Day Two Tuesday

There's just something really unpleasant about heavy wet snow falling from the sky. Yesterday, road conditions were hazardous with several accidents reported in local news. I only leave the house because dogs can't walk themselves and I'm happy that I had the foresight to bring firewood into the house on Sunday when it was warm and sunny. Today, I don't find time or motivation to drag myself off to the garage until mid-afternoon when the sun is blazing and most of the snow has melted. The sodden grass squishes beneath my boots. I know better than to wear my gym shoes across the yard.

I also remember to bring spare batteries for my phone. It's 45F and the garage is unheated, so it's also 45F inside the garage. The phone might be expending all its energy searching for WiFi and cell signals. I don't know but the phone battery power drops from 93% to the red line warning 1% in little more than 40 minutes. Crazy! I'm bundled up and my hands are icy when I start pedaling on the elliptical. I try pedaling backward for a few minutes, but my speed drops by a third and it's so frustrating that I give up and pedal forward for the remaining time. While I leave resistance at level 1, I play with the incline and increase it to level 4. I don't notice any difference so I'm not sure this function works.

Meanwhile, my HR appears to fluctuate between 70 and 130 bpm, dipping as low as 60 and maxing out at 139. That seems pretty good to me. Again, halfway through my cardio session, I build up enough body heat to warrant tossing aside my hat, gloves, vest, and jacket. While my phone slowly charges, I use the stopwatch function to keep track of plank and bird dogs. I tuck my elbows in, close to my waist when doing pushups today. My left elbow still clicks painfully. The only position where I find relief is keeping my arms almost 60 degrees from my body, and that's considered cheating, but I don't think pushups are supposed to cause you elbow pain. Today I do my 25 reps slower than usual, trying to mitigate the discomfort. It's not really working.

There's a Bowflex here somewhere

I try to set up my phone to shoot a video when I attempt Hammer Grip PullUps, but the phone slips and what I get is mostly a video of my big square butt moving up and down in the frame. I'll have to figure out something better for next time. The video is at least useful for counting reps, and seeing where my body starts to swing. Swinging makes pullups nearly impossible! I do notice my right bicep during this exercise, but I'm doing it for my back as well because other than BB Rows (I have an Oly bar) and DB Rows, there's not much else I can do. Unless I want to clear off my husband's Bowflex, which I do not.

There's not a lot of room inside the garage so I experiment with my footing to figure out how to do Lunges. Stepping back works better than stepping forward. I'm not sure why. Although I have Rogue collars in my gym gear, I find that the EZ Curl bar already has clamp lock collars on each end. I'm guestimating that they weigh about 2+ lbs apiece. The Rogues do, anyway. A standard EZ Curl is roughly 15 lbs. I do a few Reverse Grip Curls because it's been a long time, and forearms need love too.

Tuesday Home workout

Vision elliptical

Program: manual

35 min

Miles: 2.79

Calories: 268

HR 60-139

Crunches 60/60

Elbow Plank 60s

Bicycles 60

Bird Dogs 2 x 60s

Pushups 25 elbows tucked (left!)

HGPU 16 

Bodyweight squats 25

Step Back Lunges 25

EZ Bar w collars (20 lbs?) Rip Skulls 25

EZ Bar w collars RG BB Curl 25