Tag Archives: Orangetheory

Almost End Of The Year Workouts (or Hitting A Milestone And Debating A New Plan)

Posted on December 24, 2018 | 1 comment

I never should predict how a workout week will go. In my post last week, I said how I would expect the coming week to be a good week of workouts because my nausea was done. I clearly spoke too soon.

Monday was a weird day for me. I’m not sure if my pain and nausea was due to hormonal things (it should have been over by then) or if I got food poisoning or something, but I wasn’t feeling good that morning. It was not just the pain and nausea that I’ve dealt with for the past 2 years but I was also having hip issues that morning. I don’t know why everything was happening for me, but I went into my workout with the mindset that I was just going to do what I could and that was better than missing my workout.

It was a power based workout and we had 3 blocks with cardio. I was on the bike and used my normal resistance levels since I wasn’t feeling good enough to push myself. Every block was a longer push pace, a base pace, a push to all out, a recovery, and another push to all out. For the first block I was feeling not too bad and didn’t need to take any breaks, but for the other blocks I just had to stop when I felt like it was too much. I was frustrated, but not because of how I was feeling. I was frustrated that I wasn’t mentally prepared for a day like this. I thought I was going to be feeling great and I hated how let down I felt when it was a rough day for me. But I did what I could and that’s all I can hope for sometimes.

On the floor, we also had 3 blocks. The first 2 blocks had 3 rounds of 2 different exercises and then a timed row. We had chest presses, squats to upright rows, push-ups using the bench, and single arm chest presses. And then the last block was rounds of 30 second rows with squat jacks using the medicine ball. I couldn’t do the squat jacks so I did regular squats with overhead presses. My rowing wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t great either. But I was able to use heavy weights for the weighted work on the floor so it felt like that made up for something.

The weirdness continued on Wednesday for me. I started out on the treadmill, but my hip was just bugging me. And since I was going to be going to Disneyland later that day, I didn’t want to do anything that would make me hurt too much while walking around at Disneyland. So after I did my warmup I switched over to the bike for the rest of the cardio.

The goal of the cardio work was to work with a new base pace. I ended up being pretty glad I was on the bike since I know I couldn’t go faster on the treadmill yet. What I did for the bike was use my normal push pace as my new base pace, my normal all out as my new push pace, and then go higher with the resistance level for my new all out. It ended up working out well and it wasn’t as tough as I thought it might be. There were a few times where I was wishing the push pace was shorter because my legs were getting tired, but that is to be expected with any workout.

On the floor, we had a long block followed by a short core blast. For the long block we had deadlifts, shoulder presses, back extensions, and mountain climbers. And after completing a round we went to the rower. The first row was 800 and it was cut in half each time we were back on the rower. I didn’t do my fastest row, but it was one of my more consistent speed rows so I was very happy with that. And we ended the workout with a core blast with different types of crunches.

On Friday I pretty much decided to stick with the bike. I’m doing some thinking about not trying to use the treadmill for a while just to get happier with the bike (more on that when I figure it out) so this would be a good chance for me to work with the new base pace I got to on Wednesday. It was a bit frustrating because this would have been the perfect day to work on running, but that’s exactly why I knew I needed to stay on the bike.

All of the blocks were very short and it was a switch day so we were in each section of the room 3 times. On the cardio all the blocks were a push pace, base pace, push pace, base pace, and all out. Each block the last base pace got a bit longer which was a good chance to work on my endurance with that new base pace resistance level. It was a bit easier than it was on Wednesday which was a good sign to me.

On the rower, we started with a 200 meter row and then had different types of squats each block. Then we went back to the rower and finished the row to 400 meters. And since there was time at the end of each block before we switched, we had to hold a squat to complete the block. The last squat was usually about 30-45 seconds for me which wasn’t too long.

And on the floor every block had some form of a lunge movement and some core work. For the lunges we had speed skater lunges, regular lunges, and lunges knee raises (which I was able to do by using the straps for balance). And for the core work we had sit-ups, side plank crunches, and seated torso rotations. I got through 2 rounds of the movements each block before we switched and the time really flew by.

But I did hit an amazing milestone on Friday. I had the goal to do 199 workouts this year, and my workout on Friday was my 200th workout of the year!

I can’t believe that not only did I make it to my goal but I would pass it! And having that milestone happen really did help me feel better about the workouts.

Saturday’s workout was a strength day and I stayed on the bike. But I felt much better about that decision and that helped me feel much better about the workout in general. I was also able to keep working with my new base pace resistance on the bike and combining that with the hill workout made it so hard, but in a good way!

The cardio workout had 3 blocks with a similar format. There was a push pace, a hill base pace, a regular base pace, a push pace, another hill base pace, a regular push pace, and it ended with a push to all out pace. The difference was that each block the hill (or resistance level for me) went down. It was hard doing that work with my new base resistance level, but I think it was a good thing in the end because that new resistance level doesn’t feel as hard as it did when I was using it as my push pace.

On the floor, we had rowing in the first and last block. The first block had a 1 minute row and the last block had a 100 meter row and then a 300 meter row after a 15 second recovery. The rest of the work had a lot of good weight work. We had single arm snatches, goblet squats, shoulder presses, lunges, uppercuts, and sit-ups. I tried to go with the heaviest weights I knew I could use for those exercises to not go easy on myself. I might have done more weight with the goblet squats, but I’m happy with what I did.

I pretty much just have this week to finish up my workouts for the year (except New Year’s Eve which will be the week after) and it’s a good time to evaluate what I want to accomplish in 2019. The idea of making myself use the bike more often is something I think I need to do, but I don’t have the exact plan figured out. But I also want to set more goals beyond that so I can have something to try to reach for in rowing or with weights. Hopefully this week’s workouts will inspire me so I have a good plan for 2019!

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Default ThumbnailAnother Short Workout Week (or Still Can’t Believe My Milestone) Default ThumbnailA Week Of Tough Workouts (or Frustration As Motivation) Default ThumbnailHaving Some Realizations About My Workouts (or Still Adjusting My Thinking) Default ThumbnailWorking Out Into The New Year (or The End of My 2015 Workouts And Beginning of My 2016 Workouts) Default ThumbnailWhat I Plan To Do This Year (or 2015 Goals) Default ThumbnailFitting In My Workouts (or Planning For The End Of The Year)

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Working Through A Rough Week (or Just Keep Moving)

Posted on December 17, 2018 | 1 comment

I knew this week of workouts would be a rough one for me. I am glad that I can plan for these weeks so they don’t take me by surprise, but it doesn’t necessarily make them easier to deal with. But I just have to continue trying new things that might help my workouts (and my life) not as hard and hope for the best. And that’s the attitude I really tried to go into these workouts with.

Monday’s workout was a strength day and I knew that while I couldn’t pedal as hard on the bike as normal that didn’t mean I couldn’t try to work hard. Since there was incline/resistance work for the cardio, I went with increasing my resistance levels on the bike as the incline work was happening on the treadmill. I didn’t get quite as high on the resistance levels as I have before, but I was still doing more than my normal levels.

We had 3 blocks on cardio and the first block was 1 minute intervals between incline/resistance work and a base pace. Each incline went lower as we went through the blocks, so I started the resistance level at close to the highest that I have done to represent hill work. I went down 1 level each time but I was still above my normal resistance levels the entire block. The second block was 1 minute intervals with incline/resistance work and push paces. During this block, I was getting closer to my normal resistance levels but decided to not go below my all out resistance level for hill work. And the last block was 1 minute intervals with push and base paces and I used my normal resistance levels for these.

On the floor, every block had 2 exercises plus a row challenge. The exercises included lunges, shoulder presses, single leg squats, hip hinge reverse fly, uppercuts, and bicep curls. Each block had 1 exercise that was 6 reps and the other exercises we could choose between 6-10 reps. The idea was to be able to try heavier weights and have the option to do fewer reps. Because of how I was feeling, I did heavy weights but nothing I hadn’t done before. And the row challenge each block was to do 15 stokes slowly on the rower and see how far you could get. It’s not easy to row slowly and that’s the point of this challenge. We were supposed to get at least 150 meters each time, and I managed to do over 200 meters each time. So I guess my nausea was good for something.

Wednesday’s workout was a power class and even though it’s normally not a 3 group class it was this time. So I was at each section of the room for about 15 minutes. On the bike, we had short push to all out challenges and then we had squats right after. We did 5 rounds of push to all outs that got shorter throughout the block and the squats started at 12 reps and went down 1 each time. I wasn’t pedaling as fast as I could on the bike, but I tried my best and tried to work harder during the all outs than I was working during the push paces.

On the rower, we started with a 500 meter row and each round it went down 100 meters. And between the rows we had more squats plus squats to front presses with a medicine ball. We kept working down for the number of reps we did for the regular squats, so I started at 8 squats after my 500 meter row. My rowing time was slow, but it was steady and consistent so I tried to look at that as a good thing.

And on the floor, we had 1 long block that had 4 exercises plus continuing to work down on the number of reps for the squats. We had sumo squats with weights, dumbbell swings, weighted hip bridges, and crunches. The goal by the end of class was to be at the round of doing 1 squat (so you worked from 12 down to 1), but I didn’t quite make it. I did my round of 2 squats and was working on the other exercises by the time class was done. But considering how awful I was feeling in class, getting within a few exercises of making it to the goal is a big accomplishment.

Friday’s workout was a strength day and I was cautiously optimistic that my nausea was over. I was feeling pretty good when I woke up and went to the workout, but when I got on the bike it was only a few minutes before I was feeling nauseous again. But since I had planned for this week to be like this, it did make things a bit easier. Plus, as I’ve mentioned before I do like using the bike for strength days because I can add resistance on the bike much more than I can do incline work on the treadmill.

The cardio blocks were all pretty short and they combined having push work without hills and push work with hills. I was using my normal resistance levels on the bike when it wasn’t hill work but I went to the new higher resistance levels I’ve been using for the hill work. I didn’t get as high up there as I have in past workouts, but the hill work wasn’t as high as it has been in other workouts so that seemed reasonable to me.

On the rower, we had an interesting workout where we got to determine how many reps of exercises we would do by how we did with the rowing. We had different distances to row and we had to count the number of strokes it took us to get to that distance (very similarly to us having to count the strokes in Monday’s class and see the distance we could get). I know that I can do long and slow rowing and that helps to keep my stroke count down. After the first row we had calf raises, after the second row we had squats, and after the third row we had squat presses. I know that my number of reps was much lower than our coach was expecting us to do since I focused on rowing as slowly as possible. But I still had a lot of reps of everything.

And on the floor we had 2 blocks. The first block had deadlifts, double crunches, and bench sit-up to stands. I couldn’t do the sit-up to stands because of the nausea so I just did regular full sit-ups. And the second block had hip hinge high rows, hammer curls, sit-ups, and lunges. Fortunately the majority of the floor exercises that we had were things that weren’t an issue with my nausea, so by the end of the workout I was feeling almost back to how I was feeling before the workout.

Saturday’s workout was a benchmark day. We had the 2000 meter row which is the longest benchmark row that we have. It’s not an easy distance to do, but I’ve done it enough to have a good idea of goals I’d like to accomplish. My PR is significantly faster than I’ve been able to do any other time (I have no idea how I did the row so quickly that one time), so I don’t go into that row expecting to get a new PR. But I still try to do better than other rows so I can feel accomplished.

I started out on the bike where we had a short cardio block with a push pace and ending with an all out. Then we went to the floor to do some skater lunges, woodchoppers with the medicine ball, and lunges with tricep extensions with the medicine ball. I was trying to go easy on the floor work since I knew I’d have the 2000 meter row right after that, but I was going harder than I thought so toward the end of the block I took a break so I could catch my breath.

When I got to the rower, my goal was to see if I could do the row in under 9 minutes. It’s not easy to do that, and I was still feeling a bit off, but I was determined to do my best. What we are told to do with long rows like this is to start with 5 really hard pulls on the rower to get the water moving, then work on finding a steady pace we can maintain for the entire time. I knew if I wanted to be under 9 minutes that my 500 meter split time needed to stay under 2:15. I was able to do that in the beginning, but I was tiring out quickly. So instead of going at that pace as long as I could and then slowing down a lot, I found a pace I could stick with and just had to be ok with not making my goal. I ended up finishing about 15 seconds slower than I wanted to, but I was able to do the entire row without stopping.

After the row was done, we had blocks where we had short cardio bursts with lunges between each burst. I was on the bike and only made it through 2 rounds. I had to take time to recover after my row and that cut into my cardio time. And the last short block on the floor was lunges and superman work, which was easy enough to do even though I was so tired.

While this past week of workouts weren’t record breaking or amazing, I did try to stay in the mindset that I was doing something good. I think I found a small victory in all of my workouts even if that victory was a part of not reaching a goal I had earlier. I should hopefully be back to my normal workout for the next 2 weeks, so I should be finishing my 2018 workouts with some awesome workout days!

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Default ThumbnailA Good, Strong Workout Week (or I Really Love Feeling Like Myself) Default ThumbnailA Week Of Nauseous Workouts (or Just Doing My Best) Default ThumbnailAn Emotional Workout Week (or Just Making It Through) Default ThumbnailBack To My Normal Routine (or Working Through My Workouts) Default ThumbnailNot Exactly A Recovery Week (or Working With Different Challenges) Default ThumbnailAn Up And Down Week (or Working Through The Same Frustrations)

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Another OTF Hangout (or Discovering A New Local Wine Bar)

Posted on December 11, 2018 | Comments Off on Another OTF Hangout (or Discovering A New Local Wine Bar)

There have been so many organized outings coordinated by Orangetheory that I haven’t been able to go to over the years. For a long time, it was just tough for me to go to anything organized by the Brentwood studio since I didn’t drive over to Brentwood other than my workouts. I didn’t want to go there to work out, drive home to shower and change, and then go back that way for a happy hour. It was sad I never really could make it, but I knew that it just wasn’t meant to be for those.

But since the Culver City studio opened, I’ve been making more of an effort to attend the different events that they do. And I have felt such a part of the community at that studio that I am more motivated to try to go. I’ve been able to make friends at the Culver City studio much faster than I could in Brentwood, but I think that is mostly because of how comfortable I am in the workouts. I’m not so terrified or feeling out of place that I can’t focus on who is in class with me. I’m still in my own head a lot and don’t notice who is always in class with me, but I’m trying to get better about it.

So when I found out there was going to be a fun Saturday evening hangout at a wine bar for the Culver City studio, I put it on my calendar. The day of, I was feeling a bit nauseous and debating about not going. But one of my workout friends texted me about an hour before to ask if I was going to go. Since she was going to be there, I decided that I could do my best to ignore how yucky I was feeling because it was going to be worth it to be hanging out with people I usually only see in workout clothes.

This hangout was held at Stanley’s Wet Goods, which I hadn’t been to before. My favorite wine bar in Culver City closed a little while ago and I hadn’t found a new place to go. So when I saw that this was a wine bar, I was excited to see what they had to offer (even if I really don’t drink). 

When I got there, I was a little bit confused at first. The space looks like a wine store with a side section with tables where you can order wine. I didn’t recognize anyone at first, but everyone else was looking as confused as I was and we realized we were all there for the Orangetheory hangout. Then we found out that there was a back room that was reserved for us so we all got our things to head back there. And just as we were going to the back room, my friend arrived. So I was feeling much better about knowing people and not feeling alone.

Once we got to the back room, we all sat down at the tables there. We were trying to figure out if we were in the same classes or not (I really think the name tags we get need to include a section for us to write down when we go to class). I always feel bad when someone recognizes me from class and I don’t recognize them, but everyone seems to understand that when you are super focused on your workout you aren’t always looking to see if you see the same faces each week in your class. But it didn’t really matter if I recognized someone or not because everyone was introducing themselves to each other and I never had to feel embarrassed that I didn’t know someone that I should have.

For most of the evening, I was sitting at the same table because it was pretty central in the room. I was sometimes sitting the people seated on the other side of the table and sometimes I turned so I could face the other table. It wasn’t a huge room so it never felt like I was really missing seeing anyone. And I was getting pretty involved in a couple of different conversations so I wasn’t really thinking that I had to find other people to talk to. It was nice not having moments of feeling left out or wondering who else I could talk to. I always felt very much in the middle of conversations and I loved all the randomness that we were all talking about.

We talked about coaches we love, people were asking me about the Brentwood studio since many of them haven’t been there before, we talked about people we see in class and don’t know their names (and they weren’t at the bar), and as it seems like so many conversations go to we talked about dating in LA. It was funny to hear the crazy stories that other OTF people have had dating and of course I had to share a couple of my best crazy ones.  It’s nice to have people to talk to who are going through the same issues with dating that I have because it helps me not feel like some of the issues I’ve encountered are due to me. It might be due to being in LA or the guys that we are meeting here, but it’s not something I’m bringing onto myself.

By the time I was heading back home, the room we were in cleared out. I didn’t realize so many other people had left already because I was focused on who I was talking to. But it did help me feel a bit less guilty for leaving because it seemed like the night was winding down.

I’ve said this before, but it’s so hard to make friends as an adult. There aren’t as many opportunities to make new friends once you are done with school, so I am always grateful for events like this that help me meet people I already have something in common with. And hopefully I’ll start recognizing more people in class with me (or they will remind me we met at the outing) so I can have even more friends with me in class.

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A Week Of Tough Workouts (or Frustration As Motivation)

Posted on December 10, 2018 | Comments Off on A Week Of Tough Workouts (or Frustration As Motivation)

This past week of workouts weren’t my best. I had issues with the weather affecting how I was feeling plus I had to deal with nausea. These issues are frustrating to me, but I really tried my best to not let it get to me too much.

Monday’s workout was an endurance day, but it felt a bit like a power day with how the treadmill section was formatted. I was on the treadmill, but my hips were a bit off so I was power walking the entire time. I tried not to be frustrated since the format would have been a great running day, but I am struggling with feeling ok with not being able to run sometimes.

On the treadmill, the first block was a 1 minute all out pace followed by a walking recovery. Then we had 3 rounds of a 30 second push to 1 minute all out pace. The next block was 2 rounds of a 2 minute push pace followed by a 30 second all out pace with a walking recovery in the middle. And the last block was a 4 minute progressive push followed by a 30 second all out pace. And we ended with a walking recovery and one more 1 minute all out pace. I was keeping my inclines on the treadmill at the inclines I usually do, but I was having to take more breaks than I normally do. My hips were just feeling tight and off and I wasn’t sure how to fix that.

On the floor we had 3 blocks and each of those blocks included a 1 minute all out row. I was able to get better every time I did the row so that made me feel a bit better after the treadmill. In the first block we also had lateral lunges and squats, in the second block we had lateral lunges and regular lunges, and the last block was a core blast. The core blast included plank work, push ups, and sit ups.

Wednesday’s workout was a power day. And I thought I had been frustrated to not run on Monday, but Wednesday was even worse for me. We had rainy weather and that always makes me hurt. So I had to use the bike and it was hard because this was another perfect workout to work on my running if I could have done it.

On the cardio side, it was a timed run/row format. All of the runs were 90 seconds long with a 30 second push pace, 30 second base pace, and 30 second all out pace. For the bike, I tried to go 1 or 2 resistance levels higher than I normally use since it was so quick. And after those 90 seconds we switched to the rower where we had 3 rounds of 30 second all out rows with 15 seconds to recover between for a total of 2 minutes. We did the treadmill/bike part 5 times and the row 4 times before switching to the floor.

On the floor, it was timed as well and it matched the cardio side. Whenever it was a 90 second round, we were doing a form of burpees. Whenever it was 2 minutes we had ab work following the same pattern as the rower with 3 rounds of 30 seconds of work and 15 seconds to recover. I pulled the bench down to use it for my burpees, but I still had to do some of my burpees stepping back instead of jumping back. The burpees started basic and we added on every round to include things like using weights, doing bicep curls, doing shoulder presses, and doing ultimate burpees. The ab work switched between sit ups and weighted double crunches.

Friday’s workout was a 3 group workout and I was starting to deal with nausea that morning. I used the bike for my cardio to keep the nausea to a minimum. It wasn’t that bad when I started class, but I knew it was probably going to get worse as the morning went on.

We switched between the blocks so I had 2 rounds on the bike, 2 rounds on the rower, and 2 rounds on the floor. On the bike, I wasn’t thinking too much about what I was doing. I just didn’t want to feel sick. I used my normal resistance levels for my push and all outs, but I wasn’t pedaling as fast as I know I can go.

On the rower, we had sprint rows with half squats between each row for the first block and slightly longer rows with calf raises between each row for the second block. My speed on my rows was within the time we were supposed to be at, but they weren’t my best. But I was able to get through my half squats and calf raises quickly so I got a lot of rounds on the rower done.

And on the floor, we had mini-blocks within the blocks. The first block had push ups and plank reaches as a mini-block, pull ups on the straps and triceps on the straps as a mini-block, and plank low rows and pop jacks as a mini-block. And the mini-blocks in the second block were the same but we had them in the reverse order so we didn’t miss out on doing any exercises. I struggled a bit with some of the plank work, but it was much better than I expected I could do.

Saturday was a strength day and a day that my nausea was a bit worse. I was pretty happy to be on the bike because I do know that even with my nausea being bad sometimes I can do some great things with my resistance levels.

And that’s exactly what I did. I was usually higher resistance levels for almost all of my hill work on the bike. I was trying to push myself more than I normally do and there were a few moments that I could do exactly that. And when I was using the resistance levels that I’m used to, I was working on pedaling faster than normal to make up for it. I did have to take breaks to let the nausea pass, but I used those as my regular breaks and then tried to go harder when I was working.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks and the big focus was on doing single arm clean to presses. We had so many of those to do and then we had other exercises between. In the first block, we had 3 rounds of single arm clean to presses with bench overhead extensions, bench sit-ups to jump squats, and a 200 meter row. I had to split up my bench sit-ups to jump squats to crunches and then doing squats because I couldn’t take going from laying down to standing that much. And the second block had single arm chest presses, plank work, and a 200 meter row between the single arm clean to presses. I had to do my plank work using the bench, but it wasn’t the worst workout for me to deal with my nausea.

I know that I probably sound like a broken record because I am always trying to figure out how to tolerate my nausea in my workouts. It’s not something that is easy to figure out, even 2 years into the process. But I am trying to use the 1-2 weeks a month that I have it as a motivation to try to find where I can do better work. I think I accomplished that a bit this past week and I’m looking forward to trying to do that even more this week.

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Back To My Normal Workouts (or Another Challenge Switch)

Posted on December 3, 2018 | Comments Off on Back To My Normal Workouts (or Another Challenge Switch)

After having a shorter workout week the week before, I was happy to be back to my normal workout schedule this past week. My workouts are one of the few super routine and regular parts of my life and when things switch up it feels weird. I know that normally happens around the holidays, but I’m still not used to it. So getting back to my regular schedule was really nice.

Monday’s workout was a strength day, but the inclines on the treadmill were going to be pretty limited so I was going to use the treadmill. I had such a great running day on Saturday the week before and I was excited to keep that going. But I don’t know if it was being of my great running day, the heavy weights I used for squats, or something else but I was seriously struggling on the treadmill. My legs felt like they were so heavy and I had a hard time moving as quickly as I needed to. So I jumped off the treadmill right after the warmup (when I was taking breaks every 30 seconds of so) and went to the bike.

All of our blocks had push paces at no added incline/resistance, push paces at added incline/resistance, and all out paces with no incline for the treadmills with base paces in between. For the base, push, and all out paces with no added incline I used my regular resistance levels on the bike. But for all the incline work, I went to the new higher resistance levels that I had been using recently. Even though we had recovery between all of the all outs, this felt almost like an endurance workout and I was working hard!

On the floor, we had 1 long block but we also had rowing. When we started, we had a 250 meter row and then went to the floor to work on skier swings, uppercuts, deadlifts, high rows using the straps, bicep curls, and plank low rows. The exercises were grouped into 3 mini-blocks each with 2 exercises and we did 3 rounds of each mini-block before moving on. But every time the treadmill had an all out we went back to the rower for another 250 meter row so we did a total of 1,000 meters in the workout. I was using medium heavy weights for all the weighted work and made it through all the exercises by the time class was done so I was very happy with my floor work. Plus, I was able to get my 250 meter row faster every time I did it.

Wednesday’s workout was a signature workout. It’s called Go Row and it is all about timed rowing. Even though I started on the treadmill for my warmup, my group went to the floor first. But since it was a switch class I didn’t feel too weird doing my rowing and treadmill work second with each block.

For the rowing/treadmill blocks, we started on the rower every time. The first block was a 4 minute row, the second block a 2 minute row, and the last block a 1 minute row. The goal was to do at least half of what you did the previous row, and I did much better than half every time. After the rows we went to the treadmill for a quick treadmill workout. The first block was just a push to an all out, the second block was a longer push to a base to an all out, and the last block was another longer push to a base to an all out. I walked my base and push paces but did run all of the all outs. There was so little time on the treadmill that I did want to maximize my time on there so I’m glad I got some running done.

On the floor we had a lot of work using the Bosu. The first block was supposed to be plank leg lifts and knee tucks using the Bosu and I tried doing those at first but it wasn’t working for me. So I did my plank leg lifts on the ground and did sit-ups on the Bosu instead of knee tucks. The second block was running men, hip hinge tricep kickbacks, and single leg V ups on the Bosu. I switched the single leg V ups to sit-ups again due to my hips. And the last block was lateral shoulder raises while kneeling on the Bosu and back extensions on the Bosu and I was able to do both of those exactly how we were coached to do them.

Friday’s workout was another strength day, but it was a 3 group class and the format looked like a good one to do on the treadmill so I skipped using the bike. On the treadmill, we had 3 blocks and they all had a push pace that was supposed to be at an incline and then an all out pace on a flat incline. So I decided to do all the push pace incline work as a power walker and the all out paces as a runner. The 1 minute all out paces did feel a bit long to me, but they were doable. And not worrying about using incline work while running was helpful. Even though I have done a lot of 3 group classes, this seemed to be the quickest 3 group treadmill block I’ve ever had.

On the rower, we had 3 blocks as well and each block started with a distance row. The first block was 200 meters, the second block was 400 meters, and the last block was 600 meters. After the row we had squats using the medicine ball and then we rowed until the block ended. I did make it back to the rower every time and did about a minute of rowing at the end of each block. It was a lot of rowing which was helpful to finish my Orange Voyage challenge (I ended up rowing 24,854 meters in November).

And on the floor, we also had 3 blocks which focused a lot on lower body and abs. The first block had lunges, sit-ups, crunches, and leg raises. The second block added deadlifts to the exercises from the first block. And the last block skipped the abs but we added weighted squats to the lunges and deadlifts. The number of reps for each exercise was pretty low so we were encouraged to go very heavy with the weights. I didn’t go as heavy as I knew I could go because the heavy weight that I usually use for deadlifts was being used by other people and I didn’t want to go even heavier than I’ve ever done.

Saturday’s workout was a power day and the treadmill half of class was really fun! It started as a run/body weight exercise and then switched to a run/row. And it gave me a lot of opportunities to work on my running!

The first round was a .1 mile run and then squats. I ran the entire thing (even though it’s a bit longer than I have been running lately) and that felt awesome. The next round would have been a .2 mile run, but I did it as a run/walk with 45 second intervals and split the difference between the run distance and the walk distance. Then there were more squats. Next was another round where I did it as a run/walk and split the difference between the run and walk distances with more squats after it. Then the distance got longer and I switched to power walking only. After that round we had more squats and then the longest distance we had on the treadmill followed by 200 meters on the rower. I made it back to the treadmill to work on the next distance, but we switched before I finished the distance. I did 3 rounds of running (or run/walking) and 3 rounds of walking which felt pretty good!

On the floor, we had a very unique format. The first 12 days of December are a new challenge with themed workouts at Orangetheory and this one was all about working our way down from 12 reps to 1 rep. We had 4 blocks and each block had 2 exercises. We did exercise 1 for 12 reps, exercise 2 for 11 reps, exercise 1 for 10 reps, and so on. If we made it all the way down to 1 rep, we then held a plank until the block ended. The first block was plank shoulder taps and pop jacks. The second block was squats and hip hinge reverse flys. The third block was lunges and weighted triceps. And the last block was palms to elbows (which I did as plank shoulder taps) and sit-ups. I made it to doing the plank at the end for the second, third, and fourth blocks which is much more than I expected!

I’m excited for this week to see what the challenges will be in the workouts. I know they will be tough, but they aren’t as bad as Hell Week so I know I can do whatever they are!

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A Short Workout Week (or 3 Workouts In 3 Different Locations)

Posted on November 26, 2018 | 1 comment

This past week of workouts was a short workout week for me, but it was also a really amazing week. I technically worked out in 3 different cities (2 of them being my regular LA studios) but I also had my traditional family workout in Sacramento! It was so fun getting to have my family workout in the middle of my workouts this past week and I loved that we were able to continue our tradition.

Monday’s class was at the Brentwood studio (where I go on Mondays) and it was an endurance day, but it was a unique format so it didn’t feel as tough as most endurance days have been in the past for me. We had regular treadmill and floor blocks, but we also had run/floor blocks and row/run blocks. Things were switching up every block so it kept things very interesting and challenging!

I started on the treadmill and the first block was the run/floor block. We started with a 6 minute run for distance and I did run/walk intervals. I did 1 minute of running with 90 seconds of walking. The running was a bit tough because I had been on the bike the week before, but I’m glad I did it. I pushed myself but I didn’t push myself too much. After the run for distance, we moved to the floor where we had work on the Bosu. We had single arm chest presses while laying on the Bosu, crunches, and hip bridges with our feet on the Bosu.

After that, I switched to the rower side where we had our row/run. We started with a 1000 meter row and then had a minute of recovery before going back to rowing to get the meters to 2000 meters. The first 1000 meters were tough, but I only needed 1 break in the middle to catch my breath. The second 1000 meters were much harder and I was taking a lot of breaks. But I got it done and then it was time to be on the treadmill for a 3 minute distance run. After that there was more rowing and distance runs, but the block ended while I was working on the 3 minute distance run so I didn’t get to do that.

Then I was back on the treadmill for 2 more distance runs. The first was 3 minutes and the second was 90 seconds. I wanted to try to run but my legs were tired so I did those both as power walks. And I finished on the floor with a block that had a lot of plank work including side plank rotations, side plank crunches, plank hip dips, and back extensions. The back extensions were tough for me because I had a little nausea and queasiness while doing them, but I pushed through and was fine by the end of class.

I didn’t work out on Wednesday because of being out of town, but I had my Thursday Thanksgiving workout! For the past 4 years (since we started this tradition), we have always done the workout at the La Jolla studio since that is where we went for Thanksgiving. Now that we were in Folsom, we worked out at the studio there. It was so easy to get there because it was right across the street from the hotel we were staying at! So for the first time, I was able to walk to my workout!

Since this was a new studio for us all, we got there early to get things figured out. And as soon as we walked in, we felt super welcome from how amazing the staff was and from the sign they had welcoming my family!

Technically we are the Fry family (this family is my mom’s side), but over half of us in my family in the class have the last name Levin so it worked.

This workout was a 3 group workout that was all partner based. There were 7 of us in my family in the workout, but since I am so used to the workouts I let my family form 2 groups and I partnered with 2 people from the class that I didn’t know. Technically the rower was the pacer, but the floor and treadmill people paced things as well.

The rower started with a 1600 meter row. Every time the rower was back on the rower they went down 400 meters (my group only got through the 1600 and 1200 meter rows). While they were rowing, the people on the treadmill and floor were switching back and forth on their own. The treadmill person had a .25 mile run (I walked) and in the second round it went down to .2 miles. And the floor person had ground to presses, burpees, plank jacks, and high rows using the straps. Whoever finished first between the treadmill and floor initiated the switch between them. And when the rower person was done, someone else went to the rower and the new treadmill and floor person switched between themselves.

It probably sounds more complicated than it was, but fortunately it wasn’t too tough to follow. Some people in my family had some confusion, but it didn’t really matter since they still were working out for the entire class and they had a great time! Some of my family were a bit sore from the workout, but they weren’t used to rowing or some of the floor exercises. Everyone was so happy we could continue this tradition and of course we had to get a photo to add to the collection of Thanksgiving workouts!

I didn’t workout on Friday because I was traveling back home, but I was back at the Culver City studio for my Saturday workout. It was a mix of endurance, strength, and power and it was the perfect way to get back into being in my normal routine. Plus, the workout had a lot of great chances for me to run which was an added bonus!

On the treadmill we had 3 blocks. They all had a push to an all out pace, a walking recovery, 2 rounds of a push pace to a base pace, and then ending with another push to an all out pace. All of the all outs were 30 seconds so I knew I could run all of those but the push and base paces changed with each block. The first block had 1 minute intervals and I did all of them as a power walk. But the second block was 45 seconds and the third block was 30 seconds so I was able to run the push paces in those blocks.

On the floor, we had 1 long block. Every round started with a row, starting with 100 meters and going up 100 meters each round. Then we had clean to presses, sumo squats using weights, double crunches with weights, and mountain climbers on the floor. I tried going heavy with my weights, but I could only do that with the sumo squats. For the rowing, since they were short rows I tried to go as hard as possible. But I might have gone a bit too hard on my 200 meter row because I was so exhausted after that and had to take a bit of time on the floor to catch my breath. But I made it through 3 rounds on the floor so I was happy about that.

Even though this past week of workouts was a shorter one than I’m used to now, it was such a great week. I loved the things I was able to do and I always love working out with my family. My dad and I like to compete against each other with these family workouts, but it’s all in good fun. But when I said goodbye to my parents before flying home I did remind my dad that he’s only got a year to train for next year’s family workout. And I can’t wait until it’s next year and we can do this again. But at least I don’t have to wait a year to do another Orangetheory workout since I’m back to my normal routine this week.

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A Week Of Nauseous Workouts (or Just Doing My Best)

Posted on November 19, 2018 | 1 comment

I knew before this past week of workouts that it was going to be a tough one for me. I knew it would be a week that I would likely be nauseous every day and even though I have found strategies to push through, it’s still not easy to work out when you feel queasy and in pain. This past week did challenge me, but I think I did the best that I could considering the circumstances. But that doesn’t mean that I went easy on myself or didn’t feel frustrated I couldn’t do more.

Monday’s workout was endurance, strength, and power based; but it was also the really bad nausea day for me. I always think I have a handle on the really bad days, but either I was totally unprepared or this one was worse than I usually get on a bad day because it was brutal. I was in enough pain that I guess I looked pretty bad. My coach has seen me have days of nausea before, but this time he had to check in on me to make sure I was really ok. One of my friends in class did the same even though I know he has seen me have occasional bad days over the past 2 years. Obviously because of all this, I was on the bike for cardio.

We had 3 blocks on each side of the room. For cardio, we had a long push pace, a base pace, and then 2 all out paces with a recovery in between. Each block the push pace got longer and the all out paces got shorter. I really tried to stick with my normal resistance levels on the bike, but I know that I wasn’t going as fast as I usually do (even when I’m nauseous) so I didn’t work as hard as could work.

On the floor, each of the 3 blocks had a 300 meter row. We could do them at any point during the block, but I always did them at the beginning to make sure I got it done. I almost always can do a 300 meter row done in under a minute, but this time they were all over a minute. I didn’t care too much since I was just proud for rowing and also not needing to take breaks when I was feeling queasy. The first block on the floor also had burpees and lunges (I did the burpees with my hands on the bench so I wasn’t going to the ground. The second block had squats and lateral squat walks. And the last block had burpees to squats (I split the moves up to make it easier on me) and weighted double crunches. I feel like I worked much harder on the floor than I did on the bike, and that might have been because my anti-nausea medications seemed to have kicked in a little after halfway through class.

I was feeling a bit better by Wednesday’s class, but I was still nauseous. My medication was managing it much better so I was able to do a bit more work while I was on the bike. It was a strength based workout so it was a lot of incline work for the treadmills (and resistance work for me on the bike). Everything in both blocks was based on 45 second intervals. In the first block, we alternated base to push pace and base to incline work. What I did on the bike was use my regular resistance levels for the push paces and higher than my all out resistance level for all the incline work. And in the second block we rounds of all out paces with recovery in between and the all outs alternated between regular ones and incline ones. Again, I used the same plan with my regular resistance when there was no incline and higher than normal for incline work.

On the floor, the first block had bench toe taps, hip hinge reverse fly, and ab work. I can’t do bench toe taps because of my hip issues, but I wanted to get the same type of balance workout so I did single leg squats using the straps for stability. And the second block was deadlifts, bicep curls, hip bridges with weights, and side plank crunches. All of those things were things that didn’t affect my nausea so I was able to do them without modifications and without having to go too low with my weights.

Friday’s workout was a mixture of the different types of workouts, but it really felt like a strength day for me. I was on the bike again and for cardio we had timed runs for distance. The first one was 8 minutes and the treadmills started at 4% incline and went down every 2 minutes. The second one was 4 minutes and the treadmills started at 4% and went down every minute. What I did was use my usual push resistance level the entire time for the 8 minute challenge and a level between my push and all out for the 4 minute one. I didn’t really track my distance so I don’t know if I hit the goals I was supposed to hit, but I know that I was doing much better on the bike than I had been doing earlier in the week.

On the rowers, we had one long block with timed rows with squats and lunges between. The first row was 4 minutes and the second one was 2 minutes. After doing those rounds I decided to just stay on the rower for the rest of the time to get as much distance in as I could for the Orange Voyage and to try to keep my heart rate up since it’s not as easy to do that with the bike.

And on the floor we had drop sets. That means we do a set of 6 reps using a very heavy weight and then immediately after do a set of 12 reps with a lighter weight. We had hammer curls and tricep extensions for the first block and I used 20lb weights for the 6 rep round and 15lb weights for the 12 rep round. I probably could have gone a little higher for my hammer curls, but I was feeling it after both rounds and was a bit nervous I’d hurt if I went heavier. The second block was skier swings and goblet squats. I used my normal weight for the skier swings and went with the 45lb weight for my goblet squats. I was thinking about using the 50lb weight when the reps got lower, but I couldn’t find that weight on the rack and I knew I wasn’t ready for the 60lb or 70lb.

By Saturday’s workout, I was almost back to normal. And when I saw that the workout was a power based class, I really debated pushing myself and going on the treadmill. I wanted to work on my running and the format was perfect for me to do that. But as I drove to the workout I was having some small waves of nausea and I knew that it wasn’t worth it for me to push myself because I wouldn’t be able to do what I wanted to do.

For cardio we had 4 blocks. The first 3 were all short blocks with a push pace, base pace, push pace, base pace, and all out pace. Each block the push paces got a bit longer. Because I was feeling a bit down on myself for not being able to be on the treadmill, I decided to push myself hard on the bike. I kept my base pace the same but I used my normal all out resistance level for my push pace and what I usually use for hill work only for my all out pace. My heart rate really was getting up there but I see that as a sign that I was doing some good work! The last block was rounds of all out paces with walking recoveries. I used the new resistance level for my all out paces and used my base resistance level for the recoveries just allowed myself to pedal slower. This was one of the hardest bike workouts I’ve done and it helped me feel a bit better about not trying to run.

On the floor, we had 3 regular floor blocks and a partner row block. The first 3 blocks all were short and had 2 exercises each. We had pop jacks, lateral raises, skater lunges, chest fly, push ups, and front raises. I wasn’t going that heavy on the weighted work because we had a lot of reps for each. And I used the bench to help with my pop jacks and push ups so I wasn’t putting my hands on the ground. But I did feel really good about my floor work. And the partner row block was the last 8 minutes of class where we partnered with someone else and one of us did 30 seconds on the rower and the other did front raises with the mini-bands. We switched back and forth until class was done.

Considering how bad this past week of workouts could have been, I really did the best I could. I know that I can do better, but that’s when I’m feeling better too. And I’m hoping this week of workouts will be a better one. It will be a shorter one and I’ll have a workout with my family, so I have motivation to work extra hard!

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Not Exactly A Recovery Week (or Working With Different Challenges)

Posted on November 12, 2018 | Comments Off on Not Exactly A Recovery Week (or Working With Different Challenges)

After making it through Hell Week, I was thinking maybe the workouts would be a bit easier this past week. Even if they weren’t necessarily easier, I thought they’d feel easier than the Hell Week ones did. I don’t know if it was because I had some challenges this week or because the workouts weren’t as easy as I thought they would be, but this past week really had some tough workouts!

Monday’s workout was similar to a run/row format but it was more like run/do floor work/row if you have time. I didn’t make it to the rower each time, but I did get at least a little bit of rowing in to add to my total for the month.

On the treadmill we had 3 blocks. Each one had a run for distance, medicine ball squats to press, run for distance, more medicine ball squats to press, and then row until the block was done. Each block the distance on the treadmill went down which is why I made it to the rower for the second and third block. I power walked all the distances since I didn’t want to be too tired from running if I made it to the rower. Plus, since power walkers only do half the distance, I knew I’d have a better chance making it to the rower if I power walked half the distance over running the full distance. I didn’t get a lot of rowing done for those last 2 blocks, but it was at least a little something.

On the floor we also had 3 blocks. The first block was chest presses, lunges, and knee tucks. The second block was hip swings with weights, mountain climbers, and single arm chest presses. And the last block was push ups, running men, and rollouts using the straps. We didn’t have a ton of weight work, but I did go heavier than normal on my single arm chest press. I actually used the same weight that I did for the regular chest press which not what I normally do. But I think that is proof that my core is stronger since I wasn’t feeling off-balance.

Wednesday’s workout was all about rowing! I know this was done to help us get a lot of meters to add to our total for Orange Voyage, but it was more rowing that I feel like I have had in a long time! It was great to get to work on my rowing endurance, but I know that because we did so much that I wasn’t doing that great with my form. And this was a partner workout so I really worked hard to keep working so my partner wasn’t waiting on me for too long.

The first half of class was like a run/row. One partner was on the treadmill waiting for their partner to finish on the rower. On the rower, the first time we were on it we had a 1,000 meter row. The second time we were on the rower we had a 750 meter row. And the third time we were on the rower we had a 500 meter row. My partner was doing the 500 meter row (I had already done mine) when that block was done. When I was on the treadmill I was doing a power walk at my push incline to not go too easy on myself. But when I was on the rower I really tried to go hard so we could switch as quickly as possible.

The second half of class was a floor work/row block. The person on the floor controlled the switch while the person on the rower rowed until they were tagged out. On the floor we had single arm snatches, hip hinge single arm rows, knee tucks to push ups using the Ab Dolly, and crunches. I wasn’t going too heavy on the weight work since I had so much more rowing to do. My partner and I were pretty equally matched as far as timing goes on the floor work, so we were both on the rower for about the same time each round. In the end, I did just over 4,000 meters on the rower during the class!

Friday’s workout was a challenging one for me. First, I was dealing with nausea and that always affects my workouts. I wasn’t as nauseous as I have been before, but it was definitely making me off during most of the workout. But the second challenge we had was that we had to deal with a fire alarm going off! It was a false alarm so we were safe in the building, but for a couple of minutes we were working out to the sounds of the alarm. And after it stopped, the PA system in the studio was down for the first 20 minutes so we didn’t have any music and the coach had to yell so we could hear what to do. We were lucky that the fire alarm didn’t last that long and that the music eventually came back, but it really did make the workout feel different.

On the bike, we had 2 blocks. The first block started with a 1 minute push, 1 minute base, and 30 second all out. Then after we had recovery time we took out the base so we just had the push and all out. After another recovery we just had a 1 minute all out. The second block was the same but in reverse order (so starting with just the 1 minute push). I did use my normal resistance levels on the bike, but I was taking a lot of breaks and moving very slowly the entire time.

On the rower, the first block started with a 300 meter row and then 12 lunges. Then we did a 250 meter row and the lunges again. I was doing the 200 meter row when the time was called on that first block. The second block had the lunges between each row again but we started with a 100 meter row and went up 50 meters each time. Since I hadn’t done a lot of cardio work by going easy on the bike, I only did 2 rounds of the lunges and then stayed on the rower to finish out the block. I was still taking breaks, but I think I did more cardio work doing that than I would have if I did the lunges.

And on the floor, I had to make some modifications since I couldn’t do some of the work. The first block I did lunges (which were modified from the bench jump lunges we were supposed to do), weighted seated rotations on the bench, and rollouts on the straps (we were supposed to do Supermans but I know being on the ground like that makes me feel worse). The second block I did lunges (instead of step ups on the bench), plank shoulder taps using the bench so I wasn’t on the ground (we were supposed to do plank pull throughs with weights), and leg lifts on the bench. When I was switching from being on the bench to standing I had a lot of waves of nausea, so I just took my time and didn’t stress about how many rounds I was going to get done.

Saturday was another day with multiple challenges for me. Not only did I have the nausea to deal with, but Friday night to Saturday morning I didn’t really sleep at all. I rarely have insomnia, but when I do it’s pretty much not sleeping at all. I think maybe that entire night I slept 10-20 minutes. I was exhausted, but I was hoping a workout might wake me up a bit.

It was a strength based class and I was on the bike since it was incline work plus I had my nausea issues. We had 3 blocks and they all had a similar pattern. We had a 90 second push pace, 1 minute base pace, high incline work where all treadmill people were power walkers, 1 minute base pace, and each block ended with a push to all out pace. For the high incline work, the first block was 1 minute and each block added on 30 seconds. I did my normal resistance levels for the regular base/push/all out segments and went to one of the higher levels I have used when there was the high incline work. I have done a higher resistance level, but I really wanted to be able to do the base pace after the resistance and not need a full break. I feel like I did a good job considering the circumstances and was very happy with the work I did on the bike.

On the floor the first 2 blocks both had 2 exercises and a 400 meter row. The first block was shoulder presses and high rows using the weights and the second block was squats to upright rows and deadlifts. I used 15 lb weights for everything except the deadlifts. That’s not a super heavy weight, but the weight I usually use for some of those exercises isn’t a weight they have at the Culver City studio. And for the deadlifts, I started at 30 lbs but it was just a bit too much for me and I went down to 25 lbs. For both 400 meter rows, I was able to finish it in under 2 minutes and managed to be faster on the second row. And the last block on the floor was just the exercises without the row. I was definitely exhausted and ready for a nap after this workout, but I made it through even with no sleep.

I know this week of workouts will probably be a bit challenging for me since I will still be dealing with nausea. But I’m not too upset about it because I really didn’t want to have my nausea time to be during Thanksgiving. Not only will I be with family then, but I have my workout with my family on Thanksgiving morning and I want to do one of my best workouts then! Hopefully I’ll be ready to do some amazing work when I get to work out with them!

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Hell Week To Orange Voyage (or One Challenge To Another)

Posted on November 5, 2018 | Comments Off on Hell Week To Orange Voyage (or One Challenge To Another)

This past week of workouts was split into 2 different Orangetheory challenges. The first 2 workouts were the last 2 workouts for Hell Week. And the last 2 workouts were the first workouts of a new challenge that is lasting all month: The Orange Voyage. It is similar to the idea of Marathon Month where we are tracking the distance we get in all workouts for November. This time, we track all meters rowed and there are different locations we can try to reach.

Monday’s workout was all about inclines and abs. And it was fitting that the name of this Hell Week workout was The House Of The Incline Devil. There was a bit of a mix-up with me getting into class, but fortunately it all worked out in the end for me. I did have to use the bike because there were no more treadmills, but that was perfect because I had already decided that I wanted to do the bike for the workout. I can do so much more with resistance levels than I can do with inclines and I want to take advantage of that!

On the cardio side, we had all incline/resistance work. The first block was 6 minutes of increasing inclines/resistance every minute. I started at my normal push resistance on the bike and went up 1 level every minute. Since I have done some higher resistance levels lately, this wasn’t too bad but it did feel tough. The next both was all power walking work for the treadmills because it was super high inclines. And for the bike, I used all resistance levels higher than I normally would do. Even when I do the high resistance levels, I rarely go above 13. But this time I was going up to 18 and my legs were barely moving while I was working. It was so hard to keep going but I really tried to not take a break during that block since it was only about 3 minutes long. Then those blocks repeated themselves and I tried to match what I had done the first time. But I was glad to get off the bike when it was the halfway mark in class.

On the floor, we had 2 long ab workout blocks and 1 rowing block. For the rowing block, we had a 6 minute row for distance. I didn’t actually look at my distance when I was done, but I’m pretty sure it was under the goal we were supposed to hit. My legs were so tired from the bike earlier in the workout and I had to take breaks during the row. For the ab blocks, they both had the same exercises. We had static crunch scissors, leg raises, Spiderman planks, swimmers, heel touch crunches, regular crunches, and sprinter sit ups. In the first block the sprinter sit ups were at the end of the workout and we had 90 seconds of those (everything else was 60 reps). Then when we did the ab block again we started with the 90 seconds of the sprinter sit ups and then the other exercises were in the reverse order of what we did the first time.

Wednesday was the final day of Hell Week and my 5th Hell Week workout overall! So I earned my Hell Week survivor shirt which is something I strive to do each year. And since it was Halloween, I also wanted to dress up a bit for class. Some of my friends and I were trying to think of a fun group costume for us to do that would be easy enough to work out in, and I had a moment of inspiration during the workout the Friday prior. Since there were 4 of us and there are 4 types of workouts at Orangetheory (endurance, strength, power, and ESP) we could go as the 4 workouts! I had lots of leftover photo paper and lamination sheets from my Halloween costume, so I made us all little signs to wear on our shirts. Not everyone got it right away, but once they did they loved it!

This workout was called The Nightmare From Hell Weeks Past and it took elements from the past few Hell Weeks and put them into one workout. Most of the workouts this one was inspired by were workouts I had done before so that was pretty cool. We had 3 blocks on each side plus a mini tornado workout at the halfway point and at the end of class.

On the treadmill, the first block was 5 minutes of decreasing inclines. I started at 10% and we went down 1% each minute. Even though this was an incline workout, I decided to stick with the treadmill since not everything was inclined based and I wanted to see what I could do when compared to my bike workouts. I wasn’t able to get my inclines as high as we were supposed to do, but I was close. The second block was rounds of 30 seconds at inclines with 30 seconds to recovery in between. I started at 12% and went down 1% each round. We also had a 1 minute all out at the end, but I walked it. And the last block on the treadmill was rounds of increasing all outs (starting at 30 seconds and ending at 75 seconds) with 30 seconds to recover in between. I walked all of these.

The tornado that we had was the same in the middle of class as well as at the end of class. On the treadmill it was a 1 minute all out, on the rower it was a 1 minute row, and on the floor it was 1 minute of sumo squats using weights. For the treadmill, I walked the all out in the middle of class but ran the one that ended class since I had been on the floor prior to that minute.

On the floor, the first block was a 5 minute row for distance. I struggled a bit because my ESP sign on my shirt was bunching up weird (I probably should have just taken it off for the workout but I wanted to keep it on) so my rowing wasn’t as far as it should have been. The next block was doing continuous exercises without stopping between different elements. We had upright rows to front squats to shoulder presses to lunges; and all of these were done holding weights. The idea was to not drop the weights until you finish an entire round. I had to go much lighter than I normally go for rows, squats, or lunges because I needed it to be at a lower weight for the shoulder presses. But because there was no break between what we did it really felt heavier. And the last block on the floor was all burpee work. We had burpees to bicep curls, burpees with plank jacks, and full burpees. I tried my best for the first round because I didn’t have the bench out like I normally do for my hands. It was much harder to do them going to the ground so I had to go slow and use modifications. After that round I decided to just do some elements from the burpees as their own exercises so I could get through them. So I did bicep curls, plank jacks, and push ups until the block was over and we did the last tornado of the workout. It was a really tough day, but the perfect way to end Hell Week!

Friday’s workout was another strength based day and I was on the bike again. I’m really feeling more like the bike is a choice versus something I have to do when I’m not feeling great, so that’s a very positive change for me. We had 3 blocks on cardio where the first block was a progressive push that for treadmills was increasing speed, the second was a progressive push with inclines, and the last was us picking which we wanted to do. What I did was increase my resistance by 2 levels each minute for the first and third block and increased my resistance by 1 level each minute for the middle block. That ended up being a pretty good plan for me and I was using some really hard resistance levels.

On the rower, we did progressive pushes for the first and third block. It’s not easy to increase the wattage on the rower every minute and I had to be very aware of everything I’m doing while rowing to keep the wattage where it is supposed to be. For the middle block, we had rounds of 30 second all out rows with squats between each row. We didn’t reset the rower the entire time we were on there so I was able to get quite a few meters for the Orange Voyage challenge.

And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first one was longer and we had single arm low rows, bench pullovers, plank work, and high rows on the straps. And in the second block we had plank single arm rows and Y-raises on the straps. I tried to go heavy with the weights, but I know that I’ve used heavier ones for those exercises in the past. I just was feeling tired and let that stop me from trying to use the ones I know I can do.

Saturday’s workout was an endurance day and it was also a switch day. So that allowed me to really work on some awesome running and I’m so glad I had that chance! Since it was a switch day, I could really push myself on the treadmill because I knew I’d have the floor in the middle to let me recover.

We had 2 10.5 minute blocks on the treadmill. The first block was 2 rounds of a 3 minute push pace with a 90 second base pace between and ending with a 90 second run for distance. For that block I took the 3 minute push pace and did it as 1 minute run/walk intervals (so 1 minute of running, 1 minute of walking, 1 minute of running). I walked the base paces and ran the final 90 seconds. The second block was 4 rounds of 90 second push paces with 45 second base paces between with a 90 second run for distance at the end. I ran all the push paces and walked all the base paces. It was a lot of running, but it wasn’t quite as bad as I expected it to be.

On the floor, we had 2 blocks that were pretty much the same. The first block started with an 800 meter row and then we had regular lunges, lateral lunges, bench tap squats, and bench sit up to stands. The second block started with the exercises and ended with the rowing. I was using medium heavy weights for the weighted work and I got both of my 800 meter rows done in under my goal time.

Because this month will be the Orange Voyage challenge, I know that there will be a lot of running through November. But with all Orangetheory challenges, I love to see what I can do and push myself. I successfully completed Hell Week, now it’s time to conquer the Orange Voyage!

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Halfway Through Hell Week (or Finding Lots Of Moments To Be Proud Of Myself)

Posted on October 29, 2018 | 2 comments

I’ve made it through over half of my Hell Week workouts! Of my 4 workouts this past week, 3 of them were Hell Week classes. This week I’ll be doing 2 more so I can earn my shirt for being a Hell Week Survivor. I would be doing all these workouts even if I didn’t get a shirt, but getting some swag is an added bonus! I had heard rumors that this Hell Week was going to be much easier or much harder than the past few years, but I tried to go in with an open mind and see what would happen.

Monday’s workout was my one non-Hell Week workout of the week. It was a strength day, but the way it was set up it didn’t feel like a strength day the entire time on the treadmills. So I got to continue working on my running during some of the blocks which was nice.

For the treadmill, the first and third block were the same and the second and fourth block were the same. Blocks 1 and 3 were the blocks that didn’t feel like strength workouts to me. We had a 1 minute push pace, 1 minute base pace, 1 minute push pace, 30 second base pace, and 30 second all out pace. I was able to run my push and all out paces for both blocks and it didn’t seem as hard as I thought it would. 1 minute seems to be the sweet spot for me with running right now. I’d like to get my endurance back up to where it was, but this is better than not running at all. Blocks 2 and 4 were incline based with short intervals followed by single arm snatches using weights between each round. I wasn’t going to run on an incline so I did those as a power walk and I got 2 rounds in each block.

For the floor, we had 3 blocks and they all felt like strength workouts. In the first block, we had single arm low rows with weights and bench sit-up to stands. I wasn’t using my heaviest weights for the low rows, but I was using one heavier than I did earlier this year. And for the bench sit-up to stands, I usually don’t do those with weights but we were encouraged to do so this time so I tried it. It was tough, but I could feel how much harder I was working doing it that way. The second block had one exercise that included lunges, bicep curls, and shoulder presses as one move. I didn’t go too heavy with the weights for that because I knew it would require a lot of balance for me. We also had goblet squats. And the last block had single arm high rows and knee tucks. With all of the blocks, we were supposed to do rowing for distance if we finished the exercises, but I never made it that far.

Wednesday was the first day of Hell Week and the workout was called The Burpee Ring. And that was a pretty fitting name for it. I started on the treadmill but the cardio and floor had the same timing which was an interesting change.

On the treadmill, we had 10 rounds of 90 second run for distance followed by a walking recovery. Half of the walking recoveries were 45 seconds and the other half were 1 minute. My goal was to see if I could run all 10 of the 90 second run for distances, but I also knew that 90 seconds was a bit long for me at this point in returning to running. But I still wanted to try. I made it through the first 4 rounds as a run and then I had to go to a power walk. To continue working hard, when I did the power walking I didn’t do a walking recovery but just brought my incline back to my base incline. I did 4 rounds of power walking and then did the last 2 rounds as a run again. So at least I did more than half of the rounds as a run.

On the floor, we also had 10 rounds of 90 seconds on and a recovery after. For the floor, we had different types of burpees to do and then we had exercises to do during the recovery time. The recovery exercises were pop squats, pop jacks, and squat jacks. I did the pop jacks and squat jacks just as regular squats. We had one exercise per recovery for the 45 second recoveries and all of them combined for the 1 minute recoveries. I usually had about 15 seconds to actually recover each time. And the burpee types were one per round and we had ultimate burpees, rolling burpees, hand-lift burpees, burpees to bench hops, and burpees with palms to elbows. I did all of these with using my bench for my hands so I could jump back and forth and made some minor modifications with a few of them. But for the most part I did them as we were supposed to do. It was exhausting, but that’s the idea behind Hell Week. And my friends and I were so proud of ourselves for finishing the first Hell Week class!

Friday’s workout was called The Haunting Hills, so I knew it was going to be a hill based workout. But it was also a 3 group workout so I was only going to have to tolerate hill work for about 15 minutes before being able to move to the next part of the room.

The treadmill block was one long block that was at our own pace. For power walkers, we started at 12% incline and had a .125 mile walk. When that was done, we had squats with calf raises and then back to the treadmill to do the same distance but we got to bring the incline down 1%. I rarely use higher than 10% incline when I’m power walking, so doing the 12% and 11% rounds were tough on me. But the distance was short enough that by the time I was wondering if I should bring the incline down the round was done.

On the rower, we had a similar format to the treadmill. We started with a 400 meter row and then pulsing half squats. We round we went down 50 meters on the rower and continued to do the squats between each row. I was more focused on form than pace, but I did get all my rows done in below the goal time. I think my form has gotten really solid lately, so I probably should switch to working on my power and speed so I can get my rows done faster. But I also want to make sure that I don’t sacrifice my form for speed when I do that.

The floor block ended up being the toughest for me. I really thought the treadmill would be, but on the floor we had back to back exercises that used the same muscles. The first block started with bicep curls on the straps followed immediately by seated bicep curls using weights. After 2 rounds of those we had 2 rounds of hip hinge low rows with weights and bridge rows on the straps. Doing the second exercise each time was so hard because my muscles aren’t used to having to be used the same way for 2 things in a row. The second block was triceps on the straps followed by triceps with weights for 2 rounds. And we ended with chest fly followed by chest press. For that last round, I had to go much lighter than normal with my weight. But I still felt like I worked just as hard as if I had the heaviest weight I have used.

Saturday’s workout was called The Carnival of Burning Souls, and it was a crazy one! We had 3 sections that had 3 blocks in each one and we switched every time. Each second had a block that was 1 minute, 90 seconds, and 2 minutes. So we would be on the treadmill for a minute, then the floor for a minute, the treadmill for 90 seconds, the floor for 90 seconds, the treadmill for 2 minutes, and finally the floor for 2 minutes. And we did that rotation 3 times!

On the treadmill, everything was basically an all out pace or a run for distance. So I ran for 1 minute 3 times, 90 seconds 3 times, and 2 minutes 3 times. I did run all of it and I was surprised that the 2 minute rounds didn’t feel as bad as I expected them to be. That might have been because I was on the floor right before doing it. We also had 1 last block at the very end which was 90 seconds long that had 2 30 second all out paces with a walking recovery in between. For all the running except those 30 second all outs were at my normal running speed. For the 2 30 second ones, I increased my speed and I think all my previous running that workout helped to loosen up my body because it just felt great to do it!

All of the segments that I ran were a pretty short distance so I didn’t feel like I had run that far. But I am still tracking my mileage in my workouts when I can, and I have never been more grateful for that! When I got home after the workout and added up every segment that I ran, I did just over 1.5 miles in class! It didn’t feel like that at all and I know I ran almost all of that. There was the warmup in the beginning of class for a couple of minutes and some cool downs each round that had walking, but a majority of the time I was on the treadmill I was running and I can’t believe I did that much distance in my cardio!

On the floor, each segment was just one exercise. So we would do that exercise for 1 minute, 90 seconds, and 2 minutes. Doing just one exercise for that long is not easy, but I I tried my best. The first segment was neutral thrusters. I started with a lighter weight than I usually use, but for the 90 second round I had to go even lighter. I didn’t realize how long 1 minute would feel doing the same thing the entire time and I didn’t want to have issues for the other rounds. The next segment was lunges, which I modified by using the bench for stability. And the last segment was push-ups which I modified by doing them on my knees. And at the very end, we had a 90 second block that was doing each of the exercises for 30 seconds. That felt so easy compared to what we had been doing before!

Comparing this Hell Week to previous ones is a tough thing. I think some of the workouts felt easier and some felt harder. And I’m sure I’ll feel the same way about the workouts I have this week. They might be easier because I’m much stronger than I was before and they might be harder because I’m pushing myself more. But either way, I feel like I did some amazing work this past week in my workouts and as silly as this sounds, I’m really proud of myself!

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