Cardio Friday

Although my lower torso appears to be ringed with an odd soreness, I still went to the gym today, but later than I had planned. Because I hadn't planned on the school district announcing a two-hour delay due to weather. Okay, it was snowing this morning. Not a lot. And it's warm enough for the road salts to work the way they're suppose to. There's a thick sheet of slippery ice under the soft wet melting snow on my lawn. I debate whether to salt or not because tomorrow's suppose to be near 50°F with rain which would be a waste. On the other hand, our property is a cold spot pocket on the side of a very steep hill. I decide not to salt. If it's icy tomorrow, I can salt then.

Today is a Cardio Day, pure and simple. I manage my 5 minutes warm up and then go full gallop for a minute, drop to a crawl for the next minute and repeat this for another three minutes. Then I change the intervals to 30 seconds because that's all I can manage by this point.

Sweat is running down my face when I'm done and I blot the elliptical clean with a paper towel spritzed with bleach water. I want to work up to doing a full ten minutes of 1 minute on and 1 minute off. Then I can attempt doing 90 second intervals and work up to 2 minute intervals. It's nice having a plan.

My lower back and abdominals are still oddly sore. My right hip is tight and that does impact my cardio slightly, slowing me a tad. I barely feel my glutes and hamstrings, but the base of my neck and traps are sore as well. I guess DOMS takes a full two days because I did the Back Workout on Wednesday. Part of me wonders if the Ab Wheel is to blame for some of this, but I don't know. There are too many variables to know.

I do as complete a Cage Stretch as I can manage. Bending over to touch my face to my knee is more difficult than it should be but I take it very slowly, easing into the stretch. This is lower back. But tossing out a side kick is fine. As is stretching my legs out to either side, putting my foot up over my head is fine. I sit down in front of the more popular Nexersys machine, strip off my hoodie, wrap my hands and stuff them into my stupid pink gloves. I've got to learn to wrap them better: I'm not sure why, but my knuckles are pink and raw when I'm done boxing. They aren't usually but today I'm pummeling the pads during the last 3 rounds of Sparring.

The Follow Me Avatar program is a lot of fun so I do 9 rounds at the Beginner Female level. Afterwards, I try to check out the Intermediate Level. It suggests punches and kicks that I'm familiar with, but when the program starts, it asks for combinations I don't know and am unsure how to execute. There's just no way I can knee the center pad because the center pad is about neck height for me. I'm just not tall enough. And there's no way to run the tutorial on just the Intermediate Avatar program. Instead the machine wants to run you through the entire litany of cardio, core, etc exercises and I don't have the patience for that. I ask one of the trainers at the front desk and he confesses to being baffled by it as well. Oh well... I punch in 3 rounds of Sparring Beginner Level Female and take out my frustrations on the machine. It's very satisfying. My lower back and right hip only seem to hinder me slightly when I use a right-side power move but the torquing hip action doesn't hurt. It's just stiff, and not quite as fast as I normally am.

Instead of heading immediately to the showers, I put my hoodie back on and drop myself onto a Mat. I want to stretch out my lower back, but I also want to assess just how limited my mobility is. It's definitely impeding my ability to drop my face on my shin, but otherwise, the rest of me is okay. My traps and shoulders are feeling a little stiff as well, but that's understandable. The gym scale again reads 114.0 lbs and that's oddly consistent. I know I don't weigh quite that much, but I do know I'm fatter. Definitely fatter. I can see the fat under my belly skin, pooling around my navel. Didn't used to have that. My upper arms look huge too. I'm so not happy about this, but I've also not made an appointment with my GP either. I know I'll have to submit fasting blood work beforehand and I hate doing anything without a cup of coffee. Next week I'll call. Next week I'm just going to do cardio anyway.

Cardio Friday

HIIT: 5 min warm up at 189 Strides Per Min, 5 min of 1 min on (220-260 SPM) / 1 min off (70-80 SPM), 5 min of 30 sec on / 30 sec off = 1.50 miles

Nexersys: 9 rounds Follow Me, Beginner Female
  Accuracy 84% / Strikes 107% / Avg Power 128%
accuracy decreased because the machine didn't register several power kicks

Nexersys: 3 rounds Sparring, Beginner Female
  Strikes 209% / Avg Power 95% / Points 937  
this might be a high score for points!

photos provided for actual stats:

9 rounds Follow Me Avatar, beginner female 

3 rounds Sparring Avatar, beginner female