Thursday, April 27, 2006

Push in Review: Workout 6

Sweet November (2001) = 4/10. Workaholic Type A jerk meets weird-acting woman who somehow convinces him to live with her for a month. At the end of the month, things are going so well that he completely changes into the world's most caring, sensitive guy and even asks her to marry him. Yeah, not buying any of it. I guess that's why it's a movie.

I'm still Pushing. You know how I said that Push was somewhat getting me over my irrational fear of rubber bands? Forget that!



I was doing tricep extensions like this when all of the sudden the band snapped, hit me in the eye, and I was blinded for a few minutes. O...K, I'm lying. But that is what happens in my irrational fear scenarios. It was a rather unscary break. During this exercise, I'm standing on the band- it rubs the back of the legs and a small part on the arms. When it broke, the extensions just got much easier to do and for a very brief moment, I thought I had acquired Superman strencth. I guess had it snapped completely in two, maybe my eyeball would have had the chance of getting poked. My worst fear didn't happen. And that's one way to slowly get over fears.


How the workouts are progressing:

Four sets of funky push ups (plyo, 1 arm, chair, close hand) as opposed to 1-2 sets. During these two weeks when I did one particular set of the 1 arm push ups I've mentioned before, I wasn't dying at the end. It was the first time I was able to complete the entire set without cursing or collapsing. Progress

Exercises that killed me in these workouts:

* Close hand push up- with feet on step, getin proper plank position and do a set of push ups with fingers pointed away from toes and hands close together, touching. Feel the burn, then feel the collapse.

* (Holding) Lunges- do one set of regular lunges. Then, Trainer Bob has you do another set with a twist. Hold the "down/active" position, then hop up, switch legs, and get right back into the down position. Easy at first, but after 12, I got all wobbly-legged.

* Hydrant- get on all fours, take right leg at 90 degree angle out to the side. Then pop leg straight, bend, down. Hurts a lot after 12.


Exercises that I don't get but are probably precursors to killers:

* Not really a killer, but it was very awkward. Get into a tree pose with resistance band under one foot. Do one set of bicep curls. The balance part was hard for me.

* Balance lunge- Take a look at what this guy calls surfing on this page. Once again, it was the balance thing that killed me.

Concerns:

Someone has noticed a change in my body. Unfortunately, it wasn't a particularly appropriate, insightful, or nice comment.


How I feel:


I'm really liking how my arms feel, even though someone made an inappropriate comment to me yesterday. More tomorrow...

4 comments:

Amanda Z said...

So are they going to give you a new band thingie now?

My ass/hips fit comfortably in movie theater seats. That's been my recent noticable change in body. Woo hah! And my bicep is like a permanent feature now. And sometimes I can feel my triceps.

Rachel said...

It's always nice to have ass/hip room in seats. My parents' dining seats have about 6 wooden decorative planks running up to the arm rest. They are TINY and the way they are spread out makes your ass/hips squish through the sides. Oy!

Push gave me two resistance bands, but their website said if they broke just to go out and buy some more. I went to Walmart and bought 3 for $10, but they are MUCH harder than the ones PUSH gave me. I can't even do the last 1-2 reps of my bicep curl with the lightest band. It's much more common to find the resistance tubing (looks like a stretchy jump rope with handles on the end) than the flat resistance bands. Then again, I haven't looked too many places. If all else fails, I could probably score some at a physical therapy/rehab type place. I think that might have originally been what the bands were used for?

Is the permanent bicep feature and recurring triceps a product of lifting weights or just losing some wobbly bits?

Anonymous said...

You went to Wal-Mart? >:(

Rachel said...

Yes, yes I did. I'm 500 times more convenient than Target on a Saturday. I didn't tell you I banned it completely.