This past week of workouts went well for me. While I was finally able to work out normally again after getting my stitches out, it didn’t mean that I was completely free of all workout related issues. I still had some random issues I had to deal with, but they are all ones that I’m used to. I would love to have a week where I have absolutely no workout related issues to deal with, but that may never become a reality for me.
Monday’s workout was my last workout with the stitches in, and I was so glad it was the last one. I was tired of having the random pain in my face and having to be careful about how heavy I was lifting because I didn’t want to put any tension on my face. This workout was a power switch day so we were moving around the room quickly and often.
When we were doing cardio, it was a mix of different little cardio blasts. Sometimes we had a push pace with a base pace before an all out and sometimes it was just push pace to all out. They were all about 2 or 2 1/2 minutes long so we were never on there too long. I was using my old resistance levels on the bike because of the issues I was having with the stitches, but I was pedaling much faster than before so that was a sign of improvement.
On the rower, we started with a 2 1/2 minute row for distance and then every time on the rower we based things off of that distance. To make things easy for me I just used 500 meters as the distance so it was easier to remember. Each time on the rower, we rowed 100 meters less than the last time and then we held a static squat until we switched. The rows weren’t all sprint rows, but they were all able to be done pretty quickly and I was always holding my squat for a good chunk of time.
And on the floor, we had the same thing every time we were there. We had a roll out on the straps, high row on the straps, hip hinge low rows with weights, plank jacks, and burpees to bicep curls. I really struggled with the burpees that day (even more than normal), so I wasn’t always doing them each time I was on the floor. I also had to split up the burpees and bicep curls into 2 different things instead of a continuous exercise. But I was getting through everything else much easier than I had before and I was happy that it wasn’t a ton of floor work that I knew would make me put tension in my face.
Wednesday’s workout was a benchmark day. We had the 12 minute run for distance. I haven’t done a lot of benchmark distance challenge on the bike so I was excited to see what I could do. I was finally feeling better with the stitches out and I knew that I could really push myself on the bike.
The idea was to just get as far as possible in those 12 minutes. I started at my push resistance level and realized that I wouldn’t be able to maintain that for a majority of the time and any time after that might be affected by me being tired from the higher resistance level. So after the first minute, I used the resistance level between my base and push and made my focus pedaling as quickly as I could. I know that the baseline for me on the bike is 1 trip every 2 1/2 minutes but I can sometimes go closer to 2 minutes when it’s a quick sprint. But this wasn’t a sprint so I knew not to go too hard in the beginning to try to get that faster time. I was hoping to do 5 trips since that would still be faster than my baseline and was so happy when I did 5.5.
When I was on the rower, I had to go a bit slow to recover but that’s what our coach expected us to do. We started with a 4 minute row for distance and had to remember the distance. I used 800 meters to make it easy to remember. Then we cut the distance in half and had mini-band front arm raises. Each time we were on the rower we went down 100 meters. Even though I was trying to be easy to recover from the distance challenge on the bike, I was still going harder and faster on the rower than I had the past week.
And on the floor, we had one long block. We had single arm hollow hold chest presses, half getups, double crunches with weights, plank pull throughs with weights, and alligators on the straps. I was finally able to use my more normal weights and I could feel it in my body that I had been going easy on myself for a week. It was a little surprising how much I felt the difference when the weights I was using were the ones I was using not that long ago, but I did. I thought about going down in the weights, but I realized that it was a struggle to do them and not that I was doing sloppy form because of the weights so I kept them the same. It really did feel good to be back to what feels more normal to me and I’m so glad that I was able to get some awesome stuff done in that workout.
Friday’s workout was a serious struggle for me. I was at Disneyland the day before (that post is coming this week) and I woke up Friday morning having a horrible hip day. I know that workouts will always be tough when I have those days, but this workout was a class filled with burpees. I was not in a good headspace walking into class because I was already anticipating how hard it was going to be, and it pretty much went how I expected.
It was also a tornado class which means we switch very quickly. We had 6 laps around the room (18 blocks) and the first lap was 3 minutes long and all the rest were 1 minute. If the class wasn’t a tornado, it probably would have been worse, so that probably made things a bit better than they could have been.
For cardio, the first block was a push pace, base pace, push pace, and all out. And the other 5 blocks were all 1 minute all outs. I used my old resistance levels on the bike but even those were a struggle for me. On the rower, the first block was rounds of 10 strokes for distance and 5 recovery strokes. And the other 5 blocks were 1 minute all out rows. The rowing was a bit easier than the bike, but because of the hip pain it was hard sitting down and getting up from the rower. Fortunately we had about a minute to switch every time so I didn’t have to rush too much.
And the floor was almost all burpees. The first block was burpees and squats since it was longer, but all the other blocks were just 1 minute of doing a type of burpee. We had full burpees, reverse burpees, burpees with shoulder taps, burpees with lunges, and push ups to plank jacks (which are just like a burpee except you don’t have to stand up). I used the bench for my hands for all the burpees but I still occasionally had to step back and not jump back. I went slow and took breaks because even 1 minute was too long for me at times, but I did it. It wasn’t my best work and I know it didn’t look pretty, but sometimes that’s all you can hope for out of a workout on a tough day.
Saturday felt like the most normal day of the week for me. I didn’t have issues with my stitches and I didn’t have a ton of hip pain. I did have a little bit of nausea to deal with, but it was very minor and I didn’t even have to take medication to manage it. It was a strength based workout so that meant hills/high resistance levels on the bike and I was ready to challenge myself a bit.
For cardio we had 2 blocks and the idea for both blocks was to have longer hill work each time. We had a range of incline/resistance levels we could use and I tried to go a bit higher than I have for the past week or so. The shorter the hill work was, the higher we were supposed to be with the incline/resistance level. For the 2 shorter ones, I was higher than my typical all out resistance level which was good. And I did the longest hill at my normal all out level which I usually can’t hold for more than a minute. I was surprised that I did so well because I had been going easy on myself for so long.
On the rower, we had all sprint rows. We started with a 300 meter row and then we had 10 frogger squats. Next was a 200 meter row with frogger squats and a 100 meter row with frogger squats. We repeated the 300, 200, and 100 meter rows again but with lunges between. We were supposed to do the row distances again with squats between the rows, but I was working on the last 300 meter row when the block ended.
And on the floor, we had drop sets which means we do a low number of reps with a higher weight for an exercise immediately followed by a higher number of reps with a lower weight. For the first block we had shoulder press drop sets and the second block we had deadlift drop sets. The first block also had sit-ups and hip bridges and the second block also had leg lifts and crunches.
Considering how easy I went on myself the week before, I was so happy that I was able to get back to my normal work and even sometimes do a bit better than normal. It’s always nice when I can prove to myself that taking an easy week doesn’t have to be a setback. And I think that having new issues has made the normal issues I deal with during my workouts a bit easier for me to tolerate. Of course, I say that now when my nausea isn’t that bad. This week and next week will likely be my bad nausea weeks and I’m hoping that they aren’t too horrible. But if they are, I know what I need to do.
You Might Also Like
Finally A Normal Workout Week (or I Love Having Nothing Crazy)
Normal But Still Hard (or Having My Own Workout Challenge This Time)
Keeping Things Normal For A Holiday Week (or Steady With My Workouts)
A Good Workout Week (or Only Dealing With Old Issues)
Feeling More Back To Normal (or A Good Week Of Hell Week Prep)
Another Weird Workout Week (or Dealing With A Different Type Of Nausea)
