Where's the Beach?

Procrastination I'm glad most of you all seemed to appreciate the post about why it's important to take a rest day. I know that my rest day certainly helped me get through today's super high rep weight day. The thought of the reps alone made me want to take another rest day to be quite honest. I happily procrastinated this morning. I started off making steel cut oats with cinnamon apples and peanut butter. Then we hit Target, Home Depot, and the new local food market I mentioned a few weeks ago. We just needed a few produce restocks like more spinach (locally grown), bell peppers, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, and blueberries. Also snagged some giant portobellos. Can't wait to eat those. Out of Control Reps I finally couldn't procrastinate any longer (well, I could have of course), so I got to it. Today was 3 sets of 18 reps of the following: Chest - Incline dumbbell press Back - Pullovers Quads - Squats Calves - Calf raises Biceps - Dumbbell curls Triceps - ...

The Importance of Rest Days Today is an official rest day for me. I'm definitely going to enjoy it as tomorrow will be weights. Oh, but not just any weights, this is the super deluxe, mother of all high rep workouts. Tomorrow starts Week 7 of my 8-week rotation. I must say, that 3 sets of 18 reps really makes me want to make this a 6-week rotation and move along! Yes, you read that right, number of sets goes up. I can do this...already psyching myself up. ;-) Along the lines of rest days, Kalli @ Fit and Forty Something posted a really good comment/question yesterday: heather, great workouts today! would you ever skip the rest day since you feel so good or do you think that is bad in the long run? happy friday! While I did answer the comment, I thought it was a really good question and wanted to talk about it a little more. Especially because I know that I workout a great deal and my workouts are typically fairly intense. There was definitely a time when I would gladly ski...

More Running and Kicking  Since we're on tap for bad weather starting tomorrow through Sunday, I really wanted to get a run in today if at all possible. Jason was on board with that, so we took advantage of the storm-free day for a lunchtime run. We did a fairly easy 3+ miles, though we did speed up on the 2nd half of the run. It was soooo humid I must say. It would have been the perfect time to jump in the pool to cool down. After work I did a short kickboxing workout from 4 Day Split . This isn't one of my favorite Cathe compilations, but it's still a good one. Well worth the money. It's 4 DVDs giving you a 4-day split of weights and cardio. Cardio includes step, kickboxing, and boot camp. What's even better is that there are a seemingly endless number of premixes on this one - 23 to be exact. I also stretched for a bit after the workout. Since I didn't take it today, tomorrow will likely be my much-needed rest day. Actually, this is one of those weeks when ...

Double Workout Jason got up for swim this morning at 5 am, so I decided to get my lazy rear out of bed and get my cardio done. I did Shock Cardio Athletic Step . It's a fun workout, but maybe a little over zealous for a 5 am workout when I'm not fully awake.It did give me a nice morning boost of energy at least. I did my weight workout at lunch today. It's actually the last workout for Week 6 of the 8-week rotation. It was 2 sets of 12 reps done as supersets increasing weights. SS#1 Shoulders - Upright rows (with dumbbells) Biceps - Alternating bicep curls SS#2 Quads - Squats Inner thigh - Alternating plie squats SS#3 Chest - Incline dumbbell chest press Back - Underhand row (dumbbells) SS#4 Legs - Static lunges Triceps - Overhead triceps extension I also added calf raises. It was a good workout that gave me a nice extra boost of energy. Too bad it ended around 2 pm ;-) Stir Fry Dinner tonight was an easy veggie stir fry. We had lots of fresh veggies...

Thank You I wanted to thank everyone for their well wishes yesterday. I do feel much better today. The medicine has finally seemed to clear up the sinus drainage and my lungs feel back to normal. Do your lungs ever feel just totally shredded after a race? I have asthma, so I don't ever know if it's just me or everyone. Two on Tuesday In fact, Jason and I did an easy run at lunch, and I felt great. Although, I will admit that the humidity was through the roof. It was cold and dreary all weekend, but warmer this morning than it had been. I guess it's another weird front moving through. Anyway, after work, I decided to do just a short premix from Kick, Punch and Crunch plus the ab work (awesome stability ball work). I also stretched really well after. Tofu 101 Tuesday I had a request from Averie @ Loves Veggies and Yoga (I didn't forget) to perhaps talk about my favorite method for making or preparing tofu. I know some people believe in pressing their tofu and have f...

Upper + Plyo  Today was another cold, dreary day here. Where has summer gone? I ended up not going into work actually. Since the race, I have been battling sinus issues and trying to keep it out of my chest. My lungs still feel really shredded up too. I've been taking sinus meds, but they don't seem to be doing their job. I did decide to go ahead with my planned workout. It's upper plus plyo. The upper part was 2 sets of 8 reps done as supersets: SS#1 Chest - Incline flyes Back - Pullovers (goofed though and it should have been double arm rows) SS#2  Shoulders - Military press Triceps - Lying dumbbell extensions Plyo: Crossovers with 10# and Wide jump ups on 12" step SS#3  Biceps - Incline curls Biceps - Hammer curls Plyo: Explosive running man on 12" step I also did Shock Cardio HIIT Pyramid to complete the plyo part of this workout. It was quite close to a puke factor workout mostly because my sinuses and asthma issues. Definitely made if ...

Saturday Sandwich Dinner We started off with White Cheeseless Queso for a snack. We just sat at the table, listened to music, and talked. Dinner ended up being much later than normal. We bantered back and forth over what to make. Jason kept throwing out complicated, time-consuming ideas. Great ideas mind you, just not things to start at 8 pm. We settled on Italian "Beef" Sandwiches that I let him make. We served them open-faced on sandwich thins with sweet potato "fries". I apolgoize for not taking pictures. It was late, and I was starving. Step on Sunday This morning I woke up to gray skies and much cooler temps. I think we topped out at 65, if that. I was really slow going. In all honesty, I almost took the day as a rest day. Typically, Sundays are a run day, but the weather was dreary, and Jason's knee was bothering him a bit. He went upstairs to do yoga to try to stretch, and I ended up doing part of Cathe's Step Blast plus abs. Once I got going, I ...