<p>I think the waterfalls on your hikes look pretty good, iDad. :)</p>
<p>CJane, I’ll email you with the low down on the gym.</p>
<p>Quick set of 30:30 kettlebells and box jumps tonight. Couldn’t convince myself I needed to do a second set. 6 minutes was pretty good for a max 184 and average of 170 though…still fighting a cough…</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Oh, I’m not complaining! I’ve never had so much fun sweating like a pig and panting like a dog…</p>
<p>This guy films some terrific YouTubes of NH hikes, although he does a lot of stuff that is way over my head (like Huntington Ravine Trail up Mt. Washington)</p>
<p>[Dizzying</a> photo of Huntington Ravine Trail](<a href=“http://whiteblaze.net/forum/vbg/files/1/9/1/1/8/headwall_of_huntington_ravine_trail.jpg]Dizzying”>http://whiteblaze.net/forum/vbg/files/1/9/1/1/8/headwall_of_huntington_ravine_trail.jpg)</p>
![http://whiteblaze.net/forum/vbg/files/1/9/1/1/8/headwall_of_huntington_ravine_trail.jpg]Dizzying](http://whiteblaze.net/forum/vbg/files/1/9/1/1/8/headwall_of_huntington_ravine_trail.jpg%5DDizzying){kind=link}
<p>Here’s his video of the spectacular Falling Waters Trail I hiked a couple weeks ago. I only made it to about the 8 minute mark of this video (somewhere around the second switchback), but he does a fabulous job of capturing the trail and the falls. </p>
<p>[YouTube</a> of Falling Waters Trail](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jsi3-VK3prg]YouTube”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jsi3-VK3prg)</p>
<p>My goal is to get up to the summit and hike the Franconia Ridge sometime, but not yet. I need to be stronger and faster. Maybe next September.</p>
<p>Not hiking The Trail this time, but we did hike down the Sliding Sands trail a bit, which meant hiking back up to the parking lot. I wish we had more time to hike further, but we had a late start. Decided to camp one night. We shall see if we survive - our idea of a good camping is a Hilton or a Marriott. :)</p>
<p>MOfWC, I hope you feel better soon. Ouch.</p>
<p>BB- Your trip sounds wonderful. Thanks for the well wishes. I’ll be fine. Quick breaths hurt still, but it’s improving. Running isn’t too bad. </p>
<p>This morning was our first really cool morning. It was 50 degrees, clear and dry. I was chilly to start in capris and a long sleeved tech shirt, but I saw people out there in what I would wear at 30 degrees!</p>
<p>Any body builder here?</p>
<p>Just put down the deposit for our Dec Jamaica vacation. We are going as a group and all others are much younger. </p>
<p>Lost 5 inches of waist line is nice but I would love to add some definitions. Besides KB and pushups, I would add more weight once the GYM membership starts. </p>
<p>Learning from my running experiences, I would like to start slow and build the base first. There are three more months so I am very hopeful. </p>
<p>Any tips and comments will be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Dad II, the house we bought two years ago had a Hoist weight machine in the basement. It took me awhile to warm up to it but I go down there and use it most days and I think it’s really helped my core strength and made my arms look nice in sleeveless shirts. :)</p>
<p>Have no idea what I’m doing on it. I just approach it gently with the primary objective of not hurting myself. My dog loves to sit and watch me.</p>
<p>24 mins. 55 degrees, no wind. Comfortable wearing one of my regular sleeveless tech tops. </p>
<p>Saw an unusual family of ducks. Maybe a mallard mix? Little patch of white on the front – looks kind of like wearing a napkin getting ready to sit down to a plate of spaghetti and meatballs. (No, I don’t do this when I’m eating spaghetti. Just trying to paint a picture. 
)</p>
<p>Dad II…</p>
<p>The saying is…“Abs are built in the kitchen not in the weight room”. </p>
<p>It is likely that you can’t see any muscle definition because you have too much body fat.
Any decent workout routine will help you build muscle, you just do not see the definition because of the body fat.</p>
<p>You can lift heavy weights 4 days a week, but, unless you lose body fat, the ‘definition’ may not be visible. ‘Definition’ comes from low body fat, not huge muscles. Many runners have very good ‘definition’, but very little muscle mass.</p>
<p>dadII:</p>
<p>As you get started doing strength training:</p>
<p>1) The dumbbell rack will be your best friend. Focus your efforts on dumbbell lifting rather than the machines (less effective) and the barbell racks (more injury risk). </p>
<p>2) A good workout should include a balance of upper body push (bench press, pushups), upper body pull (DB rows, chin ups), and legs (goblet squat, split squats).</p>
<p>3) Single leg training is very effective and lower injury risk. For example, the [single leg deadlift](<a href=“http://www.stack.com/video/13591899001/Mike-Boyle-SingleLeg-Straight”>http://www.stack.com/video/13591899001/Mike-Boyle-SingleLeg-Straight</a> Leg-Deadlift/) is a fantastic (and very challenging) exercise.</p>
<p>4) For almost all of us, improving core strength and stability should probably be our number one goal and number one focus. Hugely important in day to day functional strength and avoiding injury.</p>
<p>We survived the camping. However, I think that I’m not camping with Mr Complains A Lot anymore. It was a little bit cloudy, a little bit on the chilly side, a bit drizzly… But we had one of the nicest REI tents and a couple of fluffy Cat’s Meows, so I do not get why one could complain so much. The sunrise was a total bust - as soon as the sun appeared, thick, milky clouds crept in and obscured any hope of taking photos. I suggested heading back to the hotel to beat the crowd of downhill drivers, and so we did. Now back at the hotel, enjoying the sun. Im seriously thinking about hiking The Trail solo, which might be crazy, but is quite doable.</p>
<p>5.34 miles, 69 degrees, partly cloudy, light breeze. I wore a short-sleeve dri-fit tee instead of my usual sleeveless and it was dark to absorb the sunlight. It was a fairly uneventful run, though fairly relaxing considering that I haven’t done much except for stretching for three days.</p>
<p>BB- can the hotel concierge put you in touch with a group hiking the trail? Or perhaps try something like meet up?</p>
<p>Back is very sore and I don’t know why! Maybe the mileage on Monday was too much. Working out on the stability ball at home. I hope this goes away quickly! :(</p>
<p>New Rules of Lifting workout for me. The one with rear foot elevated split squats, trap bar dead lifts, assisted chin ups, and pushups with my feet elevated in Jungle Gym straps. Sets of 10 trap bar deadlifts with 140 lbs are still a bear. They require paying a lot of attention to good form.</p>
<p>I’ve also got push presses in this workout. A squat and then pressing two 25 lb DBs overhead as I come up from the squat. That exercise is always a killer because it’s working so many big muscles at once.</p>
<p>I’ve now been doing the high knees skipping, the carioca, the lateral shuffles, and the lunge walking across the parking lot three days a week for over three months. It’s really interesting to see how I’ve gone from barely being able to do them without falling on my butt to being able to move pretty quickly. As was the case with the New Rules of Lifting for Abs warm up, I really didn’t appreciate the value until I had been doing it for a while.</p>
<p>Rest day tomorrow in prep for a quickie 2 mile hike on Friday (Rattlesnakes Mountain/Squam Lake) and a long challenging 6.5 mile hike (Mt. Osceola Trail) on Saturday. Whether forecast has actually improved. Mostly sunny both days, highs between 70 and 75 degrees. Looks like perfect weather.</p>
<p>NMINN:</p>
<p>If it’s any consolation, my back is always sore after I walk 5 miles and I don’t even have sore back issues! 5 miles on a treadmill is a major workout, in my book. I would be sore all over.</p>
<p>I wish it was just regular aching muscles from a good workout! The thing with the back is my skin is numb to the left of my lower spine but deep muscle is achy and I get little jolts or shocks that zing me when I move. I feel like I am in a Pavlovian experiment! I keep thinking it has to be some type of nerve issue because of the shocks. I think I will try the TENS unit to see if that helps.</p>
<p>Sounds like my old back injury. I haven’t had a flareup on it in ages - good ab muscles and not doing dump things with barbells and other heavy weights keeps my lower back healthy.</p>
<p>I think that NSAIDs help.</p>
<p>Cals 1282
Fat 91 g
Carbs 15 g
Fiber 13 g
Protein 87 g
Sugars 4 g</p>
<p>Fat 67%
Protein 28%
Carbs 5%</p>
<p>N. MINN:</p>
<p>Yeah, it definitely sounds like you still have a spinal disc/nerve root issue. If I were in your shoes, I’d spring for the Stuart McGill book and DVD that shows how he goes about working through that kind of problem with a back patient. I would also lay off all weight lifting (and any other exercise that causes a flare-up) and concentrate on six months of core training. I believe that developing super core stability is probably your best shot at ‘curing’ the problem and that’s a long-term process.</p>
<p>McGill talks about each person’s “capacity” for exercise pain free. It might be five minutes. It might be five hours. Whatever it is, you want to stay below that level.</p>