Blahs

The second week has started tough, real tough. I'm not feeling great, questioning my eating strategy and not recovering the way I want to from my workouts. Despite that, I've tried to not change too much other than adding a recovery drink with more protein and carbs immediately after my morning workout.

Unfortunately, I slipped a bit yesterday although in retrospect it wasn't all that bad and it did involve having a nice dinner with my kids! We made homemade pizza with a thin wheat crust, chicken and spinach meatballs, onions and cheese. It may have partially been a result of the way my body has been feeling with workouts as well and the fact that I skipped yesterday to recover. It gave me a blah feeling all day long but hopefully it will be worth it in the long run. I have read a bit about a tough lag a week or so after starting Paleo, and it has certainly worked out that way for me. I'm still determined to work through it though, the goals that I set are still well within reach for the month and that feels like the most important thing.

Taking a day off certainly seems to have helped me this morning, I set a new P.R. in both the bench press (230lbs) as well as with Jackie (1000 meter row,50 -45lb thruster, 30 pull-ups: 10:35) Last time I did Jackie it took me 10:37, but the key difference is that I had to scale the pull ups (jumping pull ups instead of regular). Very happy to say that pull-ups have ceased being a complete limiter for me. Still tough, and pretty hard to do 30 in a row, especially after the rowing and thrusters, but it feels great to really do the workout as prescribed!

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Racquetball

Sorry for the slacking, but just a quick update. A solid two days of lifting so far this week, and I managed to play some racquetball as well. A bit of cutthroat with my brother and cousin (1 vs. 2), and then played a doubles match with my uncle and 2 other gym rats. I have really enjoyed playing racquetball even though I'm not a great player. It's definitely a workout; short bursts of energy and constant motion especially in a 2v2 environment. The rallies can be much longer and you get into the flow of the game better I think.

Much better than tennis anyway!

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Monthly Summary - August

It's been a while, but since I have a good result to announce I figure I should do a monthly summary. This was a good month in terms of overall hours at least, and also good in terms of racing and general good times!

It was nice to see that I got over 30 hours for the month! This is composed mostly by over 20 hours of strength training! The rest is racing at Winding Trails, a bunch of mountain bike rides and my restart of running.

I almost forgot how motivating it was to see the numbers pile up in terms of hours that I've completed. I'm hopeful that September will be almost as big.

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Training log update

It's been a while since I shared monthly or weekly totals, mostly because I'd gotten pretty lazy about tracking my workouts. With my bum knee and apathetic attitude I really hadn't been writing stuff down consistently since April. Getting back in the swing of things a bit at the gym made me think of updating it this morning and I was pleased to see that even with all the stuff I missed I was still at over 170 hours for the year.

I did add the racing I did to the sheet since I remember those dates, but had to guess at a few other things. My running has really been pathetic this year, no real surprise but I would like to get it dialed back up again. I suppose I will have to get out at least once a week from work during the day to really make a difference. I've done a long run the last two Sundays, and that really fits well in my schedule, but I need to get out during the week a couple times as well.

August is shaping up to be a big month, again mostly because the rest have been weak but in any case it is encouraging to see.

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Lifting Program - week 3

As I mentioned earlier, I've started a weight-lifting regimen based on a program developed by my sister-in-law. I had two goals when I started, mix up my workouts and get a bit of a kick in the pants to refocus my attention. Any strength and fitness gains are purely incidental ;)

The good news is that both of my goals have been achieved, I have been interested in going to the gym more and have managed to get there 4 times a week for 3 straight weeks now. I've also felt better and feel like I'm moving things around. My upper body feels a bit more defined already and my legs feel very strong. I have noticed the difference in my racing the last couple weeks as well as I was able to bike and run faster.

Two good components that I would particularly recommend; foam rolling and combination lifts. Foam rolling had intrigued me for a while, it's essentially self deep tissue massage. Laying on the roller and slowing moving through the muscles feels pretty good, and when you hit a sore spot... Ouch! It can be painful, but almost immediately afterward the muscle feels much better. Secondly, the combination lifts are something she has recommended that puts a couple different exercises together. For example, this morning I was doing a squat, then stand up and curl the weight and then military press above my head. I also do a lot of these kind of exercises standing on one leg. This works the arms, but also makes your core and leg muscles fire the whole time as well. It makes for a bit more complete workout, and feels like I'm doing more than just trying to pump as much weight as I can.

Looking forward to a few more challenging weeks...

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Weight lifting week 2

Starting my second week...

Feels pretty good, I'm enjoying the program so far. I feel stronger and better already and I'm down 5 lbs. Admittedly, I don't expect that to last or have even expected that result. I'm guessing it's more a focused workout approach has made me focus more on eating better and getting other workouts in.

Hopefully, I can keep making progress.

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Nice Weekend

Fun week in general, I started my new lifting program thanks to my sister-in-law, and I got a ton of time on the bike in this weekend.

Rode to the beach with my uncle to go to my cousin's graduation party (55 miles) and then played volleyball for a couple hours. Yeah, I was shot at the end of the day! Today, we went for a quick mountain bike ride and then I sat in the hot tub to recover.

I'm headed back to the gym in the morning to start my next week's workout. Hopefully it will be as fun as this past week... it looks like it from what I've seen.

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