This past week of workouts was another good one for me. I feel like I’ve been spoiled lately with the good workout weeks. They aren’t all perfect workouts and I still have struggles, but they haven’t been as bad as they could have been. Of course, in the back of my mind, I wonder if my next cycle will be extra brutal since this one wasn’t bad, but I’m trying to focus on the positives, not the negatives. And this past week of workouts was the last full workout week of my 30s, so that was something to be excited about. Even if I’m not the thinnest or lightest I’ve been as an adult, I know that my 30s were my fittest decade. Health is more than a number on a scale, and I have gotten so much healthier over this past decade.
Monday’s workout had a lot of endurance focus to it. It was a good and tough class and I tried to push myself where I could. But I was also mindful of how my body might feel after pushing myself since I knew I would be going to the picket lines after my workout.
For cardio, we had one long block. We alternated a push pace with an incline and a base pace without an incline. I did try to increase my resistance levels a bit more for the push paces with inclines since I already use extra resistance for a push pace. I wasn’t exactly able to do the increases we were supposed to, but all of my push paces with incline were at a higher resistance level than my normal push pace level. So that was good for me.
On the rower, we also had one long block. We started with a 15-stroke drill, 12-stroke drill, and 10-stroke drill with a shoulder press with a medicine ball between each row. Then we repeated the same stroke drills with a bicep curl with a medicine ball between each row. And we ended with the same stroke drills with a tricep extension with a medicine ball between each row. I didn’t get through all the rowing, but I did get to the middle row of the last section where we were doing the tricep extensions so I was close to getting all of them done.
And on the floor, we had reverse drop sets. So for the exercises, we did 6 reps with a heavy weight and then as many reps as possible with a heavier weight after that. Normally, for a drop set, you drop down in weight instead of increasing. So this made this extra tough. The reverse drop sets were with squats and chest presses. After doing the squats we had knee drives to leg lifts, which I had to do as separate exercises. And after the chest presses we had knee tucks. Knee tucks are always hard on my hips, but I was able to do them this time by going slowly and allowing myself extra breaks during the reps.
Tuesday’s workout was another one that felt very endurance-focused. August is Marathon Month at Orangetheory, so I think there will be a lot of endurance work with cardio throughout the month. I’m not doing Marathon Month this time, but it’s mainly because I don’t want to stress about how far I’m getting on the bike if I’m not feeling well. But I’m still trying to get a lot of distance in each workout. I was able to push myself a bit more since I knew I wouldn’t be going to the picket lines after my workout (right now, I’m going on Mondays and Wednesdays instead of trying every day). So I was able to push a bit more and allow myself to prove what I could do.
For cardio, we had another long block. We had 2 long runs/bikes for distance and 2 surges in the middle of them when we were supposed to go a bit faster. I knew that I couldn’t do my push pace resistance level for the entire block, so I used a resistance level between my base and push to be a bit harder. And for the surges, I didn’t increase my resistance level but instead focused more on pedaling faster since that’s something I know I could do a lot better with. And at the end, we had an all-out where I did use my normal all-out resistance level.
On the rower, we had 4 blocks. Blocks 1 and 3 were the same and blocks 2 and 4 were the same. In blocks 1 and 3, we started with a 30-second row and then did 10 lateral hops. I did side-to-side steps instead of the hops. We then did another 30-second row and then had 20 hops. We continued the pattern of a 30-second row and increased the hops by 10 every time. These weren’t my best blocks since the steps and getting on and off the rower took some time. And for blocks 2 and 4, we had a 90-second row for distance and we were supposed to try to make it an all-out row for the last 30 seconds. These blocks were better for me and I was able to get further in block 4 than I did in block 2.
And on the floor, we had one block. It was a mix of upper and lower body work and we were supposed to try to challenge ourselves by increasing the weight if possible after each round. We had sumo deadlifts, kneeling wood choppers, single-arm high row to low row, and tricep kickbacks. I did have to modify the high row to low rows to be separate exercises because I was struggling to switch my hand position that frequently. But I was able to go a bit heavier with the weights after the first round for a few of the exercises. And the floor block ended with a 30-second plank hold, which was a bit harder than normal because I think I worked that much harder during the workout.
Wednesday was another day where I wanted to push myself but not too hard since I would be picketing. But I’m finding the balance between those things the more I go on the picket lines so I’m hoping it will be less of an issue as time goes on (or the strike ends before I have a chance to do that).
For cardio, we had a few blocks but they all had similar formats. We had rounds of a 30-second push pace and 45-second base pace and a 30-second all-out at the end. Even though the base paces were longer than the push paces, it still seemed like we never really got a chance to catch our breath or recover. But I did make sure I was using the normal resistance levels I use on the bike for all the blocks.
On the rower, we had 2 blocks. In the first block, we focused on doing a 200-meter row with a halo using a medicine ball between each row. And in the second block, we focused on doing a 10-stroke drill with front presses with a medicine ball between each row. I really like these rowing blocks. Even though it will probably always be hard for me to get on and off the rower, this went a lot smoother than other similar row blocks have gone for me.
On the floor, we had one long block. We had 6 exercises to do the first round and then after completing them, we could pick any of the exercises to take off so we did 5 exercises for the second round and so on. The exercises we had were lunges, shoulder presses, good mornings, hammer curls, squats, and plank low rows. After the first round, I took the lunges off. After the second round, I took the squats off. I was working on my third round when the block ended and I was going to take the plank off but I hadn’t gotten that far.
I was a bit sore on Thursday, likely a combination of my few days on the picket line and how I was pushing myself in my workouts at the beginning of the week. But I still was feeling pretty good, even with some extra soreness, so I was ready for another challenging workout.
For cardio, we had 3 blocks. Each block had 1-minute intervals followed by 30-second intervals. In the first block, the 1-minute intervals were push paces and the 30-second intervals were base paces with a 1-minute all-out at the end. In the second block, it was similar to the first block but the push paces had increasing inclines. And in the last block, the 1-minute intervals were all-outs and the 30-second intervals were walking recoveries. These were tough since the harder intervals were twice as long as the easier ones, but they were all short blocks so that helped a bit.
On the rower, we had one long block. We started with an 800-meter row. After that row, we had tricep extensions, halos, and squat jumps (which I did as squats to calf raise) with a medicine ball. Then we had a 600-meter row with the same exercises after the row. I was working on the 400-meter row when the block ended, but I was happy with how far I got.
And on the floor, we had 3 blocks and they had a lot of focus on balance. I tried to do each exercise the best I could, but I knew that balance things would be tough for me. The first block had push-ups and kneeling lateral raises and both exercises were with the Bosu. I did manage to do both exercises using the Bosu by doing the push-ups on my knees and taking some breaks during the reps for the lateral raises. The second block had split squats and kneeling tricep extensions, and again they were both supposed to be on the Bosu. I did the split squats as lunges and didn’t use the Bosu, but I did do the tricep extensions on it so that was an extra challenge. And the last block had jack presses without the Bosu and kneeling bicep curls using the Bosu. I did the jack presses as shoulder presses, but I did use the Bosu again for the bicep curls.
I think that this past week really was another great week for me and an awesome way to start closing out my 30s. I love how positive I’ve been feeling with my workouts recently, and I’m so happy that it looks like I’ll be starting my 40s feeling great about myself and ready to see what I can accomplish with my fitness in a new decade.
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