Can You Feel It?

Got to the gym earlier today, spent about 10 minutes on the treadmill then trotted off to class where things looked different since there were blue mats all over the floor. The teacher looked different too. As it turned out, the newbie didn't know that Jackie was substituting for Kate and that's how Step and Muscle class turned into Cardio and Muscle.

I missed the step, missed Jackie and Jackie's awesome aerobic workout remix CD. It's amazing how fast you get used to a person.

Wanna know what's more interesting than a jumping jack? A jump squat that segues into a jumping jack. And who knew that a jumping jack, challenging in and of itself, was a modification for mountain climbers which I dislike almost as much as I dislike burpees.

Fast feet or the football jog just about did me in tonight too as did the basketball defense-like back and forth shuffling with a jump somewhere in between.

I was quite verbal tonight with my oohs and aahs since it was a way to absorb the rigorous workout and carry on with the task at hand.

Can you feel it, Kate asked?

I don't know about it but I felt used and abused after the burpees, planks, push-ups, squats et al.

It was cool, though, when many of us wiped out women convened in the locker room to talk about the beat down that we had endured. There was this camaraderie among, mostly, strangers.

I Tried

I developed pre-rocking climbing jitters. I even had a sty before I headed out -- something that I rarely get. You would think that my stage fright would have subsided by now but it hasn't -- not completely anyway.

I couldn't repeat the feat of climbing the 5.8 Face Plant route that I climbed last week. I tried and I tried but I couldn't make it to the top. Take after take left me drained and every other route after that was onerous.

While I was belaying, this woman helping with the introductory rock class pointed out my technique to one of the youngsters. Who would have thunk it? At one point in time, I thought that I would never get belaying down. I used to keep a death grip on the rope but I'm so relaxed now. Relaxing was key to learning how to float and it seems like relaxation works in a number of venues. Of course...

There are not a whole lot of videos out there with tips on how to rock climb but here's a decent one and although it leans toward bouldering, there are still some useful tips and random facts for beginners.



I'm going to start doing some exercises specifically to help me with rock climbing. This Wikihow article, How to Improve at Indoor Rock Climbing, has some good suggestions which I plan on implementing soon, especially the push-ups which I've gotten away from doing.

Arms: Improve your grip by doing exercises that will strengthen the arms and wrist/forearm region. Use a squeeze ball regularly to strengthen the wrist and hand region; lift small weights frontwards and sideways to improve overall arm strength. Try static hangs on a bar to increase your capacity to do static hangs while climbing. Better to discover on the low bar than a high wall that you can't do this!

Upper body: Pull-ups are brilliant for increasing upper body strength. Even a mere 10 a day done regularly will make an enormous difference to your strength capacity.

Keep your bum into the wall as you climb, doing so will assist your body in going up. Because your bum, or the gluteus maximus are the largest muscles in your body. Which means they weigh a lot and will pull your body downward as you climb.

Maintain three points of contact as you climb. This means that you can have one limb off the wall, so you can rest it. (i.e. Two hands one foot or two feet one hand.)

A Perverse Push-Up & A Reverse Embrace

I'm going to have to give Tammy an honorable mention in the bringing the pain category.

I went to the Drills To Make You Sweat class at my gym and, fifteen minutes in, I was sweating as advertised.

In addition to jumping jacks and squats, I see that instructors like the grapevine move as well.

To add a degree of difficulty, we did jumping jacks with a weight. Later on, the same weight stayed in the crook of our knees while we did leg lifts. We then lifted our legs to the side and kicked them out too. Torture, I tell you. Holding a squat was tortuous as well.

There was also a slow motion burpee-like move that we did with weights. Walk your hands out. Plank. Walk your hands up. Holla...

We did push-ups, got up and balanced on one arm. Push-up then balanced on the left arm. It was like doing a synchronized moved and a reverse embrace of each side of the room. We collectively faltered and that's when Tammy said, Come on ladies. I hate exercising by myself. In addition to some gorgeous black and white Nike shoes, apparently, Tammy's got stamina as well.

We also did a perverse push-up on the step. First, we lunged and pulsed then placed our hands at the corners of the step. Push-up. Followed by a one hand push-up.

Of course, of course. We did the obligatory ab work.

Football jog. Drop. Push-up. Repeat.

We bicycled while moving a weight through our bicycling legs.

By the time we did the the superman, I was not feeling like much of a hero at all. I just wanted to transition to child's pose or splay out like a starfish. I wasn't picky at that point.

Oh, how Tammy brought the pain. My legs were like jelly afterwards and I could hardly walk to my car. It would be nice to have taxi service after working out.



I also need to remember to put in my contacts when I participate in a class because my glasses were wet, foggy or sliding on my face during segments of class. And who needs to be distracted with adjusting one's glasses while trying to keep up with Tammy?

Do You Know Where Your Core Is?

That was the question posed to the boot camp class by the instructor Tracy.

I'm not one for group exercise but I went to check out the new Carondelet Park Recreation Complex or, as I like to call it, the city-funded YMCA and, since I've been curious about boot camp style classes and one was being offered on Saturday, I didn't think that a better opportunity would present itself. It was really good timing because only eleven people were in class.

Not only did Tracy help locate our cores, she also showed us à la Diana Ross who was the boss.

Tracy, who is a great instructor, struck all the right notes. The class was challenging yet fun.

We tossed around a three pound weight while moving rather rapidly in a circle. My friend Lori was not crazy about the tossing of the ball; I think she might have had a flashback from her dodgeball playing days.

We did that football-jogging-in-place-crouch then sprawled on the floor. We did planks, push-ups, burpees, squatted with our backs against the wall and, at one point, we compressed ourselves ball-like and rolled on the mat. Lori's squat form was excellent according to Tracy who also made the rounds to check our jabbing intensity level with a punching mitt. I love props almost as much as I loved the sensation and echo emitted when I connected with the punching mitt.

I've been rocking steady with exercise for about two and half years now and I almost felt as if I had never done one moment of cardio. I was worn out but definitely in a good way.



Update: After taking the boot camp class, I took a few laps around the track and it seems that another blogger caught me in stride with my new blue Danskin Now top on. It really is a small world after all.

Month-End Review, March

Dare I say that I had fun at the gym today?

Is there really fun to be had while gutting it out?

Maybe I should say that I had a satisfying time as I exercised in three parts. I got physical on the adaptive motion trainer, treadmill and arc trainer. As usual, the arc trainer worked me over -- but it was a good over.

While I was on the AMT, this woman got off of the treadmill, did five regular push-ups then went into a downward facing dog position and repeated the sequence several times before getting back on the treadmill to run. I was out-and-out impressed and, I swear, it made me want to drop down and do push-ups although I've never done more than seven in a row and I've never gone into downward facing dog as a transition.

I managed to exercise 27 days this month. I took off on Fridays even when I felt like I didn't need the rest and I exercised by committee on some days. Here's how I exerted myself:

AMT, 11 x's

Arc Trainer, 2 x's

Bike (Stationary), 1 x

Elliptical, 2 x's

Stair Climbing, 1 x

StairMaster, 2 x's

Swimming, 12 x's

Treadmill, 2 x's

Walking Outdoors, 2 x's

And in the immortal words of James Brown: I feel good, I knew that I would...

I Got You (I Feel Good)