A little bit of running

Day 3 I slacked a bit on the warm up, I did none. I did start off slow on the run though and was pretty tight for the first 1/4 mile. It is cold as shit out there too which doesn't help. It was 26 degrees when I took off from the house. I ran 2.43 miles in 32:49. Before you go all bat shit on me talking about how slow I was let me finish. At 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 I did the following:

• 20 walking lunges
• 20 tiger crawl
• 20 mountain climbers
• 10 burpees

As you can see I did not do the recommended 5 miles from the workout I told you I was basing this on. I will get there but not yet. I also did 10 rather than 20 burpees, I am a wuss and will punish myself tomorrow. I walked a little to cool down but no stretching. I felt generally pretty good during the run and I think I was doing a bit over 9:00 pace when actually running but it is hard to tell because the split times get all screwed up when you do the exercises in the middle.

Christmas Eve Workout

I did day 2 of the plan I posted yesterday, sort of. I started off with a warm-up of a 400 meter run followed by 3 rounds:

• 10 push-ups
• 10 sit-ups
• 10 PVC arm circles

I then did a bunch of stretching focusing on my back again as yesterday. I figured I might as well be safe and take the extra time. I then did the following workout:

• 3x
• 100 meter sprint
• 8 barbell rows @ 68#
• 8 push press @ 68#
• 2 minute rest
• 3x
• 100 meter sprint
• 8 barbell curls @ 58#
• 8 tricep extensions @ 48#
• 2 minute rest
• 3x
• 100 meter sprint
• 8 hang cleans @ 78#
• 8 slamballs @ 20#

I said yesterday that I had told everyone about my last race a month ago but after going back and looking at the blog it appears I had been lazier with the blog than the workouts. I was working out consistently until a month ago when my sister and I did a 10k relay together in 25 degree weather. As I mentioned I was sick for awhile and jacked my back up again but here I am going at it again. 

As you might notice I switched up the high pulls on the last set for slamballs. I am not a fan of high pulls after reading a few articles by PT's about how they measure shoulder impingement and that the move is much the same and how they would not suggest doing that move under much load. I also was not a big fan of the pairing of that with cleans. I would rather pair something that works a little different set of muscles, not sure I did real well with slamballs on that but I felt it was better than high pulls. You may also notice my weights are pretty low starting out this new workout, especially on squats yesterday. As I mentioned I am coming off a tweek in the back and a month break so I figured I will ease in a bit. Finally you might notice there was a finisher in the workout for both day 1 and day 2 that I skipped. I will work my way up to that but again I figure I will ease in. Wait until you see how much scaling I do on day 3.

Finally Worked Out Again

If you recall all that long time ago when I did that 10k relay with my sister I mentioned I had a chest cold. I was having a hell of a time breathing and was coughing like I still smoked or something. I could not shake that thing for the longest time and I tried some running a couple times but I really could not get any air once I started working out so I figured I would just give it a week or two. Well just as I was getting better we had a snow and ice storm here and I slipped and went feet up on the street in front of the house and hurt my back. I was out of commission for a bit longer with that and finally now felt like I could get back at it. I think it has been just about a month sincce I did any regular sort of workout.

I started off with a warm-up of 200 jump rope singles followed by 3 rounds:

• 10 push-ups
• 10 sit-ups
• 10 PVC arm circles

I then did a bunch of stretching focusing on my back. I figured I might as well be safe and take the extra time. I did three supersets as follows for the workout:

• 5 sets of 3
• back squat @ 118#
• box jumps (weight bench)
• 3 sets mixed reps
• kettlebell swings @ 35# 20 reps
• pull-ups 5 reps
• dips 8 reps
• 3 sets mixed reps
• farmers walk @ 45# each arm for 40 paces
• hanging knee raise 10 reps

I was certainly a bit out of it today after so long off but it felt good to get back at it. I am going to modify a Spartan beast workout plan I found a bit and work that for the next couple months I think. It is based on 4 days a week of work with day 1 being strength based, day 2 is anaerobic, day 3 is running, and day 4 is muscle endurance. Day 3 is supposed to be trail running and I will do some of that but I will also do road running and probably mix in some work wit a 50# pack as well. I have some thoughts on some other modifications as well but we will see. Mostly I just want to keep it interesting. I actually did not do all that was prescribed for today but it is pretty aggressive and seeing how I am coming off a month break I figure I will work up to the workouts over a couple weeks. The plan I am basing this on is here if you want to have a look.

Good to be back at it.