Gettin Cold

5 minute walk.

5 minute light airdyne

20 minutes

1 minute on 1 minute off
all out airdyne

I still can't believe it's possible to hit 300 calories in 10 minutes.  You need to be at or above 400 watts of effort for the entire 10 minutes to make that.  Brutal.

Starting to see my breath in the garage.  Even Ms Lacy doesn't want to hang out with me anymore.  Going to have to shut the door or invest in some tights. 

Ominous

5 minute walk
leg swings
.5 mile jog


20 minute EMOM
10 burpees

This workout will get the ol ticker revving.  I finished the last set in 36 seconds which is only 5 seconds slower than my first set.  I survived.  My legs are still a bit stiff from squats on Sunday.  Usually I do another leg day midweek.  I'll see how things are feeling tomorrow.

Seems like I am the last to know sometimes.  This will be an eventful Christmas.  A wise man once said "do not pray for an easy life.  Pray for the strength to endure a hard one."  Here we go.

Not So Fast

5 minute walk
.5 mile jog

leg swings
hip joint work
5 minute squat hold

5 sets 10 (5 each leg)
pistols
1 minute rest

3 sets 20 (10 each leg)
skater squat
1 minute rest

50 air squats

3 grip crushers


I backed off on the rep count for the pistols today.  The last two times I did the full 100 reps my left quad felt strained.  Today it felt fine.  Next time I'm going to bump it to 5 sets of 12.  The skater squat was something I found on youtube for quad dominate bodyweight exercises.  I think it is a great complimentary movement to the pistol.

Legit Pistol Day

5 minute walk
.6 mile jog

5 sets of 20 (10 each leg)
pistols

1 minute rest

Every time I do these they get a little bit easier.  I'm noticeably weaker on my left leg.  I also feel like I am caving in my knees when I do these.  Still got work to do.

Back from Thanksgiving

5 minute walk
1 mile jog

5 sets
24 hand release push ups

Let Not One Day Pass

5 minutes walk
.5 mile jog

50-50-50
airdybe calories/burpees/airdyne calories

9:47

 I tried this workout a few months back and did it in 10:30.  This one is tough.  I think I probably did it more like 9:40 since I was fumbling with the watch timer so much.  I did the 50 burpees unbroken.  That is the most burpees I've done since I finished the 100.  To be honest, the airdyne was the hard part.

I've always wanted my own motto.  For the longest time I thought it was "speed wins".  I used to say that all the time to Derek when talking about sports.  I think I found a new one.  Let not one day pass.  The longer version of that is Let not one day pass without having made even the smallest progress towards your goal.  I have started living this motto everyday while attempting to work towards my goal of freedom from the freeways.

Pistol Squat

5 minutes walking

pullups
11,10,10,9,8

chair pistols

5 sets of 20 (10 each leg)

2 legit pistols holding a 12lbs dumbell

Today was cool.  I've been practicing doing pistol squats for a few weeks using a chair.  Today I decided to use a small stool which took my hip crease below parallel.  At the end of the 5 sets I was feeling pretty good so I decided to try a pistol holding a 12lbs dumbbell in front of me.  I did it!  I pulled off one on each leg.  Next time I do that workout there won't be any chair or stool.  It has been a while since I've done anything new.  Now if I can just figure out how to do doubleunders and handstands.

I never wrote about the 100th day.  I'm not sure why I didn't because I was pretty proud of it.  I filmed it with my phone and had every intention of putting it on youtube.  When I watched it the first thing I did was count the reps.  I remember sort of losing count and if I didn't do the full 100 I was going to have to do it again the next day.  Thankfully I ended up doing 101.  My time was 5:53.  My previous best 100 burpee time was something like 7:30, so I'm pretty happy with that improvement.  5:30 would have been better.

I tried doing some ring pushups a few days after the 100th day.  My shoulder felt a bit uncomfortable.  I would really like to go see a physical therapist about that.  My shoulder really hasn't been the same since I did bench press 2 years ago.

Watt

Day 99

5 minute walk
.5 mile jog

99 burpees

20 pull ups


Well...... tomorrow is it.  The long journey is about to come to an end.  I am really looking forward to not doing burpees on Saturday.  That being said, a tiny voice inside me is saying, hey wouldn't it be cool to go back down the ladder and go back down from 100 to 1.  Yeah, I don't think so.  My squat rack is embarrassingly dusty.  I mean need to remedy that situation in short order.  One thing I do plan to do however, is the 7 minute burpee challenge.  Somehow I need to get a hold of some big chocolate chip cookies.  Eating one of those about an hour prior to doing something burpees seem to have worked out well in the past.

Day 79

5 minute walk
.5 mile jog

79 burpees


This may have been my best day yet as far as how I felt during the burpees.  I was like the stress level capped out around 40 and stayed the same all the way to the end.  I ate the same thing for breakfast that I always do so that isn't the reason.  Also didn't get anymore sleep.  My diet yesterday was pizza for lunch then a bowl of spaghetti for dinner.  Seems like my diet yesterday was a bit carb heavy.  I've been reading a lot about the low carb diet thing.  Although I think that is a great way to lose weight, I don't think going low carb is going to help performance.  I also did a lot of foam rolling last night.  I did not have the same carb feast today.  I will do the same amount of foam rolling and see if I get similar results tomorrow.

Spirit of 76

5 minute walk
.5 mile jog

76 burpees

I had a nice 4 day weekend.  I filmed myself doing 73 just for fun.  That was interesting.  Even though I am hitting the floor, it doesn't seem like my entire chest is hitting the floor.  I wonder if that has anything to do with my bad posture.  74 burpees was hard.  Really hard.  I didn't eat very well the day before and I paid for it on day 74.  That was the closest I've come to stopping midway through.  I corrected the problem and day 75 and 76 were much easier.

Famous 62

5 minute walk
.5 mile job

62 burpees

I have started attempting to name all the days based on the number of burpees I'm doing.  Yesterday was Roger Maris day for his 61 home runs.  Tomorrow will be Mark Mcguire.  Doesn't always have to be about baseball.  56 was Lawrence Taylor day.  57 was Heinz 57.  Couldn't think of anything for 62.  Kinda fun coming up with those.  Makes this incredibly long workout a little more interesting.  I'm noticing there is a bell curve of difficulty when I'm doing these.  The first 20-30 are easy, 30-45 are the hardest, after 50 it's like I'm on autopilot.  It's quite the mental game.  I've stopped thinking too far ahead.  Instead of thinking there goes 30, halfway there, I'm thinking about doing 1 more.  Always just 1 more.  I also have the confidence of knowing I did the number I'm trying to do today, yesterday.

100 burpee challenge

1 mile

40 burpees

3 rounds
5 pullups
10 ring dips
20 goblet squats


I was on a reddit forum a while back where somebody was complaining about burpees being so hard.  Somebody else mentioned to just do the 100 burpee challenge then they won't be so hard.  The 100 burpee challenge is on day 1 you do 1 burpee, on day 2 you do 2 and so on until you hit 100.  I am currently on day 40.  Doing 40 burpees is no big deal the hard part is doing it every day and knowing you have to do it again the next day.  I know that a lot of people will break them up during the day too.  Meaning they will do 10 in the morning, 10 at lunch, maybe 20 in the afternoon.  Something like that.  I feel like that is cheating and defeats the purpose which is to get better at burpees.  So I have been doing them all at once and unbroken.  I don't know what my unbroken record is for burpees but I think it is right around where I am at right now.  I am certain I have never hit 50 unbroken.  I'll have to do a video when I hit that mark.

We went for a family bike ride this weekend.  That was fun.  I hope we do that again soon.  I want to do one early in the morning where we ride to go get breakfast.  That would be awesome.

Cleaning Time

walked the dog

Cleans
45x10
95x5
95x5
135x3
135x3
155x3
175x3
185x3
205x1
225x1

Way back in high school I used to love doing the power clean.  For some reason most guys didn't like it, but I did.  I still remember the last time I maxed out in the summer of 92.  I had 235 on the bar and had failed it twice.  There was a small crowd of underclassman watching when I attempted my 3rd time.  I pulled it off by doing some kind of wacky side split falling back routine.  It was ugly but I got it.  Fast forward to this morning, when after warming up with a bunch of triples I decided to run it up to 225.  I've been watching a lot of clean technique videos on youtube and I'm pretty sure my form was horrible.  It felt good though.  Power cleans are fun.  I look forward to doing that more often.

Day 11, dog still alive

5 minute walk
leg swings
.25 mile run
hip stretches

3 rounds
10 thrusters #95
10 burpees

I have never done official thrusters in a workout before so this was fun.  Real thrusters are a lot harder than I thought they would be.  I want to try out open workout 14.5, but I'm not sure I can do it right now.  Just this short thing was pretty tough for me.  However, I haven't been working as much on conditioning lately.  I really need to work on the basic technique of the thruster.  I'm pretty sure I'm screwing up the front rack position. 

I dropped the bar today and almost killed the dog.  I'm going to pay more attention to where she is when I'm lifting.  That would have been horrible.  The kids would have been devastated.  I don't think I'll tell them about that.  I'll have to live with my guilt.

Bricks

50 calorie airdyne

leg swings
hip stretches

Front Squats
8x135
6x155
5x185
5 sets
3x205 tempo
10x185

I threw that last set of 10 at 185 in there just for fun.  I was starting to feel a little wobbly at the end.  I think I'll take a pass on doing lots of reps in the front squat at the end of workouts.  Last week was the first time that I can remember doing front squats and not being that sore a few days after.  I'll go ahead and call that progress.

I went to home depot this morning to by some bricks.  I am determined to make my backyard a no doggy escape zone.  We already have all the spaces boarded up but she could still dig under the fence.  So I'm getting about 150 bricks to cover up the dirt areas in front of the fence.  We should have that wrapped up tomorrow.

Lacy

5 minute walk
leg swings

1 minute on, 1 minute off
300 watt airdyne
20 minutes

We went down to the Irvine Pet Adoption event on Sunday and came away with a new member of the family.  She is a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.

Meet Lacy.

She likes to take naps.

Here We Go

10 minute walk

50-50-50
airdyne calories
burpees
airdyne calories

10:30

I saw a video of a couple guys doing this and thought it would be fun.  They did it in 7:30.  Their burpees were weak though.  Guess I have some room for improvement.

I just turned 40.  To be honest, I don't feel any different now that than I did at age 35 or 29.  Only thing I can remember being different at age 22 was that I could eat a heck of a lot more.  I am itching for change.

Midnight Oil

7 minute walk
.5 mile run

5 sets
20 deficit pushups
10 side to sides
10 jumping side to sides

I decided to try out the aerobics room at the gym today since it was so hot outside.  It was nice.  I think I'll use that more often.  I finished this in about 25 minutes today.  I'm going to have to start actually timing it.

This project is a monster.  I feel like I'm pushing a bus uphill.  I doubt I'll be leaving before 9pm until Memorial Day.

Late Nighter

8 minute walk

1.75 mile run
30 burpees

Today was the day after leg day so I was supposed to do a 3 mile run.  Unfortunately, I didn't have time for all 3 so I shortened it.  Things are getting heavy at work right now.  The company let a guy go for a security breach today.  That was too bad.  Good guy.  It's almost 11 and I'm still here writing this.  I forsee a lot more nights like this in the next few weeks.  That being said I'm still not missing training days.

Got an email from my old friend Chris Harker a few days ago.  He appears eager to reconnect with me.  I agreed to meet up at some yet to be determined time and location.  To be honest I have no idea what I plan to say to him.  I have very little interest in rekindling any past friendships.  Hell I barely have any current friendships.

Gettin into the Routine

5 minute walk

3 mile run

Got my DOMS buster out of the way today.  I still feel pretty stiff today, but as I said before there is really no way around that when you are pushing yourself.  It feels pretty good to hit it hard 4 days in a row.  I'll do something a little easy tomorrow like abs or maybe just take a rest day.

Yesterday was pretty rough at work.  There is nothing more annoying than having to convince people to do what you need them to do.  This is what I remember when I go back to being a lighter for other people.  Just shut up and do your job already!

DOMS Buster

10 minutes walking

Front Squats
10x135
6x155
5x185

10 sets
3x225

Leg day has been pretty tough for me the last month or so.  It has consistently taken me almost a full week to recover from all the leg day soreness.  I did some searching on Reddit and got a tip about doing some leg based cardio the day after leg day.  So last week I did an easy 3 mile run the day after doing a ton of walking lunges and air squats.  I was still sore the following day.  Can't dodge those day after day after pains.  However, I was pain free about 4 days after leg day.  That's a great improvement.  Today was leg day once again.  I guess I'll be enjoying another 3 mile run tomorrow.  Most likely while waiting on the alarm guy to show up in the morning.

Don't Forget the Burbees

8 minute walk
.5 mile run

100 burpees

I would have run further but I had a lot of gas.  Ha.  That is one of the downsides of running at the gym, you can't just let it out like you can in the garage.  It's been a while since I've done a good amount of burpees.  You can't just stop doing conditioning, even if you are going for strength.  I miss having that workout cough afterward.  I really need to sit down and schedule out my workouts better.  That would be smart.

CG Supervisor pro tip:  Don't drink a 36 ounce cup of water right before going into director review.  That was getting painful near the end.

Back to the Rack

7 minute walk
1 K row

10 minutes of mobility

Front Squats
10x135
8x155
5x185
10x3x205

Finally got myself back to the gym today.  I've been working out at home a lot in the last few weeks but I've been missing those front squats.  I decided to do more sets but fewer reps today.  The idea was to just get good reps and not care so much about increasing weight or maxing out the rep count.  This felt pretty good.  I'm going to try it again going 225x5, then 205 for the final 5.


Things are coming together at home lately.  This is going to be a big transition year for us.  I'm looking forward to it.

Strep FTW

I brought my gym clothes today and had every intention of going but I missed my window by about 15 minutes.  If I don't leave the office at 12:40 there is no chance that I'll make it back by 1:30.  I got myself a nice case of strep throat this week.  That kinda sucked.  Monday was terrible.  Tuesday was bad.  Today I feel pretty ok.  Tomorrow I'm definitely hitting the gym.  Thursday is usually pretty crazy because it's the day before posting at work but screw it.  Gotta get them gainz!

I'm Surrounded

5 minute walk

2K row

I've been surrounded by sick people for the past month.  I think my defenses may finally be starting to crack.  I felt a bit under the weather today.  That 2K row was kinda tough.  I was thinking if I felt up for it I would go for 5K today, but no way that was going to happen.  I think I'll do something simple like pull ups and pushups tomorrow.

Good at What?

5 minute walk
500 meter jog

Front Squats
8x135
6x155

5x185
5x205
5x215
5x225
4x245


Still trying to figure it out.

Active Rest Day

5 minute walk
2 mile run 15:30

I was feeling tired and sore today.  I had meant to do pull ups but after my first mile and taking a look at the clock seeing that I didn't have enough time to do a real workout, I just decided to run another mile and go back to work.   I really wish I could work out at home more.  I feel like I have about 15 minutes to do anything at the gym then I have to leave.

I currently weigh the most I have ever weighed on a consistent basis.  I recall when I turned 30 I shot up to about the weight that I'm at now.  That is what caused me to originally start taking my fitness seriously.  That is when I started running.  I don't feel like I need to be worried about my weight since now I am focused more on lifting weights and getting stronger.

This should be a fun year.

Attack of the New Year's Resolutioners

5 minute walk
1K row

3 sets
up and back walking lunges
50 air squats

This is the most crowded I've ever seen the gym.  To be honest, I was expecting this last week.  I guess everybody hadn't got back from vacation yet.  I wanted to do front squats today but there was no chance of me getting a squat rack in that zoo.  So I decided to go out to the volleyball court and get a good leg day in that way. 

Things are really starting off strong this year at work.  We've got more work than we can handle.  A good problem I suppose you could say.  Should be a fun 4 months.

Pullup Regression

10 minute walk


5x5 pullups 2 minutes rest between

Boy oh boy have my pullups regressed.  I mean, I am literally back to where I started only able to do 5-7.  I am looking forward to getting back these in a real way.  Especially since I finally got a legit pullup bar setup in my garage.

Comeback Week

Run Day
5 minute walk
1 mile run
3 minute walk
1 mile run
3 minute walk
1 mile run
6 minute cooldown

I just got back from a long Christmas break (2 weeks).  I didn't work out at all the whole time.  That is the longest I've taken off in years and I am feeling it now.  I did what I would call a easy workout yesterday that ended up being really hard.  I'm definitely back in the saddle now though.  I expect my fitness to take a week or two to comeback.  Hopefully I don't do anything stupid like the bench press.