Tag Archives: fitness

I feel like I must have cursed myself when I posted last week that I was hoping this past week of workouts would be a good week for me. I really thought I was going to have no health issues and it would help me do some of my better workouts. I wasn’t expecting to have to deal with a bladder infection and the side effects of antibiotics. But that’s what happened and it affected my workouts quite a bit.

Monday’s workout was before I was able to get antibiotics so I was feeling really awful. I was in a lot of pain and was very uncomfortable during the entire workout. I didn’t think about not showing up because I knew I would still be able to do something, but I knew I also had to take it very gentle on myself. Unfortunately, it also was partially a partner workout so I had to work with someone else and I did feel a bit guilty that they were partnered with me.

The first half of the class wasn’t partnered. The cardio block was rounds of push paces to base paces and ending with an all out. I felt very similar to how I feel when I’m dealing with pain and nausea so I adjusting what I did on the bike to be what I had done the week prior. And the floor block had bicep curls on the straps, squats, plank work, and sit-ups. These all were able to be done normally, but I took a lot of breaks. I don’t think there was one exercise that I could do without taking a break in the middle of the reps.

Then it was time for the Capture The Flag partner workout. The goal of Capture The Flag was to hit certain targets on the rower. You and your partner switch off who is rowing and you don’t reset the rower for the entire 23-minute block. The person on the rower is rowing until they are tagged. And the other person does floor and cardio work before going to the rower.

The floor work was all medicine ball work. We had squats to overhead presses, push-ups with one hand on the medicine ball, and double crunches. There was also a sprint run/bike after those exercises and all those sprints took 2 minutes or under. I really tried to not take breaks when I was on the floor or bike since I knew my partner was waiting on me, but I also know that I took a lot longer than my partner did. I warned my partner that I was not doing well and that I was sorry about things, and they seemed to understand. But I was partnered with someone I didn’t know so I have no idea if they were upset with me or not. But I did my best and that’s all I could do.

By Wednesday, I was taking antibiotics but I was dealing with the side effects from them. And those side effects were very similar to the pain and nausea that I’m used to each month. It wasn’t exactly the same and the pain affected me a different way, but I guess I should be grateful that I’m used to working through it and having modifications so I wasn’t too thrown off.

Even though it was a 3 group workout, it was a run/row format. Cardio and rowing were 4-minute blocks and we switched where we were each block. So when I started on cardio I did cardio, rowing, cardio. And when I started on the rower I did rowing, cardio, rowing. Every time I was on cardio it was a sprint run/bike, then 10 squats, and then running/biking for distance with an incline. I always made it to the incline work and I did adjust the resistance level on the bike a bit. But I didn’t go as high as I would have if I was feeling ok. And every time on the rower we started with a 100-meter row and then we had 10 squats. Then it was a 150-meter row and 15 squats and 200-meter row. I didn’t get to the 20 squats after the 200-meter row for any of the 3 times I was rowing, but I was very close to finishing that last row.

And the floor was one long block. We started with ground to press with weights. When it was supposed to be hamstring curls which I modified to be weighted hip bridges. Next was supposed to be bench sit-ups to sumo squats, but I had to split those exercises up and do them separately. Then it was ab dolly work. And finally, it was suitcase squats and we were supposed to do step-ups. But I did suitcase squats as its own exercise and then did lateral lunges with weights instead of the step-ups. I was glad when the workout was done because I really wasn’t feeling ok. And the usual things I do to help with pain and nausea like waiting for it to go away since it comes in waves didn’t help me this time. I guess pain and nausea from medications are different from when it’s from hormonal fluctuations so I can’t manage it the same way. But I tried.

Friday had similar issues as Wednesday. I was on my last day of antibiotics, but I was having the same side effects that I had every day on them. I was trying to do better than I had earlier in the week, but I also knew not to push too hard because the symptoms I was experiencing wouldn’t go away the way that I was used to. But it was also a strength day so I knew I wanted to try at least a bit to see what I could do.

For cardio, we started with a push pace without incline before starting with incline work. We had a few different push paces with incline and I did work on increasing my resistance levels on the bike. We finished that section with an all out at a flat incline before moving on to the next part. We then had rounds of all outs, and some of them had inclines and some of them didn’t. I really did try my best to do the resistance levels the way I knew I should, but it was tough. I ended up taking a lot of breaks to recover a bit, even in the middle of the short all outs.

On the rower, we started with a 400-meter row and then we had squats with a medicine ball. Each round, we went down 50 meters and had the same squats. It was a bit repetitive, but that’s what I liked about it. Even though I struggled a lot with the rowing, it allowed me to focus a lot on my power and speed. I could see what I was able to do for different amounts of time and it really did help me with figuring out what some good strategies could be for future rowing challenges.

And on the floor, we had a really unique workout. We had 3 main exercises that each had 2 parts to it. The first part we always did once and the second part started with 1 rep and went up to 6. For example, the first exercise was a lunge to a neutral half thruster. First, it was 1 lunge with 1 neutral half thruster. Then it was 1 lunge and 2 neutral half thrusters, and so on until we did 6 neutral half thrusters. After completing all of those, we had burpees to a bicep curl. But I had to split up the burpees and bicep curls. Then we had push-ups (always 1 rep) to plank jacks (1-6 reps) and then more burpees and bicep curls. And the last exercise was bench sit-ups (always 1 rep) to squats (1-6 reps). And then more burpees to bicep curls. It was a lot of work but it felt like it went really quickly because we were always switching what we were doing.

And on Saturday I was finally starting to feel a bit more like myself. I was done with antibiotics, but I noticed I was feeling a bit weak. I think that was due to having to take it easy for such a long time so pushing myself was harder than normal. But I tried and it was a good workout to be able to push myself on.

Cardio and rowing had the same pattern for both blocks. For the first block, we were coached with 1-minute intervals for push pace and base pace and ended with a 1-minute all out. Then we were supposed to look at our distance for cardio or rowing and the second block was a 6-minute distance challenge. The goal was to go further in the distance challenge. For both the bike and the rower, I tried to do my actual base and push pace during the coached block. And for the distance challenge, I tried to find a pace in the middle to stay at the entire time. I did have to take breaks during all the blocks, but I feel like the distance challenges went a bit better because I didn’t have any time where I was pushing myself super hard.

And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block had to be modified a lot for me because it was a lot of lunges with exercises and I have a lot of issues with balance. We had swing lunges which I did holding on to the straps or the wall for balance. Then we were supposed to do lunges with hammer curls or with shoulder presses. I did the lunges and the exercises separately. And the last exercise for that block was side plank raises, which I modified to do on my knees. The last block was all work using the dumbells. We had tricep presses, reverse flys, hip raises, and bridge flys. For that block, I was able to do all the exercises normally.

I don’t want to say again that I’m hoping this week will go better than the past few weeks. But hopefully, I will get a bit of a break now from the pain and nausea. I know it will be kicking back in again soon, and I want to have some good workouts before that happens. But at least I know that I can get through those bad workouts weeks, no matter what the cause of the bad workout is.

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I was finally back to my normal workout schedule this past week. While I love holiday workouts and it can be fun to switch things up, it’s also really nice to be back to what I’m used to. I think having the regularity of my workout schedule has a positive impact on my mental health and I really needed it this past week with everything else feeling a bit tough. I knew that at some point I’d probably have to deal with nausea, but I wasn’t going to let that get me down.

Monday’s workout was a strength day, but it wasn’t as bad as it could be because it was also a day that we switched between blocks. We had 3 blocks at each section of the room so there were a total of 6 blocks of work.

For cardio, all the blocks had the same pattern. We had a 1-minute base with incline, a 1-minute base without incline, 90-seconds with inclines that decreased after 45-seconds, a 1-minute base with no incline, and 2 minutes with inclines that decreased every 30-seconds. Each block the inclines were supposed to get a bit lower, but I kept mine the same since I don’t have a lot of different resistance levels I can use. But I did follow the pattern with the decreasing inclines for the 90-second and 2-minute segments. Since I don’t use inclines every workout, I really feel it when I do use them. But this wasn’t as bad as some workouts because they were quick segments. But they still made me work hard!

On the floor, we had 3 exercises each block. And the first and second exercises used the same muscles so it was extra hard. The first exercise used weights and the second one used the TRX straps. The first block had chest presses with weights, chest presses on the straps, and upright rows with weights. The second block had hip hinge reverse rows with weights, bridge rows on the straps, and plank work. And the last block had triceps with weights, triceps on the straps, and double crunches using a weight. There was also rowing if you completed all the exercises, but I never made it to that point.

Wednesday’s workout had a mix of endurance, strength, and power and everything we did was timed for 1-minute intervals and they were 4-minute blocks. And every 4-minute block at each section was the same. It was a lot of switching too. For cardio, we were there for the entire time. But the rower and floor switched after every 4 minutes of work.

For cardio, the 4-minute block had a 1-minute push, 1-minute base, 1-minute walking at a high incline (or just pedaling slowly at a high resistance level), and a 1-minute all out. Technically, the high incline was supposed to increase each time we did it, but I used the same high resistance level on the bike. Since we didn’t switch between each block for cardio, we also had a bit of recovery time while the floor and rowers switched. But the recovery felt short considering how hard we worked in those 4 minutes.

On the rower we started with a 1-minute all out row then we had 1 minute to complete 15 pulsing half squats. Then it was another 1-minute all out row and we finished with 1-minute of either pulsing half squats or holding a low squat. That repeated every time we were on the rower and I know my rowing got slower each time I did a 1-minute row.

And on the floor the first minute was a hip hinge swing with weights, the second minute was triceps with weights, the third minute was chest presses with weights, and the last minute was bench sit-ups to squats. I wasn’t feeling nauseous when I got to class, but the hip hinge swings were starting to make me feel a bit sick so I changed those to sumo squats with weights to not have as much back and forth motion. The swings are supposed to work your hamstrings and I made sure that I could feel my hamstrings working with the sumo squats.

Friday was a strength day and it was the start of my nausea being an issue from the beginning of the workout. I decided to go a bit easier on myself instead of pushing through to see if it would make my nausea not as bad throughout the workout or later in the day (I’m still testing this idea and I’m not sure if it will make a difference). It was also a switch class and each block was about 6 minutes long.

For cardio, the first block had 1-minute intervals between incline and flat base paces. I did use the resistance levels for the bike and decreased them as the inclines for the treadmills were going down. And we ended with a 30-second all out without incline. The second block was a similar pattern but we had a 1-minute push pace to replace one of the incline intervals. Again, I did work with the intervals on the bike even though it was making my pedaling speed extremely slow. But even with the slow speed, I was still feeling my leg muscles working so that’s the most important thing.

On the rower, the first block started with a 400-meter row and then we were supposed to do lunges. I did squats instead of lunges because getting on and off the rower is tough for me sometimes and I can do squats over the rowing instead of on the side. Then we had a 300-meter row and more lunges/squats. I was working on the 200-meter row when that block ended. The second block was the same work but in reverse order. So we started with the lunges/squats, then the 200-meter row, and so on. My rowing wasn’t great, but it also wasn’t as bad as it sometimes gets when I’m nauseous.

And on the floor, the first block had single-leg squats to stands (I did one round as single-leg and then switched to regular ones), step-ups (I modified these to be lunges), and weighted hip bridges. The second block was all mini-band work. We had squat walks, static crunch in and outs, and heel taps. Even though I had to modify several floor exercises, these blocks were pretty good for me and not too bad with my nausea.

Saturday’s workout was a power day and it was also a switch day. That really worked for me because I was really feeling nauseous going into the workout. But knowing that every block was 4 minutes or under and that I’d be constantly switching helped me feel better. But the switching was different.

We had a 4-minute block, a 3-minute block, a 2-minute block, and a 90-second block. Normally, we would do the 4-minute block at all sections of the room before moving on to the 3-minute block. Not this time. As an example, this is how things worked for me when I started on the bike: a 4-minute block on the bike, a 3-minute block on the rower, a 2-minute block on the floor, and a 90-second block on the bike. Then we went back to the rower to start on the 4-minute block there. That pattern continued until we did all 4 blocks at all 3 seconds of the room.

For cardio, 3 of the blocks were a push pace, a base pace, and a 30-second all out. Each block the push pace got shorter and for the 2-minute block, the base pace was shorter too. The 90-second block was 30-second intervals with 2 all outs and a recovery in the middle. I didn’t really have a lot of difference between my base, push, and all outs. I was just feeling horrible and just like on Friday was trying to not push through it too much. I went a little less than I probably could because I didn’t want to be completely sick on the rower or the floor.

On the rower, every block had 100-meter rows. The 4-minute block had 4 of them, the 3-minute block had 3, the 2-minute block had 2, and the 90-second block had 1. There were exercises that were different between each row in each block, but I actually don’t remember what those were because every block I just did regular squats between each row. We were also supposed to get through all the rows and exercises and hold a squat to end each block, but my rowing was a lot slower than normal. I only made it to the static squat in the 90-second block.

On the floor, all of the exercises for each block were Bosu exercises. But I didn’t use the Bosu at all. I modified everything that would have used it, but I think I had some good modifications that weren’t that different from what we were supposed to do. The 4-minute block had crunches (I just did them on the bench) and plank jacks (again, I used the bench for my hands). The 3-minute block had burpees and plank Spiderman (just used the bench for my hands for both). The 2-minute block had side hip dips (I was on the floor). And the 90-second block had lateral crunches (I did bicycle crunches instead).

This week, I’m going to keep playing around with the idea of not going as hard as I can when I’m nauseous to see if that helps me get through the workouts. I’m still not sure if it’s helping or not and I need to test it out more before I decide if it’s worth it. I know there are so few things I can do to manage my pain and nausea in my workouts (and in my everyday life), but if this idea helps it would be amazing! But at least I know I can continue doing my normal workout schedule no matter how I feel and I’m so happy to be back to the routine that I’m used to.

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This past week of workouts was just a weird one. I knew it would be a weird schedule due to the holiday, but this was even weirder than that. I already mentioned that I had food poisoning last week, and unfortunately it did affect my workouts.

I don’t know what to say about Monday’s workout. Monday was the day I had food poisoning, but I thought I’d try going to my workout to see how I would do. I know I can work through cramps when I have to, but these cramps were very different. But it was worth trying to see what would happen and I told myself that I could leave if I had to.

And for the first time that I could remember, I actually left a workout. I made it 20 minutes in class before the pain was too much for me and I knew I couldn’t do it anymore. All I had done in the workout was be on the bike, but I don’t think I biked for more than 7 or 8 minutes combined because I pedaled for maybe 30 seconds before I had to stop. I hated having to leave, but I knew that there was no way I could make it any longer in class and I was proud of myself for at least trying.

I was still a bit weak feeling on Tuesday, but I was significantly better than I had been doing on Monday (sleeping for about 12 hours during the day helped). I’m glad I was doing better because I really didn’t want to miss Tuesday’s class. I love working out on Christmas Eve and I was excited to take the class! And as an added bonus, we had a sub coach. While I love all the OTF coaches, I’ve had almost all my Christmas Eve workouts with Coach Bruce. And by some miracle, he ended up being the sub coach for this class! It was like it was meant to be!

The Christmas Eve workout is called Presents or Coal. We draw different cards that tell us what to do for our workout assignment. Some of them are easy (the Presents) and some of them are hard (the Coal). I feel like I usually get Coal when I do these, but I was ready for them. And before we got to that part of the workout, we had a quick tornado around the room with 3-minute blocks.

The cardio block was a 90-second push pace, 45-second base pace, and 45-second all out. The rowing block was a 300-meter row, squats, a 150-meter row, and more squats. And on the floor, we had goblet squats and tricep extensions with weights. And then the rest of the class was split into 10-minute blocks with 1 block at each section of the room.

For cardio, I had a mix of Coal and Presents cards. But none of them were that bad. I had 30-second intervals and distance challenges. I don’t remember the specifics of what I had to do (I should have taken notes), but I remember all of the cards being somewhat similar and never taking too long. I think I had 4 different cards for cardio. On the rower, all of the cards I pulled were Presents. I had 300-meter rows as my longest row. I also drew a card with intervals with squats between each row. But just like with cardio, I don’t remember the specifics but I do remember I drew 3 cards and they all took me about 3 minutes to complete.

On the floor, the cards told us how many of the exercises we had to do and how many reps we had. The exercises were hip hinge swings with weights, lunges, rollouts, and knee tucks. And on the floor, I drew the same card both times I had to get one. It was a Coal card and it said to do all the exercises with 12 reps each. I was starting to get a bit tired on the floor (and I think the weakness of recovering from food poisoning was catching up with me), so I was moving a bit slow. But I just focused on doing each rep as I could and taking breaks when necessary. I was just finishing up my second round of 12 reps when class was done.

I think after feeling so horrible about leaving class on Monday, the Tuesday class was exactly what I needed. I was feeling much better about myself and I needed that. Plus, I got to add to my amazing photo collage of taking Christmas Eve classes with Coach Bruce (we only missed doing class together last year).

I was finally feeling like myself again on Friday. Plus, I was craving a workout since I had 2 days off in a row which doesn’t happen that often. Even though I was excited about the workout, it ended up being a tough one and I did have a few struggles.

The workout was a mix of endurance and power. For cardio, we had a run/walk (or bike/bike slower) assignment that we did at our own pace. The longest distance we had to do was done just once and then we had 30 seconds to walk/recover. Then we had a slightly shorter distance that we did twice with the 30 seconds of recovery between each round. The third distance was slightly less and it was done 3 times. I was working on that third distance when the block ended and we switched to the rowers.

The rowers and the floor both had 5 blocks that got longer for each block. For the rower, the first row was a 100-meter row and then we did frogger squats until the block ended. We had to remember how many squats we did because we used that for the rest of the blocks. Each block, the row went up by 50 meters and we did the same number of frogger squats we did in the first block. Once we finished those, we had to hold a squat until the block ended. I always made it to holding a squat at the end, but I usually only had to do it for about 30 seconds. But all those squats were tough on my hips.

The floor was similar to the row. But instead of having longer rows we had add on exercises. The first block had neutral full thrusters and then sit-ups until the block was done. We had to remember how many sit-ups we did to use that for the rest of the blocks. Each block we added on another exercise and then did the sit-ups and held a plank until the block ended. The other exercises were hip hinge low rows, lateral lunges with a goblet hold, pulsing half squats, and tricep extensions. Even though there was a bit more upper body work, it still was a lot of lower body work and my hips were having a rough time.

Saturday’s workout was a strength day and we had some switching between blocks. Every block was about 6 minutes long and we did 2 blocks at each section of the room.

For cardio, we had shorter intervals and alternated doing push paces and base paces with incline work. The goal is to make the incline work feel the same as a push pace. For me on the bike, this is a bit harder to do because I’m not really using the resistance levels for push paces but I do use them for incline work. Also, I think I might have gone a bit too hard with the resistance levels for the inclines because my legs weren’t moving that much. But at least my heart rate got up really high while I was doing it.

On the rower, all the work we had for both blocks were stroke drills. We always had 15 strokes on the rower and the goal was to go slowly and keep the stroke rate down. For these drills, I’m pretty good at keeping the rate really low. I was much lower than the goals we were given. But I think that makes the rowing harder because my core is involved for a much longer time. In the first block between each row, we had squats with overhead presses using a medicine ball. And in the second block, we had squats with front presses using the medicine ball.

And on the floor, both blocks only had 2 exercises. The first block had bicep curls with weights and leg raises. And the second block had tricep extensions with weights and low rows on the straps. The goal with strength days is to go heavy on the weights, and I did just that. For the weight work, we had a range for the reps and we were supposed to do between 6-10 reps. If you can’t do 6 reps the weight is too heavy and if you can easily do 10 reps it is too light. I was doing either 7 or 8 reps each time, so I think I was using the perfect weights.

Even though this past week started with me having to leave a workout in the middle of it, I feel like it ended really well. I feel much better about having to leave the workout now that I’ve had other good workouts this week. But I also know that I hope that I never have to do that again. Only a few more workouts left in 2019 before I start working on my 2020 goals!

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This past week of workouts was my last workout week with my normal schedule for this year. Because of the holidays, I have slightly different workout weeks this week and next. But I’m excited about those weeks with different schedules, so it should be fun. But this past week, it wasn’t quite as good as those should be. I just had to do what I could and push through when I could.

Monday’s workout was a strength-based class. I was dealing with my normal pain and nausea so I knew it would be a bit tough for me no matter what the workout was. So I tried to do my best to follow the workout but I made changes where I needed to. It was also a switch class, so we had 3 blocks for cardio and 3 blocks on the floor and we switched after each one.

For cardio, all 3 blocks had a similar pattern. We had a 2-minute push pace, a base pace, a base pace with incline, a regular base pace, and we ended with an all out at an incline. The base pace with incline got shorter each block, but the incline went up each block to make up for it. But for me, I used the same higher resistance level on the bike each time we were supposed to be at an incline. It was a high resistance level, but it was easier for me to keep it the same. I really tried to do my best each block to keep going, but I had to take a lot of breaks to let either the nausea or the pain subside. It was frustrating, but I also know that I did my best.

For each of the 3 floor blocks, we started with a 1-minute row. The goal for each of the rows was to be within a certain stroke rate. I lucked out because they were around my normal stroke rate, but I know they were slower than what most people do. Then for each block, we had 1 exercise with a drop set (when you do a lower number of reps with a higher weight and then immediately do a higher number of reps with a lower weight) and one core exercise. The drop set exercises were hip hinge low rows, pullovers, and bicep curls. And the core work was double crunches, seated torso rotations, and plank work. I had to modify the plank work, but besides that, I was able to do all the exercises without modifications.

Wednesday’s workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power and I was finally starting to feel a bit better so that was good. We had 3 blocks in each section of the room. We had a 5-minute block, a 4-minute block, and a 3-minute block. But we didn’t switch between blocks so we did all 3 blocks in one section back to back.

For cardio, we had a push pace, base pace, push pace, and all out. The base and all out were always 1 minute long. The push paces started at 90 seconds and went down 30 seconds each block. I had a few moments when I had to take a break to let the pain or nausea end, but I was able to do a lot more work than I could on Monday. I didn’t do anything with the resistance levels on the bike, but I did focus on my pedaling speed.

For the rower, each block had 1 row and then we had medicine ball exercises. The first block was 750-meters, the second block was 500-meters, and the last block was 250-meters. The goal with the rowing was to keep our strokes per minute the same with each row. It’s not easy to go as slowly as you did with a long row when you do a sprint row. But it was a good challenge and I liked to see what my speed naturally was with each distance and adjust it from there. The medicine ball exercises were things I couldn’t do, so I modified them to be squats with overhead presses. And we did the medicine ball work after each row until the block was done (so we were on the rower just once per block).

And the floor had a mix of strength and core work. The first block had all weight work. We had deadlifts, overhead tricep extensions, and upright rows. Then the next block had one round of the weight work again and then the rest of the block was Bosu work. We were supposed to do bicycles, crunches, and single-leg v-ups on the Bosu. But my body just wasn’t letting me do those exercises. So I did sit-ups, crunches, and then tried to do a different type of crunch to get a third exercise in. And for the last block, we only had the Bosu work, so I continued doing my modified core work. Toward the end of that last floor block, I was starting to get a little nauseous, but I think I was leaning back too far with the sit-ups and that was the cause and it wasn’t my normal nausea.

Friday’s workout was a strength-based class, and I was almost back to my normal self so I could do a lot more. I knew that I would still have to be a bit cautious about how hard I pushed myself, but I could do more than I had done earlier in the week.

The cardio had 2 blocks. Both blocks had a push pace, a base pace, hill work, a base pace, and an all out. I kept my resistance level at my base level (I really should probably stop calling it a base level since I use it so much) and then I went higher than what I used to do for my all out level for the hill work. When we were doing the hill work, I really did slow down a lot with how fast I could pedal but I think that is to be expected. And it was nice to have the other work without hills so I could go faster and feel like I’m doing more.

On the rower, we started with a 90-second row with the focus being on staying within 22-24 strokes per minute. Then we were supposed to have squats with leg lifts and calf raises using the medicine ball. I had to skip the leg lifts, but I was able to do the squats and calf raises. Then we were back on the rower and we were supposed to repeat what we just did, but decrease the row by 50 meters each time. I made things a bit easier on myself by rounding up the number on the rower so I could keep track, but I figured that way I was also doing a bit more work than necessary.

And on the floor, the first block was a mini-band block. We had walking side squats, bench tap squats, and hip raises with the mini-bands. The walking side squats were very difficult on my hips, so I had to go very slowly and take small steps. But I managed to get through them. And the second block didn’t have any mini-band work. We had side lunges while holding weights and full sit-ups.

Saturday’s workout was called Ellen’s Workout and it was named after Ellen Latham who is the founder of Orangetheory. She designed this workout to be the best representation of what Orangetheory is all about. And I really loved this class!

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block was coached with lots of 1-minute intervals and a few 75-second intervals. It was mainly push to base paces with an all out at the end. After doing those intervals, then we had another block where we paced ourselves. We had rounds of .1 miles on the treadmill (or .4 on the bike) and then 30 seconds of recovery. For me, that was just under a minute of pushing myself and then 30 seconds to recover. They were intervals that I’m very comfortable with and feel like I can do well.

Then on the rower, we started with a 1000-meter row. After that, we were supposed to do lunges but I did squats instead. Then we had 3 rounds of doing 200-meter rows with the exercise between each row. And we finished the rowing with another 1000-meter row. I was working on that second 1000-meter row when the block ended and we switched to the floor.

The floor also had 2 blocks. The first block had single-leg squats (which I had to modify and do as regular squats), overhead presses with rotations with weights, bird dogs, and v-ups while using the Bosu (which I had to modify and do as full sit-ups). And the second block had lateral lunges with weights and front raises with weights while kneeling on the Bosu. When this workout was done, I really felt awesome! It was the best I had felt all week and I thought the workout was really good!

I’m excited for this week of workouts. I know we should have some holiday-themed classes this week and next, and I love those themed classes. And I’m excited to see if I can accomplish anything else amazing before the year is up!

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As I wrote last week, the 12 Days Of Fitness were almost like having another Hell Week. Except there were more days for this than there were for Hell Week. And these workouts were just as hard, if not harder, than those. And of course, I ended up making things a bit harder on myself than they probably needed to be. But that’s just how I do things.

Monday’s workout was called Nine Reps Increasing and that was a very accurate description for what it was. Every part of the workout had increasing reps for us to do.

For cardio, we had a run/exercise workout. We had 4 blocks but they were very similar. Our first block was rounds of .25 miles (1 mile for the bike) and then we had ground to presses with the medicine ball each round. We started with 1 ground to press and increased by 1 every time. The distance for cardio decreased each block a bit and we continued working on our ground to presses and increasing them by 1 every time. We didn’t reset those each block, so by the time we finished the last block I was doing 8 of them after my bike work.

On the floor, we had 3 blocks. The first block had shoulder presses, hip hinge chest flys, and bicep curls on the straps. We started with 9 reps for each exercise and each round we added 1 more rep. The next block had side plank hip dips and sit-ups and the reps were based on where we were on the first block. For me, I did 9 and 10 reps in the first block so I started with 11 reps in the second block. The last block had chest presses, pullovers, and knee tucks and again we continued increasing the reps based on what we were able to do in the other blocks.

Wednesday’s workout was Eleven Pikers Piking and it was a power switch day so we had a lot of movement between the different areas of the room. We had 2 blocks that were 4 minutes each and 2 blocks that were 45-second tornados. It was a lot of switching for us to be at each section of the room 4 times.

For cardio, the 4-minute blocks had 30-second intervals with a push pace, a base pace, an all out, a recovery, and then repeating it. I kept my resistance level at my base level and just focused on pedaling quickly. For the 45-second tornado blocks, it was a 45 second all out and again I focused on pedaling quickly.

On the rower, the 4-minute blocks had 300, 200, and 100-meter rows with frogger squats in between each row. One block started at 300-meters and decreased and the other block started at 100-meters and increased. And just like with cardio, the 45-second tornado blocks were a 45-second all out row.

On the floor, both of the 4-minute blocks were the same. We had sumo squats with upright rows, hamstring curls (I did hip bridges with a weight on my hips), rollouts with the ab dolly, and lateral lunges. And the 45-second tornado blocks had 45 seconds of doing pikes on the ab dolly. I can’t do pikes due to my hip issues, so I did knee tucks. I was also struggling a bit with nausea in this workout, but it didn’t prevent me from doing anything. I just had to take a few more breaks than I normally would need to.

My goal was to do 7 of the 12 Days of Fitness, and the only way for me to do that would be to work out on Thursday. I wanted to see if I could get the socks they were giving away to the first 100 people who completed it, but I also knew that there was a good chance that at least 100 people would get it done before the last day (I was right about that, but I still got my 7 days in).

Thursday’s workout was called 12 Runners Running and I had a 2 group class instead of a 3 group one. It was also a strength-based day and I was dealing with the start of nausea. So I struggled a bit to complete it.

The cardio work started with a 4-minute distance challenge. Then we had a 5-minute hill challenge with the incline (or resistance level) increasing every minute. Even with the issues I was having with nausea, I was able to work on increasing my resistance level each minute. I was just pedaling really slowly. After completing those, we repeated it except we had the hill challenge first and finished with the distance challenge.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block started with a 2-minute row for distance. Then we moved to the floor where we had deadlifts, hip hinge low rows, squats to bicep curls, half thrusters, and running man. I modified a few things with each exercise and took a lot of breaks, but I was able to go heavy with the weights. The second block started with a 90-second row and then we moved to the floor. We had lateral step-ups (which I modified to be lunges), sit-ups, and plank work. I modified the plank work to be on the bench instead of the floor, but that’s something I do almost no matter what since I’ve noticed it helps with my hips too.

Friday’s workout wasn’t a part of the 12 Days of Fitness, but it might as well have been. It was Friday the 13th which is always a tough workout. I also was doing my 3rd day in a row and my pain and nausea were really hitting me. I would have struggled no matter what the workout was. Everything in the workout was themed to be with 13.

For cardio, we had 13 rounds of 30-second push paces to 30-second base paces. And then we ended with an all out. I didn’t change my resistance levels at all and I tried to go a bit faster when we were doing a push pace. But my nausea really prevented me from doing that so I just had to pedal when I could and rest when I needed to.

On the rower, all the rows were 130 meters. Between the rowing, we had squats starting with 13 squats and going down each time. Just like with cardio, I rested a lot during my rowing. And on the floor, we added on exercises each round. The exercises we had were squats, low rows on the straps, triceps on the straps, push-ups, plank jacks, and burpees. I modified any plank type work to be on the bench, but besides that, I was able to do the exercises. I still took a lot of moments to rest and let nausea pass over me, but I’m glad it wasn’t too hard for me to do the floor work.

This week I will be back to normal workouts again, but I also have the pain and nausea to deal with so it won’t be easy. But I’m coming up on the end of the year and I love seeing how close I am to my goals for the year. And I’m starting to think about what fitness goals I want to have for next year and these workouts are really giving me a lot to think about.

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For the first 12 days of December, Orangetheory is doing the 12 Days Of Fitness. These are harder workouts than normal (similar to Hell Week) and they all have different themes. I was excited about the workouts because I love it when we get to do something a bit different. And I don’t mind the harder workouts because I like to prove to myself that I can do them.

Monday’s workout was 2 Crew Rows. And the workout really did have 2 sets of crew rows. It was a 2 group class and the workout was divided into cardio/floor and row (so it was a run/floor instead of a run/row). Every block was 10 1/2 minutes and we switched between the blocks.

Both of the cardio/floor blocks were the same. It started with a .2 mile run (or .8 for the bike) at a flat incline and every time we got back to cardio we increased the incline by 1% (or 1 gear on the bike). After the run, we had lunges with weights, hip hinge swings, and low rows on the straps. We kept doing that rotation for the entire block and when we got back to cardio/floor for the second block we started the cardio at the incline that we ended the first block on.

For rowing, we had lots of crew rows. Crew rows are when one person on the rower is the leader and everyone is supposed to match their cadence and speed. It’s not easy to do this, especially if you aren’t on a rower next to the leader. But it’s a good challenge. The first crew row we had was 4 minutes and we were supposed to be at 24 strokes/minute. The next one was 2 minutes at 26 strokes/minute. Then 1 minute at 28 strokes/minutes. And it ended with 30 seconds at 30 strokes/minute. Between each crew row, we had 1 minute to recover where we could row at our own speed and not have to match anyone. The second block had the same crew rows but we started with the 30 seconds one and ended with 4 minutes. I was never the leader, but I was fine with that. I was just focusing on my stroke rate and trying to match the leader each time and that’s all I needed.

Wednesday’s workout was 4 Falling Hills. And that was a very good explanation of what we had to do. Cardio was one long block but the rower and floor switched back and forth.

I’m not going to write out all that we did for cardio, but it was a lot! We had 14 minutes of hill work. Every minute was a different incline and there was no pattern or reason for the order. We had some high incline work and some medium incline work. But there wasn’t a walking recovery or a flat road recovery until the 14 minutes were done. I was struggling a bit for this workout because my hips were in a lot of pain (it was raining so I had pain from that). I did play around with the resistance levels on the bike, but I wasn’t doing it exactly how I should have done them. But doing some incline/resistance work is better than nothing.

The rower and the floor were the same every time we were there. For the block that I started on the rower, I had rower, floor, rower and for the block I started on the floor I had floor, rower, floor. Each of those little blocks was 4 minutes long so we were switching every 4 minutes. On the rower, we had a 1-minute all out row, 10 lunges (which I did as squats), a 1-minute row, and 1 minute of lunges (again, I did them as squats).

And on the floor, we had all timed work. We had 1 minute of bench low rows with our left arm, 1 minute of bench low rows with our right arm, 1 minute of pullovers, and 1 minute of standing triceps with weights. We were all told to go easy with the weights since doing something for a minute isn’t easy. I also had to work through how I could do the low rows because I wasn’t able to do the bench work. I tried just bending over, but that started to hurt me as well so I ended up doing them while sitting on the bench. It was a little frustrating, but my friends reminded me that I still did the exercise and that’s what counts.

Friday’s workout was 6 Legs A Shaking and it was a very accurate workout name! This was a really tough class and I was so grateful to have a 3 group workout so I wasn’t at any section of the room for too long.

The cardio work was rounds of 1-minute all out with 1-minute recoveries. And each time we had an all out the incline was supposed to increase by 1%. I knew that if I started the bike at my normal base resistance level that I wouldn’t be able to increase it by 1 every round, so I started a bit lower than normal. In total, we had 7 all outs and even with starting lower than normal I was so tired by the end.

On the rower, we started with a 1000-meter row. This was a long row to start with and I tried to not take breaks. After that, we had goblet squats before moving on to a 750-meter row. I was able to finish that, do the squats, and get started on the next row when the block ended. While I do enjoy long rows because they give me a lot of time to work on my technique, my legs were already so tired from the bike so rowing wasn’t as great as it could be.

And on the floor, I had to do a lot of modifications because it was a lot of work I couldn’t do. We started with single leg sit to stands (which I can do) and then it was single leg work on the bench (which I can’t do). Instead of the bench work, I did regular lunges as well as high knees using the straps. We also had sit-ups to stands with a dumbbell and toe reaches. By the end of the workout, my legs were definitely shaking!

Saturday’s workout was 7 Bells A Swinging and I was still recovering from Friday’s workout. Fortunately, this workout was a bit more upper body so my lower body could still rest.

For cardio, we had rounds of distance challenges along with regular pushes. The distance challenges got shorter and the push paces got longer. But all the blocks were the same length so it wasn’t too bad. And I ended up having bonus time on the bike because the rower I was supposed to use ended up breaking. I tried to use it after they fixed it, but it was sticking a lot and I knew that I could injure myself trying to make it work. So I did the bike for my rowing work and that had distance challenges along with squats using a medicine ball.

And on the floor, it was an interesting format. Our main exercises were push-ups, chest fly to tricep extensions with weights, tricep extensions on the straps, and plank punches. Between each exercise, we had another exercise to do. The first round we had single-arm hip hinge swings and in the second round we had skier swings. After the second round we could just do the main exercises. I went into that workout with tired legs and I left the workout with tired legs and arms!

We finish out the 12 Days of Fitness this week and I’m excited to see what else is coming up. The year is almost over and I’m so close to many of the goals I set for myself. I can’t wait to see what I can accomplish in these last few weeks!

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This past week of workouts was a mix of really great workouts and really bad workouts. I knew it was possibly going to be a mix like that, but I don’t know if I expected it to be such a big swing back and forth. But I managed to get through the tough days the best I could because I knew it would be better toward the end of the week.

Monday’s workout was not my best day. It was the day that I wrote my short post about how I was going through a tough time. When I went to my workout, I wasn’t feeling as bad as I did when I wrote that. But I knew I wasn’t doing well. And I knew that the workout had the 500-meter row benchmark and I really wanted to try my best for that.

The workout was a strength-based class, but the cardio work didn’t have inclines. We started with a 2-minute push pace, 1-minute base pace, and 30-second all out before having a recovery. We continued that pattern but took 30-seconds off of the push pace each time until we just had a 30-second all out at the end. I tried to start the workout with my normal base level on the bike, but I wasn’t able to do that. So I had to start a bit lower than that and I worked my way up to my normal base. But I wasn’t pedaling fast or consistent. I just had to do what I could when I could and be ok with that. The nausea wasn’t much worse than I normally have, but the pain was significantly worse and I was struggling to focus on pedaling when the pain was that sharp. I was so annoyed because I felt like I wasn’t really working out, but I just had to keep reminding myself that something is better than nothing.

When I got to the 500-meter row, I wasn’t feeling horrible and was even a bit optimistic that I could do an ok job. And when I started I was shocked at how strong I was rowing. My split time was so low that it would have easily gotten me a PR on the row. And I was feeling great for maybe the first 200-meters. But right around the halfway mark, my nausea hit me so hard and so strong that I was sure I was about to throw up in class. I never felt nausea that strong while working out and it scared me a bit. I immediately stopped rowing and worked on breathing through it and seeing if I had to leave the room. I was able to get through it, but my rowing time was ruined because of it. I was determined to finish the row, but I had to go very slow and easy. For the first half, I was pacing at 1:55 which would have been amazing. The second half I was pacing at over 4 minutes. I think it ended up taking me about 3:30, but I didn’t really look at my time when I was done and didn’t track it.

On the floor, I was able to do most things without modifications. We had swing lunges that I had to do as regular lunges, hollow hold chest presses, plank work which I had to do as high rows with weights while standing up, alligators on the straps, and rollouts on the straps. I did go slow with the exercises and took lots of breaks, but I was able to go heavy with the weights and I did get 2 rounds of all the exercises done.

I was still a bit nauseous going into Wednesday’s workout, but I was doing much better than how I was on Monday. Wednesday’s workout had a mix of endurance, strength, and power and if I was feeling awesome it might have been a day I tried the treadmill again instead of the bike. I don’t mind the bike the way I did before, but there are occasional workouts that make me wonder if I should go for the treadmill. And this one was like that.

For cardio, all we had were all outs. We had 4 all outs that were 1 minute long and 5 all outs that were 30 seconds long. The recovery time after each of the 1 minute all outs got longer each round. Then we went back to a shorter recovery when we switched to 30 second all outs but each round the recovery got longer. It would have been an amazing chance to work on my running and see what I could do, but I knew that my nausea wouldn’t allow me to try that at all. So I focused completely on my pedaling speed on the bike. I didn’t play around with the resistance levels since we were doing such short intervals. But I did try to pedal a bit faster with each of the all outs so it would be like I was increasing the speed on the treadmill.

On the rower, we had 100, 300, and 500-meter rows. Between each row, we had medicine ball exercises. They were supposed to be lunges with shoulder presses and tricep extensions but I modified the lunges to be squats. I struggled a bit on the rower, but since they weren’t benchmarks I didn’t feel the same pressure that I did on Monday to go hard and do them quickly. I took my time and took breaks when I needed to. I was seeing a pattern of needing to let the nausea pass after I rowed about 150-200 meters. It did break up the rowing nicely, but I would have preferred to not need breaks at all.

And on the floor, I had a lot that needed to be modified. We started with lunges (I had to skip using weights for this one to keep my balance), lateral lunges to half thrusters (I modified this by splitting up the movements into 2 different exercises), plank jacks to pop jacks (I modified this by using the bench for my hands), hamstring curls using the straps (I did weighted hip bridges instead), and sit-ups using the straps (I did these on the floor and skipped the straps). It was a bit odd that every exercise had to be changed to work for me, but they felt close enough to what we were supposed to do so it didn’t feel like I was changing everything.

Friday’s workout was better than the other days and I was almost back to normal. It was a strength-based class which meant I would have higher resistance levels on the bike. But it ended up not being too bad so I was able to handle it and my nausea wasn’t kicking in as much as I was afraid it would.

For cardio, the first block was coached and the second block was on our own. The first block was a mix of 1-minute push paces at inclines and 45 seconds of a base pace with no incline. The inclines weren’t that high so I was using resistance levels around my push and all out levels. The second block was .1 miles (.4 for the bike) at inclines with 45 seconds to recover after. .4 on the bike takes me about a minute so it was very similar to the first block for me.

The rower was also 2 blocks. The first block was rounds of 200-meter rows and 6 squats between each row. 200 meters was a good distance for me to work with and I was able to handle it without needed to take breaks. We weren’t supposed to reset the rower during that first block because for the second block we were supposed to do the distance we got in that first block and then 25 squats. The distance for the second block was a challenge for me and I did have to take breaks every 250 meters or so. But I did make it to the squats so I was proud of that.

And the floor work was 1 long block but we had drop sets within the block. We had drop sets of bicep curls and hip hinge low rows as well as regular sets of plank work and triceps on the straps. I tried to go heavy for the drop sets since that is the goal, but after one round I realized I couldn’t go as heavy as I wanted to without my nausea kicking in a bit. I was still using 2 different sets of weights, but it wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be.

Saturday’s workout was really amazing for me. I was shocked by how much better I was feeling compared to Friday. But that also meant that I would have a great workout and not worry too much about it. The workout was endurance-based, but it felt more like a power day for me. We had 2 blocks at each section of the room and we switched after each block (so we did 2 laps around).

For cardio, the first block had 2 rounds of push paces followed by a base pace and then we ended with a 90-second distance challenge. The second block was the same pattern, but the push paces were shorter and the base paces were longer. The goal was to get to the same distance on the second block even though we weren’t in a push as long. For me on the bike, I knew that wouldn’t be too tough to accomplish because I don’t really have a huge difference between my base and push speeds. I kept my resistance level at my base level the entire time and I ended up going further in the second block which was awesome!

On the rower, the first block started with a 150-meter row followed by squats. We then had a 250 and 350-meter rows with squats between and if you got through all that then you rowed until the block was done. The second block was the same except we started at the 350-meter row and went down. Just like with the cardio, we were supposed to get to the same distance in the second block as we did in the first. I struggled a little with the 350-meter row, but I think that was more due to being tired than anything else. And I was just about at the same distance between both blocks.

On the floor, the first block had single-leg squats, lateral squats, and hip hinge reverse flys. The second block had sit-ups to squats (which I had to split into 2 different moves), scaption raises, and plank low rows. The modifications I had to do for the floor work was more about my hip issues and not nausea. And I was able to go a bit heavy with the weights even though it wasn’t a strength day.

I loved that I ended on such a good workout. I felt like I made up for the bad workout days and that I am ready to go for this week. I might have 4 workouts in because I might be adding in an extra day, but if I go with what I have planned I’ll have 3 workouts this week. But one of them will be my family workout on Thanksgiving and I’m really excited about that!

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