Born Again Gym Rat: Take Progress Where You Can

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Take Progress Where You Can

My sciatica is acting up today, perhaps from the kickboxing yesterday, or maybe from not doing a "cool down" with cardio. It's raining and is forecast to rain until tomorrow afternoon. Good grief. At least it's not snow. I can't use the cross-trainer that I favor, the one with the lowest resistance setting so I get on the one next to it. It's harder to pedal so my mileage isn't as good. It also, eventually, makes half my right foot go numb. Oh well.

I do a set of pull ups afterwards, and use the Torso Twist machine just to loosen my hips. I have some stiffness in my left lower back, but it doesn't bother me as much as the sciatica today. There are a lot of guys at the Smith and MaxRack stations so I keep busy on the Mat. Just for fun, I decide to see how many push ups I can do. My first set is a warm up set because I know I can do more, but I don't want to burn myself out just yet. Then planks. Then push ups. More planks. More push ups. Oh, let's do some crunches! Then push ups to finish. Except I'm not really finished. This feels more like a warm up. Seriously. There's something very satisfying about being able to knock out 50 push ups and get up without even breathing hard. It's badass! Okay, I'm kidding.

The MaxRack is clear, although the last users leave things behind, like a cup of coffee (which is eventually retrieved) and portable mats (also later retrieved). Today I'm going to test how much I can pull while doing RG BB Rows. At light weights I just move the bar off the floor into the RG BB Row position. But at heavier weights, I do a Romanian Dead Lift and pull the bar straight up, then cautiously bend forward until I'm in a position to row. I can't row parallel to the ground... it's too hard on my lower back because I have a long torso and short limbs. My angle is probably closer to 60 degrees instead. Once I get past 100 lbs, I have to use my Versa Grips because my hands ache from holding the bar. I have tiny hands with bony little fingers. It wasn't that long ago that I was pulling 155 to 165 lbs on a free Oly bar, but there's no room to do that any more unless I go to the other end of the gym to the CF station. No thanks.

Because I went heavy on Monday, I only do 3 quick light sets of DB Lateral Raises super set with Bent Over Reverse Flyes. All the Inclined Benches have DBs on them as place holders. I'm not interested in getting into a conversation with whoever so I just do a slightly different exercise than the one I had planned. My training philosophy is to not ever do the same routine two days in a row. And if I've benched heavy on Monday, then I'll go for reps instead. I might see how I feel about benching heavy on Friday, but that's not set in stone.

Looking very soft these days

I do another two sets of pull ups and 30 more minutes of cardio. I'm not happy that my weight is inching upwards, but I suspect that's because I've not been as strict with my food as I should be. The gym scale reads 111.2 lbs today. I'd like it to be back down to 107-8. I still have a few weeks before the banquet weekend. And I've tried several of my dresses on. Even at this weight, they fit fine. I just need to learn how to walk in something other than boots...

Wednesday Workout
(6.13 miles total cardio; 26,691 lbs moved)