Gym is Open (Thursday 3/27)

The gym is open!  What did you do to move your body today? Kix

I let the elliptical kick my butt for 30 mins.... LOL

Did you kick it back? 

I totally admire anyone who can go that long on the elliptical - its murder for me. 

Good morning, Kix.  One more 2-a-day for me this week, then I'll rest.  I'll do lower body strength training and core work at lunch, then 50-60 minutes of cardio after work.   I'm really beginning to see the results of my new strength training routine, especially the core work.  My belly looks really odd with all the extra skin, but I can actually see and feel my abdominal muscles now; it's weird, but cool at the same time.  I'm hoping that if I can improve my core muscles enough, that I won't need muscle tightening in my abdomen when I have plastics, but can just get rid of the excess skin.  We'll see whether that works -  Kellie

Ah, to be young!  There's no hope of my skin even trying to go back where it belongs.  Can't say I blame it, it was pretty stretched out for too many years. I need to ramp up my strength training.  I'm mulling over trying to reduce my body fat composition. Have you lost inches?  Even though I had a small weight gain recently, I've lost two inches off my waist.  Why the two inches won't come off my thighs, I don't know! Good work on all that exercise.  Will you continue the 2-a-days? Kix

I've been in a funk this whole week and FINALLY pushed myself today to run. I think part of my funk has been exhaustion - the past two weeks I haven't gotten much sleep plus all the physical exertion from camp and my climb just caught up with me. Also, I think it's been kind of hard to get back into "normal life" after a great week at Moab.  I've been walking all week but that's it. Today I did 10 minutes warm up by walking, 30 minutes of weights and then ran 36 minutes, which was about 3.3 miles (at 5.5 mph - that's a first!). I'm trying a new training program for the 10K I'll be doing in May and I think I'm going to like it much better - works better with my schedule and it is more based on amount of time running rather than miles.  It will also give me time to cross train for my adventure race (I'm doing my first one April 20th - can't believe it's that soon). By the way, congrats on the interview!! Can't wait to hear how they are blown away by you and offer the job to you on the spot

You're entitled to a down patch, you had all that agita with your aunt's passing, plus it takes time to grieve after losing a parent.  I lost my brother in late 1998 and my mother six months later, and it took me about a year before I stopped being acutely affected by it.  It would sneak up on me at odd times, usually when I was between stressful projects at work. With all this training you're doing, will you be competing in Beijing?    Seriously, I'm proud at all you can do! This job will probably be perfect, and then I'll get extremely bummed out when they tell me the salary is some puny figure.  No salary was posted on the announcement, it said DOQ, which can sometimes be a good thing, or the kiss of death. Kix

We took the plunge and signed up at Anytime Fitness today.  I am oddly super-excited.  The funniest thing happened to me today - I was actually EXCITED to go work out.  I was looking forward to it.  I can honestly say that hasn't happened, ever.  At most, I've looked at is just something I've got to do. I did 20 minutes on the treadmill at 2.7mph (and 5 minutes each warm-up and cool down at 2mph).  I did one of the fat burning programs that varied the inclines.  I also did 10 minutes on the bike.  I am going to wait on circuit training until we meet with the trainer to go over those machines next Thurs.  Hubby did 3 circuits on the arm machines and 25 minutes treadmill. Overall the machines reported that I burned 250 calories.  

Funny how that works, isn't it?  I actually like being active now.  My favorite thing is walking, and in my big fat days, you couldn't have paid me to walk.  BTW, you walk faster than I do on the treadmill! Good job!  Instead of feeling inadequate, I'll just assume it's because you are young and full of pep. I need to ramp up the speed on the treadmill, I've been kind of lazy about it. Were the dues at Anytime Fitness too outrageous?  They have specials from time to time at the one near my house.  I don't regret joining Bally's, but sometimes it would be nice to just be able to walk one mile to the gym. Kix