Long Weights Session

I had a fair bit of catch up work to do today. Am supposed to be training 20-30 mins four days a week, but because I had only been in one other day this week, today I completed about 2.5 days' worth of sessions.

Upper body:

• Chin-ups - 2, 2x1.5 - one of my personal goals for this year is to be able to complete a full set of 8-12 chin ups. As you can see I have a long way to go given I'm averaging at only 1.5 so far (or round that down to 1)
• "Floor" chin-ups - these are a way easier version - 3x10
• Lat pull-downs - 90 (I think that's pounds?) - 8, 2x6
• DB clean & press - 2x15p - 3x8
• BB shoulder raises (? can't remember what this one's called) - 15kg, 8 then17.5kg, 2x8
• SB tricep dips - 3x10
• tricep push-downs - 40 - 8, 2x6

It's nice to be getting some shoulder work into my program... maybe it'll buff me up a little so my arms don't look so skinny :)

Lower body:

• Squats - bar+35kg (55kg) - 2x10, then bar+37.5kg - 1x10. I think next time I will up this to 40kg, see how I go.
• 45degree leg press - 100kg - 3x10. These were pretty easy, upping to 120kg next time.

Abs:

• SB bridge - 30s, 2x45s - wow these are much more difficult than the standard one on the floor. By 20s I was already shaking!
• SB curls - 3x10

At the moment my workouts are taking a little longer than usual. Still trying to figure out what weights to use - high enough to get me a little fatigued but not so high that I kill myself dropping something on my neck or pull a muscle.

Distances

Okay so I finally got around to measuring the distances for my runs.

Here they are:

1. Run on 8/03/07 - 7.4km
2. Run on 9/03/07 - 7.5km
3. My "usual route" - 5.6km
   

You can imagine how disappointed I was to find these distances out - particularly because I thought maybe the second run was closer to 9km.

So that just gave me an incentive to do a long one today. James is so wonderful, he came too! You will know how wonderful in a minute when I disclose the distance.

Route: from our house, right at Burwood Hwy, right at Station St, right at Canterbury Rd, right at Blackburn Rd, right at Burwood Hwy and back to our house.

Total distance = 10km! YAY.

Finally hit the double digit mark. Now how am I going to get this distance closer to 15km? I am starting to realise 15 km is a very far distance. Short of doing a 7.5km route twice, I am running out of ideas for how to construct a circular route 15km long.

Slept in, rushed for a run

I overslept half an hour this morning. So I only had just enough time to squeeze in my "usual" run before I had to prepare and head over to work. Actually, I was 5 minutes late to work... which I wouldn't have been if I hadn't slept in!

A usual run for me means going from my house to Burwood Hwy, then doing a big almost rectangular shape route going along Burwood Hwy, Blackburn Rd, Eley Rd, Holland Rd, Fulton Rd, Middleborough Rd, back to Burwood Hwy and home.

Sometimes I do that route backwards - today was one of those days. The two directions have their various advantages and disadvantages in that the hills vary. When doing it backwards I am faced with Holland and Blackburn Hills (not their real names, but my nicknames for them) at the end of my run which helps me training my anaerobic fitness.

It was a good run... I think I might even be getting slightly faster. Anaerobic fitness is definitely improving, for sure.

Weights Session - starting new program

This week I start my first round of the new weights program. The gym was not as busy as I expected tonight.

The gym instructor told me that in order to achieve my bench press strength goal, I should be using more weight on the bar than I have been up to now and getting someone to spot me, in order to encourage my muscles to adapt to the extra weight and grow stronger.

But what can I say? I am a bit of a scaredy cat. The weights room is often dominated by males and I have a hard time acquainting myself with strangers who are friends of friends, let alone approaching a complete male stranger, panting, sweaty and all, to ask him to spot little me for a set of reps.

So today I benched my usual weight instead of upping it per gym instructor's suggestion, all because I was a scaredy cat. If you go to my gym and I know you, would you consider meeting me once a week in the evening after work at the gym? We could spot for each other... :)

This evening's program:

• BB bench press - 35kg - 12, 10, 2x7
• DB bench close - 10kg pair - 8, 2x10
• EZ bar bicep curls - bar+2.5kg - 3x10 (I tried for bar+5kg, but there was no way I could lift that weight - I've always had relatively weak biceps compared to triceps, is that normal?)
• DB bicep curls - 15pounds - 3x10, last reps I let DB down as slowly as possible
  

Rest Day

I didn't end up going to Running Group today, wasn't feeling well. I was a little disappointed because I was looking forward to seeing if any of my results have improved since January. Oh, well... the next one is only about 2 months away. And we all know how quickly time flies.

Only 3 weeks to go until Run for the Kids... I'm getting nervous now, I am definitely under-prepared at this stage in the game.