Oh, did I mention I did 3 chinups in a row yesterday? And, just because I was feeling cocky, I did 1 pullup, too. (Definitely harder, so that’s the next progression). I credit using negatives to get me to that level. Doing a negative means getting up on the bar, standing where I’d be at the top of a chin-up, and then slowly (SLOWLY!) lowering yourself back down to the beginning of the motion. Ever since starting this effort, I’ve done 15-20 negatives in between the few positives I’ve managed to get out. I feel the more work I do with negatives, the better my success.
More neato news. For the first time since somewhere in high school, My weight is in the 220s. 229 to be specific, so let’s not get crazy, but hey. That’s the first 22X I’ve seen on the scale since Poison, Cinderella, Ratt, and Bon Jovi topped the Billboard charts. Of course, this still means a hell of a lot of hard work between me and that 210 interim goal. This also doesn’t mention the slip back upwards to 234 and the subsequent scissorfight to get the weight back down again.
I ran a 5K to start my process to be ready for Margaret. Man, I should’ve listened to my Inner Coach. Here was the conversation.
Coach: You’ve been away from this a while. You should ease in slow.
Me: You kiddin? I’ve been doing sprint drills, baby. I’m tough as nails.Coach: Uh, sprints are brief. You’re running 5K today.
Me: Yeah, whatever. Watch THIS!
And what do you think happened? Yep. I ran a BLAZING first 1/2 mile, then wheezed through about a 1/4 mile of walking to recover, and then everything else I did for the rest of the 5K was a slog. I pulled my second worst 5K time ever, and that’s even counting the several attempts I made to shove the speed back up and finish strong. At this point, Margaret will blaze past me, take the ribbon, go home and get changed up, and then come back to thank me for supporting her first ever 5K.
Sorry, Coach.
This is day 2 of my super-huge new training program. Day 1 started with doing something I haven’t done for over a decade. Max reps. Yep. I did a warmup set with a lower weight. A few trial sets with more weight. And then… POW, all that I could muster for one rep. Two sets of single rep maxes.
Now, I’m a bit of a sissy still, so I didn’t really blow any blood vessels doing this. I don’t ask for spotters, so I use tricks to get around it (like smith machines, dumbells instead of bars, etc). But whatever. I’m doing super more weight than I’ve used in the last decade. And still no injury.
Sore? Hell, yeah! But I’m getting it done. And I’m doing it smartly according to a plan. I’m getting in better and better shape, and that’s the goal: to be in a better position, such that I can actually do those CrossFit workouts I read about with envy every day.
Oh, don’t bother buying Sylvester Stallone’s new magazine. It’s uh… well, there’s lots of issues telling divorced guys how to get laid. The rest is mostly advertisements for other things Sly’s doing. Fairly sad mag, in general. But great concept. I think the more interesting celebrity rag to look for will be Gene Simmons Tongue. It’s a weird world, people.
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