April 30 - Practice Jog

Just a quick (around 20 minute) easy paced jog at Wonder Boy's soccer game tonight.

My legs are still pretty stiff from the soccer game, but it was good to get moving like this. I always enjoy these runs at practice. The trails are nice. We had a good breeze tonight. And at the end, I got to sit and watch Wonder Boy and his team practice for the tournament this weekend.

I call this a WIN for me!

April 29 - WOD

After yesterday's soccer game, today we went looking for a WOD that didn't have a strong cardio component. This is what we ended up with:

Shoulder Presses:
1 - 45#
1 - 65#
1 - 75#
1 - 80#
1 - 85#

Push Presses:
3 - 85#
3 - 90#
3 - 95#
3 - 100# (PR!)
3 - 110#

Jerk Presses:
5 - 75#
5 - 77.5#
5 - 80#
5 - 85#
5 - 90#

You know what's coming next, right?! This WOD left my shoulders just quivering! But I'm happy with my results. I hit a new PR on the push presses and kept on going! I may ride that high all night. :+)

April 28 - Last Gasp

Aye yi yi!

Tonight's soccer game nearly did me in! We got stomped (of course). But worst of all, it wasn't a lot of fun.

It's not the losing that is so irksome. We routinely do that and I tend to have a fabulous time anyway.

Most games I spend in the back field with my good buddy on defense. We play our hearts out, but we laugh at our old legs along the way. We have fun, we run, we play, and we get in a heck of a workout during the process. It's why I signed up in the first place.

But tonight wasn't fun.

Let me remind you that we play in an "over 30" division. Except it's not STRICTLY for "mature" players. Women of any age or skill can play in our division. And male novices of any age can play too.

There are always a few women who are closer to Wonder Boy's age than mine on the pitch. And while that is irksome in itself, tonight was just worse. Insult to injury. Salt rubbed in an open wound.

The other team not only had a young girl (not long off of her COLLEGE squad) but a young punk of a goalie who routinely took to dribbling the ball up the field all the way to our goal. HE SCORED EVEN. Our team was no match - either in age or skill. And having some KID show off like that over and over was just too much.

I felt very much like letting my inner 2 year old come out and stomping off the field.

But it WAS the final game of the spring season, so I gutted it out, gritted my teeth and only complained once out loud.

I *really* think the league should have a strictly over 30 division. Even young kids who have never played before can run circles around us and that is how we (of the Injured Reserves) end up on the IR list - trying to chase them down. *sigh*

I'm going to bed now. My legs are sore and my spirit is heavy. But I have every intention of being back out there come fall.

SO THERE!

April 27 - a rare gym appearance

We've been enjoying our garage WODs so much lately that we haven't been to the gym very often. We've stopped by there to walk/run when the weather has been bad, but we haven't been on the gym main floor much.

Today we decided to take advantage of it though. Wonder Dad is still nursing a calf strain and I've got a soccer game tomorrow, so we didn't want to run. So off to the gym we went!

Today's workout looked like this:

Leg Extensions:
I did 6 sets of 10 reps at the following weights:
108#, 144#, 168#, 192#, 216#, 240#

Pulley Rows:
I did 3 sets of 10 reps at the following weights:
105#, 120#, 135#

Standing Leg Curls:
I did 2 sets of 10 reps at 45# (each)

Incline Dumbbell Bench Press:
I did 3 sets as follows:
30# (10 reps), 50# (7 reps), 50# (4+2 reps)

Seated Shoulder Press:
I did 2 sets of 10 reps at 25# (each)

And that, as they say, was that.

It was a good workout. We both felt pushed physically. And we hit the muscles in a different way than our WODs have been hitting them. I'm already sore - especially in my chest and shoulders. Hopefully it won't be too bad for tomorrow's soccer game. It's the last one of the season.

April 26 - WOD

I know I sound like a broken record, but ....

When we were writing down today's WOD, we both caught ourselves saying "is that it?"

I should have known. I should have known RIGHT THEN that we were in for more than we bargained for.

So ... without further whining ... today's WOD looked like this ...

Five rounds (for time) of the following:
7 - Pull Ups
7 - Dips
400M Run

The pull ups/dips combo we did like this... 1 pull up, 1 dip. This is our "work around" for not yet being able to do muscle ups. My chest is quite sore - we haven't done dips in a while and I could feel it from the very first set.

The run wasn't a lot of fun either, but that got better with each round. It was probably the hottest it's yet been this spring and I felt it. But on the whole, the run felt OK.

I'm not terribly happy with my time (24 minutes and 11 seconds) but I guess not every WOD is going to feature PRs.

We followed this up with 20 knees to elbows. I am really liking the hanging straps we got for this exercise!

I'm kinda glad Wonder Boy's piano lesson got cancelled because I'm wiped out now. Time to find the couch and stay there a while.

April 24 - WOD

To say I don't feel like working out today is an understatement. I left work with a migraine and my legs are still sore from Momnday's WOD. But after a 2 hour rest, my headache was down to a dull roar so I felt obligated to do something.

You know, it's days like today that I can really appreciate working out at home. With me feeling on the puny side, if I had to pack up and go to the gym, I would probably just call it off. But since all I had to do was walk to the garage, I was able to work myself up for the effort.

Today's WOD, thankfully, was not a cardio killing WOD. Instead it was more of a strength day. Today's feature exercise was my favorite (NOT), overhead squats.

My seven sets went like this:
1: PVC bar
2: 45# bar
3: PVC bar
4: 10# bumper
5: 10# (5# plates)
6: 10# (5# plates)
7: 45# bar

We finished off with 20 knees to elbow.

My struggle with OHS continues. But I feel like I'm making progress. I guess I just have to keep at it. Hopefully soon this exercise will start to feel more natural.

So while tonight's WOD wasn't super intense, I am pretty pleased with my efforts anyway.

April 23 - Brisk Walk

Despite our good intentions w/ the "break in" WOD yesterday, I still feel a bit more "broken in" than I would like. So rather than moan and complain my way through a neighborhood jog, we decided to keep it to a brisk walk. And we were rewarded with a brisk, cool breeze as we walked thanks to a rare late April cool front blowing in.

Hopefully our lawn will get some rain out of it later on as well. BONUS!

April 22 - Inertia

Today's WOD was all about overcoming Newton's 1st Law of motion that says "An object at rest will remain at rest unless acted on by an unbalanced force."

Lately we have most certainly been at rest. It started with an injury. And then we added a mega killer WOD. And then we topped all of that off with a few 14 hour work days.

Bottom line - our bodies needed a break. And so we were forced to take it easy.

But today we made up our minds to break the cycle of inertia (where rest breeds more rest). So our break in WOD featured this:
3 Rounds for time of the following:
400 M run
50 - Squats

My first run was down right pathetic. But things got better as my body warmed up. And in the end, I finished in 15 minutes & 37 seconds.

We finished off our efforts with push ups (I did 30), sit ups (I did 50), and knees to elbows (I did 20).

All in all, it feels good to be "in motion" again. Hopefully we can keep it up for a while.

April 18 - Ginger Steps

After Tuesday's WOD, all I could manage today was a 15 minute leisurely stroll on the treadmill. I am even more tender and tired than yesterday. *sigh*

I guess I was a bit over zealous in pushing through all 10 rounds of that WOD on Tuesday. And I'm paying for it in spades right now.

To be honest, right now ... I just hope I can move enough to play soccer on Sunday.

April 17 - Ouch!

After all those dead lifts yesterday, I knew I would be hurting. But as today has passed, I have grown more and more sore by the minute. And now ... now I hurt.

We did the math and all of those dead lifts account for lifting 20,250 lbs in one evening!

After that Herculean feat, today we took things at a slower pace. We walked about a mile and a half around the neighborhood. I was hoping it would help to loosen up my legs, but no luck there.

Hopefully we'll be able to move enough for tomorrow's workout.

April 16 - WOD

I'd like to start this post w/ a hearty "HECK YEAH!"

Thank you for bearing with me for that. :+P

Today's WOD called for 10 rounds (timed) of the following:

15 - Deadlifts (135#)
15 - Push Ups

Take a minute and do the math. That equals 150 dead lifts. 150 DEAD LIFTS. 150 push ups too and we all know what that says for my shoulder.

But it was the dead lifts that frightened me. When I went to write it up on the white board. I left a spot to record our time and then I added a line to record the number of rounds ... just in case I couldn't handle the 10 rounds that were prescribed.

However, as you might guess by my earlier exclamation, I FINISHED ALL 10 ROUNDS! WHOOP!

We capped off the WOD with 15 knees to elbows. That was literally all I could manage. I'm hoping to be able to bump that up by a few reps in the near future.

And as Forest Gump like to say, "that's all I have to say about that." Except, of course, I'm not Forest Gump, so on we go.

Sorry, I don't know what has gotten into me today.

I do want to add that it took me 17 minutes and 47 seconds to complete all of this. And quite honestly, it was not the dead lifts that did me in. It turned out I should have been much more concerned about the 150 push ups. I managed to power though most of the dead lifts with hardly a pause. In fact, I was in my 9th set before I went unbroken. The push ups .... well .... even my first set had to be broken up in to 2 sets. I know. I'm lame that way.

The other thing I want to add is about my SHOES!!!!! I'm still lifting in the Innov-8 F-lite 185s. And I love them more with each passing WOD. I still haven't done any ballistic motions with it yet (i.e. box jumps or jump rope, etc) but I did 150 dead lifts today (I still can't believe I'm typing that) and not a single cramp in my feet! These shoes are worth their weight in gold - actually, they're worth at least TWICE their weight in gold (they're very light shoes).

If you are an over pronator like myself, these are THE shoes to lift in! Even lifting bare foot had my feet aching, but I am powering through the workout without the pain in these shoes. THEY ROCK!

And I guess NOW, I can be like Forest and keep mum for the rest of the night (at least on this particular subject). I suspect tomorrow you'll hear me moaning about how sore I am feeling, but as of right now, though I'm completely worn out, I'm a happy camper.

April 14 - 50/50 play

It's soccer night. And that means I'm worn out. But in that good way that means I actually got my bum up off the couch and made it to the game on-time.

That was more of a struggle for me today than usual. I'll admit it. I wanted nothing more than to camp out on the couch. A plate of cookies wouldn't be refused either (& I even had them on-hand). *sigh*

But our team has been so short handed as of late that I didn't want to add to that. So we did what we were supposed to do - and got up off the couch.

The game turned into a good news/bad news affair.

Good news: we actually had enough players show up that we had a couple of substitutes on the sidelines!

Bad news: Wonder Dad was hurt not 2 minutes into the game. It's actually the same injury he got in last week's game. When he was able to run on the treadmill yesterday we thought he'd at least be well enough to play goalie. But alas, it just wasn't meant to be. He spent the rest of the game on the sidelines with Wonder Boy coaching and cheering.

Good news: the team matched up well against us. There skill level was pretty similar and there were not a lot of young players on their roster. It's always more fun when that happens.

Bad news: we lost anyway. We had a lot of opportunities to score, but today was just no our day and we ended up on the low end of the score sheet.

Do I regret getting up off the couch? Not entirely. I mean, for me personally, no. I do not regret it a bit. I need to get up and get moving more often. But I do feel bad that Wonder Dad is hurt again.

I guess it's just that kind of 50/50 day.

April 13 - Treadmill Time

Today we got some quality time on the treadmonster, I mean treadmill.

We both took it easy. Wonder Dad is still nursing that injury from Sunday's game. And I'm a little wobbly after all those thrusters yesterday.

So we started easy. Just a walking pace. Then we ramped it up here and there and got in about 15 minutes of tread time. I completed just over 1 mile. I can live with that for today. Got the soccer game coming up tomorrow, so I'm sure I'll get plenty of leg work in then.

And as an aside, I'm still loving to run in my Brooks Pure Flow shoes when on the treadmill. :+)

April 12 - WOD

Tonight's WOD is pretty straight forward:

Record the time it takes to do the following:
45 - Thrusters (75#, for me)
45 - Pull Ups

Straight forward? YES. Easy? Heck no!

I know, same song, different day, no? I'm nothing if not consistent (in this regard anyway). It was tough; very, very tough!

The thrusters are hard on your whole body, taking you from standing, through a front squat, and all the way back up to an over head press. That's a full body work out right there. Then we added the pull ups. I managed the first 35 or so in groups of 3 to 5 reps. But the last 10 I had to resort to jumping up to the bar and lowering myself under as much control as possible.

I guess I should be happy that I'm now able to put together 3 to 5 reps at a time when just a few months back I was jumping for each rep. But I'll admit I'm a bit disappointed that my body wore out like that.

In the end, my time was 10 minutes and 43 seconds.

And we finished up with 15 knees to elbows. After all of those pull ups and then the knees to elbows, my core got a heck of a workout tonight. Going to be feeling this one for sure tomorrow!

April 10 - WOD

Today's WOD we're calling the Dead Lift Ladder.

The idea was to do 7 sets of only 2 reps, untimed, of increasing weight.

My ladder looked like this:
set #1: 135#
set #2: 185#
set #3: 205#
set #4: 225#
set #5: 235#
set #6: 245# (a new PR!)
set #7: 235#

I almost didn't get the new PR on set #6. It took every ounce of energy I had to straighten myself up for that weight. And after the first rep, I wasn't sure I could do another. But I managed to squeak it out. I tried to stay there for another set, but just couldn't get the bar up again, so I dropped back.

On the whole, I am not displeased with this effort. My back is going to be complaining tomorrow though. Ham strings too.

Just the price you pay, I guess.

April 8 - WOD

When picking out a WOD for today, we were hoping to find something that wouldn't hit the legs as hard as the last work out. We've done this one before. Our times were not a lot better or a lot worse, so I guess, even though we're still feeling the last workout, we're holding our own.

Anyway ... today's WOD is one of the named workouts. It's called "Barbara" and each round looks like this:
20 - Pull Ups
30 - Push Ups
40 - Sit Ups
50 - Squats

You get a 3 minute rest between rounds and you are supposed to record your time for each round. My times looked like this:

Round 1: 4 minutes & 45 seconds
Round 2: 4 minutes & 52 seconds
Round 3: 4 minutes & 28 seconds

Technically, you are supposed to do 5 rounds. But today all we could eek out was 3 rounds.

On the whole, I guess I'm not overly disappointed with my performance. The last time I did this workout, all of my pullups were assisted/jumping. Today I managed to knock out most of the pullups without assistance. I did them in groups of 2 or 3 at a time, but I did them. I'll take that kind of progress ANY day.

April 7 - Pain on the Pitch

Tough, tough game tonight. We only had 6 players show up, which means we played down a man the entire game. NOT fun.

On the up side, we actually won this game. How that happened, I will never fully understand. I feel like they played better, but I guess some times it's better to be lucky than good.

On the down side (WAY down), we had even MORE injuries. In fact, of the 6 players that walked out onto the pitch, only ONE PERSON walked off after the game w/out a limp. Wonder Dad and I were both among the wounded warriors. I took a charge late in the game that knocked me flat and already a HUGE bruise is coming up on my knee. And somehow, in all of that, *I* drew the foul. Doesn't seem right.

Wonder Dad is much worse. He strained his calf. But since he knew we were already so short handed, he played goalie in the second half. And I'll be danged if he didn't shut out the other team!

What can I say? I married well!

Hopefully we'll both be able to make it back on the field next week. And hopefully a few more of our players will make an appearance as well!

April 6 - WOD

Today's WOD is one of those that, when you look at it written out, you think "is that all?"

But then, when you are laying on the ground afterward gasping for air, you say to yourself "when will I ever learn?"

Today we did the following:
20 - Kettle Bell Swings (44# for me)
30 - Toes to Bar
400M sprint

Those 3 simple things took 7 minutes and 26 seconds for me to complete. SERIOUSLY! And it took probably twice that long before I could get up and get moving again.

I am constantly amazed at how even a simple looking WOD can make me feel muscles I never knew I had.

If you have never tried "Toes to Bar" ... try it ... and see if I am not right! :+P

April 4 - WOD

There's no soccer game tonight (for a change), so we thought we'd take the opportunity to try the 13.5 Open WOD.

This one was a bit tricky to understand, but it goes something like this:

Each round is broken into 2 exercises:
15 - Thrusters (65#)
15 - Chest to Bar Pull Ups

The goal is to do as many reps as possible (AMRAP) in 4 minutes. But here comes the tricky part. IF you manage to complete at least 3 sets (90 reps total) in that 4 minutes, then you get an additional 4 minutes to keep going.

If by the end of 8 minutes, you have done 6 sets (180 reps), then you get another 4 minutes, etc.

The is pretty comfortable for me, but I knew the pull ups would be difficult (& they were). I managed 59 reps in the first 4 minutes. So yes, that means I did not get an additional 4 minutes to keep going.

As you can guess, I was gasping for air and falling to the floor at the end of my 4 minutes. FOUR minutes. But it was a kick butt 4 minutes.

Enough said. :+P

April 1 - WOD

Today's WOD is another one that just features a single exercise: thrusters.

I wasn't really looking forward to this as we hit the shoulders pretty hard yesterday with all of those clean and jerks, but I guess that is just how it goes. There's no such thing as an easy WOD and almost all of them hit the whole body in one way shape or form (there is no "leg day" or "arm day", etc).

The one good thing about today's WOD is that there is no time component. The idea is to work strength and form, so no rushing through it today. This WOD is broken in to 7 sets of only 2 reps. The idea is to keep increasing the weight with each set and to hit a PR near the last set or two.

My thruster WOD looked like this:
set 1: 2 @ 75#
set 2: 2 @ 80#
set 3: 2 @ 85#
set 4: 2 @ 90#
set 5: 2 @ 95#
set 6: 2 @ 100# (this was a new PR for me)
set 7: 2 @ 105# (another PR)

I was pretty pleased with the new PR. I struggled to complete the move in both of those last 2 sets, but I was able to lock out my arms and finish, so I'm pretty happy.

Again, my new lifting shoes performed great and my feet were not cramping at the end. So I'm feeling better about having splurged on them now. I hope they hold up as well when we get to box jumps and/or jump rope exercises.