My Dynamic Body

Yesterday was the last day of our Dartfit class, the HIIT training class I took this term.  Of the 20 or so people who signed up for the class, only 6 showed up.  Another one took an earlier session, but nonetheless the class just felt so empty on the last day.

We did our usual warm up and gathered around the white board, which normally would spell out our end-of-class workout, that yesterday listed our entire class plan.  Instead of our usual 6-7 stations we would rotate in 2X blocks with cardio and water breaks in between, we had 3 large stations with 6 sub-station each.  We would do each sub-station for 35 seconds with 10-second breaks, and complete all 6 sub-stations 3 times before taking a water break and move on to the next big station.  Each station was themed: TRX straps, heavy ropes, and dumb bells.  All the sub-stations within each themed stations follow a similar flow: there was always a lunge, a sit-up, and a push up type of activity, and the other three were sort of unique to the instrument we were using.

So by the end of the class, I did these activities for 105 seconds of each:
Heavy rope jumping jacks
Push-ups
Heavy rope waves
Sit-ups
Heavy rope side swipes
Burpees
Dumb-bell squat lifts
Dumb-bell renegades
Dumb-bell sit-ups
Dumb-bell back lifts
Dumb-bell side lunges
Dumb-bell bear crawls
TRX rows
Medicine ball slams
TRX push-ups
Medicine ball forward and backward lunges
TRX pikes (we switched to fitness balls after the first round)
TRX skaters

It all seemed so daunting at the beginning.  We had done all of these activities before, some were fun, others were absolutely miserable to do.  I think it was the 3X part that scared me the most.  My friends joked that last day of class is like finals, you basically do everything you did and then some.  I joked that maybe that's why nobody showed up to class.

By the end of class all I realized was that, it just wasn't so bad.  It turned out that because there wasn't that much cardio involved (there was the burpee sub-station that was exhausting), so although by the end my arms were feeling like lead, overall I felt strong.  That afternoon, as one of 5 people who showed up to ride it to the end, I realized how much I had improved over the course of the term.  In less than 3 months I had improved on my muscle building and speed.  Not so sure about endurance since I still haven't managed to run a 5K in one shot on the treadmill.  And now I truly regret not signing up for the class for next term.

Registration for next term's class started earlier this week.  At the time I was so determined to not take this class again so I could recuperate and take everything slower and easier.  I thought about taking a morning yoga class with my friends to increase my flexibility, toyed with the idea of taking a fun dance class like hip hop so I could learn some cool routines, and ultimately chose beginners pilates thinking that it would be a milder form of exercise that still focused on muscle building and strength training.  I plan to continue indoor running and I thought pilates would be a nice anaerobic compliment.

The school offers three different pilates: beginners, intermediate, and advanced.  My main concern was whether beginner's class would be too easy, since although I've not taken a pilates class before, I'm not completely useless.  But time wise the beginners class was the only one I could comfortably fit into my schedule, and after watching a few beginners pilates videos online I thought maybe it will be a good challenge for me.

After I registered for my class a friend of mine decided to also take it with me.

Which makes the thought of backing out a bit more awkward to execute.

My current plan is to shop around for morning yoga, Dartfit, and pilates during the first week of class, and in the end decide which one(s) to take.  I don't think I will be doing Dartfit and pilates simultaneously, but if the morning yoga class is pleasant I might do that too.

If I don't like pilates it would be a better excuse to use to quit that class, and if I get injured again during Dartfit it might make me feel less bad about taking a break from it.  I am planning to take it again in the Spring regardless of how this upcoming Winter terms pans out.

On the running front, I did about half an hour on Thursday on the treadmill and managed to do about 2.5 miles, at speeds between 5.0-5.5 with slower speed during walking breaks.  The bottom of my right foot started to feel a bit stressed at 5.5 speed but overall I was quite comfortable running at this newer, faster pace.  Given my weight and prior injuries I'm pushing myself to achieve any certain unrealistic speed goals, but after taking Dartfit I could sustainably run at a speed I couldn't do before, and felt this rush I never had before that was a combination of adrenaline and a sense of accomplishment.  It just made me so happy that I had decided to take this Dartfit class after realizing how much I needed to build some muscle and strength, so  proud of myself that I didn't quit the class after that horrific first day (it did get easier, just like everyone had promised), so thrilled that the class worked, and that I was even injury free now.

All in all it has been a great 3 months.  In retrospect it's such a short period of time, but I think it has been the most dynamic, active, and empowering 3 months in a long time and I'm thankful for all the changes that my body went through.  My weight still has not changed, but that doesn't even bother me at this moment.  I know that if I keep doing what I learned I could push myself to do, I will achieve my health and exercise goals in a few more 3-month cycles.

Broadcasting your workouts

Although it's not the last day of the month till tomorrow, today is the last day of the July Journey to Splits Blogilates challenge.  For 30 days we stretched various parts of our legs every day, and each day we do a new stretch in addition to the basic 5.  And theoretically by the end of the month we would be able to (or getting closer to) do a standing split.

Well, I did my last split stretch yesterday and I can confidently say that I still cannot do a standing split.  But my hips are much closer to the ground on my side splits and I can almost do a forward split, so the month-long work was not in vain.  And for the most part I was able to successfully do my stretches every day and managed to take a semi-respectable selfie of that day's new pose.  And after a month, looking back on my Instagram history, I have to say it was quite impressive.

This is the first time I did something this public.  It's one thing to blab random thoughts and report progress on this blog about my various running, yoga-ing, and other exercises, but it's quite another to take a picture of yourself doing some stretching pose, post on social media, everyday, for a month.  I had a lot of insecurities, about how I look, about how I look while stretching, about my surroundings (I have a very small and messy apartment), about what I wear, everything.  Initially I took pictures in public places like the gym, then I switched to fancy photoshopping apps and went on a PS diarrhea.  Then I just thought, you know what, screw it, and ended up doing a basic blurring of the background and called it a day.  Many pictures had my face in it, and in some of them I really didn't look very appealing.

But the feedback was amazing.  From the very first picture I posted accepting the challenge I got "likes" from many popsters (other people who also follow the blogilates workout).  I returned their kindness with my own likes of other random people on Instagram, and a few of us started following each other and my feed began to be flooded with other people's stretches and other workouts.  Every day after I post my pictures I will receive about 20-30 likes, which is not many compared to some other people but considering that I only opened an account for this occasion and only had three real life friends on Instragram (for this purpose) it was a pretty good response I think.  And I got slightly more traffic on this blog after putting the web address on my profile.  Occasionally I got comments and felt very flattered, but this form of quiet camaraderie and support is perfect for me.  It's partly what keeps me going forward and I'm very thankful for those who cared.

And now this month is coming to an end.  There's a short plank challenge for the beginning of next month that I think I will do but didn't seem very interested or very well put together.  But after this month, with the new gym classes I'm taking and this everyday goal I try to achieve, I think I've gotten into a good momentum to keeping going forward, doing workouts and stretches every day, just to keep myself moving if anything else.

Here's to another great month!

Exercise Diary: Random Thoughts

• The spinning classroom in our school gym recently got new spinning bikes that made the old bikes (which are currently sitting sadly in the hallway outside of the room) look like yucky ancient dinosaurs.  The new bikes are shiny, slick, and got a nice touch of red color.  They are also equipped with a display monitor that shows you how long you have been spinning, rpm, watts, calories burned, and distance.  I was very sad to learn today that after 35 minutes of peddling I only burned 197 kcals.  Also I really hope the distance display is in miles and not kilometers.
• This is the fourth week into my gym class and 2nd full week of 4-5 days/wk workouts.  Sadly my weight has not been dropping like I had hoped, and different parts of my body have been hurting everyday.  But I think I've got more arm muscles already, as I can already see a little bulge when I flexed my arms in front of the mirror today.  So that's kind of cool.  If I can build up some arm/upper body strength this summer I will be very happy.
• One morning (could've been Tuesday) as we were leaving I saw a very old woman in the gym getting ready for her workout.  The whole time I was watching her she was just stretching and flexing her extremities, but she looked very lean and muscle-y, probably more fit than I am, and  looked as if she's in her 80s.  I really wish I could be like that when I'm her age.
• This week I also saw a girl doing what I like to call "seizure crunches." She was doing crunches, and then bicycle crunches, but it was obvious from the way she worked that she valued speed more than anything else.  Her head and shoulders weren't lifted very high, which is totally fine since I think that's how I look when I'm doing crunches, but she was doing it so fast that she looked like a crazy person.  It was funny to watch if anything else.
• Speaking of abs, crunches are very effective when they are done on an exercise ball.  I felt that I could lift my body up much more, and my feet are more grounded in order to be properly balanced on the ball.  And afterwards you can stretch and drape yourself over the ball with arms extended like nobody's watching.  It felt good.
• I force myself to go to the gym and workout ridiculously early in the morning by paying and working out with people who are considerably older than me, but every time I go the gym is also well populated with other people and after a while you notice that it's always the same crowd.  And they are just there by themselves, working their heart out, apparently with only their self-motivation.  And my emotion switches between admiration and jealousy.  
• The steps class that usually take place on Wednesdays has now been switched to spinning.  Which means that instead of getting to the gym 4 days a week I am now doing 5.  I actually really like this since even with 4 days a week I still manage to complete not follow my routine on my day offs.  And with the new spinning bikes I got a very nice workout today.  
• I still don't know everyone's name in my class but they all seem to know mine.  Awkward.