Humidity is Not My Friend

Today's Selfie

Because I had an eye doc appt at 10:30 this morning, I didn't get to the gym until nearly noon. Suddenly the gym is crowded with teenage boys and I have no hope of getting on half the equipment I normally use on a Monday (Smith machine, Bench). After 10 minutes on the LifeFitness cross-trainer, I find myself wrestling with some DBs to do a few sets of DB Presses. Keeping my arms positioned in a normal press seems to spare my right shoulder. My shoulders don't like the "neutral" grip when I press. I'm not even moving that much weight, but since my legs are too short for my feet to sit flat on the ground, I'm not all that concerned. It's extra work just to stabilize my core.

Last week I had thought to try doing sets for reps of free benching with just 95 lbs, but today I can't even get on one of the three Matrix breaker benches. There are just too many guys here today. The few women are either in a class or cowering in a corner with little plastic Beauty Bells. Oh well. At least I can do my normal DB routine for delts. I hate it when guys do their DB routine right up against the DB rack so that no one else can get to the weights. I feel like saying, "What'sa matter? 'Fraid you can't move those weights back to the rack if you step back two feet?" But those would be kind of like "fighting words". Of course, when I lift, I'm not going to feign girly daintiness either.

It's probably time to up the weight a smidge on the Rip Skulls since I got 4 sets of 12 reps at 40 lbs. But those sets totally shot me for the next tricep movement. No benches for CGBP so I do a few sets of straight bar Tricep Cable Push Downs. It's a good thing I had anticipated how hard this was going to be, and set the weight at 30 lbs. Failure came quickly after 3 sets.

Doing HIIT cardio was like sucking wet tissues into my lungs. Humidity is not my friends when I'm desperately trying to oxygenate. I could only bear to do 5 minutes of it at a time. Luckily, it's Monday and Mondays are always the hardest for cardio because I'm such a slug on the weekends. I admit that I've missed the Stretch Cage and I'm glad it's back, although I haven't had the nerve to try pull ups on it yet. Nor have I tried any practice kicks at the side bars. It's too centrally located now, and this makes me a tad self-conscious. Which probably sounds funny coming from someone who drops into dramatic splits on the big mats.

Maybe I should go try those Dive Bomber push ups again? I've been looking at push up variations, but nothing with elevated feet. That will raise the pressure in my head, and as someone with glaucoma, I can't risk anything like that. Diamond push ups and side to side push ups look like fun though. And I remember doing push ups interspersed with punching a body bag, or tapping the opposite shoulder when my hubs and I used to take a kickboxing class together. I was really good at stuff like that.

I've been taking a half dose of milk thistle for the past few days. It's a purported tonic for the liver and gallbladder, and can help with diabetes, inflammation and cholesterol issues. At my last physical, my doc mentioned a slight elevation in my liver enzymes, and a potential for a pre-diabetic condition. I'm not sure if she says this to everyone, but being Asian predisposes me to diabetes even though I'm not overweight. I've haven't noticed any difference except that my fingers no longer feel stiff when I wake, and my stomach seems more noisy. Milk thistle is suppose to release toxins from the liver as well. I'm just really happy about my fingers since I can't remember the last time I woke up without having to stretch out my hands before I got out of bed.

Tomorrow is Cardio and Core Day, and then my son and I are going to see The Man from U.N.C.L.E. I hope I won't be disappointed. I remember watching the TV show when I was a child with dashing Robert Vaughn and David McCallum as the two spies and best buddies. We both enjoyed Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, so we have our fingers crossed.



Monday Push Day Workout
(3.41 miles cardio; 10,970 lbs moved)

CrossTrainer

warm up

Calorie :   46 CAL
Distance: 1.25 mile
Speed :    7.45 mph
Duration : 00:10:06

Dumbbell Bench Press

52.5

Set 1 : 25x15
Set 2 : 30x12
Set 3 : 35x12
Set 4 : 35x12
Set 5 : 35x15

Barbell Incline Bench Press

100

Set 1 : 45x15
Set 2 : 65x12
Set 3 : 75x10

Dumbbell Lateral Raise

35

Set 1 : 20x12
Set 2 : 20x12
Set 3 : 25x8
Set 4 : 25x12
Set 5 : 25x12
Set 6 : 20x15 SuperSet with

Dumbbell Reverse Flyes

37.5

Set 1 : 20x12
Set 2 : 20x15
Set 3 : 25x12
Set 4 : 25x15
Set 5 : 25x15
Set 6 : 25x15

Barbell Reverse Grip Skullcrusher

56

Set 1 : 40x12
Set 2 : 40x12
Set 3 : 40x12
Set 4 : 40x12

Cable Triceps Pushdown

45

Set 1 : 30x15
Set 2 : 30x13
Set 3 : 30x12

Elliptical Training

Calorie :   212 CAL
Distance: 2.16 mile
5 min HIIT, 5 min LISS
5 min HIIT, 15 min LISS
Duration : 00:30:03

Willful Blindness

There's nothing wrong with ignoring the fact that you used to lift heavier, that you used to be thinner or leaner, that you were younger. Once. We all were. Once. Sometimes you have to be willfully ignorant of past history, otherwise you'd never get off the couch, mired in self-pity and excuses.

I haven't gotten enough sleep but that's not really an excuse. It will cause me some memory issues throughout the day because sleep is inextricably entwined with daily brain functions. I'm only concerned that this fatigue is going to negatively affect my workout today. Cardio seems surprisingly okay, although I've noticed that my endurance seems to ebb and flow. I don't make steady, continuous gains like younger athletes. Perhaps that's because I'm decades older than most athletes in their prime? Regardless, I'm here now and it's early enough that I can actually grab the Smith after my cardio warm up.

I haven't moved past 130 lbs on the Smith Bench even though I've done it in the past. But those attempts always left me feeling I had injured my right front delt. No need for that. I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm benching several pounds more than my body weight, and for a 55-year old woman who's not using supplements, I think that's pretty damn good. At some point I'll look my age, but hopefully that won't be any time soon.

Lack of sleep is catching up with me. I do a few sets of Inclined Benching on the Smith, adding reps for each set. It's counter-intuitive. It's also proof that I'm a lot stronger than I think I am. The DB area is really crowded today. R is here early and he's chatting with a lot of the other guys. He and his wife are expecting a baby girl in a few weeks. He's planning to relocate to a better school district in the near future, although his town has come up fairly high on the list of Best Suburbs to Raise a Family. He's not comfortable talking to me much when there are a lot of peers about. It's okay. I don't have anything much to say to him anyway.

DBs feel heavy doing Lateral Raises and Reverse Bent-Over Flyes. But I still do them. Benches are crowded so I skip Close Grip Benching for triceps and go straight to RIP Skulls by the DB area. It's crowded there too. Mostly it's a younger crowd though. High school and college boys, I'm guessing. I'm surprised to see that the cable station for Press-Downs is vacant. I haven't done these in a long time. They are harder than I remember. Bummer. I pyramid the weight up, and reps down. Then reverse. And I soooo don't feel like doing it, but I march back up the cardio platform and get myself in gear to do 10 min of HIIT cardio, followed by 20 min of LISS. It's not really feeling any easier.

I haven't done Dive Bomber Push Ups in a very long time, mostly because of my wonky right shoulder. I don't plan to start doing them today either. But I do my other stretches. I feel like I've been here all day between 45 min of cardio, weights, and stretching. Time to shower and change!

Monday is Push Day
(4.05 miles; 18,345 lbs moved)

Cross Trainer

Steady State

Calorie :   71 CAL
Distance: 1.91 mile
Speed :    7.62 mph
Duration : 00:15:03

Smith Machine Bench Press

164.67

Set 1 : 30x15
Set 2 : 80x12
Set 3 : 120x10
Set 4 : 130x8
Set 5 : 110x12
Set 6 : 90x22
Set 7 : 90x3

Smith Machine Incline Bench Press

126

Set 1 : 30x15
Set 2 : 70x12
Set 3 : 90x8
Set 4 : 90x10
Set 5 : 90x12

Dumbbell Lateral Raise

35

Set 1 : 20x12
Set 2 : 20x12
Set 3 : 25x8
Set 4 : 25x8
Set 5 : 25x12
Set 6 : 20x15 SuperSet with

Dumbbell Reverse Flyes

37.5

Set 1 : 20x15
Set 2 : 20x15
Set 3 : 25x12
Set 4 : 25x12
Set 5 : 25x15
Set 6 : 25x15

Barbell Reverse Grip Skullcrusher

52.5

Set 1 : 15x15
Set 2 : 37.5x12
Set 3 : 37.5x12
Set 4 : 37.5x12
Set 5 : 37.5x12

Cable Triceps Pushdown

60

Set 1 : 30x12
Set 2 : 40x10
Set 3 : 50x6
Set 4 : 40x8
Set 5 : 30x10

Elliptical Training

Calorie :   209 CAL
Distance: 2.14 mile
10 min HIIT
20 min LISS
Duration : 00:30:00

Grinder Tuesday

I'm never in the mood to go to the gym so I don't pay any attention to the little voice in my head that tells me how nice it would be to lay in bed all morning. I didn't even go yesterday, Memorial Day, because I suspected it would just be so crowded with kids home from school that I'd just be vexed. Instead, I spent a productive afternoon going through my email account and deleting hundreds of emails (if not thousands) that dated back to 2009. Good grief! Then I reformatted the 4T back up drive I got a month ago because it's Windows-friendly and I work on an ancient Mac.

Okay, my Mac Mini isn't as old as the laptop in the kitchen, but it's close. I still use a huge VGA Diamond Trinitron monitor too instead of the latest flat screen. Then I had to install a "new" version of '09 iWorks because my iPad uses Pages and I don't own that on any of my other computers. Yep, that was just about an entire afternoon right there. I haven't figured out how to off-load videos from my phone though. It's an iPhone 5 and only the photos seem to sync with the iCloud mirror drive. Videos take up a lot of room, and I'd like to be able to archive these and not lose them. Sigh.

I get to the gym and spend 30 minutes on the LifeFitness cross-trainer to make up for not doing anything yesterday. (Okay, I made ciabatta bread french toast for lunch, but the hubs grilled chicken, mowed the lawn, worked out in the garage, and cooked up marinade for the 9.5 lbs of London broil I bought Friday to make beef jerky this week. Of course, I'm cleaning up the kitchen mess today!)

The Smith machine is occupied by a guy doing OHP. Someone else is in the Max Rack. I don't feel like wrestling with the breaker benches. Instead, I do sets of DB presses on a flat bench, but I keep my hands in the neutral position. My right shoulder immediately makes itself known, but it's not painful. I should've cut my reps as I upped the weights, but I didn't so when I got to the 45s, well, I could get them into position, but couldn't press them. I got my arms up about 2-3 inches but not enough for a full extension. So that's zero for that set. Oh well. Next time I'll cut my reps. I pyramid down to make up for the failure.

I'm not all that concerned about my chest anyway. I move on to the DB laterals and Reverse Flyes. The gym is sporadically busy with regulars and new faces. Tattoo Tank, PonyTail, M, Skinny J, Soccer Boy are a few I recognize. There are a few tall, blonde, young women as well. One takes a pair of 10 DBs and moves sideways across the front of the DB rack, with her knees bent and feet facing outward, her elbows bent as she simultaneously rotates her shoulders so that her arms seem to be opening and closing in front of her body as she moves. Well, I've never seen that before.

Too heavy for me!

Two of the breaker benches have big plates on the bars and the 3rd bench has one of those godawful multi-angle thick grip bars which I'm not even attempting to budge. Instead, I position myself in the Max Rack for Close Grip Bench Press. It takes me a while to figure out where I need to be to clear the support hooks. It's not quite the same as the Smith, and the bar is a lot heavier. I'm very happy to get 20 reps on my last set! Finally, just Rip Skulls are left. I wish I could catch a photo of my arms with the EZ bar: they look so cool and impressive.

Just 30 minutes on the Precor: 10 min of HIIT (15 sec On/ 45 sec Off -- which really means a slow jog) followed by 20 min of LISS. A quick stretch on the Mat and then a well-deserved hot shower, followed by 20 seconds of ice-cold. At least I'm not sweating when I get out to the 84F parking lot!

Tuesday Workout
(5.81 miles total; 11,8454 lbs moved)

Cross-Trainer

Warm Up

Calorie :   148 CAL
Distance: 3.72 mile
Speed :    7.43 mph
Duration : 00:30:03

Dumbbell Bench Press

56

Set 1 : 25x12
Set 2 : 30x12
Set 3 : 35x12
Set 4 : 40x12
Set 5 : 45x0 Boooo! Set 6 : 35x12
Set 7 : 30x12

Dumbbell Lateral Raise

35

Set 1 : 20x12
Set 2 : 20x12
Set 3 : 25x8
Set 4 : 25x8
Set 5 : 25x12
Set 6 : 25x12 SuperSet with

Dumbbell Reverse Flyes

37.5

Set 1 : 20x15
Set 2 : 20x15
Set 3 : 25x12
Set 4 : 25x12
Set 5 : 25x15
Set 6 : 25x15

Max Rack BB Close Grip Bench Press

125

Set 1 : 55x25
Set 2 : 65x25
Set 3 : 75x20 Yaaay!

RIP Skulls

52.5

Set 1 : 15x15
Set 2 : 37.5x12
Set 3 : 37.5x12
Set 4 : 37.5x12

Elliptical Training

Calorie :   200 CAL
Distance: 2.09 mile
10 min HIIT
20 min LISS
Duration : 00:30:00