Exploring Equipment

It's been raining all weekend. I admit to having little incentive to doing much of anything. I didn't even get to my garage workout until after 5 pm today but mostly because I went to the grocery store with my son and also to shop for a friend who hasn't left her house in two weeks. She's 76 years old and widowed, with only a sick cat for company.

I guess as much as I claim to be a creature of habit, boredom can be problematic. Especially since I'm not working out to exhaustion to alleviate my anxiety. It's not just the home confinement and close quarters. It's not just the news reports of ever-increasing infection and death rates amidst the threat of economic collapse. Our county adds a dozen people each day to its roster of the coronavirus infected and today the count is 142 people. Worse is the fact that my own sibling is afflicted, and he's not the most robust person. Although he's in his 50s and doesn't suffer from anything like diabetes, heart disease or asthma, he is borderline hypertensive (high blood pressure) and has glaucoma and other eye issues. Yes, I'm really stressed. We're not super close, but he is my brother.

Because I'm really stressed, I'm actually surprised that the elliptical doesn't register a higher HR. I would like to think that I'm acclimatizing to this workout so my mileage and HR might be a tiny bit better each session. I do my pushups with my elbows angled out about 30 degrees and although the left one clicks, it's not painful. I have a bit of trouble with my last pullup and only count it as a half. Part of me suspects I'd do better if I had worked out yesterday, and earlier in the day. To make up for this, I decide, after doing some uncomfortable (for my knees) bodyweight squats, to try the Power Straps dangling from the ceiling. It's a knockoff of the TRX cables. My husband has a cool deck of cards that has a different exercise on each card. I give it a quick look. Some of them look really complicated.

The one main problem with these straps is, as my husband warned me, using them without sliding across the floor. Even though I'm wearing my Skecher Go Walk super soft sneakers, the soles don't provide any traction. I wind up bracing myself by planting a foot against the base of the bench under the pullup bar before I do a set of Inverted Rows. Twice. It's not a difficult move but I'm pleased to feel lat involvement.

After some quick lunges, I take a closer look at the EZ Bar. The collars are plastic and ridiculously light! Nothing at all like my Rogue collars. I slip two tiny 2.5 lb plates on the bar, clip the collars shut and do my Rip Skulls and RG BB Curls. Next time I'll use 5 lb plates.

Sunday Home workout

Vision elliptical

Program: manual

35 min

Miles: 3.06

Calories: 283

HR 64-137 (average 95-105)

Crunches 60/60

Elbow Plank 60s

Bench Knee-Ins 30

Bicycles 60

Bird Dogs 2 x 60s

Pushups 25 elbows flared (Left click no pain)

HGPU 15+

Bodyweight squats 25

Power Strap Inverted Row x 12 x 2

Lunges 25

EZ Bar +5 (20) Rip Skulls 25

EZ Bar RG BB Curl 25

Quick stretch