TGIF

I managed to get into the gym after work today. I stayed up late watching cheesy TV shows online, so I really wasn't up for the morning run that I had planned and I didn't think it wise to go for a jog tonight either. Not that the alternative was necessarily helpful either.

I missed pilates class with Marie, but I think it was for the best. I did a quick 10 minute warm-up on the upright bike with 30sec/90 sec power bursts. I managed to keep my rest pace above 90rpm most of the time, which was great.

I then managed to get the studio to myself. I did the following with no rest in between exercises, which left me seriously dripping all over the floor with sweat.

1-10 rep pyramid set (push-ups, crunches, squats)
Repeat twice:

• 1 set walking lunges with 8lb handweights
• 1 set oblique twist walking lunges
• 1 set of traveling plie squats
• 1 set of traveling squats
• 1 set of backwards lunges

1 set of jump squats
3 sets of 30 sec each (plank, push-up plank, mountain climbers)
1 set of burpees with push-ups
2 - 30 sec full side plank with balance ball btw ankles, each side

After that I did a 45 minutes pilates routine, focusing on more reps than usual and slow, deliberate movements. I ended with one last set of push-ups.

Running late, not literally

Today's Morning Workout:

So somehow I thought my clock said 4:47, not 5:47, and suddenly it meant that I missed my bus. So I jumped up and ran out to catch the 6:08am bus. This means that I missed out on my cardio warm-up and my 15 min Abs class. I did arrive in time for pilates, which is the important part. The class goes by a lot faster when you don't do the Abs class before it.

Pilates was tight today. Or rather, I was tight during pilates. She threw us directly in to the Rollover after the 100/teaser/neck pull/roll-up series. This was brutal. I could barely get my legs in parallel. This has never happened before! My entire back/neck was just so incredibly tight that it wasn't funny. Perhaps not stretching well enough last night? The way I slept? Maybe it really was the lack of warm-up beforehand...

Outside of that, class was good. We used the small ball today, fully inflated. We only did one set of push-ups, but she tossed in the leg pull back which somewhat made up for it.

Afterwards I did some lower body.
Two sets of weighted lunges (no wobbliness during thru-motion! )
Two sets of oblique twist lunges.
One set weighted plie squats.
One set per leg fast back step stationary lunges
One set jump-squats
Pyramid (1-10) of push-ups, crunches, squats
One set burpees w/push-up
Superset Leg Ext (70)/Leg Curl(80)

For food intake:

Pre-workout:
One slice toasted pear-banana bread

Post-Workout:
1 bottle water
4 oz nonfat, plain yogurt + 1 Tbsp agave (110 calories/80 sod/5g protein)

Snack:
12 oz tea
16 oz tea
baggy of celery/grape tomatoes/carrots (50/40mg/1g fib)
2 laughing cow wedges (70 cal/4g fat/520mg sod/5g protein)

Lunch:
1 slice of American cheese (100cal/9g fat/410g sodium/6g protein)
1 portobello veggie burger (125 cal/4g fat/400mg sod/3g fiber/11g protein)
1 cup of snap peas (45cal/3g fiber/2g protein)

Snack:
12 oz tea
Cinnamon Raisin Oatmeal (360cal/3g fat/220mg sod/8g fiber/8g protein)

Totals: (860/20g fat/1670mg sod/15g fiber/39g protein)

Bootcamp, pilates, kickboxing - oh my!

Thursday Review

Thursday was, well, a typical Thursday. I dragged myself about of bed after 4 hours of sleep in order to make my morning bootcamp class. As I predicted the day before, it was far more challenging than with my usual instructor. Or rather, they have different styles. Catherine is all about go-go-go, no rest. Which is good. She incorporates more cardio and jumping. Katie is more structured and really cuts everyone a lot of slack. Catherine does everything with us, so really you have no excuse for slacking. Whereas Katie demonstrates how to get started and otherwise chats with us while we workout. I do love Katie's classes - but I think the fact that Catherine doesn't entirely compromise the workout in order to accomodate people who aren't fit is better. In my opinion, everyone should be pushed hard and if they can't take it, then on an individual level they can rest. The entire class shouldn't have to reduce the quality of their workout for the few who can't keep up. She should go full force and everyone completes it at their own level - but that the maximum is demonstrated, to aim for.

Anyway, I did some burst intervals on the stationary bike before class. Class was 45 minutes. I then tackled my upperbody with the remaining time before work - biceps, triceps and rows on the cable machine; lat pull-downs and shoulder press on the weight machines; assisted pull-ups on the Gravitron at 75lb assistance. Sadly, after the work in bootcamp, I ended up doing three sets of 10-8-6. I suppose if I could handle three 12-rep sets, it would be time to drop even more anyway. So I'll work at 75lb assistance for now and hopefully get down another five by the end of the month. I'm now pulling more than half my body weight though!

Speaking of which, I've been bad and weighing daily. I'm at 160 which wavers up to 162 by the end of the day. I'm hoping that I'll drop into the 150s next week. Fingers crossed. Hopefully I'll have a good/healthy eating weekend. I have big running plans, since the snow kept me indoors all week. I've been doing my little cardio bursts, since I can't stand the tedium of treadmill running, but nothing is a substitute for a good long run. I'm excited for the spring and warmer weather to be here. It means clear roads and sidewalks.

Alright, I went back to the gym on Thursday night for Muscle Conditioning class, again with Catherine. I used a combo of lighter and heavier weights since I didn't want to overtrain certain muscles that I'd already worked in the morning. Our abs and leg work were the same moves that we did in the morning, so I modified them slightly and/or skipped the weight versions. I admit that I was a little tired. It was good to get some extra work in though. Even today I feel the work I did on my abs yesterday.

Friday

Now I managed to catch up on sleep last night. A full 9 hours! However, given that I'm still up, I'm not really sticking to that. Utilizing this improvement in my schedule. Today was an easy day at the gym. I took Beginner Pilates with Marie. While the class is far easier, one aspect that I really like is that fact that she spend so much time talking and explaining things that I'm stuck in these positions for extended periods of time. It takes a lot of strength to keep my upperbody lifted and my legs out straight at 45 degree angle while she talks for a minute straight, and after all that do the exercise.

After class I asked her about some of the more advanced workouts that I was seeing only. For example, a version of scissors that looks like a cross between scissors and a rollover. You rest on your shoulders with your torso vertical, arm on you lower back for support, and then execture scissors. She was dismissive of it, it was neither Stott nor Power pilates she said. She said that Windsor pilates, which it may have been, is a mutation on the originals developed by a woman in LA that wanted to be able to make money off the move, so she modified things pointlessly for the sake of making it unique. Interesting take. Anyway, she had us stretch for 20 minutes after class. I wanted to work out some more, but I had to meet some people for drinks and by the time we were done stretching, it was late and I didn't have time. I feel so rude bypassing the stretch, but since I'm going to just continue exercising and stretch afterwards, I technically don't need to stretch twice. At least not that extensively.

Tonight I was talking with the boyfriend of an old coworker. They both teach at a local Tae Kwon Do school, which happens to offer a kickboxing class. They run at 6:3op Monday, 6:30p Wednesday and 6p Friday. He said that they sell packages or sessions, the next one starting on April 1st. I can do a trial class for free. They also sell packages that can drop price down to around $10/class. The session is $150, which is unlimited classes for three months. I'm putting a lot of consideration into this because I'm not getting what I want from my gym classes lately. If I could ad cardio three times per week in the form of kickboxing - wow. The thing is the cost. That's $50/month. The cost of my gym membership. That's not really cash I have laying around. So I'm going to have to give this some thought. I really want to get back into kickboxing though - and a class taught by TKD black belts is reassuring on the instruction front. I have the rest of the month of March at least to think about this all.

Early morning

Rise and Shine

I'm still not totally back on my sleep schedule. I got to bed at midnight last night, so I managed to get 5 hours of sleep before I went to the gym in the morning. I started to immediately feel sore last night as well, more from the legwork during cardio than anything I think with some remaining aches from shoveling.

My classes begin at 6:30, so I had a little bit of time before they started up. I supersetted my way through Leg Extensions(70)\Leg Curls(80) for 4 10-rep sets, followed by Abductor(90)\Adductor(80) for 4 10-rep sets.

My 15-min abs classes didn't seem that challenging today except on the side plank hip raises. Pilates was definitely a more difficult day, but I think that she lowered reps to get out of class a little early on some moves that I wanted to do more with. Such as my fave - the side plank with balance ball. We did follow through into a new method of hip work - the ball to the right, sitting on one knee with the other leg extended sideways straight, we leaned over the ball until our right fingers touched the ground on the other side, then lifted the extended leg to hip height. Repeat, repeat, pulse, more repeat. Ouch.

We did get a reprieve with the Rollover, since when we're using the b-ball, the ball hits the ground before our toes during the "flex and touch" part. This is nice in the mornings because for whatever reason my back isn't as stretchy in the morning as it is at night. Here is a link to instructions on how to do the Rollover with Ball - they say it makes it harder, but honestly, I think its easier (plus they tell you to start/end at 90 degrees when you start/end at 45 degrees, and they skip the flex-and-tap altogether, but I swear, they're in there!). Yes, you have to hold the ball, but saving that extra inch or two to tap down to the floor is so nice when you've just woken up.





After class, I stuck around to perform several sets/types of walking lunges, walking squats (I still feel the plie squats from Monday!) and weight hip raises. I had a meeting to get to early this morning, so I didn't have time to throw in some cardio.

Tomorrow Catherine will be subbing for Bootcamp. I'm a little nervous. She's seriously cranked up muscle conditioning recently with plyometric and combo moves. I mean, I thought she kicked me ass in bootcamp the last time she subbed - with her new trainer-inspired routines I suspect tomorrow morning will be brutal (as in "80 push-ups, go!) unless she applies her new lower-rep/more torturous exercise philosophy to this class as well. But I will feel badass when I take MC tomorrow night with her as well - whenever she sees me in that class she's always like "Did you do this morning too?" in semi-disbelief, which is an ego boost. Thursday do make me seem a little crazy. It is a little odd that she's subbing though because she teaches MC at another gym on Thurs mornings, so maybe she has the day off from there or something.

Food Intake

Pre-workout Breakfast:

4 oz Colombo nonfat plain yogurt
1 Tbsp ground flaxseed
1 Tsp agave nectar

Post-Workout Breakfast:
1/4 cup 1% milk with tea
Cereal-

1/2 cup 1% milk
2 Tbsp flaxseed ground
10 almonds
1 cup Optimum Power Breakfast

Snack:
150g sweet potato (plain)

Lunch:
45g asparagus
1/2 cup of quinoa aspargus/pepper dish
50g red pepper + chile pasillo

Snack:
Pear

Dinner:
2 Eggland eggs
1 slice of fat free american cheese
50g of red peppers and green onions
1/2 cup peach fat free frozen yogurt

Post-vacation Reflections

Well, in terms of fitness, thank god my boyfriend went back to Iraq (I mean, I love him and it was my choice but this push to spend as much time as possible together was a serious hit on my exercising). I finally feel free to work out until my hearts content - not like I want to spend every waking moment with him since I'm not going to see him for three months.

I did great the week post-Aruba. When to the gym constantly, worked my ass off and it felt amazing. Then DB came home and given that I was short two days on our time left together, I chose to forego the gym that week.

I ran the 10k on February 1st and came in with an average 8:58 minute mile or something like that. Keeping it under 9 minutes for 6 miles! I hope to do better in the future, however. I want to be running my 5k in March at an 8min/mile. I ran the following Tuesday and possible Thursday, but I can't recall exactly. Either way, I did something at least.

This past Sunday I ran to the grocery store, since I was limited for time and had a ton of work to complete. It was only like two miles, but I tried to make them fast miles.

Monday, yesterday, I went to the gym after work. I learned that my intermediate pilates class is going to be moved from 6:15pm to 4:45pm since not enough people were attending. It's also moving to this tiny little closet-like room rather than the studio and will only be 45min long. I can no longer attend, since I can't leave work early for that. I'm going to have to invest in some Stott videos. She told me to buy only the Advanced series because I was at that level now. Honestly, I don't think that this will improve anything for attendance, but we'll see. Hopefully they'll move the class back to 6:15, although I kind of suspect that she just doesn't want to be there that late.

So I did pilates for 60 minutes last night. Then did my lower body work. I incorporate three sets of multiple types of lunges, high knee sprints and butt kicks. In between sets I do squats - side, plie, jump, regular. I threw in some mountain climbers and a plank at one point also. I think did a up-and-down speed work on the bike for 11 minutes. I tried running on the treadmill, but some asshole was wearing cologne and I didn't last more than 3 minutes before my respiratory system couldn't take it. I ended with a superset of leg ext (63lb x 8) and leg curls (85lb x 8) x4.

I'm a little sore today and I think it'll settle more as the day goes on.

Cool Pilates Move

I learned a cool new move in Pilates last week.

You're laying with your back in imprint, legs in tabletop, arms above your head, parallel to the ground. Extend both legs to a 45 degree angle in the air. Inhale and extend your arms vertically above your head, and nod your head. As you exhale, lower forward and extend your arms parallel to the ground, and in the same movement slowly roll yourself up with your abs. Keep your legs steady at 45 degrees.

Basically you end up in a "V" shape with your torso and legs both at 45 degrees. Hold. Then slowly lower your torso back down in a controlled movement with your abs, your arms raising back up and then down above your head.

It's a combination of The Hundred and the Roll-Up.

This requires a lot of ab strength, imo. Enjoy.