<p>Bromfield- Glad you can ditch the crutches!</p>
<p>Hotel fitness rooms- I think, generally, they are a LOT better than they used to be. My former CEO/Coach in Dallas used to say “hotel exercise equipment COMES broken!” Now it seems like some hotels actually have decent gyms. Some actually are as nice as gyms that you pay to join. One huge exception was my motel in Houlton, Maine in 2010. The gym was damp, moldy and had one rickety treadmill and a broken exercise bike. It was truly awful. The big conference hotels have decent gyms, but I try to get outside whenever I can.</p>
<p>Made a return to hot yoga this morning (what I call the “mommy” class at 9:30). I had almost a 3 month break, and it was SO hard to go back. I survived- but barely. I don’t want to spend a lot of money on it, so I may try to go just once a week.</p>
<p>I did “hot iPod nazi” on Saturday as muggy “hurricane” air had moved in. Gorgeous here today, so I’m hoping for a little easier time of it. Except the workout is brutal so could be a whole lotta sweatin’ goin’ on. I watched the video last night and Mr. Former Pro Soccer Player ipod nazi was panting like a dog the whole time. Yikes. I don’t know how an ol’ (formerly) fat guy is going to hold up… Six exercises, three sets, no rest in between and three of the exercises are high knees, jumping jacks, and a burpees variation. I’m approaching this one with some trepidation. I would hate to finally hit the PAUSE button on the 12th and final week, but it could happen.</p>
<p>Bromfield: great news! I think you will be our “guinea pig” for that type of a fitness class. :)</p>
<p>Most hotel gyms stink (literally!), but some hotel gyms are definitely better than others. The best hotel gym and my absolute favorite is the gym at the Marriott’s Ko Olina resort in HI: tons of treadmills ensure that there are no unhappy people milling behind my back waiting for me to finish my 1.5 hr run, lots of other machines, and two separate areas for the weights and exercise ball stuff. Westin now offeres an option of rooms with a treadmill and a bunch of free weights, rubber bands, etc. in the room at some of their properties.</p>
<p>On a happy note, one of the today’s Biospace headlines reads:</p>
<p>Bromfield, I know a couple of people who love the Barre Method. I am eager to hear your reports. This is one exercise class I have not yet tried. Maybe due to my budding ballet career cut short due to… lack of talent.</p>
<p>Well, I did it. And didn’t hit the PAUSE button.</p>
<p>It was so nice out that I grabbed the exercise mat and did my workout on the deck, which was devastated by the hurricane (i.e. I had to sweep off a few acorns and leaves). Can’t say that I filled every second of the allotted time exercising as hard as I could. For example, there is no way in heck that I can do this pushup variation (spread the legs out like a jumping jack on the way down and back in to normal pushup position on the way up) for a full 60 seconds. I could do 10 of them, so I did 10 and grabbed a gulp of air before starting the burpees.</p>
<p>Three sets of all that then my usual two sets of four strength training exercises: squats with DBs on my shoulders, kneeling alternating DB should press, single leg single arm deadlift, and chin ups.</p>
<p>Now it’s off to chicken caesar salad with some chicken breast I grilled out in the rain for pre-hurricane preparation.</p>
<p>More on travel and fitness centers. I used to travel with a co-worker/witness back in the 90s. We would go to the local fitness club, tell them we were in the process of moving to the area and ask if we could try out the club for a couple of days. We were never refused… (it was his idea, and it was brilliant!)</p>
<p>Yep. I can make it through the week with no-pause, which means the entire program - 12 weeks and 36 workouts without once hitting the PAUSE button. I did skip an exercise in one of the workouts, something that wasn’t feeling good to my back, so I did get a little extra rest for a couple of workouts. All in all, I’ve been pretty pleased with the way I’ve done these workouts. Some exercises better than others, of course. I’m also pleased that I’ve been able to add 20+ minutes of weight lifting to all 36 workouts. I wasn’t sure how that would go. I have had to scale back to just two sets of weight lifting as the iPod workouts got more intense.</p>
<p>Fun plank variation today. iPod nazi calls it “rotisserie plank”, like “rotisserie chicken”. Start out with 15 seconds of side plank, then rotate into 30 seconds of front plank withouth ever putting a knee down, then finally into 15 seconds of side plank on the second side. That’s the 60 seconds of “rest” between 30 seconds of high knees and 30 seconds of jumping jacks. The “jumping jack pushups” are then supposed to be the 60 seconds of “rest” between the jumping jacks and the burpees (yeah, right). Burpees today requires shuffling to the side (about four or five feet) between each burpee (yeah, right, like burpees need to be harder!) Today was tough. I hit a max heart rate of 96% after the star pushups during the second set. I haven’t seen anything that high on these kinds of workouts for a while. That’s interval cardio territory.</p>
<p>We offer a two week trial… come in and check things out… sometimes we’ll have guests come in and pay $5 a day and others they do the 2-week trial and move on…</p>
<p>Tried on 32 waist pants. I was able to close the buttonbut they were a little tight. 33’s would be perfect but i do not have any. I think that i should be able to comfortably wear the 32’s at 180 pounds which will hopefully be in three months.</p>
<p>5 miles, 8:30 pace - felt great. Uh-oh, I should be in pain, but my legs just kept going. Time to refuel with something proteinaceous, check email and do some odds and ends chores around the house.</p>
<p>I have been a slug since Saturday’s 5K. Need to get my rear in gear as we rev up for another 5K on Sept 10. Should be a fun one in Waterloo Iowa…Park to Park. I will TRY to run a little…not sure how that will work with the knee but i have been feeling pretty good lately. Keeping my fingers crossed!</p>
<p>Dropped two pounds from last week. Main difference is going from 40% carbs to 25% carbs and bumping up the running. I haven’t had a break day in quite some time too.</p>
<p>5K walk jog in the park for me. Spectacular weather. Good tunes. Zoned out. Forgot to stop jogging at the end of the alloted 2 minutes on the final interval and went an extra 10 seconds. Then, threw in a quick 45 second “sprint” at the end to my house for good measure. (Note: my sprint is Bunsen Burner’s half marathon pace – about an 8:30 minute mile).</p>
<p>Yay, BCE on the 2 pounds. And great run, iDad. I’m calling it a “run” on purpose!</p>
<p>I am SO sore from hot yoga yesterday. I did manage 6 miles this morning (wasn’t as sore this morning as I am now). Tomorrow I need to force myself to go back to yoga. Maybe if I don’t get a lawyer-job I could go to the 5 week Bikram training in LA and be a Bikram instructor (not)!</p>