issues with SIL over the last week or so that have created an immense amount of stress for DH and I. I'm very, very angry and hurt, and I don't think that things will be the same after this. Also, on top of everything else I've been dealing with in the last week, our 2006 Toyota decided yesterday to commit suicide...so after its attempted suicide, I took it to the dealership. (That put an interesting twist in my workout of the day...more on that below). Its still under warranty, so hopefully we'll get it back soon. My parents are arriving tonight for a week long visit. At least that will be wonderful! I can't wait to see them!

Last week on Thursday, I did 45 reps of clean, squat, and press with the barbell. I started with 5 reps of 65 and then did 40 reps with 75 lbs. Friday I think I did circuits of jump rope, pullups, situps, and pushups. I took the weekend off. Monday I did a really light workout with a lot of HEY and a few pushups and body rows and stuff, focusing on form and alignment. Tuesday, I just don't remember. Wednesday I worked out with my afternoon Crossfit class, and we did a card deck of pushups, burpees, v-ups, and squat jumps. Yesterday I messed around with the kettlebells and the barbell for a little while. Oh yeah, and the fun part of the workout - I ran, FAST, 1 mile from the Toyota dealership to the Park and Ride where our other car was. I had to get back to the gym AND I was racing a thunderstorm to the car....JUST made it. :)

That's what I can remember. Not sure what I'm going to do today - I have one break in the afternoon - probably need to focus on pushups, situps, and pullups. I'll throw some rows, jump rope, or running in there too. Be strong. :)

gosh its been awhile

Hi ladies! I've been so busy that I haven't been posting my workouts. Not that they're all that exciting anyhow.

I did a day working on olympic lifts, 5 min per lift. I did OH squats, cleans, jerks, snatches, and deadlifts. Mostly with light weight (45-105#).

The next day I did a 40 minute run. It was a slow run, and I walked for a bit halfway through. I felt energetic though.

I did a workout similar to BBG's posted WOD, with 80's of: jump chins, hip slaps, broad jumps, lateral jumps over 18" hurdle, and PW pikeups. That one made me tired, and my legs are sore today, probably from all that jumping.

Then I did an agility ladder workout, pretty free form, just going through all the exercises I could think of. I have no idea how long the workout was, probably 20 min, but I was sweating by the end, and that's what counts.

That's as far back as I can remember. I'm still sticking to the 30 minute routine, and although I'm losing fitness, I'm trying not to feel bad about it. I try to be satisfied that I work out at all, since none of the residents I talk to even try to work out. Maybe during my upcoming vacation I'll get a little further back into the swing of things, but I doubt it!

Staying with the program

So, had a lovely weekend. Bike ride on Friday (about 20 miles) another of the same on Sunday, and this morning dragged myself to body power. The set workout was:

80 reps total of:

Assisted chins, jump chins, or kips
Hip taps


lateral jumps (over a cable)
broad jumps (using resistance from a cable bolted to wall and belt).

PW pike-ups

I scaled way down to 40s of:

Jump chins, hip taps, walking lunges (no resistance but lots of focus on form), and leg curls. I felt good afterwards and that was the goal. Be strong!!

A new attitude

Well, have not been working out much the last week, but have been doing a re-evaluation of my approach to and motivation for training. I realize now that over time, I've loaded a lot of emotional baggage onto my training with the result that I have developed a pattern of overtraining until I'm too sore to do anything, bag out for a few days, come back for a few days, repeat the cycle. I'm tired of beating myself up. I'm tired of judging my body all the time---too big, too fat, too hungry, too weak. With those thoughts, no wonder I punished myself with those workouts! So, I'm letting it all go. I'm only going to workout for the sensation of strong, life-affirming energy. I'm letting go of the need to judge my body like I have and I'm just going to trust that my positive attitude, energy, attention will provide me with the guidance I need to stay healthy and strong. It's already working. Even though I walked out of the house without any makeup on, rode my bike to work, need to get a hair cut, haven't lost any weight over the last 2 months and may have even gained a couple pounds, I look GORGEOUS! And I feel so good! Love yourselves!

Picking up

So I think I am slowly but surely picking myself up again.

Yesterday evening I did a prison workout starting at 10 reps and working down to 1 rep of pushups, thrusters (squat and press), swings, and burpees. I used two 20 lb dumbbells for thrusters and a 20 kg kettlebell for swings. The idea was to do a workout that would push me, but not kill me. So I started with 10 reps instead of 12, and chose those weights to work with so that it would be a medium workout. Felt pretty good. I finished in just over 20 minutes.

Today I went for a 3 mile run at Town Lake. It was difficult because it was SO muggy out, which made me feel more tired. It was during a break between rain storms, so it was pretty steamy. I was struggling with beating myself up over not running faster and harder, and trying to keep myself at a pace that would promote increased energy instead of breaking me down. In the end, I think I did fairly well at running at a pace that made my legs feel light most of the time. I felt happy about it when I was finished.


Be strong! :)

Staying light...

Well, had a nice workout yesterday, stayed at strength/stability level for the morning workout. It was a circuit of 20 reps for: alligator push-ups, pull-ups, step ups (20 each leg), full extensions with cables, leg curls, and runners with the jungle gym. I went through twice. I'll be doing a bike ride tonight. Other than that, nutrition has been o.k. I'm really working at staying positive. Be strong!

Sore!!!

Yesterday I worked out with my afternoon Crossfit class.

Three times through:

12 dumbbell snatches on each arm
Alligator pushups across the room
Walking lunges for about 50 yards (really not sure on the distance)
320 m run


After that we did incline plane, touchdowns, touchbacks, and situpnreach.

I am super tired today, and I'm getting more sore as the day goes on.

Back to it!

So, took Wednesday and Thursday off. Today I'm heading back for the noon workout, keeping in mind that the whole pattern of over-doing it always sets me back, no matter how strong it helps me feel in the moment. I'm committing to staying at stability level for this workout. I almost wrote strength, but corrected...In fact, I think I'll stay at stability/strength for the rest of the month, and see where I'm at. Same with FIT classes. Otherwise, finally feel better, over the soreness of the last two days. Be strong and wise ladies!

Tired

What is the deal? I think I really overtrained at the beginning of May, and its been hard coming back from that. I am SOOOO tired!

Monday: A whole ton of house cleaning and apartment cleaning (rest day).

Tuesday: warmed up with 5 sets of 100 fwd + 100 bkwd with the jump rope. Beaded rope for the first three sets, green rope for the last two sets.
Then 3 sets of slow body rows and slow pushups, 8 reps per set. Slow 5 count up and 5 count down. Next 3 sets of slow front squats with 2x12kg KBs, and 115 lb deadlifts. The deadlifts were slow, but not as much as the other exercises.

Wednesday evening: went for a jog - about 2 to 3 miles. I had a slight headache, achy joints, and felt slightly nauseous. I'm a stubborn idiot - should've just taken a rest day, but I forced myself to run, and because I was tired, I tripped and fell, landing both palms and both kneecaps on the concrete. Ouchie. I'm fine, just embarrassed.

Today: I just messed around and did random sets of jump rope, KB swings, snatches, presses, double front squats, and barbell overhead squats.

I haven't been doing too well getting a solid 7-8 hours sleep every night, however its been a very slow week at work, so I've made it a priority to take a substantial nap between sessions to accumulate my 8 hours. I managed that every day except today.

My goal for this weekend is to sit down and write out my training plan for the rest of July. :) I think I need to treat myself like a client to get my ego out of the way and make some real progress. Be strong!

Too much...

So, I was off for about a week and a half. Rode my bike quite a bit during that time. When I got back to the gym last weekend, I had a great workout

Saturday: 5X5 of chins, dips, lunges, swings. Used 15# resistance on the dips, 2x16K for the lunges, and 38K for the swings. It felt great!

Then a bikeride Sunday.

Then Monday was a 15/15 that I did on my own with 5 reps per set 10 sets of: Dive Bombers, Chins, Swings, and jumped split squats (no resistance).

Tuesday FIT was a kind of prison workout starting at sets of 15 and working down to 1 cycling through sit-n-reach, lunges, PW rollouts, box jumps. I did jump lunges with a 25 d-ball at my chest and box jumps using a knee high box. I didn't make it through the whole workout in time but I finished my sets of 6 reps.

This morning, I went in, dragged myself in, and couldn't do the workout. It looked good and I hope to do it some other time: 4 laps (1 lap = 30 yards) then 3 laps, then 2 then 1 of:

D-ball overhead carry
D-ball rack carry
Lunges (again!)
Broad Jumps

I couldn't get past two laps of carrying the 16 Ks over my head. Too tired and sore, so I did some yoga, cleaned up, and headed to work. I guess today will be a rest day. Take it easy, especially when it's hard!!!

My new favorite drink...

Pedialyte. Have had a busy week and a half. Got some good workouts in, and some good rides. Last Saturday I went out to Blue Mounds for an off-rode biking event that involved riders going around a circuit (I guess it was about 8 or 9 miles) as many times as possible in 12, 6, or 3 hours. It was 90 degrees that day. And humid. I didn't ride but my boyfriend did, and when I got there at 4:30 in the afternoon, he was in his 6th lap. He'd been riding since 8 a.m. He didn't return until a little after 5:00 and he was a mess. My brother who does the firefighter combat challenges had told me that the best thing when training hard in adverse conditions is pedialyte---better than any of the sports drinks or anything, so that's what I had. I'm so glad I had it too, because DB was drenched with sweat, shaking, and kept starting to fall asleep. Lesson learned----just because I'm sweating doesn't mean I'm not heading for trouble. I went out the next day for a bike ride (another humid 90 degree day but I went around 7:00 p.m.). I took a bottle filled with pedialyte and diluted with water (70/30) and I can't tell you how much less stressed my system felt! I rode my usual circuit which is about 35 miles. I'm hooked! Try sipping it instead of straight water especially now that you all are living in such hot climates.

Heading to the gym for FIT this afternoon. Stay strong!

Busy week

Today I went for a run - somewhere around 3 miles...maybe a bit more than that.

Yesterday I was working around the house all day and just didn't work out.

Friday I did a random workout. I did some overhead squats, 5 or 6 sets of 5 pushups with the PPU, KB cleans and snatches, some situps, a 400 m row...can't remember what else.

I did a short workout on Tuesday with the kettlebells, but don't remember exactly what I did.

That's about all for this week. I've been busy with finishing up moving, getting the house in order, and cleaning the apartment. The apartment still needs a good final cleaning.

This week the goal is to sleep 7-8 hours a night, and get 5 workouts in. :)

week in review

It looks like everyone else has been as busy as I have! I've been working out, but not having enough time to post. Here's the week in review:

Monday: clean/squat/press. 30 with 60#, 40 with 40#, and finally 50 with 20# Dball. I tried to stick to 15/15 style until finished, and each set took between 4.5 and 6 minutes.

Tuesday: 30 min. run

Wed: Off! Had a BBQ at a co-resident's place, with plenty of hot dogs and corn and beer. I love cookouts :)

Thurs: simple circuit, 20 reps of each. Made it through 2.5 times in 30 min: pushups with PPU, chins, squats with 60#, deadlifts with 115#, PW pikeup

Fri: 30/30 circuit, 5X through: cable punch, run in place, up downs, burpees, russian twist, hindu squats

Sat (today): Yoga warmup, then hold workout. 3 min. total of each hold: handstand, chinup, wall sit, pushup @ bottom, PW curl, thinker, L-seat.

All in all, a good week. Sometimes I feel like I'm not working out hard enough, but then I remind myself its better than not working out at all.