Weekend Warrior

Working out on the weekend is normally not something I do. I make a deal each week with myself that if I exercise every day Monday through Friday, I can take both weekend days off. (The exceptions are when I'm in the middle of half-marathon training months, where I swap out my Friday workouts for long runs on Saturdays.) Besides, by the time Friday afternoon rolls around, I've generally already accumulated 7-8 workouts that week between teaching classes and my own workouts. Another reason I don't like to workout on weekends, at least in a gym, is that it just reminds me of WORK, so sometimes it's more just that I need a mental break from exercise or planning workouts.

However, this past Saturday morning, I tried out a boot camp at Survival Fitness in Carmel. (survivalfitnessgym.com) One of my personal training clients takes boot camps there and encouraged me to try one out with her--they offer your first class for free. Not gonna lie...I was a little nervous! Boot camps are a lot more scary when you're not the one controlling the class content! Plus, I think the element of surprise is what makes boot camps so appealing...you never exactly what's in store, but it's guaranteed to be high-intensity cardio and strength. It was actually a lot of fun though, and I would definitely go back. While I wasn't very sore on Sunday like I thought I might be, it was a great workout! We were all dripping sweat within the first 10 minutes, and anytime we got a "break" from the circuits to go run outside I was overjoyed at the chance to let my heart rate fall from "verge of exploding" to just "high."

I realized how good it felt to not have to be the one planning out all the circuit stations and keeping track of the class time, but more than that, it just felt good to be able to push and challenge myself without thinking about anyone or anything else. Doing this on a semi-regular basis would be a great idea for my own fitness. It was also fun to experiment with different kinds of equipment. Survival Fitness had what basically look like gymnastics rings that you jump up and grab onto, and then use to do a pull-up. They also had a brand new line of equipment I had never seen called the "Roc-it" machines by Hoist. Google them for yourself, because they're pretty hard to describe, but basically no matter what muscle group you're targeting, your whole body is moving to involve the core, even though you're still sitting down. I got a couple new ideas for my own classes too, for equipment we already have, like performing a wall sit with your feet on an upside-down BOSU.

So, on to my second workout of Saturday. Yep. My mom and I had already saved that date to do a 10-mile walk together for our mini training. All in all, the walk was uneventful. Our pace was really steady at 15:00 min/mile; we finished at 2h 33m counting a mile spent in the Ritchey Nature Preserve on gravel and mud that really slowed us down. Mom had already done the full 13.1 miles on a treadmill a week ago, but it was good for me to see that I can in fact walk that distance on our target pace without killing my ankles or shins (or dying of boredom). It was a good experience for her to see the differences between a treadmill and walking outside on varying inclines and surfaces. None of my joints were sore on Sunday either, just some lingering burning on the bottoms of my heels.

Now that I've assured myself I'll be ok walking 13.1 miles, I'm onto worrying about the weather for race day. April hasn't been very conducive to doing anything outdoors (especially for over 3 hours), so we'll see what May 7th brings!

Half-Marathons: Running Versus Walking

We're at T minus 17 days until the Mini-Marathon, and I'm just now starting to realize how different walking that distance will be, as compared to running it like I have in the past. Gut instinct tells you that running would be much harder than walking it, and that mostly is true. However, if you're a runner (like me) then changing your body's way of covering that distance, even if you're dropping down to a much slower pace, works muscles and joints much differently. I decided last Friday that I was just going to walk for a whole hour on a treadmill at a speed of 4.0mph. Aside from the boredom factor (thank God for HGTV!), it was pretty easy in terms of the cardio required. I was barely working up much of a sweat and able to breathe through my nose the whole time. How my joints felt was a totally different story. Towards the end of the hour, I started to notice the bottoms of my feet were burning--kind of like a tingling feeling if you've been on an elliptical for too long. My shins were getting a little tight but not too painful, and I think my hips noticed the movement more than they do during running. All I was thinking was that it would be so much easier and more natural for me if I just started running. For the whole weekend afterwards, my ankles, shins, and feet felt the effects.

If you think about it, your feet have contact with the ground much longer when you walk, as compared to when you run. There is obvioulsy much more force and impact when you run, being that there are brief time periods where neither one of your feet is touching the ground. Based on the joint impact of running, walking would still be a safer option for the general population. During running, most people don't have much of a heel strike--I had my running gait analyzed in college, so I know this is true for me too. You see some people at an extreme who almost have zero heel strike and look like they're running on tiptoes. With walking, however, your heel always hits the ground first, and then your foot rolls from the back to front, ending with the push off the toe--so all in all, more time spent on the ground. (You can almost pick out these form differences in the two pictures above.) So if you're more accustomed to running, where your foot has a lighter tread on the ground and is only touching for a brief second, then walking a long distance can create burning sensations (or even blisters!) on the feet and a feeling of more pressure where the shin connects down to the ankle.

I'm definitely glad I decided to do a few practice walks before the day of the Mini. From people who have both walked and run a half-marathon before, they say you are equally sore the next day. If nothing else, this has given me way more respect for the people I see "just" walking every day, and I'll be less likely to discount it as a real workout!

Excuses, Excuses

To fitness professionals, there is NO excuse (other than injury or some sicknesses) to not workout. Scheduling can never be an excuse, because we all know there are certainly enough hours in the day to squeeze in something. This blog post is going to become a running list of the best (and by "best" I mean worst) excuses I've heard from people to avoid exercising. These all came from clients of mine when they were cancelling a personal training session. (And if you're reading this and thinking, uh oh...that one was me, don't worry...I still love ya! I just can't help poking fun!)

1. I had a work pitch-in. (so you canceled your training session to EAT.)
2. I fell down the stairs during the fire drill and twisted my ankle. (Injury--yes, a valid excuse. But what a creative way to fall!)
3. I have to help my little sisters get ready for homecoming...cute right?! (Not cute, and here's why....these past 3 excuses were from the same person)
4. I have to find earrings for a wedding.
5. I put my shoes out on the deck and it rained overnight. (Valid excuse, because we do have a policy of no barefeet in the gym...but don't most people own a spare pair?)
6. I forgot my shoes. (Valid reason if you have super small or super large feet...but I always have an extra pair!)
7. It's too nice outside to be in the gym. (Do you not have enough faith that your personal trainer can create an outdoor program for you?!)

Healed!

So, after 6 days of not doing any exercise except for some light yoga, and a weekend spent icing my back and popping Aleve, my spine issue is finally better. Just in time too, because 6 days felt like forever...that's practically like taking a week of vacation! (And I definitely noticed the effects of not doing anything when I jumped back into spin class this week!) I was able to see the nurse practitioner here at work a week ago (one of the benefits of having occupational health in the same department as the fitness center!), and she did a pretty thorough exam to immediately rule out any nerve issue. Whew! Since the pain wasn't radiating down through my leg, and I wasn't experiencing any numbness or tingling, it looked like a musculoskeletal problem. Also, the pain was very localized in the middle of my spine, not stronger on one side or the other, which would typically be the case with nerves. She said for whatever reason, I strained one of the tiny muscles/tendons/ligaments within the spine, and the area was just badly inflamed. I'm normally resistant to taking medication and try to find any other remedy first, but she kept stressing that I take an Aleve every 12 hours to clear it up. It worked, and by Tuesday of this week I was able to teach cycle again. I kept my workouts on the lighter side, but now by today, Friday, I feel ready to do almost anything!

It's still frustrating that I have no real clue as to how this happened in the first place! The only thing that could have possibly triggered pain was that the Thursday before this all happened, we did two 45-second rounds of boat pose (aka V-sit) in boot camp, which puts all the body weight on the very, very low spine and "sit" bones--a real ab challenge! Still, that's not an out of the ordinary exercise for me, and nobody else from that class had any pain...and I was sitting on a mat, not like it was directly on hard ground. The human body can be so weird sometimes! Just a lesson that you can never be too over-protective about your back.

Weight lifting is for girly girls too!

One of the biggest struggles of being a female personal trainer is reversing years of WRONG thinking in your female population that lifting any size weight beyond a 5-8 pound dumbbell will immediately make them bulk up into a female version of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Now, this post will not dive too much into that myth--my co-worker Lucy just wrote a fabulous post about that on her blog (which you can see the link to on the right). What I do want to comment on is a post that I saw on Rachel Cosgrove's blog about how weight lifting is for even the girliest of girls.

I wouldn't call myself a "girly girl" per se, but I do enjoy all the simple luxuries of being a girl--doing makeup, getting mani and pedis, buying a new outfit/pair of shoes/purse even though you have something oh-so-similar already in your closet. (I'm sure anyone from work right now is thinking really?? Because the attire they see me in everyday is black workout clothes, hair in a pony and maybe mascara if I was really feeling ambitious!) Rachel had a very intersting point on her blog...most of us women make time for appointments like manicures, eyebrow waxing, massages, etc. so why don't we think of strength training as another part of our beauty routine or body maintenance? Along with the health benefits and functionality for daily living that weight lifting brings, that's why we do it right? To stay toned and firm, and have some sculpting in the right places, and just feel overall attractive?

I've learned how to phrase questions during personal training sessions with women. Instead of asking "Were the weights too light?" or "Do these dumbbells feel heavy?" I've started re-phrasing and saying things like "Were the weights the right amount of a challenge for your goals?" "Could you have done 5 more reps?" or "Were those last 2 reps a struggle for you?" Even having a client rank the intensity level from 1-10 is a good way of fishing out the truth. Once these ladies get past the number on the dumbbell or cable machine and find out that they can in fact complete the set at the heavier weight, they start better answering my questions about how challenging the weights really are for them. Or, better yet, they start telling me when they need the weight to be increaesd, without me having to ask! When this happens the Hallelujah chorus always plays in my head, because one more female has reversed her thinking!

You can still be feminine and be able to kick your husband/boyfriend's butt in a push-up competition! And I'm sure a guy would agree that nothing is more attractive than the confidence...and strength training to the highest of your ability does just that!

Rants

As the title suggests...I have 2 things to really get off my chest. Nothing major in either case. Just things lately that have irritated me enough to warrent a blog post.

1. Personal training in apartment gyms. I'm not really sure how this comes about in the first place, but lately there have been two people (one girl, one guy) who train clients in the gym at our apartment complex. Again, I'm not sure which party actually lives there, the trainer or the client, but why would it occur to you that this would be an acceptable place for personal training sessions? First of all, the gym is so tiny...they have 2 treadmills, 2 ellipticals, 2 bikes, weight machines for the major muscle groups, a set of dumbbells and ONE weight bench. Yes, one. So, the other night this woman was there training a client, having her do rounds of strength exercises and then intervals on the treadmill--meanwhile, Chad and I wanted to use the treadmills for an actual 30-minute cardio workout and had to wait until she finally let us take over. Then, there has to be some legality issue here. Guarantee if the apartment staff knew that people were paying for personal training on their grounds, there would be some liability concerns.

The other thing that aggravates me the most, is that the male trainer who works in the apartment gym is a BAD trainer!! He only has his clients do the weight machines, which I'm pretty sure my grandma could figure out if she had to. He waits forever in between sets before he has his client repeat them, and worst of all, he has this bored to death expression on his face the entire time. Never cracks a smile, doesn't really even talk much, and he often watches the TV instead of his client DURING a set. You really have to wonder how much these people are paying for his "service." The starting rate for personal trainers at Life Time Fitness was $60 per hour, so it's scary that someone could be paying him that much to stand and point at what machine they are supposed to do. I'm half tempted to catch his clients when he's not around and tell them they deserve much better.

2. P90X Craze. Before I start ranting about this one, understand that I am NOT saying that this is a bad exercise program. I have seen people transform their bodies with the help of P90X--using the science of muscle confusion is the best way to ensure that someone keeps seeing results 3 months into their routine. (I will say it cracks me up that people at work seem to just now be getting into P90X when the program was out in fitness centers my senior year of college, which was 4 years ago.) Now. What I can't stand is when anyone and everyone jumps on the bandwagon of P90X (or any similar program) when they aren't already doing strength training or before they even consider if the program is a good fit for their individual body. What happens is people hear about so-and-so who did the program and saw great results, so they go out and buy the materials or join a group who's doing it, and then get discouraged because they can't keep up. Or get injured. P90X is not a beginner's program.

The other part that really makes my co-worker Lucy and I chuckle is that people think this is some kind of miracle routine. All it consists of is alternating high intensity strength and cardio exercises, and keeping up with a strict schedule of working out most days of the week---i.e. the same format of workout programs we would recommend that anyone follow for really making changes to their body. P90X is infamous for taking normal everyday exercises and re-naming them to make people think they are something new. For example, a couple months ago, a member at work asked me if I knew what a swimmer's press was. He had forgotten his instruction manual and couldn't remember what that exercise looked like. I wasn't immediately familiar with the term, so I found a youtube video of it...only to discvoer it was a bicep curl to shoulder press. A totally standard combo that I do all the time. I see the benefit in having a set routine and pre-written plan and/or video for the day so you don't have to think much about what you have to do. And if you need a popular program to give you the discipline to workout 6 days per week, then go for it. I'm just so over people thinking that this specific program is going to change their lives when the fact is, it's no better than making your own mix of challenging exercises that keep your heart rate up and work your muscles to their point of fatigue.

Man, I wish I would have thought of some crazy number/letter combination for a name of a program and marketed my own personal training routines. Genius.

Falling Apart

Ugh. Just when I was on a roll, feeling really good about my fitness level and workout schedule, I've developed some sort of lower spine issue. It's only been a week now, but with my job and level of activity, any injury or illness can seem like an eternity when it's disrupting my daily workouts and limiting what I can do in the work setting. It started on Friday morning when I woke up, sat up in bed and realized my very low spine was throbbing...almost that feeling of falling directly on your tailbone, but it was that whole section of sacral vertebrae. For those of you who aren't anatomy nerds, your spine is divided into 4 sections (cervical, thoracic, lumber and then finally the sacral vertebrae are the very lowest ones that are fused together and end in the tailbone.) Nothing I did in my Thursday workouts came to mind as what could have triggered this. I taught core class (which is only 10 mins of ab and low back strength) ball yoga and then boot camp, which is always my typical Thursday schedule. I even asked around to some of the participants who were in any of those classes and nobody else had noticed anything strange.

And it's just getting progressively worse. Both Monday and Tuesday I taught cycle classses, which really aggravated the spine even more from the sitting position on the bike. It's constantly a bit painful just standing still, but any movement triggers more intense pain and any pressure to the area creates more of a burning sensation deep within. Even on Wednedsay, doing 30-minutes of yoga triggered pain in the simplest poses. My range of motion is also becoming more limited, to the point where bending down to pick a dumbbell off the floor is a tedious task. The hardest part is not just that my own workouts are affected, but like I mentioned, my entire day is disrupted. I can't full-out participate in my strength classes; during personal training, there are exercises I can't demonstrate without pain; and forget about any extra workouts of my own.

I may be freaking out a little bit here, but it's becoming really scary when a) the situation is not improving, in fact getting worse and b) it has to be a nerve issue in the spine--which is a more serious issue than just muscle pain and also outside a fitness instructor's scope of expertise. So what are my options...pinched nerve? Sciatica? Nothing fun, or easy to fix. The truth is, I would need about a week of no physical activity, which is pretty impossible unless I took a week of vacation.

So, there's my pity party for the day. Sorry you were invited.

Relay for Life

Let me just say, I HATE fundraisers. HATE them. Not that I don't think there are many worthy causes out there that would make great use of my money or time--I just hate asking for donations. Most of my friends are in their 20's, newer in their careers and, like me, saving up for major life events like houses, weddings, etc., so needless to say, not a lot of extra money flowing. The other problem with picking a fundraiser in my job field is that there are so many out there--I come across all sorts of charity walks, races, etc. every month, and the fact is, I can't participate in all of them. I've been fortunate enough that I haven't had any family members or friends that have been stricken with any major cancer or disease, so I can't choose any one organization or fundraiser event that is personal to me.

With that said, I signed up today for the Dow AgroSciences' Relay for Life team. The thing I like about the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life is that it is a broad fundraiser, going towards all types of cancer. We hear a lot about breast cancer, especially, and while it is more common than some other cancers, it's not any less expensive or emotionally tolling than the more obscure forms of the disease. Along with fundraising, one representative from each Relay team has to be walking at all times for a 24-hour time period. Typically enough people will be on a team so that each person only has to walk for about an hour time slot...but yes, even the overnight shifts have to be covered! The DAS Relay event this year takes place on May 14, starting at 10am, through May 15 at 10am. I set my fundraising goal fairly low and (hopefully) attainable at $100, to get my feet wet and just see what happens from there.

Here comes my great fundraising idea. (Drum roll please!) For about a year now, I've been wanting to host a wine tasting for my family/friends. I've envisioning several different "stations" set up around our apartment with a wine to taste as well as some food pairings. My dad's girlfriend happens to be both a wine-o and a foodie, so coming up with the combinations shouldn't be a problem :) Everyone can rank their favorites, and my hope is that we'll all be introduced to some good, affordable wines we hadn't come across before. So, Saturday April 30, we'll be hosting the wine tasting, with a $5 entry fee that goes straight to Relay for Life. I'll keep you posted on how my first "charity event" goes!!

I guess I should throw in here somewhere, if you do want to make any donations to the team in my name, you can give it to me in person or drop it in the mail. No donation is too small!