Okay, I haven't posted for awhile. So here is whats been going on lately.
Yesterday was back to school, and my oldest started Jr. High. He seems pretty happy, and was excited that his locker is close to a girl he has a crush on. We had to go and get all those little back to school things, 3 ring binder, pad-lock for orchestra locker, 3x5 cards, etc.
The middle two (my daughters) are both loving their teachers. I think it will be a good school year.
We played a soccer game with the Priesthood from our Ward last Saturday. This was a good time. We had 15 people show up, including 3 Deacons. My team was slaughtered, but I did score a goal from midfield. The guy playing keeper for their team had never been a soccer player and was way out of position. I kept telling the young soccer players to take a shot, and no one would, so I did.
You may have noticed the post title, and thought, "That's not like Brett. He only ever complains about his back." I've decided I need to branch out, and now I'm going to complain about my legs.
For the past week the front of my quadriceps have been hurting. I've been working out, but they just don't seem to recover very quickly. The weird thing is where it hurts. Usually the outside, and down by my knee gets sore, but this was firmly in the upper-middle quad. Now I didn't loose any sleep thinking about this, but wondered why the change in the muscle pain. Then I went to the gym yesterday.
Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays are more "strength" days. That's not to say that all the other days aren't also, but we slow down a bit, and focus on good technique. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays we focus on getting an elevated heart rate, and getting a good whole body workout.
We walked into the gym on Monday, and my wife looked at me and said, "Let's go home!" This is because the first three exercises contained the term, "mountain climber". Now a mountain climber is where you get in a push-up position, and then alter bringing your knees up to your chest like you're running. We usually do them with our hands on something to give a bit of elevation. This allows us to place our front foot down, which works your legs along with your abs. We had 100 Bosu mountain climbers (where you put the palms of your hands flat on the platform of the Bosu to add instability), 100 beam push-ups (our trainer, Jason Muir, has had some handles attached to six inch square metal tubing. We use this for push-ups, standing rows, and now mountain climbers.), and 100 medicine ball mountain climbers. As soon as I started on the workout, I realized that the mountain climbers were the cause of my sore quads. This was nice to know, but not really nice when you realize you have another 200 to do.
We then moved on to our "Hop-Touch-Reach" exercise. This is similar to a burpee, but without the push-up. We also usually throw in either a weight, or source of instability for the muscles in the arms and chest to get a better workout. Monday we did all of the above. We started with 40 hop-touch-reach with a six foot section of ABS drain line (similar to PVC pipe). This pipe is two inch diameter, and filled with sand. It is awkward to grab, and adds some instability up top. The real trick was putting it on the ground when you jumped backwards, then picking it back up for the hop on the end. We repeated this with medicine balls, and dumbbells.
We then moved into the core session. We started with a TRX 3 ab combo (I discussed most of these in a lovely post title, "Ab H#$@!"), followed by a Power Wheel 3 ab combo, and a Swiss ball 3 ab combo (this is the only set of exercises mentioned in my earlier post.) For the Swiss ball ab workout we first sat on the exercise ball, and rolled our rears forward until our back was touching the ball. You then roll backwards as far as you can and do crunches. The key is keeping the exercise ball still. By being back that far your abs have to be tense the entire time and they get a great workout. You then move to pikes with your arms in push-up position, and your knees on top of the ball. Then end with leg lifts with the ball between your feet.
The next set of exercises didn't really have a theme, besides elevating your heart rate. We started with a half-mile run, then flipped heavy punching bags four lengths of the gym, and jumped up on tractor tires 30 times. Then a new exercise was tried, the double-roundhouse belly. You get in front of a punching bag, and through a roundhouse kick with your left leg, then your right leg, and then do a push-up (making sure to touch your stomach to the ground.) I did have a slight advantage as I didn't have to go as far down as some people! This was followed by 40 band touch-reach (where you stand in the middle of an exercise band, with the handles in your hand, then you squat down and touch the ground, then reach up above your head as high as you can.) We then ran another half-mile.
To cap off the workout, we did a two and a half minute static squat. It was a good workout, and no wonder my legs hurt!
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