This past week of workouts was a really good week for me. They were good workouts, I was not dealing with any nausea, and I had lots of opportunities to work hard. These weeks are the weeks that really help me feel amazing about the hard work I’ve been doing and I love them!
Monday’s workout was a strength day and it was a pretty standard strength workout. Lots of incline/high resistance work and lots of opportunities to work on weight work. Even though I loved all the themed workouts the week before, I was equally as happy to see one of the more standard workouts that I also love.
On cardio, we had 2 blocks. The first one was base work with no hill work and base work with hill work with an all out at the end. Even the all out had hill work which is not too common. I was playing around with the resistance levels on the bike to see which ones felt like the right levels for me. It was a bit tough to figure it out because the hill work was so quick, but it gave me a bit of an idea of what I want to use next time. And the second block was a 5 minute hill with the incline/resistance level going down every minute. I was able to plan it out so that the last minute was going to be at the resistance level between my push and all out levels. I needed to make that last minute a bit easier because my legs were so tired by the end of the 5 minutes.
On the rower, we had 2 blocks but they were very similar. The first block started with a 1 minute row and then we had lunges with medicine ball rotations. After that, we repeated the distance we did with the first row and had more lunges between each round. And the second block was the same idea but we started with a 30 second row. And on the floor, we had one long block. We had deadlifts, side lunges, regular lunges, crunches on the Bosu and Spiderman planks on the Bosu. I wasn’t using my heaviest weights for the deadlifts, but they were only one weight down from my heaviest. And I did go heavier for the weight on my side lunges.
Wednesday’s workout was a mix of endurance, strength, and power. I feel like each section of the room was a good mix of those 3 things and it made for a really tough class!
For cardio, we started with a 90 second push pace to a 60 second base pace. Then we repeated that and the goal was to maintain what we were able to do the first time. Then we had our hill work. We had all outs with hills (again, not something we normally do) and each round the hill went down. I was trying to keep my resistance levels on the bike above my normal all out level for all the inclines, but by the last one, I had to drop down to the level between my push and all out. The high resistance levels are really tough, but I’m getting more motivated to work on them.
On the rower, we started with an 800 meter row and then we had squats to shoulder presses with a medicine ball. Each row went down 200 meters and we had the same squats to shoulder presses each time between the rows. I was struggling more than I expected with the rowing. I don’t know what I didn’t have the same endurance that I’m used to, but I had to take a lot of breaks with each row. It was really weird and I just had to be ok with it and keep going.
And on the floor, we had 2 blocks. The first block was shorter and was using the bench. We started with being in a plank position on the bench and then we had single arm reverse fly using weights. And then we had sit-ups on the bench to squats. I really can’t do the sit-ups to squats in a single movement because when I’m on the bench my feet don’t really touch the ground. So I split up the movements and did all my sit-ups and then stood up and did all my squats. And the second block was all mini-band work but the mini-bands were around our arms so that was much better for me. We kept the mini-bands in the same spot the entire block and we had hammer curls using weights, scissor kick crunches with our arms up, and plank in and outs. My arms were really sore in the best way at the end of the workout because of all the mini-band work.
Friday’s workout was another strength day. I think being on the bike has made strength days a bit easier for me since I struggled with the inclines on the treadmill so much. I do struggle with the higher resistance levels on the bike, but not as much as I did with inclines. We had 3 blocks for all 3 sections of the room. The blocks were 2 1/2 minutes, 3 1/2 minutes, and 5 minutes. And each block within a section of the room was pretty similar.
For cardio, we started with a 1 minute hill, 1 minute base pace, and 30 second all out. We had the same pattern for the second and third blocks but the second block had a 2 minute hill and the third block had a 3 minute hill. My 1 minute and 2 minute hills were above my normal resistance levels and I did the 3 minute hill at my normal all out level. It was very tough to do 3 minutes with that high of a resistance level, but I felt so amazing when it was done and I realized I was able to do it!
On the rower, we had the same assignment for each block. We had rounds of 150 meter rows and then we were supposed to do lunges with tricep work using a medicine ball. I don’t mine doing lunges between rows if I don’t have to do that too often. But when we have to do lunges more often I really can’t do them because it’s hard for me to step in and out of the rower. So instead of the lunges, I did squats which worked out fine for me.
And on the floor we sit-ups, toe reach crunches, low rows using weights, shoulder presses with weights, and sumo squats. For the second block, we added torso rotations and all the weighted work was 2 rounds instead of 1. And for the last block, we added double crunches and had 3 rounds of the weighted work. I was able to go heavy with my sumo squat weight but not as heavy as I would have liked to for the other work. But I also know my arms were tired by the time I was on the floor because of all the tricep work on the rower.
Saturday’s workout was an endurance day. It was nice to have a break from all the strength work I had earlier in the week, but that didn’t mean the workout was any easy. It was still really hard and challenging and I got to test myself.
For cardio, we had 3 blocks. The first and last block were both 4 minute distance challenges. The second block was to do half the distance from the 4 minute challenge and then do squats until time was callled. For the second block, I cheated a bit and just did another challenge for time because I didn’t want to get off the bike. But for all of the blocks, I did the entire thing at my push pace resistance level. It was so hard to do that for 4 minutes at a time, but it was a great boost to my self-esteem when I found out I could do it.
The rower also had 3 blocks. The first and last block had a 90 second row, squats, a 45 second row, squats, and then to row until time was called. The middle block was a 3 minute row for distance. I was worried that I would struggle with the 3 minute row, but I did it without needing to take a break which was another boost to how I feel like I’ve been doing.
And on the floor, we had one long block. We had weighted chest presses, push-ups, triceps on the straps, plank work, single leg bicep curls with weights, and hip bridges with weights. It was a lot of work and my muscles were getting so sore after completing each round. I did take breaks when I needed to and I was still able to get almost 3 rounds done before the workout was done.
I really felt so accomplished after this past week of workouts. It’s so nice to just have a great week with lots of awesome work. I need these to make me feel better when I’m having a bad week. And I’m so glad I have this one in my recent memory since this week may be when my nausea kicks back in.
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