Brendan told us he had prepared "a little different" class for the Hartsville YMCA Spin hour this past Wednesday. Brendan seems to spend a great deal of time working on appropriate play lists for his classes and he said the play list would also be "a little different."
What was most different was the theme he shared for this class -- Celebrate What Your Body Can Do!
I am appreciating that theme as the week progresses because as I find my body not moving as quickly as it has, or being able to do as many reps as it did, or not lifting as many lbs as I think it should I have noticed I am not giving it credit for what it is doing for and with me.
This week I have been coming off a more than 10-day best.vacation.ever and as part of that vacation the only real exercise was trudging through the sand to and from the ocean. A few days that trudging included pulling a heavily loaded wagon and maybe a walk or two with the three year old -- but it was not exercise filled. (Okay I did manage some daily beach push ups,)
So this week I decided on trying a variety of workouts. It began with an early morning walk on Sunday that went just under an hour and covered a little more than three miles. A short trip to the Y on Sunday afternoon included a set of 500 crunches on the Red ball and four sets of chest pulls on the machine. Kept the resistance down around 40 for three sets and did try 40 for the fourth set. Monday was back to the Robbie YMCA Bootfit for a brutal 30 minute AMRAP. Tuesday I went back to the core and did combined sets of dumbell flies with 20lbs with 25 reps four sets while doing scissor kicks; then 25 pound bells for chest press with 25 reps at four sets while doing leg lifts
So as not to bore you with more of the specifics I will note that while I was castigating myself for the reduction in weight over the past few months -- I was not congratulating myself for what this body was still doing. I listened to the Spin music and tried to keep up with the others as we increased our work loads and speeds as we were celebrating what the body could do - except I was not celebrating -- I was wondering why I was not doing more.
So Thursday I decided to do the night Bootfit class -- which was a 20 minute challenge AMRAP that included 100 meter farmers carry ( I used the 25lb plates) 10 clean and jerks with the plate and then 10 squats with the plate.
My knees rebelled at the squats so then I did a mixture of reclined chest presses and reverse crunches or chest rows. I was not able to carry the 45 lb plates the other guys in the class were moving, nor could I do those sumo dead lifts but I was able to modify that workout and get in 20 grueling minutes that moved the heart rate and stressed some muscles. And as that class finished and I was feeling some of the soreness in muscles throughout the body I finally got the message and on the way home gave myself a proverbial slap on the back. While I am not fast enough, strong enough, or flexible enough to earn any medals I have a body that can and does push - It was time to celebrate.
