stairs

I started out with 40 min of the stair mill - something like 172 floors. Then I stretched out my legs. Once I stopped sweating I starting a with 50 sit ups, 30 leg raises, 40 bicycles, 1 min plank, 1 min on each side plank, 50 superman's, 15 push ups. I did 3 sets of these. Then did 40 crunches on the ball, 15 push ups with my feet on the ball, and 25 things were my feet were on the ball hands on the floor and I rolled the ball towards my hands with my feet. I streched out again and headed home. My knee felt great the entore time. The only thing is that right now - as I write this my right foot keeps cramping.

very late night

I had to go into the office at about 12am to fix a small bug on an ad for the homepage so since I did not get to bed till about 1:45a I'm going to do my stair workout this evening after work :)

forgot the headlamp

Went for a run with Colleen, Bryan and Kyle ran with us as well. I have no idea where we exactly went but we started out around greed lake and then ran in the dark for a while and then back near the lake again.. Some parts were super dark. But we all did well not tripping or anything. I just fallowed Colleen. So in all Col said we did about 4.5 miles averaging about 8:30 miles. I felt pretty good, only had one little side ache as we went up hill at one point - I think around the end of mile 2... But it pretty much went a away later. My legs actually felt good even though they were a little bit sore from yesterdays workout.

morning swim

On a whim last night I set up a swim lesson with the same instructor I had worked with before Lake Samm tri in the spring (I hope this is ok). This morning at 6 I met with him for 30 min of drills to improve my form and it was a great refresher of what he worked with me on before. I started at 5:30 and warmed up with 100 yrds freestyle, 100 yrds kick, 100 yrds pull buoy. I ten started some of my main set as planned - I got 2 x 150yrds, 2 x 100yrds in before 6am.
He started me with focusing on head position - so I kicked on my side with my head straight down and one arm out at about 45 degrees down in front, rolling on my back to breath. I did this for about 100yrds each arm. Next I did this but after a couple kicks brought my hand up to my face and switched sides and repeat - 200yrds of this. I had a hard time at first just because of the coordination involved and keeping my breath under control but by the second 100yrds I got it pretty good. Then keeping in mind head position, arm at 45 degrees down, rotate side to side I swam 100yrds freestyle. felt way better esp on my shoulder and neck. Then did a rotation drill using a kick board like pull buoy/fin as I rotated it gave resistance and really forced me to focus on my abs and hips. It was really cool i could definitely feel when I was rotating and when I was not - 150yrds. Last focusing on my breathing - I keep my left arm out and patient while I breath (rather than pushing down) and then slowing getting rid of the pause between strokes when I breath after 150yrds of practicing this and trying to make it more smooth I started to get it.
After the lesson I continues my main set 3 X 100 - 6 X 50 - cool down 150 easy. I felt way smoother, faster and it seemed to lake less effort then even in my warm up.
I'll probably do a couple more lessons this winter as mini refreshers and reminders in addition to the rest of my training :)

starting the week off

I slept in this morning till 7:30a which was just lovely. So I went to the gym after work instead. I did about 20 min warm up on a stationary bike. Now I remember why I never use them - the seats are huge and sooo uncomfortable. My knee felt ok though I had a horrible time trying to find the right position on the seat , on the pedals (since no clips), seat height.. At 20 min I gave up. I then stretched out my legs and back, then did abs - 2 sets of 50 sit ups, 2 sets of 25 bicycles, 2 sets of 25 leg raises, 2 sets of 30 toe touches with 5lb ball. Then on to some weights - 2 sets of 15 bicep curls with 25lb bar, triceps pull down 3 sets of 15 with 30lbs, shoulder raises 3 sets 15 with 8lb barbels, bench press on ball 2 sets 15 with 10lb barbels, lunges 4 sets of 25, squats on bosu 2 sets of 25, 1 leg squats on bosu 2 sets of 15 each leg. That about covers it. I finished up with some stretching.