Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Wednesday Workout Update - Picture Edition

What a wild day we had on Monday - Brad had a special workout planned for us - an entire hour in the gym, doing an "Extra Filthy Fifty" - because apparently just a plain old "Filthy Fifty" (50 reps of each exercise, for time) wasn't enough! Linda grabbed her camera and caught us in action, so I'm glad to be able to share with y'all a little bit of what we did:
Me doing a chest press, Brad cheering us on, Jenny doing tricep curls, Jeri doing burpee/box jump combos.
Please note that Jenny and I wore our GLOW run t-shirts with pride on Monday!
Jenny doing some sort of pull ups (I think they had a name but I've blocked it out); me doing a walking plank where I would move my feet to each side of the stepper and then back on. Kathleen doing a kettlebell row (that kettlebell is 26 lbs!)Kathleen doing the burpee/box jump combo; Ashley doing the kettlebell row; Jeri doing the burpee/box jump combo (it took a while to do 50 of these!)Kathleen flying through the air with her box jump!Me finally doing a box jump - more on that later in this post....and she sticks the landing! ::cheers::My favorite picture: Jenny beating the tar out of a punching bag. This was the most fun out of all the exercises!

So yeah, about that burpee/box jump combo. As it was easily the hardest exercise of the bunch, I decided to start off with them - get them over with while I was freshest. I did my first burpee, then moved to do the box jump...and froze. I could not get myself to do it. Stepped back, tried again. My body wasn't moving. Stepped to the side and did a practice one, then stepped back in front of the box and...no go. At this point I was holding up other people, so Brad told me to move on and come back to them. I went ahead and did all of the other exercises and then faced the box jump again. What the hell was wrong with me? I can do these - a month ago I did 50 in one day and then 40 the next day! It still wasn't happening, and I was thisclose to losing it out of frustration. Luckily Linda saw what was happening and started calming me down and talking me through them. At that point I remembered that the last time I did these, Brad had been adding extra height to them, using the 45 pound weight plates, and I fell when I tried to jump 14 inches (the standard box is 12 inches). While I didn't hurt myself, obviously it stayed with me. It took a few more tries, but finally I was successful.

It is amazing to me how much of this is mental. From doing something scary like a box jump, to going for a run and pushing past that voice that starts screaming "What are you doing?!? You aren't a runner! You can't go any further - stop right now!" - there is pushing your body to do something and then pushing the self-doubt out of the way, which for me takes more strength than doing the actual physical stuff!

Today I thought there was a good chance of getting to run during our workout, so I brought my running shoes with me. I don't like to workout in them because the soles are not as flexible as my Asics, but they are awesome to run in. Anyway, I ran on the treadmill and can't believe how much better that felt in my running shoes (I know, duh!). I felt GREAT and did 1.34 miles in 16:30 - starting speed was 4.5; ending speed was 6.4! This will be my last run before Sunday's Armadillo Dash so I'm glad to have such a good one under my belt.

After we spent our time on the machines, we played the "Deck of Cards" workout - Linda drew a card and we had to do whatever exercise matched it. For example, if she drew the eight of clubs, we did eight mountain climbers. It's a fast-moving, random workout that really keeps your heart rate up!
We hated to see a spade pulled!

Finally, here's a picture of my calendar for February - I didn't run as many days as I did in January, but my times and distances are increasing. It's fun for me to see the improvement!
...my glow sticks were still glowing, a couple of days after the GLOW run!

22 comments:

  1. I love to see your workout in pictures.

    When I run it's different every time. One day I just go out, start running and everything is okay. The other day I start and say to myself: what the h*ll am I doing, I can't do this, I want to go home. In the end I always go on and don't turn around. I think we all have these moments.

    I have Reeboks fitness shoes for the gym and Brooks running shoes. I ran once on my Reeboks on the treadmill and my legs and foot really hurt afterwards. Since then I wear my running shoes at the treadmill too and it goes so much better. It's not allowed to wear outdoor shoes but I always clean them before going to the gym.

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  2. Haha! I love it!! Great pictures! By the way, is my nose really that long? Good grief!

    Awesome job on those box jumps Shelley! You'll be doing the tall-daddy before you know it!!!

    Have I told you how much I love working out with you??

    Jenny

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  3. Oh my Lord, that looks so hard! I would be so intimidated by those box jumps...and the photos prove you did it!

    You guys kicked some serious butt (Brad's?)! Thanks for showing your workout as it progressed with pictures- a great idea!

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  4. good work! I love the workout pictures and good for you for kicking some butt and just moving on! WTG

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  5. " ... my times and distances are increasing."

    Isn't that the beautiful thing about running? If you keep at it, the results get better and better. Doesn't even matter where you started.

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  6. I love your workout pictures. It's great that you have such a motivating group.
    I am all about wearing my race shirt the Monday after a race too.

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  7. WAY TO GLOW! Your workouts always make me tired.

    Thanks for the encouraging comment. I appreciate your friendship.

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  8. I love all the pictures! Can I say that your gym looks like someone's living room?

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  9. cool pics! I might like to beat the tar outta something on occasion like that last pic.

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  10. That damnable left brain that tries to talk us out of being the strong, conquering, athletic women that we are. Glad to see you beat it down!

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  11. Loved the pictures! Awesome workout your are so strong and I just know you can do what ever you put your mind to doing!!

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  12. I am just so very impressed and so proud you got on the box! Whenever I do something risky like that, I always conjur up images of ambulances, health insurance cards, hobbling around on crutches for months, etc. A truly effective mental deterrent from trying it. You did it girl!

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  13. All I can say is, there is no box jumps in my future. No not ever. I don't even mention box jumps to Vicky. I am past the age where box jumping is appropriate, I am sure.

    But its fun to see you young'uns jumping. hehheh.

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  14. new blogger award for you, missy!

    http://thesunnylife.com/?p=406

    :)

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  15. I still think that your trainer pulls cards for which exercises you do is so cool - mixes things up :)

    Happy Thursday, Shelley!

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  16. I could not agree with you more that its mind over matter sometimes. I hadn't run in a while and yesterday when I started the treadmill at 4.5 I was like "I can't keep this pace for 40 minutes!"

    But I talked myself INTO it and I did it.

    Congrats on finishing at 6.4!!

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  17. Wow, that is so cool that you do the lump box. I would never!!! You're brave :)

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  18. Wow, those pictures are AWESOME! Look at you rock the workout! and I love that deck of cards idea...I might have to use that!

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  19. I love the workout pics. Jenny looks like she is working hard (!) in that first pic. Ouch! You ladies are all doing so great and even though it looks like a tough workout it also looks like you're having fun. Or am I imagining that? :)

    Great job!

    looking forward to the Sunday race. For me it won't be so much a race but a "get to the finish line in whatever time you can make." LOL

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  20. Wow! You gals were movin'. Great job. What a sense of accomplishment after all that.

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  21. Im off today to DISNEY!

    Did I convince you to join twitter? :)

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