Wednesday

I have a set formula for how I pick which workouts I'll do each week and on what days.  Its something I've come up with over the last couple years of doing pretty rough workouts.  Since I'm probably going to explain it more in depth later on, the short version is that Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday are hard days, Wednesday is my (relatively) low impact recovery day, and Sunday is my complete rest day.

Wednesdays for me mean no running, no pull ups, push ups, squats, dips, or shoulder stuff, no burpees, none of that stuff.  Instead, I ruck march (speed walking with a heavy weighted backpack), row (on a machine obviously), pool stuff (mainly treading water, but I try to toss in a few laps every now and then), and some joint mobility exercises I've picked up along the way for my ankles, knees, and hips.

First:
Got up earlyish and did a 5mi ruck march with about 50lbs at 0700 this morning.  Mid 70 degree temps weren't so bad, but the 85% humidity made it awful.  Thankfully there were a few people on the trails in front of me so I only had to eat spiderwebs a few times, rather than constantly eating them for an hour like the last time.  Finished in 1:21.

Second:
Off to the gym.  Warmed up by rowing 5:00 with a resistance of 6/10, changing grip every 1:00.  Then spent 10:00 doing full body stretching.

Headed back upstairs to the rower, bumped the resistance up to 10/10 and did a 500m max effort sprint.  PRed (personal record) it with a 1:35.8.

Hopped off, did side planks for 1:00 per side.

Started on my joint mobility stuff.  Its a bunch of boring, low weight, low rep exercises to help strengthen the ligaments and muscles in and around my ankles, knees, and hips.

Back upstairs to the rower.  Did another 500m max effort sprint and PRed (again!) with a 1:34.8.

Did another set of side planks for 1:00 per side.

Third:
Changed into my swimsuit and jumped into the pool.  Stretched in the water for a bit, then jumped into the hot tub for 5:00.  Back into the pool and treaded water in the deepest part for 30:00.  Then back into the hot tub for 5:00, dried off, changed, and headed home.

Tuesday

First post!  Trying to get back into this sort of thing.  I had good feedback the last time I tried it so we'll see how this goes.  I wanted a way of documenting the workouts, races, and other challenges I do in a way that could be shared with my family and friends.  So without further adieu, I present my shenanigans for Tuesday 30 July 2013

It was mostly a Golds workout today.  Got there around 1400.  I normally like to warm up by getting on the rowing machine, selecting a 6/10 resistance, and then go pretty hard for 5:00, changing grip every 1:00.  Unfortunately there was an older gentleman on it today so I was resigned to using an elliptical, bleh.  Followed that up with my usual full body stretches, and then got into the tough stuff.

First:
Crossfit 090327 (when you see numbers like this, its usually the last date that this was the workout of the day, or WOD, for that program.  It translates to year/month/day, in this case 27 March 2009)
10 Rounds, for time:
10 Pull ups
10 Ring Dips

I built my own gymnastics rings last year so I brought them with me.  Normally they're $50-100 per set, but I think my total cost came to under $10.  The last time I did this workout was Sept 2012 and I had a pretty awful time of 22:00.  In my defense, I think this was one of the first WODs I did with my new rings.  If you haven't ever done ring dips before, they are much harder.  One ring dip roughly equals 3 regular dips.  Tried to stick to a plan of only resting for 10sec after each round.  Worked very well and I pulled out a 12:59.

Second:
Lots of boring ab exercises.  Sit ups, flutter kicks, scissors, side bends.  There isn't much to say about that stuff, you just suffer through it.

Third:
Crossfit 091019
Weighted Pull ups, for loads:
1-1-1-1-1-1-1

This is testing your 1 rep max ability for weighted pull ups.  I've done these before and found that its good to start off conservative and then build up.  I used a dip belt which has a chain you can attach plates to.  Started with 45lbs, then 55, 65, 75, jumped to 90lbs, then 100, then for the final set, I thought screw it, go big or go home, and tried it with 135.  I was so close, ugh.  Probably 1.5 inches from getting it.  Ah well.

This was just an addendum but then I dropped back to just 45lbs and did 3 max rep sets, getting 7 reps on the first set, then 6, then 5.  Then took all the weight off and did a max rep set of muscle ups and got 7.

Fourth:
Changed clothes and headed to Harbison State Forest for my cardio.  Ran the Firebreak Trail, which is a little over 4 miles.  At each mile marker I stopped and did 10 burpees.  Made for a very tough run.