Fun workout today with a challenge

[Catrin]

We had a great group training session this morning. For the second time in a row, the men in our group apparently decided to sleep in so it was an "estrogen only" group this morning - 5 women

We started out with several creative plank and pushup series that used planar movements in all possible directions with a little jogging and split-jacks tossed in. That was the first warm-up - he always gives us two "warm-ups". The second so-called "warm-up" was a series of 4 exercises that focused on lateral movements. I will try to describe it - a bar is attached to a stretchy band that is secured. 5 rounds of 30 seconds each doing different movements with the bar. At one point I hit myself in the nose with the band so my glasses came off for the rest - these are partner exercises so we alternated partners each 30 seconds and rested while our partner did her exercise.

Once we were warmed up we moved to the next thing: 5 kettlebell deadlifts (appropriate weight for each of us) and 10 pushups. Rinse and repeat every minute on the minute for 10 minutes (50 deadlifts and 100 pushups in total). If you want a break then finish each round in under a minute.

The last part of the session was a 12 minute challenge that he calls the "I Will Challenge". In those 12 minutes we each had to complete the following:

50 jump ropes (with a short fat monster rope) or 150 with a normal jump rope
50 TRX rows
50 Jumping Jacks with the regular monster ropes
50 lateral jumps between two cones, touching each cone
50 split jack crunches
500 meter row

Much to my surprise I was the second woman to finish, and we ALL completed everything within the allotted 12 minutes.

We rocked

[Dogmama]

That sounds GREAT!!!

Where are you doing this? In a commercial gym or...?

I'm looking for something to break up my (yawn...) lifting routine. I really like this kind of metabolic workout but find it difficult to cheer myself on. I have this little devil that sits on my shoulder whispering..."take a break....you can't do this....take a break....:

[Veronica]

Jumping jacks with the monster ropes always feels so weird to me.

Sounds like you had fun today.

Veronica

[Catrin]

That sounds GREAT!!!

Where are you doing this? In a commercial gym or...?

I'm looking for something to break up my (yawn...) lifting routine. I really like this kind of metabolic workout but find it difficult to cheer myself on. I have this little devil that sits on my shoulder whispering..."take a break....you can't do this....take a break....:

My gym isn't the usual commercial gym. It is a non-profit facility called "National Institute for Fitness and Sports" that is located at IUPUI University here in Indianapolis. This is a fitness/sports research based facility that has a massive facility. There is all of the "usual" stuff that any gym has but it has so much more...including lots of room for the weird stuff that I love so much. I love the group training I am a member of - the manager of the fitness center is our trainer and he rocks. It really helps not to have to think about what to do next and to just do what we are told to do Basically it is personal training but at the small group level and he customizes everything for each group to hit what the individual members need. The overall structure for, say, all of the groups on a given day might be basically the same but he will change it as needed for the needs of that group.

If you are on Facebook, you can always become a fan of that page. Every Monday Tony posts a "workout of the week" or a monthly challenge on the NIFS Facebook page. He just started doing that rather than just emailing it to his group trainees.

[Catrin]

Jumping jacks with the monster ropes always feels so weird to me.

Sounds like you had fun today.

Veronica

It is hard to get the jumping jacks going with the monster ropes - I find that I want to do something else with the ropes and it takes a couple of jumps to get it down. I didn't burn as many calories as usual though - I've noticed that the last couple of group sessions. I think that means my conditioning must be improving - I certainly am not slacking though it seemed easier than in the past.

[Catrin]

My knee feels MUCH better after my ride yesterday. Today's "Sunday Funday" workout with my group made it feel even better - much to my surprise. It still troubled me during the ride yesterday but at the end of it it felt better than when I started. Not one twinge from it today, even after 300 squats!

Today's "Funday" workout was a blast - in every meaning of the term. This is a session outside of our usual schedule and it is open to anyone who trains with him so the group ranges from 12-25.

Warmup - we lined up and each of us did our favorite dynamic warmup - the only rule was that we couldn't repeat what the person in front of us did.

After we warmed up we did 7 sets of the following after partnering up - one rested and coached while the other did his or her set:

3 barbell deadlifts
3 hang (power) cleans - no break between the two, no putting down the barbell - I am just learning how to do this and while I DID have to take the plates off the barbell, I finally got the form down Deadlifts are one of my favorite things - upper body lifts are quite the challenge for me right now but I am starting to see some response from my body.

Endurance Partnership
(each partnership is responsible for the total number - so one partner starts the first exercise, while the other does the exercise in parenthesis. When, say, the 10 wall balls are complete the partners switch and the second partner starts the pullups counting where the first partner stopped, and so forth until the required reps of the first exercise is completed)

100 pullups/chinups or TRX Rows (10 wall ball shots)
200 pushups on the Bosu (15 kettlebell swings)
300 squats on the Bosu (10 mountain climbers)
400 situps on the Bosu (200 meter run)

I felt wonderful when this was over - it is a different type of workout than we normally do but occasionally he throws something like this at us.

[Catrin]

We finished up the Sunday Funday workout this morning with a 200 meter bear crawl - and I did it Ok, so I had to take a couple of breaks, and the occasional couple of steps, but I did 98% of those 200 meters crawling like a bear. Oddly enough I wasn't/am not sore later so all of this work appears to be having an effect. The bear crawl was part of a fitness "card game". I will be kind and not describe the game unless there is interest.