What Was Your Work Out Today?

Elliptical Interval setting 150 minutes for 9.94 miles.

Did 2.5 mile treadmill walk yesterday at 15% incline. Then the wife wanted to go for a walk on the local bike trail. Only did a mile or so more.

One hour elliptical, hills. Yesterday's eating turned out to be a lot less than anticipated for the Super Bowl. Twenty years ago I would've finished off an entire pizza by myself; this time I was stuffed after 3 slices.

Legs and glutes today!
15 minute incline walk
Leg press
RDLs
Deadlifts
KB sumo squats
Glute bridges
Glute kickbacks

Physical therapy appointment in the afternoon with a new PT. Stationary bike, 60' (88W) + 3' CD (81W), Z2. Had thought about doing another short machine row before the bike, but wasn't feeling it after the PT. Will do home PT exercises before bed.

One hour of "hills" on the treadmill. Turns out not all treadmills are built the same. The ones I've been using for the last few weeks can adjust incline all the way to 30 degrees. But they were all in use when I got to the gym this morning, so I jumped on a different row. It wasn't until I was already 15 minutes into my workout I learned these are capped at 15 degrees, half the incline of the others. There goes my plan, have to improvise on the fly. Instead of hills where I adjusted incline, I kept the incline constant and instead made the movement easier or harder by adjusting the speed.

Yesterday I was talking with a coworker who shares a love of lifting and knows about my stricture against lifting due to my elbow. He mentioned how I was obviously losing weight around the waist and neck (yay!) but it was also apparent my upper arms were smaller also, as they aren't quite filling out the sleeves of my shirt like they used to (boo!). Now I really can't wait until start of April, when I not only can resume lifting but will stop actively trying to lose weight. Not sure yet if I'll actually join my coworker in bulking or simply eat maintenance, but at least I won't be losing any more hard-earned muscle!

Sunday
I lifted, doing:

• Bench: 3 sets of 5, 60 kgs. It looks like this is the heaviest I've done for a while. Lol I'm weak. At least I can still bench bodyweight (I am currently 64 kgs, 141 pounds).
• Squat High bar: 3 set of 5, 80 kgs.
• Hangboarding
• Pull-ups: A shed load.

Monday
Climbing. It was fun. The gym had reset. I got some pretty hard slab, and in the room which had not been reset, some new overhanging routes. 90 minute session.

Never made it to the gym, on account of a blizzard. But an hour of shoveling snow, plus an hour of deep cleaning inside the house since we weren't going anywhere, will burn just as many calories as a good gym session.

Physical therapy session this afternoon. The new guy is having me do harder things, subjectively speaking. (This is fine with me, and it feels like they're reasonable things.)

I'm getting a certain amount of amusement out of the arm-bike warm-up, 4' forward then 4' backward. It estimates METS and watts, which is sort of interesting. I'm about 10w stronger (+25%) in the reverse (pull) direction, not surprising why after thinking about it.

This evening, the usual stationary bike, 60' (91W) + 3' CD (80W), about 1/4 Z3 and 3/4 Z2 except for a few seconds at start-up. I guess I was tired: It took a surprising amount of intention to get through the workout even at that low watt/HR level tonight, legs felt fatigued . . . well, all of me felt fatigued kinda. Maybe it was the short sleep last night? Dunno.

Still need to do home PT exercises before bed.

nossmf wrote: »

Woke up early to get to the gym by 5, note on the door said they wouldn't open until 8. No explanation given, but not a delay I could afford to wait. Went home, showered/changed, and got to work early. No cardio for me for the second day in a row, which bizarrely enough I actually WANTED to do today. For years as an avid weightlifter, I dreaded cardio day as a necessary evil to endure and get out of the way...now, this morning I was disappointed I could not do cardio. What is happening to me?!?

Uh oh, @nossmf, this is the first sign that you are approaching the slippery slope leading to cardio bunny status! It's not too late though, since early diagnosis is the key to managing the disease.

So as long as you don't start buying skin tight brightly colored Lycra workout clothes, or tracking your workouts on social media platforms like Strava, Training Peaks or Garmin Connect, I'd say there's still hope for a full recovery.


My recovery from surgery has been slower than I'd hoped for, since I had a reaction to the betadine solution used on my abdomen and I still have a lingering cough and congestion. Antibiotics haven't really knocked out the symptoms, though I'm making some progress.

I'll ride with the tri club tonight and again tomorrow night. This is all indoor stuff, even with mild weather.

I'm in a 3 week countdown to completion of kitchen remodeling and then a15 day trip to Fla. I'll make up for lost swim, bike and run time once I get to Florida.

nossmf wrote: »

Woke up early to get to the gym by 5, note on the door said they wouldn't open until 8. No explanation given, but not a delay I could afford to wait. Went home, showered/changed, and got to work early. No cardio for me for the second day in a row, which bizarrely enough I actually WANTED to do today. For years as an avid weightlifter, I dreaded cardio day as a necessary evil to endure and get out of the way...now, this morning I was disappointed I could not do cardio. What is happening to me?!?

Welcome back to the dark side! I know you did it in your youth a lot. Sometimes, it's way different when you have to versus when you have a choice and enjoy it.

Today it was like 32 outside in Tucson (we had two inches of snow on the ground yesterday!). So just did a simple interval set -- 5 minutes as hard as sustainable/1 minute recovery. 2 intervals (each) on the Treadmill, then LateralX, and then Assault Bike. HR got up to 91% max by the last one. Gradual steps up each interval.

I've been leaving the lifting till Friday and not doing it on Thursday with my hard cardio sessions. I'm enjoying it more that way. Not as brutal.

nossmf wrote: »

Woke up early to get to the gym by 5, note on the door said they wouldn't open until 8. No explanation given, but not a delay I could afford to wait. Went home, showered/changed, and got to work early. No cardio for me for the second day in a row, which bizarrely enough I actually WANTED to do today. For years as an avid weightlifter, I dreaded cardio day as a necessary evil to endure and get out of the way...now, this morning I was disappointed I could not do cardio. What is happening to me?!?

Cardio and Weight Lifting go hand and hand for me. I feel the cardio work allows me to lift harder, and recover faster between sets. Not to mention a hard cardio workout leaves me with a feeling close to that after lifting.

Got my hour on the treadmill, the one which elevates all the way to 30 degrees incline. Rather than a series of hills or series of speed variations, kept it simple...start at 1 degree and a fast walking pace, EMOM increase by 1 degree and decrease by .1 mph until I hit 30 at the halfway point, then spend the second half-hour doing the opposite, slowly decreasing incline while increasing speed.

In doing some reading online, I realized something I should have already known, that my smaller upper arms was likely not a product of actually having lost muscle but rather a decrease in glycogen stores since I'm not actively lifting. As soon as I pick up the weights again, those stores will rush back, and I'll be my old size again. Load off my mind!

Opened a cough drop early this AM. The wrapper has some inspirational sayings and I think they apply to us.
-Conquer today
-Let's hear your battle cry
-Push on
-Be resilient
-Don't give up on you
-Impress yourself today.
All of these on a little cough drop wrapper!!!!