Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Three Miles Then Last Stage 1 Workout!

Yesterday, I got up early to work out, but it was 31F (~ -0.5C) so I did a 45 minute yoga tape instead. But, I ended up working from home and wanted to meet someone after work, so I mapped how far away that would be on gmap-pedometer.com and noticed that depending on how I went it would be 2.5-3 miles to get there. Bingo! Much nicer weather than in the wee hours of the morning. AND I got to see some sunshine. I chose the 3 mile route and finished in 34 minutes. Considering the few pretty decent hills on the route and my reduction in mileage lately, I thought that worked pretty well. I didn't go all out, but my heart rate did get up to 185bpm up one hill. It was that type of hill where I just stop thinking about making any kind of real progress and focus on keeping the feet going. I could have walked that fast! But, eventually, the road evened out and I was up! That is one of those hills that challenges drivers in the winter. Sometimes four wheel drive trucks even have a problem.

My husband encouraged me to go ahead and sign up for the 5k run on the 25th. So, I can't back out now! I need to send off the entry form so I can save $5.

After the run, I felt good. Although, I do notice a bit of oddness with my knee. That is kind of scary. I'm going to see if I can locate a good brace for running. I don't know what else to do.

This morning, I did one more repeat of Stage 1 workout B of New Rules of Lifting for Women. I warmed up with 50 calories on the elliptical. LOL, I think it took about 5 minutes or so, but I used the calorie count as my goal. I guess I was in a weird mood.

I was able to twice up the weights on the deadlifts to 55lb plus the 45 lb bar. One nice thing about the bar in the gym is that the surface is smoothed where your legs are. The knurling that helps you hold the bar is stopped there so you don't scrape up your shins doing deadlifts. I think I held good form for the lifts.

I tried upping the shoulder press weights, but a five pound jump from 20# to 25# was just too much. I got through 6 of 8 reps before I had to drop back down.

I finally got the Swiss ball situps to kind of show a little challenge. I held a 35# bar weight above my head. It was extra challenging because where I was doing the exercise had a surprisingly slippery floor. So, I had to stabilize and keep myself from slipping.

Lunges still weren't easy and I was on the verge of muscle failure. The other guy in the weight room was also keeping a log and did some lunges. I don't often see people with logs or lunges. I think some people think lunges aren't masculine enough or something. All I know is they kick my butt and I don't think I'm alone in that.

Now onto the AMRAP (As Many Reps As Possible) workouts. I think I'll pick weights from a few weeks in, rather than what I started with. We'll see.

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