Another metabolic circuit

I did a bodyweight metabolic circuit again today.  I improved on most of the exercises.  It's going to be hard to do that again!  It's a good workout for a little under 30 minutes.  I warmed up with 4 sun salutations and foam rolled afterward.  That's about it for today.

Almost in tears after this workout....

... tears of joy!
After a week off, it felt sooooo good to be back at the gym.  I missed the feeling of accomplishment after a hard lifting day.  On my way home, I was feeling so grateful for the gym and how it has everything I need and it's all close at hand... oh, and how it's not crowded at the times when I'm there.  (I was alone, today!)  I was feeling so good on the drive home, my eyes got a little moist thinking about how much better I felt.

It was a really hard workout today: Break-in B3.  Before I started, I weighed the two olympic bars.    They added a second one a couple months ago.  I though the new one might be a bit lighter, so I brought over the scale and weighed them.  The new one isn't chromed and looked a bit like aluminum, but obviously it wasn't.  To my surprise, the new bar was 5 pounds heavier!!  The original chromed one is 44#, the standard weight.  The new one was 49#.  So, I'm going to add 45# for the original and 50# for the new.  I don't want to deal with the one pound.

Total: 46 minutes
Warm-up: 4 sun salutations at home, deadlifts - 8x50#, 8x100#

Deadlift: 2x15@140# (2 minute rests, mini-sets of 5 with short breaks)

Step-up: 2x15@20#each hand


DB one arm shoulder press: 2x(5@25#, 10@20#) (last couple were really hard)

Close-grip lat pull-down: 2x15@87# (mini-sets of 5 with short breaks)

Incline reverse crunch: 2x15@30deg

Saturday at the gym!

I got to the gym this morning.  The nice thing is I don't have to get up quite as much on Saturday. The squats were still painfully (not literally) awkward.  I even started re-reading the squat section of Starting Strength.  I think I had my legs a bit farther apart this time, which helped a tad.

Afterward, I did the intervals, but just didn't go as hard as last time.  I probably should have pushed harder, but oh well!  I did notice that my overall average HR was still 142 as opposed to last time's 145, when I felt like I worked harder.

Break-In A3

Warm-up - 3BW squats, 8 BW static lunges each side, 7x45# squats

BB squats - 1x15@60#, 1x10@60#

Static DB lunge - 2x15@20# each hand

2-pt DB row with elbow out, one arm at a time - 2x15@30# (yikes!)

Push-up - 1x15, 1x13 (arms out, good depth)

Swiss ball crunch - 2x15@30#DB behind head

Metabolic overdrive - Warm up 3min@45W, 3xhard@150W, 3xeasy@75W, cool down 3min@50W

Cardio weightlifting

Today was Break-In B2 for me.  I just did the lifting and no intervals, because I was basically doing cardio intervals the whole time.  My average heart rate was 145bpm over 43 minutes.  The deadlifts hit it hard and it didn't let up from there.  Most of my rests didn't go much over the allotted 60 seconds.  Sometimes I had to through some brief rests in during the sets, though.

My heart rate graph today

(the markers are the ends of the sets)

I made myself do a little more warming up today.  Maybe I should write out a warm-up plan so I actually do more warming up.  I wasn't able to increase the weight much, but there were a couple small bright spots.  The step-up increase went well.  There were some funny looks on my face doing the 25# presses, though!

Warm-up - 5 squat to stands, 5 inchworms, deadlift 7@45# 6@95#


Deadlift - 1x10@135#, 1x15@90#

Step-up - 1x15@15# each hand, 1x15@20# each hand

DB 1-arm should press, alternating, palm in - 1x15@20#ea, 1x5@25#ea then 1x10@20#ea

Close-grip lat pulldown - 2x15@87# (biceps were burning after this one!!  Some grunting to be heard...)

Incline reverse crunch - 2x15@30deg

Going metabolic

I did Rachel Cosgrove's Bodyweight Metabolic Circuit again today.  Today was a lot more successful, but I still had some problems.

I noticed she has another metabolic circuit online.  I'll have to try that one.  She also has metabolic stuff in her book, but I haven't gotten that far with reading yet.  I did peek ahead and noticed I would have to pick out exercises, so I just repeated the one I attempted before.  It looks like between the two online articles, she covers most if not all of the metabolic exercises she has in the book.

I doubt the workout has a much of an "afterburn" effect as she claims, but it is a good way to fit in a hard workout into a busy day.

Static squat in and out jump - 30
Prone cross-toe - 20 (first few without arms)
Split jack - 37
One-leg burpee - 10 (5 each leg)
Mountain climber - 70 (35 ea)
Bodyweight jump squat - 25
Inch worm - 12 (travelling)
Spiderman climb - 26 (13 ea)
Over/under - ~20 (~10 - forgot to count)
5-dot drill - 18
Bicycle crunch - 60 (30 ea)
Explosive step-up - 26 (13 ea - 2 risers)
Skiers on Swiss ball - 16 (8ea)
Lateral step-out - 40 (20 ea - R-L-R-L-...)
Swiss ball alternating step-off - 24 (12 ea)
Jump lunge - 14 (7 ea - I was shot by then!)