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Finishing The 12 Days Of Fitness (or Debating If I Like This Workout Schedule)

Posted on December 13, 2021 | Comments Off

This past week of workouts was another 4 workout week for me to finish the workouts I needed to do to complete the 12 Days Of Fitness challenge. We had to do 7 out of the 12 days, and I had 3 days the week before so I needed to do 4 more this week. That’s normal for me with my workout schedule. But just like I’ve done recently, I had to pack in my workouts to fit with the holiday schedule so I did 3 workout days in a row.

Monday’s workout was Day 6 of the 12 so we had a few different 6-minute of 6 1/2-minute challenges and it was endurance-focused. For all sections of the room we had 2 blocks. The first block was 6 1/2 minutes and the second block was 6 minutes.

Both cardio blocks had the same format. We had a 3-minute push pace, a base pace, a 1-minute push pace, and a 1-minute all-out. The difference was the length of time for the push pace. I was still feeling a bit nauseous that morning, but I was doing much better so I could do a decent effort for the 3-minute push paces. I did put the resistance level at my normal push pace level to start, but in the second block I had to move it down a bit.

On the rower, the first block had rounds of 1-minute all-out rows with squat jacks and lunges between each row. I did the squats as normal squats and my lunges were not that deep because of feeling some hip pain getting on and off the rower, but I still did the exercises. We didn’t reset the rower for that block and then in the second block we first rowed the same distance we did in that first block and then just had the squats and lunges until the block was done.

And on the floor, the first block had sumo squats to upright rows with weights and lunges to bicep curls. I ended up splitting up each move so I had 4 exercises instead of 2, but I still did all of them. And then the second block was a 6-minute challenge with the Bosu. We had push-ups, pop jacks, and single-leg v-ups all using the Bosu. We started at 8 reps and went down by 2 each round. The goal was to finish the round of 2 reps, but I only started it when the workout was done.

Wednesday was Day 8 and it was a power day. And we had an 8-minute floor challenge.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block was rounds of a 1-minute push pace to a 30-second base pace with a 1-minute all-out at the end. And the second block was rounds of a 30-second all-out with 1-minute to recover between. It feels like it’s been a while since we had short all-outs with recovery for an entire block, so this was a fun one to do.

On the rower, we had a similar timing pattern with the cardio. The first block was the same intervals with the push pace to base pace with the all-out at the end. And the second block was technically the same timing, but during the recovery time we also had lunges to do before continuing our recovery. So we didn’t have the full minute to rest before the next 30-second all-out row.

And on the floor, the first block was a short block with bicep curls and tricep extensions. And then the second block was the 8-minute challenge where the goal was to get through 5 rounds of hip hinge swings, sumo squats to froggers, plank pull-throughs, and plank dumbbell taps. And if you finished all the rounds, the bonus round was double crunches. I was able to get through almost 4 rounds of the exercises, but I didn’t make it to the 5th one. I wanted to make it to the end, but I also knew if I went faster that my form would have been sloppy and that wouldn’t have been good.

Just like the past few weeks, I worked out on Thursday instead of Saturday. For Day 9 we had another challenge on the floor, but this time it was using the TRX straps.

For cardio, the first block was rounds of 30-second push paces and 30-second all-outs with 30-second recoveries, which felt like not having much of a recovery. And the second block was rounds of 90-second push paces with either 1-minute or 90-second base paces with a 30-second all-out at the end.

The first block on the rower was rounds of 150-meter rows with 12 criss-cross squat jacks between each row. I did regular squats instead. And the second block had 300-meter rows with front press jacks between each row with the goal to double the distance from the first block. For some reason, that day I really struggled with the rowing and I didn’t get that much distance for either block, but I tried.

And on the floor, the first floor block was shorter with gorilla rows with weights and overhead presses. And the second block was the 9-minute challenge with the straps. We were supposed to start with knee tucks in the straps, but I did mountain climbers instead since I can’t do that sort of unstable exercise. Then we had 3 rounds of tricep extensions, bridge rows, and squats using the straps. And if we completed that, we had the knee tucks again. But I was doing my last round of squats when the 9 minutes were done. I felt like this was the toughest of the floor challenges this week, but it might have been because all my workouts that week had floor challenges.

And Friday was Day 10 of the challenge but day 7 for me so I was able to complete the challenge and earn my hat! This workout was an endurance day and it was a really good endurance challenge.

For cardio, we had rounds with different distance challenges with 45-seconds to recover between each round. Because some of the distances were a bit longer than what I would normally do in a push pace, I set my resistance level to be between my base and push paces and that seemed to work really well for me. And even though the recovery time was short, I tried to pedal really slow on the bike to get some recovery instead of doing something closer to what my base pace is like, which is what I tend to do at times.

On the rower, we had our 10-minute challenge. We started with a short block with a 2-minute warm-up row with some push paces and an all-out. Then we had 5 rounds of a 2-minute block on the rower. We started each block with high knees and then we went to the rower to row the rest of the time in that block. I usually had about 90-seconds to row each time. And we had some distance goals to hit, but because my hips were hurting from getting on and off the rower I really didn’t get close to the goal time. But considering how much time I had on the rower, I didn’t do too bad.

And on the floor, we had 1 long block that all had exercises with weights. We had neutral thrusters, reverse flys, sumo squats to upright rows, tricep kickbacks, bicycle presses, and plank low rows. I might have gone a bit too heavy with my weights for the floor because I needed to take more breaks than I normally would. But it was a good floor block and a great way for me to finish this week of workouts.

Even though I have done weeks in the past with 3 workout days in a row, I think this is the first time where I had multiple weeks doing this. And I’m debating if I want to change up my regular workout schedule to be Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday from now on. It does make it tough, but it also makes my Saturdays a bit more open since the earliest I can go on Saturdays is at noon after work. I’m still deciding what I will do this week, but I know the week after I have to do this again because of the holiday schedule. So I think I’m going to keep testing this out and I know I can decide to change whenever I want. But maybe change will be good for me. I’ll just have to wait and see.

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Kicking Off The 12 Days Of Fitness (or A Different Type Of Hell Week)

Posted on December 6, 2021 | Comments Off

This past week of workouts was a tough one for me for a few different reasons. First, I knew this would be a tough week because I was expecting to have to deal with pain and nausea, and I was right that it would be happening. Also, I had another week where I had 3 workout days in a row. And finally, this week was starting the 12 Days Of Fitness! I’ve done the 12 Days Of Fitness before and it’s a great challenge. The goal is to do 7 out of the 12 days and then you earn a winter beanie! Just like with Hell Week, I knew I’d be doing this and making sure I earned my hat!

Monday’s workout wasn’t a part of the 12 Days challenge since it was before the start of the month. It was an endurance day and it was also a day I wasn’t feeling too great. I was mainly dealing with pain that day, which can sometimes be easier for me to push through. And I think I needed the ability to push through in order to do the endurance plan.

For cardio, it was all about long push paces. We had 2 rounds of a 3-minute push pace and 2 rounds of a 2-minute push pace. Between each push pace, we had a 1-minute base pace and after the last 2-minute push we went right into a 30-second all-out. It was a lot of work and didn’t feel like it had a lot of rest. I did have to take my own breaks during the workout in order to get through some of the pain, but I think I did better than I expected to do considering how I was feeling.

On the rower, I really struggled and had to do a bit of my own plan. We were supposed to do long rows with hops between each round of rowing. But for me, the hops were making me feel really sick, so I decided just to work on rowing for the entire block and take breaks when I needed to. But I did try to be aware of the plan for the rowing and make sure I took breaks after each round. The rowing was supposed to be 800-meters, 400-meters, 200-meters, 400-meters, 200-meters, and 100-meters. I only got through about half of the rowing even without doing the hops between each round. That just shows how slowly I was rowing and how often I needed to rest.

The floor was a bit better for me. We had 1 long block with 2 mini-blocks in it. We were supposed to do each mini-block for 3 rounds before switching. The first mini-block had bench squats, goblet squats, and static crunches with scissor kicks. And the second mini-block had sumo squats, squats with rotations, and single-leg v-ups. I felt much better about my workout after the floor work since I think that was the best section for me.

And Wednesday’s workout kicked off the 12 Days challenge. And each day is themed around the day number that it is. So for Monday, since it was the first day we had a lot of things that were for 1 minute. Unfortunately, I was also feeling really horrible this day. I was really struggling to do anything, but I knew I just had to try my best.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block had a 1-minute push pace, 1-minute base pace, 2-minute push pace, 90-second base pace, and 1-minute all-out. The second block flipped the push paces so we started with the 2-minute push pace and had the 1-minute one toward the middle of the block. I still took a lot of breaks to rest or let the nausea pass, but I think I did a pretty decent job considering how worried I was about being able to do anything.

For the rower, again I struggled as I did on Monday. The first block started with a 100-meter row and then we had high knees. I knew I couldn’t do high knees, so I did marching in place instead. Each round on the rower, we increased the row by 100-meters. And for the last minute of the block, we had a 1-minute all-out timed with the treadmills. Then we reset the rowers for the second block and we started with a 300-meter row and high knees. And each round on the rower we went down 100-meters. And again, we ended with a 1-minute all-out row. The goal was to do better in the second block, and I think my nausea medication was kicking in around the second block because it went a lot better for me than the first block did.

And on the floor, we had 4 blocks. The first and third blocks were longer blocks. The first block had goblet squats and hip hinge low rows. And the third block had deadlifts and shoulder presses. For the second and fourth blocks, it was a 1-minute block that went with the all-out on the treadmills and rowers. We got to pick one exercise to do for the entire minute. I picked squats and I was able to get a lot of reps done within the minute both times.

As I mentioned before, I did a Thursday workout instead of one on Saturday due to my schedule (I think this week will be the same way again). So I was at the workout for Day 2, which had a lot of 2-minute things and it was also a strength-based day and a 2 group class so I had longer on cardio than I usually do.

We had 3 blocks for cardio. The first block was rounds of a base pace at an incline and a base pace without incline. We started with the highest incline and went down each round. But the incline base paces got longer as the incline got lower. And the block ended with a 2-minute distance challenge. I did work with the resistance levels on the bike, but I was pedaling really slowly because it was another day I was feeling rotten. The second block was the same idea as the first block, but we went up the inclines instead of down. It also ended with another 2-minute distance challenge. And the last block was one more 2-minute distance challenge.

On the floor, we also had 3 blocks. The first block had single-arm high rows and chest flys. And the second block had single-arm chest presses and hip hinge reverse flys. For both of those blocks, when the treadmills were doing their 2-minute distance challenges, we had a 2-minute row. For the last block, it was 2 minutes long and the coach got to pick what exercise we had to hold for the entire time. Our coach picked squats so we had a 2-minute squat hold. We were told to take breaks when we needed them, and I also did wall squats for maybe 10 seconds at a time to make it a bit easier for me.

By Friday’s workout, my pain and nausea were a bit better (but still not great) but I was dealing with a little soreness from having 3 workout days in a row. But I still think it was one of the better days of the week for me. It was a power day, and because it was Day 3, we had a lot of things that lasted 30 seconds to fit with the theme.

We had 3 blocks for cardio and blocks 1 and 3 were the same. For those blocks, we had 2 rounds of a 30-second push pace and 30-second base pace and then ended with a 30-second push pace to a 30-second all-out. I tried to limit the breaks I needed to take to just the base pace time and I was still working with the resistance levels to make my push and all-outs harder. And for the second block, we had 4 rounds of a 30-second all-out with a 1-minute recovery after.

For the rower, we had the same 3 blocks as we did for cardio with the push paces to base paces and the all-outs with recovery. This was a lot harder for me than the cardio was and I took a lot of breaking during the rowing blocks. But it was also a lot of rowing even if I was feeling ok.

For the floor, the first and third blocks were timed out with cardio and the rowers. In the first block, we had alternating heel touches and static crunch in and outs with mini-bands and we switched every 30 seconds. And in the third block, we had front walks and side walks with the mini-bands and again we switched every 30 seconds. For the second block, it was supposed to be lunges and step-ups, but I usually replace step-ups with lunges. So I ended up having a block of lunges, which wasn’t easy but at least it gave me a challenge during a week I had to go easy on myself.

This week, I’ll be finishing up the 12 Days Of Fitness and I hope that I feel better for most of it. It’s an unknown how I’ll feel this week, but I’m trying to think positively so I can finish out the challenge on a good note!

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A Thanksgiving Week Of Workouts (or Still Keeping Up A Tradition)

Posted on November 29, 2021 | Comments Off

For this past week of workouts, I knew I would likely start dealing with some pain and nausea, but I tried to not let that stress me out before it happened. Instead, I tried to focus on the good things coming up during the workout week. I had a slightly different workout schedule, but having that allowed for something pretty cool.

Monday’s workout was a strength day, and it was a pretty normal strength-based workout. For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block was rounds of short distances where we added to our incline/resistance level each time. We were on our own for this block since everyone would have different timing with completing the distances. But we were supposed to remember our distance from that first block and use it as a goal for the second block. In the second block, we had rounds of a 90-second push pace at an incline with 30-seconds of a base pace between each one. Because the timing was different from when we were going on our own, we had to try to make sure we could beat our distance from the first block. With the bike, you don’t see as specific of a distance as you would on the treadmill (the bike goes one decimal point and the treadmill has three decimal points), but just as the block ended I beat my first block’s distance!

The rower had a lot of medicine ball work with a little bit of rowing. This was because the next day was a rowing benchmark (I wasn’t going to do that workout, but I knew it was happening) so we weren’t supposed to burn out too much. In the first block, we had ground to press, front press, and squat to press with the medicine ball first and then a 100-meter row. Each time we had the row, we increased the distance by 50 meters. And in the second block, we started with a 100-meter all-out row and then had more medicine ball exercises. We had bicep curls, overhead tricep extensions, and calf raises. And again, each time on the rower we increased the row by 50 meters.

And we also had 2 blocks on the floor. In the first block, we had single-arm chest presses, concentration curls, and shoulder presses to stand. I was really struggling with the shoulder presses and then standing, so I split that exercise into shoulder presses alone and then squats. And in the second block, we had single arm low rows, push-ups, and hip hinge reverse flys. I think I did a lot better on the second block than I did with the first.

Wednesday’s workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power and it was themed around cluster exercises. The idea with cluster exercises is that you do one thing for 3 different rounds and you work until fatigue for the rounds so you don’t necessarily have a specific number of reps or time for cardio to complete.

For cardio, the plan was to have a 30-second all-out followed by a 30-second recovery. Then we did an all-out as long as we could followed by a 30-second recovery. And finally one more all-out as long as we could followed by a 1-minute recovery. And each round, the incline/resistance level for the all-outs increased by 1. The idea was that you should never be able to do an all-out longer than a minute or your all-out isn’t hard enough. For me, I usually managed to stick it out for about 45-seconds before I needed the recovery.

For the rower, we had rounds of an all-out row and a recovery row with a medicine ball exercise in the middle. We had 3 rounds of 10 strokes of an all-out followed by 5 strokes of a recovery row. Then we either had an overhead press or a front press with the medicine ball before going back to the 3 rounds on the rower. I know 10 strokes of an all-out row doesn’t sound that hard, but when you only have 5 strokes to recover is gets really tough!

And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. In the first block, we had seated low rows and chest presses on the straps. For the seated low rows, we did 5 reps for the first round, had 10 seconds to recover, and then did 2 more rounds until failure with recovery between those rounds. And for the second block, we had weighted chest presses and high rows on the straps. For the weighted chest presses, it was the same as the low rows with the 3 rounds with recovery.

Even though I had my family Thanksgiving workout 2 weeks early when I worked out with my dad and brother, I still wanted to do a Thanksgiving workout. And since I had the day off of work for the holiday, I had a lot of flexibility with what time I would work out. So when I was looking at the schedule, I noticed that there was a Lift 45 class as the last class of the day (which was still in the morning). Lift 45 is a really unique class. Instead of working with cardio and the rower, it’s a 45-minute class that is only on the floor. My studio does Lift 45 classes each week, but the times they are scheduled are always times that I’m working. So I decided to take this opportunity to try something new that I’ve been wanting to check out!

We had 4 blocks for the entire workout, but we started with a group warm-up on the floor since nobody was warming up on cardio (which is what I’m used to). The first block had goblet squats and jump squats (which I did as squats with calf raises). The second block had hip hinge swings, step-ups (which I did as lunges), and sit-ups to squats using the benches. The third block had sumo squats, single-arm deadlifts, and mountain climbers. And the last block was all lunges, which had different types of lunges but I had to modify them to just be regular lunges for the entire thing.

Obviously, this workout was a lower-body class. The Lift 45 classes are split into upper or lower body workouts. And while lower body is usually harder for me, I didn’t know how hard this workout would be without cardio. I was pleasantly surprised to see that this may have actually been harder than a regular workout for me! Maybe I pushed myself more because I knew I wouldn’t have cardio. Or maybe I’ve been going too easy on the floor in most of my workouts. No matter the reason, this was the first workout that made me seriously sore after it and I loved that! I wish this class was offered times I could go, but maybe in the future, I’ll have more opportunities to take them. The only real downside for me in this workout was this was the first workout that my nausea really hit me, so I had to go easy when I wanted to push myself. But at least the nausea wasn’t that bad so I didn’t have to limit myself too much.

And even though this was my actual Thanksgiving workout, I still used my workout from 2 weeks ago in my photo collage of all my family Thanksgiving workouts that I shared online.

Being sore from Lift 45 made my Friday workout a bit harder. I also had a bit more nausea in that class, but it still wasn’t as bad as I know it can be. This workout was a power day, and I’m glad it wasn’t another strength day. But we had a lot of similar exercises to what I did on Thursday, so that was a bit tough.

We had 3 blocks for cardio. The first block was all about 30-second intervals. We had rounds of a push pace to a base pace and ended with an all-out. The second block was a 3-minute distance challenge. And the last block was all 45-second intervals with a push pace, all-out, recovery, and one last all-out.

On the rower, we also had 3 blocks. The first block had rounds of a 1-minute all-out row followed by lunges. The second block was rounds of a 30-second all-out row with squats and the goal was to try to beat the distance from the first row (which I didn’t quite get to). And the last block was timed out with cardio with the 45-second intervals. I really struggled on the rower overall because of how I was sore, so I rowed slower than normal to make sure my form wasn’t too bad.

And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block had deadlifts, hip hinge swings, skater lunges, leg raises, and sit-ups. The deadlifts and hip hinge swings were especially tough since I had done them the day before, so I went a bit lighter with the weights than I normally do. And the second block was timed with the rest of the room with 45-second intervals and we alternated between hip bridges and v-ups (which I did as crunches).

While I have done weeks before where I do 3 workout days in a row, I wonder if having the Lift 45 class made things a bit harder for me. But I still am so glad I took that class since I don’t know when I’ll have another chance. And I might have a chance to try out doing 3 workouts in a row again because there is a chance that this week and next week I won’t be able to work out on Saturday. I have toyed with the idea of not doing Saturday workouts since I have to do them so late in the morning because of my work schedule. So this might be a good test to see if I want to switch to only doing weekday workouts. I guess I’ll have to wait and see how it goes!

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Another Full Workout Week (or More Family OTF Time)

Posted on November 22, 2021 | Comments Off

This past week of workouts was another good one. I had my usual schedule, but there were a few things that changed. But I think the variation in my workouts was for the best.

Monday’s class was a 3 group class. I think most of my classes will be 3 group ones right now (that can change, but I think it will be like this for a while). And that means I get to do more rowing, which is both good and bad. I think rowing is the toughest thing for me, but that’s why I need to do it more. And this workout was a power day so it was a good day to kick off having more 3 group classes.

We had 4 blocks for cardio, 2 that were longer and 2 that were super short. The longer blocks had push pace to base pace intervals ending with an all-out and the short blocks were just an all-out. I was doing better than I had over the weekend, but I was still dealing with the end of the side effects from my booster shot so I didn’t go too crazy.

On the rower, our blocks matched cardio with 2 long and 2 short blocks. For the first long block, we had either a 1-minute or 30-second row with squats between each row. And for the second long block it was either a 300-meter or 150-meter row with squats between each row. And the short blocks were just an all-out row.

And on the floor, we also had 4 blocks. In the first long block we had lunges to a neutral thruster with weights, lunges to hops, and plank punches. In the second long block we had goblet squats, squat jumps (which I did as squats with calf raises), and plank rotations. The first short block had bench sit-ups to squats and the second short block had froggers. It was a lot of work, but I took my time and rested when I needed to.

Wednesday’s workout was a special one for several reasons. First, it was a benchmark workout which is always special. Also, my dad worked out with me. He’s done a bunch of Orangetheory classes, but this was the first time that he’s done 2 classes within a week! And finally, this was Coach Benzo’s last class with us. He got a promotion and can’t keep the regular Wednesday classes, but he’s hoping to come back as a sub from time to time. I’m happy he got a promotion, but I’m sad he won’t be my regular coach anymore. He was my first coach back after the studio reopened and I’ve loved having him motivate me in the morning. But the class was more celebratory than sad, so that was good.

For cardio, we just had the benchmark to do. The benchmark was the 12-minute distance challenge. I hadn’t done this challenge since before the shutdown, so I wasn’t too stressed about trying to get a PR. And for my dad, this was his first time doing a benchmark so he knew he’d PR. And since he’s a runner at his gym, this wasn’t too hard of a challenge for him. For me, I set the bike resistance at the level between my base and push paces and just tried to keep my pace steady until we were almost done and then I went crazy to go as fast as I could for the last minute. I didn’t do my best, but I was close to my distance from before the shutdown.

On the rower, we had decreasing rows with lunges between each round. We started with a 400-meter row and went down 50 meters each round. I was doing better on the rower than I had on Monday. And even though normally my dad and I challenge each other when we row next to each other, we didn’t really do that this time and just tried to get in our best workouts.

And on the floor, we had one long block that had both upper and lower body exercises. We had balance bicep curls, seated torso rotations, knee tucks on the ab dolly (a piece of workout equipment my dad never used before), single-arm low rows on the straps, and triceps on the straps.

And of course, after the workout we had to get a photo! Both to celebrate Benzo’s last class and because I always get a photo after my dad comes to class with me!

Friday was another power day and I really did try to push myself more. I was finally feeling normal again and I know it’s only a bit of time before I start having nausea again so I wanted to take advantage of this workout.

We had 3 blocks for cardio and they were similar. The first block was a 2-minute push pace, 30-second all-out, 1-minute recovery, and 30-second all-out. The second block was 2 rounds of a 1-minute push pace and 30-second all-out with a minute to recover between. And the last block was 2 rounds of a 30-second push pace and 30-second all-out with a minute to recover between. I tried to not only increase the resistance level on the bike but also pedal faster, especially with the all-outs.

On the rower, all 3 blocks were similar with 3 different types of rowing. We started with a stroke drill, then a 100-meter all-out row, and then a recovery row. In the first block, the stroke drill and recovery each had 15 strokes. In the second block, they were 12 strokes. And in the last block they were 10 strokes.

And on the floor, we had 3 blocks and each block had 2 exercises. We had chest presses and power push-ups, hip hinge low rows and pull-ups on the straps, and seated torso rotations and sit-ups. My upper body was tired after all the floor work, but I knew I needed to push myself this way.

Saturday’s workout was a 2 group class (I think this one will be staying as a 2 group class for now). The workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power and it gave me a lot of opportunities to work on a bunch of different things.

For cardio, we had 4 blocks that were basically the same. Every block has a 1-minute push, 1-minute base, 1-minute all-out, 1-minute of recovery, and a 1-minute all-out. The difference in each block was the incline/resistance level for the base pace. It started at the highest level and went down each block. I didn’t go too high for the resistance level on the bike, but I tried to keep it at either the level I use for my push pace or the level between my push and base paces. That wasn’t exactly what we were supposed to do, but it worked for me so I could do the all-outs faster.

And on the floor, we also had 4 blocks but there was one set of exercises for all of the blocks. For each block, the first 3 minutes was doing the exercises, then we had a minute to get to the rower, and then we had a 1-minute all-out row. Wherever we left off on the exercises, we picked back up there each block when we were back on the floor. The exercises were skater lunges, lateral lunges, deadlifts, and plank low rows. I didn’t go too heavy on the weights because I needed to be able to row and there wasn’t a lot of rest time. But because there weren’t breaks, the weights I used felt heavier.

I really enjoyed the workouts this past week, even when I had moments I was struggling. And this week, I’m excited because I will be doing my traditional Thanksgiving day workout even if it’s just me and not with my family. But I’m glad I’ll be keeping up with the tradition and I think it’s going to be a fun one!

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Some Interesting Workout Days (or 3 Regular Workouts And 1 Traditional One)

Posted on November 15, 2021 | Comments Off

This past week of workouts was interesting for me. I had some odd struggles that I wasn’t expecting and I had some really great things too. I didn’t love having as much of an off week as I did, but I think I made the most of it.

Monday’s workout was a strength day and it was a prep day for the Everest workout happening later this month. I was also having a bit of an off morning. I think having the clocks change affected me more than I thought it would because I struggled to sleep the night before. And while I was tossing and turning, I made my hip hurt a lot. It wasn’t ideal going into a strength workout, but I was prepared to try my best.

The cardio work was similar to what the regular Everest workout is like, but we had a break in the middle. For the treadmills, they increased the incline by 1% every minute. For me on the bike, I increased the resistance level by 1 every other minute (I have done every minute before, but it gets really difficult and I didn’t want to risk it with my hip). We did that for about 11 minutes and then we had about 2 minutes to have some recovery. Then we did the same 11 minutes as we did before but we started at the top and decreased the incline/resistance level until we had a flat road all-out at the end. Because I was only doing the increases every other minute, I never had the resistance level too high. It was still higher than I normally use, but not as bad as it has been for hill work.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks. We started with 2 rounds of high rows on the straps, alternating chest presses, side plank rotations, and sit-ups. Then we had a 200-meter row before going back to the exercises again. And the second block had a similar format. We had 2 rounds of chest presses on the straps, bird dog single-arm low rows, and palms to elbows (which I did as shoulder taps) before another 200-meter row. My row wasn’t fast, but it was better than it was last week. And I tried to go heavy with the weights, but I wasn’t able to go as heavy as I would have liked to.

Wednesday’s workout was a mix of strength and power. It wasn’t as bad with inclines as Monday was, but it still had some hill work.

We had 4 blocks for cardio. Blocks 1 and 3 were similar and blocks 2 and 4 were similar. For blocks 1 and 3 we started with a 90-second push pace followed by a 30-second base pace. Then we had 3 rounds of 1-minute hills with 30-second base paces between each one with a 30-second all-out at the end. For the first block, the inclines/resistance levels got higher each time and for the third block, they got lower. And for blocks 2 and 4, we had 2 rounds of a 30-second all-out with a 1-minute recovery after. So between all 4 blocks, we had 6 minutes of hill work and 6 all-outs.

On the floor, we also had 4 blocks. And blocks 2 and 4 were done on the rowers and timed out with the treadmills. So for each of those blocks, we had 2 rounds of a 30-second all-out row followed by a 1-minute recovery row. For the regular floor work, we had sumo goblet squats, squat jacks (which I did as side step squats), lunges, and plank rotations for the first block. And for the third block we had good mornings with weighs, lunge to hops, and plank alternating leg lifts. My hips and legs were definitely feeling it after this workout, but this was a much better type of pain and soreness than what I was dealing with on Monday.

Friday’s workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power. But it was a really bad day for me. I had gotten my booster shot on Thursday and didn’t have that many side effects when I got it. But the next day, I was really feeling it. I usually have reactions to any vaccines I get, so don’t let this dissuade you from getting the booster or vaccine. But I guess I was too hopeful I wouldn’t have side effects this time and I was wrong. So I spent a lot of my workout dealing with a lot of body aches and a bad headache.

This was a run/row workout for cardio. We had 2 blocks that were very similar. We started with a 3-minute push pace and then had a 1-minute base base. Then we had rounds of a .1 mile (.4 for the bike) run and then a 30-second all out row. In the first block, the incline/resistance level increased each round and in the second block, we started at the top and decreased the incline/resistance level each round. Because I was so slow on both the bike and rower, I didn’t make it through that many rounds.

On the floor, we had 4 blocks. Every exercise we had was for 10 reps, so it was easy to remember how much I had to do of each exercise. Block 1 had chest presses and hip hinge low rows. Block 2 had push-ups, back extensions, and mountain climbers. Block 3 had close grip chest presses and squat to Y raises on the straps. And block 4 had tricep extensions, plank pull throughs, and lateral crunches. Just like on cardio, I was pretty slow so I didn’t make it through a lot of rounds. I also had to go a bit lighter with the weights because of how I feel.

Saturday’s workout was a special one. First, it was a signature workout called The Chipper. But also, this was my traditional Thanksgiving workout with my family. I know that it’s not Thanksgiving yet, but my family decided to do it earlier this year because it’s less expensive to travel if we celebrated a bit early. We were spending it in Santa Barbara (more about that day in tomorrow’s post) and there was a brand new Orangetheory studio that was only minutes away from where we were staying! So it was perfect for us to work out that morning. This year, it was just me with my dad and brother, but we still had a great time.

The idea of The Chipper is to chip away at the workout each round. So for cardio, you started with a 3-minute push pace and that decreased each round after a 1-minute base pace. The bike at this studio was different from the bike at my studio, plus I was still having some side effects from my booster shot, so I know I didn’t do as well as I could for the workout. But I tried my best and it was fun to experience class at a different studio.

On the floor, we had intervals of an exercise and then rowing. We did just 1 exercise before the row and the number of reps started at 40 and went down by 5 for each exercise. And the row started at 400-meter and went down by 50 each round. The exercises we had were bench tap squats, leg raises, sumo squats to upright rows with weights, low rows on the straps, palms to elbows, chest flies, and bicep curls. This studio also had the new rowers with the screens, and I loved seeing all my data while rowing easily displayed. I didn’t make it through all of The Chipper, but I did better than I expected.

And of course, we had to take our traditional picture with our coach after class.

I’m still having some side effects from my vaccine, but they get better and better each day. So hopefully this week will bring more wins and less struggles in my workouts.

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Almost Having A Second Hell Week (or Just Pushing Through)

Posted on November 8, 2021 | Comments Off

After a crazy Hell Week, I was glad to be back to my normal workouts. But I ended up having my personal Hell Week this past week because this was the week I had to deal with a lot of pain and nausea. But at least this is a type of hell that I’m used to dealing with, so I pushed through the best I could.

On Monday, I wasn’t feeling too horrible. I was a bit off, but there were other factors that could have been causing that too. The workout was an endurance class, and it was a really good one.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block had two rounds of a 3-minute push pace followed by a 90-second base pace and ended with a 3-minute distance challenge. The second block had two rounds of a 2-minute push pace followed by a 1-minute base pace and also ended with a 3-minute distance challenge. For the distance challenge, I set the resistance to be at my regular push pace level. They did feel like long blocks, but nothing too crazy and I really did try to improve with the distance challenges.

On the floor, we also had 2 blocks. We started with a 500-meter row, which didn’t go that great for me. I was just slow and a bit awkward and couldn’t get my form to feel right. After the row, we had Arnold presses and hammer curls with weights and high rows to I raises on the straps. The second block didn’t have rowing. We had step-ups (which I did as squats), single-arm reverse flies, and bicycle presses with weights.

Wednesday’s workout was a power day, and it was a really miserable day for me. I was so nauseous and in a lot of pain. I really was struggling a lot just to get out of bed, but I knew that doing something in my workout would be better than doing nothing. But I know I didn’t do that much because of how I felt.

For cardio, we had 3 blocks. The first block had three rounds of 1-minute push paces, a base pace, a 30-second all-out, and a recovery. The base pace and recovery increased with each round. For the second block, the base paces were removed so it was three rounds of a 1-minute push pace to a 30-second all-out with recovery between. And the last block was just rounds of the 30-second all-out with the recovery between.

On the floor, we also had 3 blocks. The first block had deadlifts, skater lunges, and hip bridges followed by a 200-meter row. I was able to go heavy with the hip bridges, but I used a lighter weight for the deadlifts and went very slow with the skater lunges. The second block had hip swings with weights, curtsy lunges, and a 150-meter row. And the last block was only sumo squats to upright rows with weights and a 100-meter row. My rowing was very slow for each block and for the first two blocks I only made it to the rower once. I just had to take a lot of breaks to let the nausea pass so I could feel like I could continue.

By Friday, I wasn’t fully better but I had gotten over the hump of being miserable. I still had to go easy on myself because of how I was feeling, but I could push a bit harder. And I’m glad because it was an endurance day to prep us for an upcoming cardio benchmark.

We had 2 cardio blocks and the first block started with a 5 1/2-minute distance challenge. I kept the resistance level on the bike between the level I use for my base and push paces. I did have to take a lot of rest during it, but it wasn’t as bad as Wednesday. We then had a 90-second recovery before doing another 5 1/2-minute distance challenge. The second block started with a 2-minute row and then a 6 1/2 minute distance challenge for cardio again. The row was really tough for me and I didn’t get a lot of distance, but I tried.

On the floor, the first block started off with a mini-band block. We had 3 rounds of static crunches with in and outs, hip bridges, and knee tucks. After that, we had a 1-minute row and then plank work, uppercuts, and bicep curls. For the plank work, I did use the bench so I wasn’t completely facing the ground. The second block had bird dog low rows with weights, single-arm chest presses, and plank pull-throughs. Again, for plank work, I used the bench.

Saturday I was finally over the nausea and just dealing with a little pain, so that was a lot better. I still struggled, but at least it was a bit of an easier struggle. And this workout was a 5×5 themed class. So we had 5 rounds of a lot of different work.

For cardio, we had 5 blocks and each block had a push pace, base pace, push pace, and an all-out. The base pace was always 1-minute and the all-out was always 30-seconds. But the two push paces changed for both lengths of time and incline. The longer the push pace was, the lower the incline got. But for me on the bike, it can be tough to do a lot of variation with my inclines, so I always used 1 resistance level higher than my all-out for the incline work. I know that’s not exactly how the workout should have been, but it was a good option for me.

On the floor, we had 1 long block. We started with 5 rounds of deadlifts and squats (5 reps for each exercise). Then a 300-meter row. Then 5 rounds of chest presses and seated low rows (5 reps for each exercise). And another 300-meter row. And finally 5 rounds of shoulder presses and squats to high rows on the straps (again, 5 reps for each exercise) before a final 300-meter row. I never made it to the last row, but I did get through all the exercises. And because the number of reps was low, I was able to go pretty heavy with the weights.

Considering I was coming off of the official Hell Week and going through my own type of hell, I’m really happy about how I did in my workouts. And I hope that this week gets a bit easier for me so I can get back to my normal self.

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A Full Week Of Hell Week (or I’m A Survivor)

Posted on November 1, 2021 | Comments Off

I’m a Hell Week Survivor! I had a feeling I’d be able to get this done since I’ve been able to do it every year, but this is my first Hell Week since having 13 months off from in-person workouts. So I knew it might be harder than it has been in the past. But I had every intention of getting my 5 workouts in so I could earn my shirt. And that’s exactly what I did!

Sunday was my first Hell Week workout. This one was called Fishing For Recovery, and I didn’t have the best start. I don’t normally work out on Sundays, but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that I didn’t know the main street I had to cross to get from my place to Orangetheory was closed due to a race. I was struggling to find a way to get over there, and I finally had to drive down the freeway a few miles to exit and find another street to take. I thought I wouldn’t make it to class, but I made it after class started but before the cutoff to join in.

For cardio, we had 4 blocks that had similar patterns. We had 3 different 1-minute intervals at a base pace with increasing inclines followed by a 1-minute base at no incline and a 1-minute all-out. The recovery after the all-out for those on the treadmill was at a 15% incline. I just used whatever the highest resistance level was that I had during that block. These resistance levels got really high for me and in the end my legs weren’t moving much at all because it was so hard. But that’s what Hell Week is about!

On the floor, we had 4 blocks as well. Each block started with the same 3 exercises. We had clean to presses, front squats, and half thrusters. All of these exercises were with weights. Then we had 1 exercise on the straps after that. We had low rows, alligators, bridge rows, and high rows. After the 1 strap exercise, we were supposed to row for distance. But I only was on the rower for a brief moment each block. This wasn’t the worst Hell Week workout I’ve had, but it was a good one to kick off a tough week.

Monday’s workout was called The Burpee Breach. I’m not a huge fan of burpees, so I wasn’t looking forward to this one that much. Fortunately, the burpees weren’t as big of a part of the workout as I feared.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first block was all about distance challenges and all-outs. We started with a 2-minute distance challenge followed by 30-seconds to recover. Then it was a 90-second distance challenge, 75-second distance challenge, 1-minute all-out, 45-second all-out, and 30-second all-out. And all of those had 30-seconds to recover between the work. The second block was all about 1-minute intervals and inclines. Every minute the incline or resistance level went up by 1 until the last minute when it was back to a flat road. The goal was to try to beat your distance from the first block, and I just was able to beat my first distance.

On the floor, the first block was the burpee block. And it was timed out with the treadmills. Every time the treadmills had their 30-second recovery, we would have a squat hold. And during their runs, we had burpees in various forms. Because I had to use the bench for my burpees, I didn’t do exactly what we were supposed to do. We started with ultimate burpees which is a burpee with a push-up, low row with weights, and shoulder press. I can’t do the low row with weights when using the bench, so I did shoulder taps instead. And each round with the burpees, we took away one part of the burpee until at the end we were just at regular burpees. But those 30-seconds of regular burpees felt just as hard or harder as the 2-minutes of ultimate burpees because I was so tired. For the second block, we had 3 rounds of hop-overs, step-ups (which I did as lunges), and squat jacks. After that, we were supposed to go to the rower and work with the person next to us to alternate 100-meter rows and recovery rows. But the floor work took me a long time and I never made it to the rower.

Wednesday was Decoding the Drop Set, and yes it was about doing drop sets on the floor. But I had cardio first and it was a run/row.

The run/row started with a .5 mile run (2 miles for the bike) and we increased the incline/resistance level 1% 5 times. Then it was a 100-meter row. The treadmill/bike segment shortened each round and we didn’t increase the incline/resistance level as many times but we started at a higher incline/resistance level. And each row increased by 100-meters. The segments were all pretty short, but with the increased resistance level they weren’t getting that much faster for me.

On the floor, we had 3 blocks. Each block had 1 drop set exercise, 1 exercise we were supposed to do until failure, and 1 exercise that we had regular reps for. With drop sets, you use a heavy weight for a low number of reps and then a lighter weight for a higher number of reps. And after doing the drop set exercise, we were supposed to use that same lighter weight for our exercise until failure. The drop set exercises were seated shoulder presses, seated low rows, and chest presses. For the until failure exercises, we just did as many as we could until we lost our form and couldn’t continue. For me, this varied a lot, but I tried to get at least 6 reps done for each. We had tricep extensions, hammer curls, and chest flies. And for the last exercises, they were all jumping-type exercises like jumping jacks. I really couldn’t do those that day (and rarely can do them), so I did different types of squats instead.

Friday was one of the hardest Hell Week workouts I can remember. I know I’ve had some tough ones, but this one was just that much harder. This workout was called Meltdown, and I feel like it was a good description for it.

For cardio, we had a run/exercise block (like a run/row but floor exercises instead of rowing). Cardio started with a .1 mile run (.4 for the bike) and increased by .05 miles (or .2 for the bike) each round. After the run/bike work, we went to the floor and had the same 4 exercises each time. We had single-arm clean to press, plank single-arm low rows, single-arm snatches, and single-arm hold with lateral step-ups (I did these as lunges). The first time on the floor we had 4 reps and it increased by 2 reps each time. It was a lot of work and I was exhausted. But that was probably the easier part of the workout.

On the rower, we pretty much had a 23-minute row. It was broken up into segments and we had some rest between each segment, but it was still a lot of rowing. And after the floor, my hip was really hurting so I knew I’d be struggling with the row. The first segment on the rower was a 4.5-minute row for distance. I wasn’t able to do this without stopping, but I tried. We looked at our distance after that was done and then reset the rower because the goal was to match the distance for the next 3 blocks. The next block had a 90-second push row, 1-minute base row, 1-minute push row, 30-second base row, and a 30-second all-out row. Again, I needed breaks but I tried to do what I could. The 3rd block was probably the hardest one. We had 10 rounds of 20-seconds of an all-out row and 10-seconds to do a recovery row. Having double the effort than recovery is just really hard, and doing it for 10 rounds is that much harder. And the last round was 10 rounds of 10-seconds of an all-out row and 20-seconds of a recovery row. This was a little better, but I was so tired by this point that it didn’t feel much easier. While I love challenging myself, this might have been a bit much for me and I was glad when it was done so I could rest.

And my final Hell Week workout was on Saturday. This one was called Pyramid Scheme and not only was it a Hell Week workout, but it was also a 90-minute workout too! This was not something I necessarily planned, but my usual class was a 90-minute one. And since I didn’t know when I could do my final workout, I decided I might as well end on an extra challenging class. So we had the regular Hell Week workout and then did an extra rotation around the room. And it was a 3 group class so we had equal time on cardio, rowing, and the floor.

The pyramid idea was very clear in the cardio work. We started with a 90-second distance challenge followed by 30 seconds to recover. Then we had a 75-second challenge, 1-minute all-out, 45-second all-out, and 30-second all-out. And between each one, we had 30 seconds to recover. Then we went back up and went from 45-seconds back to 90-seconds again. When we had our next rotation around the room for the extra 30 minutes of class, we had another pyramid with 30-seconds, 1-minute, and 2-minutes of all-outs of distance challenges before going back down to 30-seconds.

On the rower, the first half of the main block was timed out with cardio going from the 90-second challenge down to 30-seconds. But after we did the 30-seconds, we didn’t work out way back up but had distance rows with lunges between. And for the bonus block, we started timed out with cardio again for the first half and then had distance rows with high knees between each row.

And on the floor, we started by learning the mystery number of squats we had to do in the middle of the block. For my group, we had 80 squats. But before that, we had other exercises. We had low rows on the straps and chest presses with weights. We had a round of 40 reps, then a round of 20 reps, and finally a round of 10 reps. Then we had our squats before moving on to the next half of the block. We had bicep curls on the straps and overhead tricep extensions. For those, we started with 10 reps and worked up. But I only got started on the 20 reps of the bicep curls on the straps before the block was done. And for the bonus block, we had hip hinge swings, plank jacks, squats, and plank hops (which I did as mountain climbers). For those, we started with 20 reps and then had 10 reps and 5 reps. By the time I was done on the floor, I was so exhausted. I possibly overdid it a bit this past week, but it was worth it because I hit my goal and did all 5 of the workouts I wanted to do!

I’m still a bit sore from all my workouts last week and I know this week might kick off my bad week. So I’m not planning on going too crazy in my workouts. I know I’m recovering still from all the work I did last week and I need to allow my body to get back to normal. But I’m still proud of what I did and that I continued my streak of being a Hell Week survivor!

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Hell Week Prep (or The First Part Of My Workout Week)

Posted on October 25, 2021 | Comments Off

I did get my 4 workouts in this past week, but I’m actually only going to write about the first 3. That’s because this week is Hell Week and my 4th workout was on Sunday so I could make it count toward my 5 workouts to earn my shirt. And I’m going to write about all 5 of those workouts in next week’s post. So this post is just about my 3 regular workouts this past week.

Monday was an endurance day and also a run/row day. I know I’ve had run/row workouts in the past, but I always look forward to them because they feel like they don’t happen that often and are a nice change. Plus, since my classes are 2 group classes, there usually isn’t that much rowing. Last week, that was good because of how my foot was doing. This week, my foot is still a bit tender, but I’m not in as much pain as I was. So I wasn’t powerful with my rowing but I could do it.

The run/row had cardio, a body weight exercise, and a row. The first round was .5 miles on the treadmill (2 on the bike), 50 pulsing half squats, and a 500-meter row. The next round was .4 miles, 40 squats, and a 400-meter row. That pattern continued through the block. I played around with the resistance level on the bike for the cardio, but I mainly kept it at the level between my base and push paces since it took a bit of time to get through it. And I did have to take breaks with the squats because of my foot, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be. I didn’t get as far into the pattern as I would have liked to, but it was still over 23 minutes of work.

On the floor, everything was timed. We had 3 blocks and each block had 3 rounds of the exercises. Each exercise was done for 30-seconds and we had a few 15-second transitions within each block. The first block had ab dolly rollouts, alternating superman planks, knee tucks on the ab dolly, and plank rotations. The second block had goblet squats with weights, Cossack squats, sumo squats with weights, and lateral hops. And the last block had lateral lunges on the right side, lateral lunges on the left side, and mountain climbers. We were supposed to use weights for the lunges, but I didn’t use them because I used the wall to balance.

Wednesday’s day was a power day and it was a lot of short intervals of work! I think I needed this workout after getting through all my convention work and it was a great energy boost.

For cardio, we had 4 blocks. Each block started the same way with a 45-second push pace, 1-minute base pace, and 45-second all-out. After the all-out, we had a recovery and then another all-out. Each block the recovery got a bit longer and the all-out got a bit shorter. I don’t know if my legs were tired or what, but those all-outs were extra hard on me with the resistance level I set the bike at. I’m not sure what happened, but I just struggled a lot more than I expected to. I still did it, but I know that they weren’t my best all-outs.

On the floor, we had 2 floor blocks and 2 row blocks. For the row blocks, we had either a clean to press or a single-arm snatch with weights before going to the rower for a 150-meter row. This row should be fast and done with much shorter strokes, but I still was dealing with some pain in my foot so I had to do them a bit slower than a typical power row. Even my coach called me out on this, but he understood when I explained why I couldn’t press as hard on my heel. For the other 2 blocks, we had 2 exercises on the floor. One block had chest presses while laying on the floor and plank rotations and the other block had single-arm split stance high rows with weights and plank reaches. Even without a ton of exercises on the floor, it felt like I wasn’t getting a lot of breaks and working non-stop. But I really enjoyed that!

Because I was going to work out on Sunday, I didn’t work out on Friday. But my last non-Hell Week workout this past week was my Saturday class. I knew that I would be doing 3 workouts in a row starting with Saturday, so I did try to be a bit easier on myself. But this workout was a strength day, so it wasn’t as easy to go light.

For cardio, we had 2 blocks. Both blocks started with a 2-minute push pace and then we had intervals of base paces and push paces with inclines. And we ended with a run for distance challenge for 90-seconds at an incline. None of the inclines were too high, but I still went a bit lower with the resistance levels than I might do if I wasn’t about to start Hell Week. I still got a great workout in even with going a bit lower than we were supposed to do.

And on the floor, we also had 2 blocks. Both blocks had 2 exercises and then we did a 300-meter row and repeated it. The first block had single-arm low rows with weights and goblet squats. The second block had single-arm chest presses with weights and lunges. I tried to go pretty heavy with the weights since it was a strength day, but still remembering I was about to do 2 days of Hell Week workouts in a row. I think I found a great balance for pushing myself and not going too hard, so I was pretty happy with how things went.

And for my 4th workout, that was on Sunday and it was day 1 of Hell Week. And that will come in next week’s post when I write about all 5 of the Hell Week classes I attend to earn my shirt!

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Another 3 Workout Week (or Grateful For A Lack Of Rowing)

Posted on October 18, 2021 | Comments Off

After having a 3 workout week the week before, I was hoping I’d be able to do 4 workouts this week. I had already planned on this past week to be only 3 workouts because of my union convention, but I wanted to see what I could do to fix that. But a lot of other things are happening in my life right now, so I couldn’t make that work. So it was another 3 workout week for me, and I did my best to maximize the classes I was able to go to.

Monday’s workout was a bit tough due to pain, but I was fortunately feeling a bit better than I had the past week. And I needed to be feeling better because it was a tough endurance and strength workout! Having both endurance and strength in one class was tough, but it was a good challenge.

For cardio, we had one long block with no recovery. We had base pace increasing inclines for 75-seconds each with a 2-minute flat base pace between. The resistance levels did get higher than what I usually use for my push pace and all-outs, so I needed the flat base pace time to catch my breath and let my legs rest a little bit. But just like it normally is, the inclines felt like they took forever and the flat road time flew by. And after about 20-minutes of this work, we ended with a 1-minute all-out. Because we had been doing so much with inclines during the workout, I did my all-out at a lower resistance level than I normally would.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks. For both blocks, we started with a little bit of rowing work. We had 15-stroke drills and then overhead triceps and chest presses with a medicine ball. We repeated that and then went to the floor for the rest of the block. The first block had hip hinge low rows, low rows on the straps, and plank bird dogs. And the second block had deadlifts, single-leg deadlifts (which I do without weights and use more core strength so I can hold on for balance), and plank leg lifts. Even though I wasn’t feeling completely better, the floor work didn’t make me too nauseous so I didn’t have to make that many modifications for the exercises.

Wednesday’s workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power. And it was the day after my doctor’s appointment and my foot was in a lot of pain. I have dealt with this before, and sometimes it’s not as bad as it was this time. I wasn’t really able to put my heel on the ground, so I was hoping I wouldn’t need to do much rowing. I have had to try rowing without putting pressure on my heel, and it’s extremely difficult. Fortunately, there was no rowing in this workout. But it was another crazy challenging day!

Cardio was another single-block workout with no recovery built-in. I added in little bits of recovery for myself because even on the bike it can make my heel hurt. But at least I was over feeling pain and nausea, so I was only dealing with one issue. We had a 3-minute push pace, 2-minute push pace at incline, 1-minute push pace at incline, and then repeated that all again but in the opposite order. All of the base paces between each push pace were 90-seconds. And at the end, we had a 90-second distance challenge. Just like on Monday, I had done a lot of higher resistance levels during the workout, so for that last distance challenge I used a lower level on the bike than I normally would.

And on the floor, we focused on drop sets. A drop set is where you use a heavier weight for a lower number of reps and then immediately use a lighter weight for a higher number of reps. We had 3 blocks with 1 drop set exercise for each block. The drop set exercises were chest presses, seated low rows, and bicep curls. And we had 1 other exercise in each block with pull-ups on the straps (I did high rows on the straps), push-ups, and squats to upright rows. Some of these exercises were a bit tough because of my heel, but I was able to work around the pain for most of them. The squats were the hardest thing for me, but I just took a little break when the pain was getting worse.

And Friday was my last workout of the week (Saturday was the first day of the convention!). Again, my heel was still hurting and I was having some hip pain because of how I was walking to not be in pain. But it was manageable. I was worried again that we might have some rowing, but I lucked out and it was another day without rowing! But it was another strength day, so just like the rest of the week, we had a lot of incline work.

For cardio, we had 3 blocks with similar patterns. The first block was a 2-minute base at incline, 1-minute base without incline, 90-second base with incline, 1-minute base without incline, and a 1-minute all-out with incline. Each block, the incline got higher but the incline time was shorter. The second block had 3 incline intervals for 90-seconds, 75-seconds, and 1-minute with the same flat base paces and 1-minute all-out at incline. And the last block had 3 incline intervals for 1-minute, 45-seconds, and 30-seconds with the same flat base paces and 1-minute all-out at incline to end the block.

On the floor, we also had 3 blocks. In each block, we had 3 exercises but the first two exercises were designed to do back to back without changing the weights we were using. The back-to-back exercises were front raises and lateral raises, deadlifts and lunges, and hip hinge low rows and bicep curls. For those exercises, the only modification I had to make was to do the lunges without weights so I could balance. And the other exercises we had were low rows on the straps, squats, and chest presses on the straps. Just like with Wednesday, I had to take a few little breaks because of pain but it wasn’t that bad.

I do feel like I did the best I could with the workouts I went to this week. I would have loved to have fit in a 4th workout another morning, but my schedule just didn’t work to add that in. But just like I said last week, doing 3 workouts is still great! And hopefully this week, nothing crazy happens with my schedule so I can get back to my normal 4 workout week!

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Tagged fitness, Orangetheory, workout

A Short Workout Week (or I Guess I’m Glad This Happened On A Bad Week)

Posted on October 11, 2021 | Comments Off

Going into this past week, I knew it was going to be a tough week with how I was feeling. But I was planning on pushing through like normal and going to all my workouts. But it ended up being a week where I only made it to Orangetheory 3 times (I still can’t believe I refer to going 3 times in a week as “only”). But I tried my best for each day I was there.

Monday’s workout was a power day, and I’m glad that’s what it was. I tried taking my medications before going to bed, but it didn’t seem to make that much of a difference. I don’t know if I was feeling that much worse than normal or if the timing didn’t change how they helped. All I know is that I was fighting a lot of pain and nausea the entire time. But at least with cardio, the work was all in short sprints.

We had 2 blocks for cardio. The first block was 4 rounds of a push pace to an all-out with a recovery after. The all-out was always 30-seconds and the recovery was always 1-minute. But the push pace changed. We had a 75-second, 60-second, 45-second, and 30-second push pace. In the second block, we had the same 4 rounds but we did them in the opposite order (starting with 30-seconds and ending with 75-seconds). But the recovery was a bit different because we had about 45-seconds to recover and then 30-seconds of jump squats. I did these as regular squats, but still needed to take breaks during that 30-seconds as I was feeling very nauseous.

On the floor, we also had 2 blocks. The first block had burpees and pull-ups on the straps. I did the burpees with the bench for my hands and I did high rows on the straps instead of pull-ups. We also had rowing starting with a 250-meter row and going down 50 meters each time. Because of how many breaks I needed, I only made it to the 200-meter row. The second block on the floor was timed out with the treadmills. When the treadmills were in their push pace, we had bicep curls (so starting with 75-seconds and going down to 30-seconds). When they were in their all-out, we had shoulder presses. When they were recovering and transitioning to the floor for squats, we had squats. And when they were doing squats we had running man plank work. I did the running man planks with the bench for my hands and rested when I needed to. It was a lot of work back to back and if I was feeling great I would loved this type of power workout. But because I was feeling so off, it just felt like a lot of work. But I did it.

Wednesday’s workout was an endurance day and it was also a run/row day. I was not feeling that much worse than Monday, so that was a bit of a relief. I was really worried I would be feeling really horrible that day. But I still was dealing with pain and nausea, so I didn’t make it that far in the run/row.

Because it was an endurance day, the run segments were a bit longer than a lot of run/row days. The first round was a .25 mile run (or 1 mile for the bike) and then a 200-meter row. Then it was a .5 mile run and a 300-meter row. I was working on the .75 mile (or 3 miles for the bike) segment when the run/row was done. I did take a lot of breaks on both the bike and rower, but I knew that was likely to happen for me.

On the floor, each block had 2 mini-blocks in it and the second mini-block of each was core work. We were supposed to do 3 rounds of the first mini-block before moving on to core work and I only just made it each block. In the first block, the exercises were goblet sumo squats, lateral lunges, and squats before we were supposed to do mountain climbers and static scissor crunches. And the second block had sumo deadlifts, squat sit to stands, and squats before we were supposed to do side plank hip rotations and bicycle crunches. Because I didn’t really make it to the core work, I didn’t have to worry that much about modifications.

Friday’s workout was a regular 2 group class, but we did it as a 3 group class and had 14 minutes at each section of the room. I was still feeling off, but it was less nausea and more pain, so in some ways that it was easier for working out.

For cardio, we had 3 rounds of a 3-minute block. We had a 30-second push pace, 1-minute base pace, and a 90-second distance challenge. Between each of the blocks, we had 1-minute to recover. And then we ended with one more 90-second distance challenge. I did use the resistance level for the 30-second push, but for the 90-second distance challenge I used the resistance level between my base and push pace. I didn’t struggle as much as I feared, but it wasn’t easy.

On the rower, we had a very similar pattern to cardio. We had the 30-second push row and the 90-second distance challenge. But instead of the 1-minute base pace we had 20 side hops which I did more as side steps. I was doing ok for the 30-second push row, but for the 90-second challenge I usually was taking a break in the middle to get over a really bad cramp. I don’t know if the bike or rower is harder when I feel bad, but at least for this day I was doing a lot worse on the rower.

And on the floor, we had 4 blocks to match the cardio and row sections. So we had 3 different 3-minute blocks and 1 90-second block. The first block had neutral thrusters with weights, bicep curls, and full burpees. For the burpees, I used the bench for my hands. And each round, you added one more burpee. So you started with 1 burpee, then 2, and so on. And you continued that through the next 2 blocks. The second block had squats using the straps, high rows on the straps, and more burpees. The third block had sit-ups, palms to elbows (I did them as shoulder taps), and more burpees. And the last block was a burnout block where you started in a push-up hold in the bottom of a push-up and when you needed to rest you moved to a plank. And you went back and forth for those 90-seconds.

And I didn’t work out on Saturday. There were a few factors that affected my ability to work out. I had some scheduling things that were going to make it tough for me to get to class (and on Saturdays there is only 1 time that I can go to without taking time off work). Also, the street where the studio is located was closed so we were told we would need to park a few blocks away and walk. Normally, this would be fine but because of my schedule I wouldn’t make it to class on time because you can’t be that late. So instead of worrying about if I could make it to class or not, I canceled my Saturday workout. And I’m sure that was the right choice.

But this week, I might also need to cancel my Saturday workout, but because I know about this in advance I’m hoping I can find a time to add in another workout. I’m not exactly sure when I can do that, but I’ll see what I can do. And if this week ended up being another 3 workout week, it will be ok. Because I know I’ll be making it up when we have Hell Week later this month!

Comments Off on A Short Workout Week (or I Guess I’m Glad This Happened On A Bad Week)

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Tagged fitness, Orangetheory, workout

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