My workouts this past week weren’t the schedule I’ve gotten used to. I had to change things up because the studio was closed on Wednesday morning because they were getting new treadmills and I couldn’t go on Thursday morning because of a doctor’s appointment. But I still found a way to get my 4 workouts in.
Monday’s workout was a signature workout. We had Everest, which I’ve done a few times. It’s always a tough challenge and I know that I definitely can make improvements after each time we have the class.
Because it was a 3 group class, our Everest challenge was 14 minutes long instead of 28 minutes long. So instead of changing the incline/resistance level by 1 each minute, we changed it by 2 every minute. I started the bike’s resistance level a bit lower than my normal base level, so it wasn’t as hard as I’ve made it in the past. But it was still a challenge at the highest resistance levels and I did feel like I was barely moving for those minutes. And we did record our distance when we were done and I was shocked to see I got a PR! It was .1 miles further than my previous PR, but that’s still an improvement!
The rest of the workout was designed to be a bit easier since the focus was on Everest. For the row, we started with a 500-meter row with lunges after. And we repeated rows and lunges but decreased the row by 100-meters each time. And on the floor, we mainly had upper body work. We had single-arm low rows, tricep extensions, leg lifts, single-arm reverse flies, hammer curls, and bicycle crunches.
Since I couldn’t go on Wednesday or Thursday, I went to a workout on Tuesday. Tuesday’s class had some interesting challenges.
For cardio, we had 4 rounds of a 2 1/2-minute distance challenge. We were supposed to be around our push pace, but the goal was to not go too hard so you felt gassed out. I did keep the resistance level on the bike at my push pace level and I tried to be consistent with how fast I was pedaling each time. We had a base pace/recovery between each distance challenge and I tried to keep them at my base pace for a majority of the time.
On the rower, we had stroke drills again. We started with 3 rounds of a 20-stroke drill with squats between each row. Then we had 3 rounds of a 15-stroke drill with high knees. And we ended with 3 rounds of a 10-stroke drill with lunges. For each row, we were supposed to keep the stokes between 20-24 strokes per minute but to increase the wattage as the strokes went down. That meant pushing off the rower harder each time and really focusing on using your legs more.
And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. And for each block, we had 3 exercises that were portions of a bigger exercise, and then the last exercise of each block was putting all the parts together. For the first block, we had squats to calf raises, upright rows, and front squats. And the last exercise in the set was a clean-to-front squat which used all those moves together. And in the second block, we had a pop jack, push-up, and lunges. And then the last exercise was a full burpee with a lunge. I was using the bench for my hands for most of the exercise in the second block, but I made it work.
I was back at Orangetheory on Friday, and unfortunately, I was starting to deal with nausea in that class. It wasn’t too bad and manageable, but it’s always annoying when it kicks in because I know I might have a tough week or so coming up. But fortunately, the workout we had worked pretty well with how I was feeling.
For cardio, we had a pretty simple endurance-based workout. We had 3 rounds of a 3-minute push pace with a 2-minute base pace. I did keep my resistance levels to what I usually set them to, I just had a few moments where I was pedaling slower. And in the last 3-minute push pace, we went immediately into a 1-minute all-out. For that, I didn’t end up increasing the resistance level because I was starting to be tired but I did work on pedaling faster.
For the rower, we had 1 long block that didn’t have any super long rows. We started with a 250-meter row and then did overhead presses with a medicine ball after the row. We repeated that and decreased the row by 50 meters each time, so we ended with a 100-meter row. Then we did another 100-meter row and did deadlifts with the medicine ball and we increased the row by 50 meters each time. I didn’t get that far while working back up the row distances, but I knew that would likely happen.
And on the floor, we had 1 block with 2 mini-blocks in it. The first mini-block was supposed to be all single-leg things, but I had to do them without that with my balance issues. We had 2 rounds of a shoulder press, deadlift, and bicep curl before moving on to the second mini-block which we did until the end of the workout. The second mini-block had a rep range so we were supposed to figure out how heavy we could go with the weights to do at least 6 reps but if we could easily do 10 reps we knew they were too light. We had alternating single-arm shoulder presses, deadlifts, and concentration curls. And for the last minute of class, we had a static sumo squat with front raises.
And I was at Orangetheory on a Saturday! I haven’t gone on a Saturday for a while, but this time was a special class because my dad was working out with me! I also had taken Saturday off of work so we didn’t have to go to as late of a class as I normally went to on Saturdays. And not only did I have a Saturday workout, but it was a 2 group class, which is rare for me these days.
We had 3 blocks for both sections of the room. For cardio, blocks 1 and 2 were almost the same. We started with a 1-minute push pace at an incline and another 1-minute push at a higher incline followed by a 90-second walking recovery. We repeated that 3 times with the incline increasing each time. And for the second block, we did the same pattern but the incline decreased each time. And for me on the bike, I just worked with the resistance levels. I was still feeling off, so I went a bit lighter than normal, but I was still able to do quite a bit of the incline work. And the last block was 3 rounds of a 30-second all-out and 30-second walking recovery.
For the floor, the first block was the only block that had rowing. We started with overhead tricep extensions before we rowed. We did 4 reps with a heavy weight and 10 reps with a lighter weight before rowing for 400-meters. We repeated that pattern for the entire block, and my triceps were really feeling it! The second block had single-arm high rows with weights, push-ups, and step-ups (which I did as lunges). And the last block was timed with the treadmills and we had 30-second intervals or either hammer curls or holding a plank.
And of course, my dad and I had to take a post-workout photo with our coach!
I should be back to my regular workout schedule this week unless something crazy happens, but it will likely be a tough week for me with how I’m feeling. But as always, I’ll just push through and do what I can do.
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