Burpees: the exercise you love to hate!!

What makes them so hard IMO is that they a) require lots of hip flexibility and b) require very strong back muscles. It's an exercise, that if not done properly (especially when you get older) can easily lead to injury. Not a reason not to do them, but you just need to be smart about how you do do them.

I typically log my workouts as strength training, even if they're more like circuit training. I tend to like to underestimate calories burned and overestimate calories in so when I do indulge in some of my exercise calories, I still don't go overboard.

And what the hell I just did a 50 minute pretty strenuous yoga workout (Tapout XT, for those that might be in the know. Not exactly the stress-relief yoga type but it does a wonderful job of loosening and strengthening some things. I had to keep taking breaks cuz I'm not used to it anymore and my shoulders were screaming) and MFP gives me less cals for that than strolling walks of 30 minutes. LOL *shakes head*

ScientificExplorerGirl wrote: »

Burpees: the exercise you love to hate!!

What makes them so hard IMO is that they a) require lots of hip flexibility and b) require very strong back muscles. It's an exercise, that if not done properly (especially when you get older) can easily lead to injury. Not a reason not to do them, but you just need to be smart about how you do do them.

Understandable, but you can modify them greatly, as you can with most exercises I hurt my back rollerskating (falling straight backwards and somehow not cracking my head open lol) and instead of the kick back, I put one foot back at a time, then went to my knees, small pushup, one foot at a time back, no jump. Still works you, still gets your race pumping

Yesterdays workout

Squats - 1x5 @ 85lbs, 1x5 @ 95lbs, 3x5 @‌ 110lbs
- sticking here for a while until 110 feels easy. I did 115 in the last couple weeks but felt form was off
-
OHP - 3x5 @ 55lbs, these were tough!! And a side note...baseball hat during OHP was not good! Ha!

DL - 1x5 @ 95lbs, 1x5 @ 115lbs, 1x5 @ 125lbs and 1x5 @ 135lbs!!! (my best yet)

2x10 @ 20lbs on the tricep pulldown thingy
1x10 @ 30lbs on the tripep pulldown thingy

3x8 @‌ 55lbs on seated row

3x10 @ 60lbs on chest flys

Workout done for today. I decided to go before work instead of after so that I can try and catch the morning grit strength class tomorrow. Figured lifting at 11pm then doing strength cardio at 10 am the next day would be a bit of a push. Lots more people at the gym but managed to get what I needed okay (well, except the foam rollers so I skipped that part of warm up). Though I still prefer lifting later because less people around while I'm squatting or attempting to do the pesky rows. Wore my new L capris, which were nice cause unlike my older, bigger ones, I didn't have to pull them up as often, though still had on a big tshirt over them. Might try some day to wear one of the tighter shirts but I don't like the risk of shirt moving up when I'm bench pressing and such.

Workout A

Squat - 5x5 @ 140, it was tough near the end but my back was less cranky than the weight before, so that was interesting. Looks kinda funny with the 45's and then the 2.5's. I may take a picture of it next time, just cause. lol

Bench - 5x5 @ 85, barely. I was worried at the end of more than one set that I'd have an oh *kitten* moment and need to rerack on the lower set. I pushed through but will probably do this weight again. It's the one I failed at before the deload so we'll see if I can push past in a little bit.

Row - 5x5 @ 95, barely. I like the height from 25's more but it's a bit heavy. I'll repeat this weight next time.

3x8 db bench with 27.5 and 3x8 db row with 22.5

Then 40 minutes slow cardio on treadmill.


Now I'm hungry and going to plan out my lunch before I have to get ready for work.

StrongLifts 5x5 / Workout A

Such a great day at the gym. The kind that makes me wish tomorrow were Wednesday so I could go and do it all over again.

Squats -- 1x10 @ 45 (warmups); 1x5 @ 55, 65, 75, 85; 5x5 @ 115
- Since I'm playing with form and depth, I just did a whole boatload of these babies. They all felt really good, actually, and I am confident I am getting as low as I possibly can. As much as I hate to admit it, the extra mass in my hips and thighs may very well be obscuring the visual confirmation. So, I am officially done worrying about getting below parallel. I am going to just keep progressing.
- That said, 115 felt pretty darn heavy by the time I got to my working sets. Do-able, but oof. I'm looking forward to diving back in to fewer warm-ups next time.
- Next tweak is going to be hand positioning. At the lighter weights, I prefer to have my thumb behind the bar, but when I got to the higher sets, I had to switch back to putting my thumb around the bar to take some of the pressure off my upper arms. Since this has been a problem area for a while -- and one of the reasons I couldn't do squats for the first six or so weeks of the program -- I need to figure out what I can do to keep this in check.

Bench Press - 1x10 @ 45 (warmups), 5x5 @ 72.5
- The last reps of the last couple sets felt slightly heavy, but overall a strong showing here.
- I want to start thinking more about my leg drive on these, but need to do some reading to see exactly how to accomplish that and what it will do to my BP.

Barbell Row - 5x5 @ 75
- These felt pretty good. I could definitely tell the difference from last week's 72.5 sets, but that may also have something to do with all the squats. Changing my stance -- straightening my legs a bit and making sure my back is parallel to the ground -- has made a big difference in these.

Accessories:

Bicep Curls / Seated Dips Machine (alternating sets)
- Bicep Curls 2x10 @ 12.5, 1x10 @ 15
- Seated Dips 2x10 @ 90, 1x10 @ 95 (I forgot to go up to 95 in the first 2 sets, so will do 3 sets at 95 next time)

Planks - 1x40 seconds; 1x30 seconds
- Second plank after the adductor / abductor sets

Adductor - 4x12 @ 80
Abductor - 3x12 @ 80
- I think I'm going to stay at this weight for a good long time. I'm viewing these as "support" exercises rather than strength building, so not really concerned about consistent progression. I'll move up when the current weights feel too easy.

Looking forward to hearing all about your workouts this week!

xo,
C.

huh. i know i posted today's wall o text somewhere, but now i can't figure out where. rest assured though, i did my workout.

edit: found it. i got misled by @crabada's squat saga ****************************************************

today's shoeless workout brought to you by 'crud, no shoes packed' and 'gee, i hope they don't catch me and throw me out.' wouldn't normally do it and wouldnt' get away with it at the yuppie gym, but i discovered that the just-regular-folks one isn't feeling the resolutionist rush, plus their weight room is less public ;-) and i wanted to go tonight because it's time and tomorrow is massage day.

it went really well. i'm *really* trying to make myself stuff the ego and live by the rule of 'if you can't lift it, then put it back'. it was fun getting up to 100 last month, but i'm paying out of my own pocket to try and fix these problems and it just doesn't make sense to go straight back and spray any gains that i get out of it up the wall in the gym. and since i feel back on track again i quit with the grab-bag approach and did a straight workout b.

warmup: 7k~ride from work, with hiit mini-sprinting mixed in. since i scaled back on weights the ability to do this is coming back and i really REALLY like the payoffs.

squats: 2x5@45, 1x5@65, 5x5@75. 85 last time, but 75 felt like a great weight today. i'm trying to correct the habit of looking down at my knees/feet to make sure i'm passing parallel, and i want to keep doing that. looking at myself in the mirror makes it easier to keep my spine from twisting and my shoulders from getting out of alignment with one another. i was able to work pretty fast since the weight wasn't deadly, and i isolated a couple of upper-body things to keep improving. when i was done the little kid who'd been waiting to take over from me said i had good form and it's goofy how pleased i was. i watched him do his own squats so i could consider the source of the compliment and he clearly knew what good form looks like, so that made it even better.

ohp: warmup with shoulderblade retraction and pulldown on single-cable bar at 20lbs (would be 40 at the other gym). very positive. for the press i did 5x5@30lbs, but actually i kind of quit counting at some point so i think it was a lot more than 5 sets. it went really well, and i felt like i actually am getting a couple of lightbulbs on form for this one. i somehow found a great physical cue for the chest-up part of it. fingers crossed. tried 40 and it was doable but not easy and i want easy right now because form.

deadlift: i've been floating up and down the weight scale and all over the numbers with deadlifts for months. don't even know where my benchmark working weight is anymore. so today i settled down and got serious. and it was a form-form-form project, for serious. i started at 80, did 5 reps, moved up to 100 and did 5 more, then added 5lbs on each side and did my real set with that. so 110 is my baseline. it was working well enough taht i did consider just going for 45s because basically the whole thing was deficit deadlifting (no bumpers at the bare-basics gym). but the last of the 110 reps was just close enough to almost being a grind, i followed my new rule and called it.

feel really good. obviously it wasn't as challenging a workout as i've been doing, because afterwards i went down to the grocery store (bit of extra mileage), and still had enough gas in the tank for a few extra sprints on the way. post workout: homemade ww bread with butter and apricot jam.

i think i might have been working too hard. post-workout tired is a nice feeling, but this time i actually got that euphoria bulletproof rush thing instead.

Whew, got in a quick one this AM because I had to go home to shower. For once not by my fault. The gym's water heater broke last night and they were changing it this morning xD a nippy -24 out (-32 with windchill, that's celcius) made it a cold one to travel back and forth like this. hankfully I don't live far from the gym

every 20s for 3 mins - power split jump x 2 per leg

4 rounds of
- side step-ups x5 (pistol progression) 2 rounds with a 30lbs KB on the offset side, last 2 with only 20lbs
- 1 arm KB swing snatch x10 / arm @‌ 30
- half hindu push-up x submax (8, 7, 7)

E20Sx3min kneeling jump (on a 45 and a 35 bumper + ab mat) x2

Then 6 min AMRAP of
- 1 arm Power KB Clean x 1, 2, 3...
- burpee lateral hop x 1, 2, 3...
- switch side

got up to 5 and 5 cleans @ 35lbs. I'm a lil sad because i had noted that I did 6 full rounds the last time around (which would've taken me another minute at least). But maybe that was with a light KB or maybe I didn't note properly.

I then did a pretty solid hollow hang from the rings for 35s and decided I was going to build myself up to a minute and then work on the monkey bars because that's a skill I want to have for the mud runs I wanna do this summer

Ah, and added in 5 hang power snatches @ 45 to see if I had the muscle memory still intact. But I was so wiped out it was pretty pathetic. lol

Made it out of the house today but don't know if I'll make it to the gym. Still feeling tired, headachy, stuffed, and grumpy. We'll see how I feel once I get home. Seems that every time I get my squat up to 125, something happens to prevent me from getting to the gym. Boo!

Non-lifting day, so I went and did the Grit Strength class followed by treadmill walking. It's a new routine from before as they change up every once in a while and I missed the first week with this new one as I wanted a day off last week. I may have hit my head again, but this time just the back with the bar so.. yeah. And it involved burpee attempts which I can't do. I still use the wall for pushups so my burpee was put hands to ground, then slowly put legs back to an almost pushup position, then try and get back up. My right elbow is not a fan of those at all. Did lots of clean&press, rows and squats with 30 lbs so it wasn't too bad overall. Though had issues with rows.

However, I talked to the instructor after about the rows and she helped me a little on form. I pull up towards my chest because pulling to my stomach doesn't give much room to pull which leads to me not feeling it where I should (I have a big stomach and can't do knee pushups cause of it still). She had me try a different grip if I'm going to pull up higher as I have been and also suggested I start using two bars in the class so I can lift heavier on the rows. I still struggle to feel it much but she said my form is actually good on them, so I'll take that and keep plugging away.