After my recent realization that I was not doing as much running as I should, I thought I’d be getting back to running a lot more. And that was my plan and my intention for this past week of workouts, but it didn’t quite work out that way. And that was very frustrating because I wanted to be the best I could before my workouts this week. My Thanksgiving workout is a family event and my dad and I are pretty competitive about it. But I know that I probably didn’t do enough running this past week to really be ready for it.
Monday’s workout was an endurance and power based day. It was a 3 group workout so I figured I’d be able to do running since we wouldn’t be on the treadmill that much. But that morning was just a horrible day for hip pain and I was worried about how I’d feel at Disneyland later that day. So after a few minutes on the treadmill, I got off of it and went over to one of the bikes to use that for cardio. I didn’t really pay too much attention to the intervals when I was on the bike, I just was trying to stay steady with my pace and increasing the resistance when we were in push or all out paces.
On the floor we had 2 blocks. The first block had arm work, goblet squats, and alligators on the straps. The second block had squats thrusters, front raises, and pop jacks. I wasn’t able to be that fast on the floor, so I focused more on not taking as many breaks and just continuously working. And on the rower we started with a 600 meter row and 10 bicep curls using weights and each round the rower went down 200 meters. The second block was on the same pattern as the treadmill with push to all out paces and my focus was just to keep going. I wasn’t able to do the same push or all out pace on the rower as normal because of the hip pain, but just moving is sometimes all I can ask for.
Wednesday’s workout was on where I thought I might try running, and then it ended up being a strength workout so all the treadmill work was in inclines. I know that I could have ignored the inclines and ran, but I like to try to follow the workout as much as possible. So this workout was al walking for me. We had 3 blocks on the treadmill and each block started with a 3 minute progressive hill. The first block I was between 6-8%, the second block it was 7-9%, and the last block was 8-10%. I was able to keep my normal speed for everything until the last minute of that last hill at 10% where I did end up bringing the speed down a bit. Each block also had a longer push pace but I ended up walking them too. It was tough not running on a day that I felt motivated to run, but I felt really good about my hill work.
On the floor we had 2 blocks. The first block was lateral lunges to rows with weights, regular lunges, and scissor ab work. And the second block started with a 500 meter row that I was able to do in 2:10. It’s not my fastest row, but considering how late in the workout it was I was pretty happy with myself. After the row we had squats, triceps, hip dips, and bicycle crunches. It was a tough floor block with getting up and down a lot, but again I just focused on moving and not how hard I was working.
Friday’s workout ended up being another walking one. I originally thought it would be a great one to work on running because I heard we had 2 different 5 minute runs for distance. What I didn’t realize until class started was that those 5 minute runs would be incline runs. So I ended up walking them. For each round, we went up 1% each minute. I started at 6% the first time and did ok. The second time I started at 4% because my hips were starting to hurt a bit more. We also had blocks on the treadmill that weren’t at inclines, but I was a bit nervous to try to run them since I knew how my body was feeling.
On the floor we had 2 floor blocks and 1 rowing block. In the first block, we had single leg squats using the straps, sit-ups, and plank work. And I actually was able to do the single leg squats as single leg squats. I was holding on tight to the straps for stability, but that’s still a big accomplishment for me. The second floor block was high rows using weights, uppercuts with weights, lateral raises, side plank crunches, and a 250 meter row. But I knew we had a rowing block after that so I didn’t go too hard with my rowing. And the last block was that row block were we followed the same pattern as the treadmills with push to all out paces. I was able to do my rowing a bit harder than I had done earlier in the week so I was happy with that.
Saturday’s workout ended up being the one time I really worked on my running, and I did a lot of running! It was a 3 group workout so I was only on the treadmill for about 15 minutes. There were 2 blocks and the first block was 3 rounds of 1 minute push paces, 1 minute all out paces, and 30 second walking recoveries. I ran at the same speed for those 2 minutes at my normal push pace speed. So out of a 7 minute block, I did 6 minutes of running! The second block was essentially the same except that the length of time for the push and all out paces were changing. But since I was doing the push and all out paces at the same speed it was the same as the first block. Again, I had 6 out of 7 minutes in the block as running. To have 12 minutes out of 15 (there was a 1 minute walk between the blocks) be running is pretty great for me!
On the row we had 2 blocks and the first block was 150 meter rows with squat thrusters using weights between each round. I wondered if my rower was broken because no matter how fast or how slow I went, it seemed like I always finished my row in 40.3 seconds. It was really weird. So I stopped worrying about the time I finished my rows in. The second block was also 150 meter rows but this time we had squats with medicine ball presses between each round. And on the floor for the first block we had squats, knee tucks, and mountain climbers. The second block was rows on the straps, lunges with high knees using the straps, and side to side crunches.
Out of my 4 workouts this past week, only 1 had any running in it. Not at all the ratio that I wanted to have but I also realize that I’m not in control of the situation all the time. I can’t necessarily control when I am in pain and I can’t control at all what type of workout we have at Orangetheory. And while I could adjust the workouts to be more running friendly when it’s an incline day, I also want to work on my inclines. It’s still a balance that I’m trying to figure out.
This week will be a bit weird with my workouts, but I am looking forward to my Thanksgiving workout. It should be the biggest group of my family at a workout yet and that should be fun. And I think that even if I can’t do all the running I want to do at that workout, it will still be a good one. And knowing that I’m getting a good workout in that morning will help me feel less guilty about eating all the delicious things that night!
