After doing a couple of 4 workout weeks, it was really nice to have a 3 workout week this past week. I had actually originally planned this past week to be a 4 workout week, but due to scheduling issues and street closures from the LA marathon it wasn’t possible. But I know my body needed a bit of an easier week, so I enjoyed my 3 workouts and taking things a bit easy.
I was so happy on Monday that we got to switch between blocks. I’ve been saying that I feel like we are switching between blocks less often than we had in the past, and I have been missing those. It seems to help me do better on the treadmill because it breaks up the treadmill block and I don’t get as tired as easily (but I think getting over being tired is the reason I probably need the solid 30 minute treadmill blocks).
During the treadmill blocks, we had some 3 minute push paces to do. I think 3 minutes is the longest push pace we ever have (except when we are doing timed or distance challenges where you set your own pace the entire time), and 3 minutes is a long time! I’m pretty ok doing my 3.5 miles an hour push during 2 minutes or less, but that 3rd minute seems so difficult and I really want to break through that time barrier. I think I did pretty ok with my pushes, but I’m pretty hard on myself and I wish that I was doing my pushes (and base pace) faster by now). Besides those long treadmill blocks, I was using 20 pound weights for all of my arm work today. And I’ll admit that I feel like a bit of a badass using 20 pound weights for my bicep work (I started at 10 pounds).
The end of the workout on Monday was pretty fun with a partner challenge. The partner work was a combination of treadmill, rowing, and lunges on the floor. One partner was on the treadmill while the other person did 200 meters on the row and then did a lap of walking lunges around the floor space. Many people used weights during the lunges, but since walking lunges are very tough on my balance I kept my hands free. I worked really hard to make sure my partner wasn’t stuck on the treadmill any longer than I was, and that was a great motivator!
Wednesday was back to a 30 minute treadmill block. There was nothing spectacular for me about that treadmill block. I know I can do better in my mind, but my body isn’t ready for it and that’s such a tough thing to battle through. I was pushing things a bit more with my all outs and picking up the speed, but that was always a short sprint and not something that I feel like I can maintain for a decent amount of the treadmill time.
I was pretty happy with my floor work that day though. We did a lot on the Bosu and that’s one of pieces of workout equipment I have a love/hate relationship with. I know I can do Bosu work because I have done it before, but the condition of my hips have gotten worse since then so I’m struggling a lot. I want to improve my balance because I think that will help so much more, but it’s baby steps. We had to do sit-ups to standing on the Bosu, but my body can’t do that combination yet. So I do a round of sit-ups and then a round of squats. Still the same motions, just broken down a bit. But when we used the Bosu for the arm work, I felt amazing! I was having a bit of balance issues, but I was able to correct myself much quicker than I have in the past and I felt like it was less of a balance change and more of an arm workout.
I wasn’t able to work out on Friday (more on that tomorrow), so I went in on Thursday for my 3rd workout of the week. Again, we had 30 minutes straight on the treadmill. There were a bunch of treadmill blocks and each one started with a 2 minute push pace. I toyed with being at 3.6 miles an hour (instead of 3.5), but I wasn’t able to maintain that for the entire 2 minute push. But just doing those sprints within the push of a couple of seconds each was a good step forward and helping me hopefully reach my goal of increasing my treadmill speed soon.
While I didn’t love the 30 minute treadmill block, there was a good reason for it this time. The floor block was 22 minutes straight with 8 different exercises to work through. It was kind of similar to the idea of a run/row, but it was weights/row. We had 3 floor work exercises followed by a 400 meter row, then 3 different floor work exercises followed by a 200 meter row. Then we repeated that cycle as many times as we could. It seemed easy enough to me and I was really looking forward to the weights/row segment. But as soon I did my first row I started to feel off. I thought maybe I had overdone it, but then I noticed that I wasn’t recovering as quickly from the row that I’m used to. I pushed through and kept feeling a bit off. By the second row I realized that there was a good chance that I didn’t eat enough before class. When I looked back at my food diary after class, I had only about 600 calories between my breakfast and lunch when I usually try to get more than that on a workout day. So clearly I was light-headed due to that and I had to keep taking it easy. I ended up skipping my last row because it’s not so easy for me to take it easy on the row and just moved on to the next round of floor exercises.
Even though my Thursday workout ended on a bit of a not-so-great note, I still consider this entire week a week of wins for me. There were so many times I could have been frustrated and given up, but I didn’t. I modified what I needed to and kept going. Despite my head and body disagreeing in what I could do, I focused more on what my body was saying and I know that it was for the best.
This coming week is a 4 workout week, plus there will be 3 workouts in a row! I’m thinking about some ideas for how to make this coming week another successful workout week for me, and I’ll share what I end up doing next week!
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