Monthly Archives: September 2019

I knew 2 things going into this past week of workouts. First, I would still be dealing with nausea and pain and I know how much that affects my workouts. And second, I was going to be doing the Dri–Tri on Saturday. The Dri-Tri is going to be a separate post because I have a lot of say about how that went. But for my regular workouts, I knew that I had to find a balance of getting ready for how intense the Dri-Tri is and taking it easy so I’m not too tired by Saturday. The nausea actually helped me balance that since the days I was feeling the worst had to be easy days.

Monday’s workout was a power day, and it was the worst nausea day of the week.  I’m glad it was a power day because I knew things wouldn’t be as long and there would be more opportunities to have a bit of a break.

For cardio, we had 3 blocks that all had the same pattern. We had a push pace, an all-out, a walking recovery, a push pace, a base pace, and an all-out to finish the block. The times of each interval switched up between the blocks but having the same pattern was helpful. I did play around with the resistance levels on the bike for the long push and all-outs, but when the intervals were shorter I just focused on pedaling faster.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block had pullovers with weights, sit-ups to squats, lateral raises with weights, and bench hop overs. After doing one round of the exercises, we also had a 200-meter row. I tried to go a bit heavy with the weights even though it was a power day because I wanted to make up for what I couldn’t do on the bike. And when I had the 200-meter row, I ended up being pretty slow. The second block had single-arm weighted work, plank low rows with weights, and squats. There was also supposed to be a 200-meter row at the end of each round, but because I was struggling by that point I skipped the row.

Wednesday’s workout was an endurance day. I was finally starting to feel better so I was able to do more than I could on Monday. The cardio block was one long block that had rounds of push paces with base paces after. All of the base paces were 1 minute, but the push paces increased every round. We started with a 30-second push and went all the way up to a 3-minute push. And the cardio ended with an all-out. I was feeling really good during the cardio block and it helped me feel a bit more confident about the bike portion of the Dri-Tri.

The rowing was a single block. We started with a 500-meter row and then we had squats with front raises using the medicine ball. We repeated it with a 300-meter and 100-meter row. Then we went back up the rows with 100, 300, and 500-meter rows.

And the floor was 1 block but it had 3 mini-blocks within it. Each mini-block was supposed to be done 3 times before moving on to the next mini-block. The first mini-block had bicep curls and skier swings. The second mini-block had lateral raises and hip hinge swings. And the last mini-block had lunges and hip hinge high rows. All of the exercises were with weights, but I wasn’t going too heavy because it was a lot of work and a lot of reps.

Friday’s workout was a power day and it was my last workout before the Dri-Tri so I knew I had to make sure I didn’t go too hard. Power days are easy to push myself, but if I did that then my Dri-Tri would suffer. And I was finally not feeling nauseous so I was optimistic that I wouldn’t be nauseous for the Dri-Tri, which I was afraid of.

Cardio had 2 blocks with similar formats. We had a push pace, base pace, all-out, walking recovery, and then 2 more all-outs with walking recoveries. The first block had 1-minute intervals and the second block had 30-second intervals. I did work with the resistance levels for the first block but skipped them on the second to focus on pedaling faster. I knew with the Dri-Tri that I wouldn’t be using the resistance levels so fast pedaling was important to work on.

The rowing was also 2 blocks. The first block started with a 200-meter row and then we were supposed to do lunges with medicine ball raises, but I modified those to be squats with medicine ball raises. Then we had a 150 and 100-meter rows with the same exercise between each row. The second block was timed rows with the same exercise, but I wanted to get some extra rowing time in to be ready for the next day. So I just rowed as long as I could without breaks for that block. I was feeling discouraged because I wasn’t able to row that long without a break, but I tried to remember that in the Dri-Tri the rowing would be the first thing and I wouldn’t be tired from the bike.

And the floor also had 2 blocks. The first block had deadlifts, reverse lunges to hops (which I modified by using the straps), hamstring curls (which I switched to hip bridges), and rollouts on the ab dolly. The second block had lateral lunges, skater lunges, and knee tucks on the ab dolly. I could have gone heavier with the weights, but just like everything else for that workout, I was trying to go easy so I wouldn’t be tired the next day.

Even though I had some struggles with my workout week last week, I think I worked through them the best that I could and they even might have benefitted me. I didn’t overdo things before the Dri-Tri, but I felt like I got a lot of good work done that prepared me for it. I still had a little hesitation about how I would do with the Dri-Tri, but I felt as prepared as ever for it. And I’ll share how it went on here tomorrow.

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This past week of workouts wasn’t a great one for me. I knew it was potentially going to be bad because of my pain and nausea, and that’s what happened. But I’ve got the Dri–Tri coming up and I want to be as prepared for it as I can be. So I just had to work through how I was feeling and do my best.

Monday’s workout was a partner workout. We had a total of 4 blocks, and 2 of them were partnered ones. It was a good partner day, and I thought it was a good variety for the workout.

For both partner blocks, the rower set the pace and switching. For the first block, the rower rowed 200 meters and then they switched with the partner using cardio. We did that for 10 minutes and didn’t reset the rower the entire time. For the second partner block, the rower rowed for 1 minute before switching. Again, for the full 10 minutes, we didn’t reset the rower. The goal was to try to get more meters rowed in the second block than in the first. My partner and I didn’t quite make it, but we were close.

There was also a regular cardio and regular floor block. For cardio, it was rounds of push to base paces. We started with a 3-minute push and it went down 1 minute each time. The base paces were 1 minute every time. And at the end of the block, we had a 1 minute all out. And on the floor, we had step ups, shoulder presses, and mountain climbers. The regular blocks were a nice break from the constant switching during the partner blocks.

Wednesday’s workout was a strength day. It was also a switch day and we had 2 blocks at each section of the room. I was starting to deal with nausea so it made things a little tough for me. But it did help that it was a switch day so I had a few extra breaks.

Cardio was a lot of hill work. Both blocks were the same. We started with a 1-minute hill, then a 90-second hill, and ended with a 2-minute hill. Between each hill segment we had 45 seconds to recover at a flat incline. I did play around with the resistance levels on the bike, but I didn’t go as high as I would have gone if I was feeling ok. But I still did more than I would have done if we didn’t have hill work.

On the rower, the first block was distance rows with medicine ball squats. We had a 100-meter row, 300-meter row, and 450-meter row. I just got through those when the block ended. And the second block was timed with cardio with doing the rows while the treadmills were doing the hill work and then we were supposed to do the medicine ball squats again while cardio had their recoveries. But I was feeling pretty rotten by that second block so I skipped the squats and just did recovery rowing.

And on the floor, we had a block of upper body work and a block of lower body work. The upper body work block had chest flys, chest presses, and single arm low rows using the weights. And the lower body work block had deadlifts, sumo squats, and plank reaches. I tried to go heavy with the weights as much as I could, but for the upper body work I had to go down to lighter weights because my arms were feeling oddly weak.

Friday’s workout was a benchmark class. We had the 12-minute run/bike for distance. I knew going into the class that I wasn’t going to break a record because my nausea was hitting me really hard. I had a goal idea in my head, but I also set it very low because I knew it would be tough.

My plan for the 12 minute distance challenge was to try to use my usual push resistance level on the bike as long as I could. I only lasted about a minute before I went down to my base resistance level. I was able to stay at my base level the rest of the time and never had to go below that. And I tried to do little intervals of pedaling harder when I wasn’t feeling too sick. That plan ended up working out because I did go further than my goal distance which was nice. I was still pretty far off from my past benchmark distances, but I tried to remember that those were done when I was feeling better.

The rowing block was supposed to be rounds of rowing with either frogger squats or lunges between each row. I don’t usually do the lunges during the rowing blocks and I didn’t feel like doing squats as those have been making my nausea worse lately. So I just spent the entire block rowing and taking breaks when I needed to. It wasn’t my best rowing block (and I’ve got the Dri-Tri soon so that worried me), but I had to keep reminding myself that I was not feeling like myself and I had to go easy.

And on the floor, we had 1 long block. We had bicep curls while balancing on one leg, weighted double crunches, push up to knee tucks on the ab dolly, roll outs on the ab dolly, single arm low rows, and triceps on the straps. I had to make a few modifications with the work. I did the push ups with my hands on the bench and did mountain climbers instead of knee tucks, I did the roll outs on the straps, and I did both arms for the low rows together because my balance was feeling off. I don’t love that I had so many modifications, but at least they felt like they weren’t too off from what we were supposed to do.

Saturday’s workout was an endurance day, and it was designed to be almost like a prep for the Dri-Tri. When the coach asked how many of us were doing the Dri-Tri, I was the only one who said they were doing it. It was pretty funny to see I’m the only one going for it from that class, but I was extra appreciative of the prep class.

Because I wasn’t feeling great, I was cautious about the workout. For cardio, we had 3 blocks that had the same pattern. We had a push pace, base pace, push pace, and all out. The second push pace got longer each block. I was using the resistance levels on the bike, but when we had the all outs I just kept it at my push level and worked on pedaling faster. I had to take breaks from time to time during each block, but I tried my best to push through them because I know I need my endurance to be up a bit for the long bike ride that I’ll have for the Dri-Tri.

On the rower, we were supposed to have long rows and then jumping jacks. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to do jumping jacks (I barely can do them when I’m feeling great), so I spend the entire block just rowing. I took breaks when I needed to and I needed to do it a lot. I was having some horrible waves of nausea on the rower and it was getting pretty bad. But I did stick it out and got a lot of rowing practice in.

And on the floor, we had all body weight work. A lot of it was supposed to be done while standing on the bench, and I had to modify them to be done on the floor. With my modifications I had single leg bench sit to stands, single leg reverse lunges while using the straps for balance, lunges with high knees while using the straps for balance, and scissor kick crunches. Just like on the rower, I needed a lot of breaks, but I made it work.

This week, I have the Dri-Tri at the end of the week. Hopefully, my nausea will be done by then, but I know there’s a bit of a chance that it won’t be. But I just have to hope for the best and see what I can do.

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