I knew going into this past week of workouts that it was likely going to be one of my bad weeks. But I really hoped it wouldn’t kick in as soon as I thought it might. And I’m glad it didn’t because my week of workouts kicked off with a big celebratory workout!
Monday was my birthday workout! I do laugh a bit at the fact that I worked out at 6:30 in the morning on my birthday. I still can’t believe I’ve turned into this person. But why should I change up my routine for Mondays? And I like doing a workout on my birthday so this was perfect.
It was a power workout (which is usually my favorite so that was a nice birthday treat!) and we had 4 blocks on each side of the room. 2 of the cardio blocks were run/row blocks and 2 were timed cardio blocks. For the run/row blocks, we had .1 miles on the treadmill (.4 on the bike) and then a 100-meter row and repeated that until the block ended. And the other 2 blocks we had rounds of 30-second all-outs and 45-second recoveries. All of the blocks were tough because I made them tough, but they were really good too.
On the floor, 2 blocks were regular floor blocks and 2 blocks were times exercises (that were when cardio had timed blocks). For the regular blocks, we had pull-ups, triceps, chest presses, and bicep curls on the straps. In the first timed block, we had neutral thrusters with weights during the 30-second intervals and hops during the 45-second intervals. And the second timed block had hip hinge low rows during the 30-second blocks and lateral hops during the 45-second intervals.
And of course, I had to do a birthday workout picture with my coach!
On Wednesday, we had an endurance workout. I also started to have to deal with pain and nausea (I did appreciate that it didn’t start on my birthday). So that made the workout a bit more of a challenge.
For cardio, we had 2 blocks. Each block was intervals of push paces followed by 1-minute base paces. We started at a 3-minute push pace and it went down by 30-seconds each round. The entire thing was split in half so we did the first half of it as the first block and then had some recovery time before continuing the intervals until we were finishing with a 30-second push pace.
On the floor, we also had 2 blocks. The first block was a bit of a balance focus. We had pullovers, hip bridges, plank work, and hyperextension all on the Bosu. After doing 2 rounds of all the exercises, we had a 500-meter row. I was a bit slow and didn’t get a chance to finish my row. The second block had 2 rounds of front squats to shoulder presses and hammer curls before having a 500-meter row. This time, I did get to finish my row even though it wasn’t that fast.
Friday’s workout was themed for Friday the 13th. And besides the workout being themed, it felt like the situation in the studio was a bit cursed too. All the wi-fi went down, which meant we had no heart rate monitor screens to look at and the screens that showed the workout were down too. I’ve done classes without being able to monitor my heart rate and they can be an interesting challenge, but I usually have to be careful because I know my heart rate can be a bit crazy too. But this time, I didn’t worry too much about it because my pain and nausea were really awful so I was doing a very light effort through the entire workout.
For cardio, we had 3 blocks and 2 of them were rowing blocks. For the first and last block, we had 5 rounds of 30-second all-outs on the rower with only 15 seconds to recover between each round. On a normal day, this would probably have been a fun challenge, but because of how I was feeling I was just trying to keep rowing. I did make it through all of the rowing, but because I wasn’t rowing hard I didn’t get a lot of distance for each block. And on the treadmill and bike for the middle block, we had 3 rounds of a 3 1/2-minute distance challenge with 75 seconds to recover between each round. I did better on the bike than I expected. I was able to keep my resistance level at my push pace level for the entire time for each of them. I still didn’t get as much distance because I wasn’t pedaling as fast as I can, but at least I had the resistance up.
On the floor, we also had 3 blocks and the first and last blocks were timed with the rowers. We had 30 seconds of effort with 15 seconds of rest. In the first block, the exercises were neutral half thrusters and skater lunges. And in the last block, we had ground to press with weights and high knees (which I did more like marching in place). And for the second block, we had 13 reps of a lot of exercises. We had pull-ups on the straps, rollouts on the straps, push-ups, bench tap squats, sit-ups, and bear planks. I didn’t have to do too many modifications due to my nausea, but I did move slowly since I needed time to let the pain and nausea pass.
Saturday’s workout was the toughest one for me because of how I felt. I had spent a lot of Friday after my workout really miserable and having to be very careful with timing out my medications because I didn’t want to miss anything. Saturday wasn’t as horrible as Friday day was, but it was still worse than Friday morning had been. So again, I just did what I could in my workout and didn’t stress too much about what I could or couldn’t do.
For cardio, we had long push paces with all-outs after. It started with a 3-minute push pace with no incline and each time we decreased the time but increased the incline/resistance. And every time we had a 1-minute all-out after the push pace. And I did make the effort to increase the resistance level each time, even if I was feeling horrible. I just took a lot of breaks to let the pain and nausea pass when I needed to and then continued when I could.
On the floor, we started and ended with a 2-minute row. For both rows, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to go that hard so I just tried to row without stopping. And I’m proud of myself because I was able to do that even if I got a very low distance at the end of the row. Being able to row without stopping has been a struggle, so knowing I can do that when I feel my worst is a great feeling. We had 2 other blocks between the rowing. In the first block, we had lateral hops, sumo deadlifts, and sumo squats to froggers (which I had to split into 2 different exercises). And the second block we had squats, weighted squats, and skier swings. I wasn’t going super heavy with the weights because of how I felt, but at least I did use weights for all the exercises that asked for them.
I’m so glad I had a great birthday workout and felt like myself for it. That really started off this past week on a great note. I wish I had been feeling amazing for the rest of the week, but I knew that was very unlikely so I am not too disappointed that happened. And for this week, it’s still up in the air how I’ll feel. I might be only a little off or I can have some of my worst days. I’ll just have to wait, see, and let you all know in my workout post next week!
You Might Also Like
This Felt Like Hell Week (or An Unexpected But Fun Workout Week)
Workout Celebrations (or A Week Of Awesomeness)
Dri-Tri Prep Workouts (or The Beginning Of My Workout Week)
Finishing Up 12 Days of Fitness (or This Felt Like A Long Hell Week)
This Wasn’t Going To Be A 4 Workout Week (or Some Pleasant Surprises)
Last Regular Workout Week Of 2019 (or Still Pushing Through)
